The New York Times announced Monday that it would sponsor a fellowship in honor of David Carr, the media columnist and reporter who died this year.

The David Carr Fellow, the Times said, will "spend two years in The Times newsroom covering the intersection of technology, media and culture." It is an opportunity, the Times said, "for a journalist early in his or her career to build upon Mr. Carr's commitment to holding power accountable and telling engaging, deeply reported stories."

The thinking behind the fellowship, said Dean Baquet, the executive editor of the Times, "was that we needed a more permanent, lasting way to honor David."

Carr, he said, was an important figure within the Times newsroom and without — a source of inspiration to those who had struggled with substance abuse, as Carr had, and to young journalists. Carr, a Minnesota native, worked at the Twin Cities Reader.

Carr's "Media Equation" column was viewed by many as a kind of journalistic compass. He was the breakout star of a 2011 documentary about the Times, "Page One."

For the fellowship, Baquet said, the Times will look for candidates who share Carr's interests and his openness to new ways of telling stories, "and also people who maybe have an unusual background. David Carr was a recovering drug addict who came to us from the alternative news media world. That's very unusual for the New York Times."

New York Times