(Update Monday, June 22: Most of the final exchanges listed here have been removed. If AnnArbor.com is going to enforce a moderation policy after the fact, they will need to spend the money to have 24/7 coverage so that the posts won't remain up more than a few seconds.)
The new moderation policy at AnnArbor.com is not exactly off to a stellar beginning. Here is the latest give and take between two posters on a line about thie hiring of digital journalists. It's easier to prevent this type of give and take if you hold the comments in moderation and then review them before they go up.
18 Comments
Masters Sullivan in June 19, 2009 3:15 PM
They look like real people to me...
Jenny in June 19, 2009 3:56 PM
Good move hiring David Jesse.
Brit Satchwell in June 19, 2009 4:02 PM
Mr. Jesse's hiring will provide the community with continuity in local education reporting. Nice to know that AA will have somebody already familiar with the local trails as our journalistic edu-guide. Great also that .com was able to retain Ms. Reed (same reasons).
Katrina in June 19, 2009 7:29 PM
Ms. Reed's work will be a valuable asset to your new initiative. What beat will she be covering?
Amalie Nash in June 19, 2009 7:41 PM
Katrina,
Thanks – we think Tina will be a great asset, too. She'll be covering health and the environment for AnnArbor.com.
Amalie Nash, News Director
Jake in June 19, 2009 8:35 PM
Smart to put the woman's info/photo at the bottom this time. Best to avoid the wrath of the feminists.
Dave Poulson in June 20, 2009 8:22 AM
Nice to see Tina Reed covering the most important beat at this news organization. Her drive, skill, curiosity and the fact that she gets digital media will transcend any friction of being a Spartan in Wolverine country.
Tony Dearing in June 20, 2009 4:44 PM
Wenalway and Wenalway'sBane, we want to give people plenty of latitude here, but when we have two people going after each other with a string of personal attacks that have nothing to do with the post they're commenting on, we'll remove that. We've taken down your comments. We ask that your future comments be directed at the post you are discussing.
Wenalway in June 20, 2009 11:50 PM
And Victory No. 1 goes to the anonymous person making a personal attack as a response. There will be many, many more, I suspect.
As long as you moderate that way, people can get the removal of any comment they disagree with.
Might want to revisit that policy, there, sport.
Wenalway'sBane in June 21, 2009 9:27 AM
David and Tina are indeed talented journalists. I live in Washtenaw Couny, unlike some of the other posters here, so I know their work and am interested in what happens with AnnArbor.com. It's nice to see the discussion focus on them instead of seeing anonymous rants on the evils of feminism (!?). I hope such moderation continues. It would result not in the removal of any comment that generates disagreement, but in the removal of any comment that is pointlessly insulting and completly off topic.
Wenalway in June 21, 2009 2:07 PM
The brilliant moderation continues.
I predict a rapid decline if this continues. Now anyone knows all they have to do is come up with a personal insult, and any post they disagree with can be removed.
Weak. Very weak. But what else should we expect from people who embrace fools like Patrick Thornton?
Wenalway'sBane in June 21, 2009 2:55 PM
It is my hope that sensible moderation will force the "trolls" to spew their bile elsewhere -- some other place that they haven't already been banned from, that is. It would be nice if AnnArbor.com could become a place for people to converse about the topics at hand, rather than a forum for people to vent their completely off-topic vitriol. It is my hope that Mr. Dearing will Google "wenalway" and/or "rknil," if he hasn't already, to gain some insight into what he's dealing with and to see how some other blog sites have coped with Mr. Knilands.
Wenalway in June 21, 2009 3:25 PM
Again, we have an anonymous poster who wants to name people but doesn't want to name himself. There's a word for that: Cowardly.
Wenalway in June 21, 2009 3:30 PM
Also, I inadvertently reneged on my pledge to restore previously deleted material every time an anonymous clown is allowed to make a personal attack.
Journalism feminists = people who are too cowardly (much like this clown) to address real issues, so they concentrate on acting like unprofessional shrews in the workplace.
Wenalway'sBane in June 21, 2009 4:40 PM
To recap, I made a personal attack on no one.
1.) I expressed admiration for David and Tina.
2.) I voiced support for moderation that would remove vicious, off-topic rants.
3.) And I pointed out, indirectly, that moderation on other Web sites has led to bans on comments from Mr. Knilands, who happens to live nowhere near Washtenaw County.
Wenalway in June 21, 2009 4:48 PM
Your name itself is an insult. Your continuing need to try to sound smart by naming people and citing entirely unrelated incidents while hiding behind anonymity shows what a truly tiny, pathetic person you are.
Sign with a name, coward, or continue to be insulted.
Also, to continue with my pledge of restoring deleted material every time an anonymous jackass is allowed to post an insult:
Journalism feminists: Often destructive to their organizations. They should be treated as the poor performers they are.
Wenalway in June 21, 2009 5:15 PM
I am sorry if I offended anyone. I didn't mean what I said. Sorry.
Wenalway in June 21, 2009 5:22 PM
And now the clones begin...
Sunday, June 21, 2009
My first week at the Flint Journal was nearly my last
Back in the late 1980s and early 1990s a night police beat shift at the Flint Journal could be an adventure. Almost 20 years ago tonight was one of the most interesting of my career.
I had barely warmed the seat at my desk in June 1989 when my first eventful Friday night police shift arrived. In fact, it was my very first Friday night police reporting shift at the Journal.
In those days a Friday night shift began at 6 p.m. and went until 2 a.m. We could get breaking news into the paper until about 1:45 a.m. The presses rolled about 2 a.m. Usually there was one reporter that worked the 3-11 shift and then I was by myself until 2 a.m.
On this first Friday, there was a serious car accident at Thompson Road and U.S. 23 about 5:30 p.m. I learned about the accident with my first run through the police phone list that night. A young child had been critically injured and complicating the injury was the fact the family was the member of a religious group that did not believe in blood transfusions, which the child desperately needed.
There was a large religious convention at the Pontiac Silverdome for this group and the family was on their way back to a hotel for the night when the accident happened. I think it was the Jehovah's Witnesses, but can't remember for sure.
As a new Journal reporter, I had very few sources in the police department or hospital, but I did the best I could to start piecing together a wrenching story on the fight to get this child treatment.
From the police I learned that a judge was being summoned from home to hold an emergency session to issue an order directing the hospital to provide a blood transfusion. I wanted to talk to the parents at the hospital, but Hurley Hospital on a Friday night, as I learned very quickly that night, could be a wild and crazy place.
Hurley is a place that in the late 1980s the Army assigned its surgeons to for practice in dealing with gunshot wounds. Gunshot wounds were a nightly occurrence.
What happened next was a factor of my previous experiences at a Pontiac hospital where I had spent hours in my 5-year stint with the Oakland Press dealing with similar emergency trauma situations. In those days I developed a great relationship with one of the greatest ER doctors I ever met. The doctor, who died a few years ago in a traffic accident, was a great resource and help to police officers and reporters in the days before HIPPA privacy laws.
One night in Pontiac, I was covering the homicide of a young man and responded to the hospital late at night to see what I could find and add to the story there. I ran into Dr. A and we chatted for a moment and I asked him how many times the victim had been shot.
"I don't know, but let's find out," he said. I followed him into a room, filled with equipment, and the man was laying there with tubes coming out of him and the doctor, with me looking on, counted the bullet homes, making sure he was only counting entrance wounds. I honestly can't remember today how many holes there were, but it was a lot.
So in relating my Hurley story it is important that you understand that my previous hospital experience was one of wide open access.
So back to June 1989 and Hurley Hospital.
After I had confirmed the court order requiring treatment I headed to Hurley to find the family, if I could. These are always difficult stories because you are intruding on people at a very traumatic time.
When people get upset with reporters for this intrusions, I simply ask folks that if something like this was happening to you or your family would you at least want the opportunity to weigh in with your version of the events, or not. In trying to tell both sides of a story, you should at least try to reach both sides. People are often mad at reporters for NOT calling them to verify or get their side of an issue or event when they could have.
Once at the hospital, I entered the emergency room waiting area and was asking folks there if they were friends or family of the injured child. A hospital security guard came over and asked me who I was looking for, and I told him.
I made the assumption he knew who I was because I was carrying a notebook and wearing Flint Journal identification. This is where the confusion began.
The security guard said the family is in another room and told me to follow him. We walked down a hall and into a room where a doctor was talking to the family and when I entered, the doctor asked who I was and I identified myself as a reporter from the Journal. Before I could explain what I wanted, all heck broke loose.
"Get him out of here," the doctor yelled at the security guard. The next thing I knew I was getting the bum's rush by several security guards who made sure I not only left the emergency room, but that I drove off the property.
Whether the family ever knew what I was doing or what my intentions were, I'll never know. They were from out-of-state and I was never able to contact them. Sadly, the child died that night even with the treatment.
Back at the office, I finished up the story about the dramatic events of the accident and court hearing (we didn't learn about the death the next day, as I recall) and filed my story. All this in my first four hours of my first Friday night shift in Flint.
About 11 p.m., the scanner blurted out with a call of a possible dead woman in a lot on the north side of Flint. Checking the location on a large newsroom map, I headed up Martin Luther King Drive to the location of the lot.
I'm not even close to the location of the dead woman when I can't help but notice two men about a block north of me, one on the west side of MLK and the other on the east side of MLK near a convenience store near Ninth Avenue exchanging shots at each other across the street.
I stopped my car, did a U-turn and headed the other direction. In those days we had a car phone (which came in its own suitcase) and I drove a safe distance and called police to tell them about the two men shooting at each other.
Then taking an alternate route, I proceeded to the location of where the dead woman was supposed to be. What my memory can not seem to recall is whether the call of the dead woman was unfounded or if that was another story I wrote that night. I vaguely recall that there was a homicide.
The sight of two men exchanging shots (nothing ever came of that either) had completely dominated my memory of that night. I do remember arriving at the scene where the dead woman was supposed to be and telling a couple police officers about what I witnessed at Ninth and King.
It was the reaction of those officers that let me know I was in a special place. They barely nodded and just shrugged over my report.
When I returned to work on Monday afternoon, the editor called me into his office. He had been called by the public relations department of Hurley Hospital with a complaint about my 'trespassing' on hospital grounds and ambushing the family.
As my career flashed before my eyes, the editor listened to my version of events, my history of contacts at the Pontiac hospital and then told me I did nothing wrong and that he would take care of it. I let out a big sign and it was the last I heard of the hospital complaint.
Later that day I also was cornered by the religion writer who complained that I had poached on her beat and that I should have called her with the information and let her do the story. I explained, successfully I think, that it was only my first week and I really wasn't aware of who covered what. Besides, I didn't think anyone would have wanted to be called in on a Friday night.
So at the end of my first week I had nearly gotten arrested for trespassing at a local hospital, had a serious complaint filed against me for my reporting and witnessed a shooting. What had I gotten myself into?
Another memorable Friday night recollection was hearing some scanner traffic right at 2 a.m. as I was preparing to leave work on a Saturday morning. The report was of a roll over accident at First and Grand Traverse.
I told the night editor that I would check on it on my way home and would call him with some notes to leave for the Saturday reporter as it was past deadline for the Saturday paper.
The accident scene was literally a 30-second drive from the Flint Journal and when I got there I was the first one there, even before the police. The person who called it in (possibly a drunk driver who didn't want to be around when police arrived) had driven off.
Rolled over on its top, there was steam coming from under the hood. Two men were trapped in the car and another man had been thrown from the vehicle. I went over to the man who was outside the car and put my hand on his back, he was barely breathing. It must have been cold because I remember seeing his faint breath.
Until police arrived, I just kept my hand on his back so perhaps he would at least know someone was with him. One of the men in the car was already dead I later found out, the man I stayed with died at the hospital a short time later. The other man presumably recovered.
On my way home, I called the night editor, related the details as I knew them (leaving out the part about me putting my hand on the man's back) so that the Saturday reporter could follow up the next day.
I had barely warmed the seat at my desk in June 1989 when my first eventful Friday night police shift arrived. In fact, it was my very first Friday night police reporting shift at the Journal.
In those days a Friday night shift began at 6 p.m. and went until 2 a.m. We could get breaking news into the paper until about 1:45 a.m. The presses rolled about 2 a.m. Usually there was one reporter that worked the 3-11 shift and then I was by myself until 2 a.m.
On this first Friday, there was a serious car accident at Thompson Road and U.S. 23 about 5:30 p.m. I learned about the accident with my first run through the police phone list that night. A young child had been critically injured and complicating the injury was the fact the family was the member of a religious group that did not believe in blood transfusions, which the child desperately needed.
There was a large religious convention at the Pontiac Silverdome for this group and the family was on their way back to a hotel for the night when the accident happened. I think it was the Jehovah's Witnesses, but can't remember for sure.
As a new Journal reporter, I had very few sources in the police department or hospital, but I did the best I could to start piecing together a wrenching story on the fight to get this child treatment.
From the police I learned that a judge was being summoned from home to hold an emergency session to issue an order directing the hospital to provide a blood transfusion. I wanted to talk to the parents at the hospital, but Hurley Hospital on a Friday night, as I learned very quickly that night, could be a wild and crazy place.
Hurley is a place that in the late 1980s the Army assigned its surgeons to for practice in dealing with gunshot wounds. Gunshot wounds were a nightly occurrence.
What happened next was a factor of my previous experiences at a Pontiac hospital where I had spent hours in my 5-year stint with the Oakland Press dealing with similar emergency trauma situations. In those days I developed a great relationship with one of the greatest ER doctors I ever met. The doctor, who died a few years ago in a traffic accident, was a great resource and help to police officers and reporters in the days before HIPPA privacy laws.
One night in Pontiac, I was covering the homicide of a young man and responded to the hospital late at night to see what I could find and add to the story there. I ran into Dr. A and we chatted for a moment and I asked him how many times the victim had been shot.
"I don't know, but let's find out," he said. I followed him into a room, filled with equipment, and the man was laying there with tubes coming out of him and the doctor, with me looking on, counted the bullet homes, making sure he was only counting entrance wounds. I honestly can't remember today how many holes there were, but it was a lot.
So in relating my Hurley story it is important that you understand that my previous hospital experience was one of wide open access.
So back to June 1989 and Hurley Hospital.
After I had confirmed the court order requiring treatment I headed to Hurley to find the family, if I could. These are always difficult stories because you are intruding on people at a very traumatic time.
When people get upset with reporters for this intrusions, I simply ask folks that if something like this was happening to you or your family would you at least want the opportunity to weigh in with your version of the events, or not. In trying to tell both sides of a story, you should at least try to reach both sides. People are often mad at reporters for NOT calling them to verify or get their side of an issue or event when they could have.
Once at the hospital, I entered the emergency room waiting area and was asking folks there if they were friends or family of the injured child. A hospital security guard came over and asked me who I was looking for, and I told him.
I made the assumption he knew who I was because I was carrying a notebook and wearing Flint Journal identification. This is where the confusion began.
The security guard said the family is in another room and told me to follow him. We walked down a hall and into a room where a doctor was talking to the family and when I entered, the doctor asked who I was and I identified myself as a reporter from the Journal. Before I could explain what I wanted, all heck broke loose.
"Get him out of here," the doctor yelled at the security guard. The next thing I knew I was getting the bum's rush by several security guards who made sure I not only left the emergency room, but that I drove off the property.
Whether the family ever knew what I was doing or what my intentions were, I'll never know. They were from out-of-state and I was never able to contact them. Sadly, the child died that night even with the treatment.
Back at the office, I finished up the story about the dramatic events of the accident and court hearing (we didn't learn about the death the next day, as I recall) and filed my story. All this in my first four hours of my first Friday night shift in Flint.
About 11 p.m., the scanner blurted out with a call of a possible dead woman in a lot on the north side of Flint. Checking the location on a large newsroom map, I headed up Martin Luther King Drive to the location of the lot.
I'm not even close to the location of the dead woman when I can't help but notice two men about a block north of me, one on the west side of MLK and the other on the east side of MLK near a convenience store near Ninth Avenue exchanging shots at each other across the street.
I stopped my car, did a U-turn and headed the other direction. In those days we had a car phone (which came in its own suitcase) and I drove a safe distance and called police to tell them about the two men shooting at each other.
Then taking an alternate route, I proceeded to the location of where the dead woman was supposed to be. What my memory can not seem to recall is whether the call of the dead woman was unfounded or if that was another story I wrote that night. I vaguely recall that there was a homicide.
The sight of two men exchanging shots (nothing ever came of that either) had completely dominated my memory of that night. I do remember arriving at the scene where the dead woman was supposed to be and telling a couple police officers about what I witnessed at Ninth and King.
It was the reaction of those officers that let me know I was in a special place. They barely nodded and just shrugged over my report.
When I returned to work on Monday afternoon, the editor called me into his office. He had been called by the public relations department of Hurley Hospital with a complaint about my 'trespassing' on hospital grounds and ambushing the family.
As my career flashed before my eyes, the editor listened to my version of events, my history of contacts at the Pontiac hospital and then told me I did nothing wrong and that he would take care of it. I let out a big sign and it was the last I heard of the hospital complaint.
Later that day I also was cornered by the religion writer who complained that I had poached on her beat and that I should have called her with the information and let her do the story. I explained, successfully I think, that it was only my first week and I really wasn't aware of who covered what. Besides, I didn't think anyone would have wanted to be called in on a Friday night.
So at the end of my first week I had nearly gotten arrested for trespassing at a local hospital, had a serious complaint filed against me for my reporting and witnessed a shooting. What had I gotten myself into?
Another memorable Friday night recollection was hearing some scanner traffic right at 2 a.m. as I was preparing to leave work on a Saturday morning. The report was of a roll over accident at First and Grand Traverse.
I told the night editor that I would check on it on my way home and would call him with some notes to leave for the Saturday reporter as it was past deadline for the Saturday paper.
The accident scene was literally a 30-second drive from the Flint Journal and when I got there I was the first one there, even before the police. The person who called it in (possibly a drunk driver who didn't want to be around when police arrived) had driven off.
Rolled over on its top, there was steam coming from under the hood. Two men were trapped in the car and another man had been thrown from the vehicle. I went over to the man who was outside the car and put my hand on his back, he was barely breathing. It must have been cold because I remember seeing his faint breath.
Until police arrived, I just kept my hand on his back so perhaps he would at least know someone was with him. One of the men in the car was already dead I later found out, the man I stayed with died at the hospital a short time later. The other man presumably recovered.
On my way home, I called the night editor, related the details as I knew them (leaving out the part about me putting my hand on the man's back) so that the Saturday reporter could follow up the next day.
Skip the networks for news, go to Twitter, blogger.com
You have to wonder if television news will go the way of newspapers with the instantaneous possibilities of local coverage by Twitter, social net works and blogs. I've been keeping up on the minute by minute protests in Iran through a blog and Twitter.
'persianq' on Twitter provides frequent updates on street protests and this blog posts pictures and sometimes videos and plenty of other links to news of protest.
There are plenty of other sources of instant information. With reporters being forced out of the countries this will be one of the main sources of information.
'persianq' on Twitter provides frequent updates on street protests and this blog posts pictures and sometimes videos and plenty of other links to news of protest.
There are plenty of other sources of instant information. With reporters being forced out of the countries this will be one of the main sources of information.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Dad's on high-speed
Now I know the apocalypse is near. My father has now converted from dial-up to high speed.
Welcome to the Internet fast lane, Dad. Also, Happy Father's Day tomorrow.
Welcome to the Internet fast lane, Dad. Also, Happy Father's Day tomorrow.
A quiet Saturday rant
Last week I had one of the most frustrating phone conversatons I have ever had. While trying to resolve an issue over phone listings I ended up talking to someone in India.
Without wanting to offend them, I was finally forced to ask if there was anyone close by who actually understood or spoke English. This was an AT & T call center and when the supervisor came on the line, I bluntly asked him, where is this call center?
He was quiet, so I asked, is this in India? He admitted it was. Now, he was a very nice man, but he was completely unequipped to deal with my issue and simply kept saying yes, when I knew full well he didn't have a clue what I was talking about.
Why a company with AMERICAN in its very name is exporting its call service department to a foreign land is ridiculous.
All that brought to mind this video, sent to me by my unemployed sister and brother-in-law in West Virginia. I had not heard it before, but it has had 11 million hits, so far.
Without wanting to offend them, I was finally forced to ask if there was anyone close by who actually understood or spoke English. This was an AT & T call center and when the supervisor came on the line, I bluntly asked him, where is this call center?
He was quiet, so I asked, is this in India? He admitted it was. Now, he was a very nice man, but he was completely unequipped to deal with my issue and simply kept saying yes, when I knew full well he didn't have a clue what I was talking about.
Why a company with AMERICAN in its very name is exporting its call service department to a foreign land is ridiculous.
All that brought to mind this video, sent to me by my unemployed sister and brother-in-law in West Virginia. I had not heard it before, but it has had 11 million hits, so far.
Friday, June 19, 2009
Gordon Young, Flint Expatriates, has a great Slate.com article on Flint, including former editor's home
Gordon Young, who has a great blog that I have linked to for a long time - Flint Expatriates - has been visiting Flint and Slate.com has run a wonderful article from him about Flint.
As a native California, one with some roots in the San Francisco Bay Area, I can give a big "Amen" to his conclusions.
There is also an interesting mention of the former, and still unsold, home of the former FJ Editor who is now the content czar at AnnArbor.com.
Hat tip to Inside Out for calling my attention to this article.
As a native California, one with some roots in the San Francisco Bay Area, I can give a big "Amen" to his conclusions.
There is also an interesting mention of the former, and still unsold, home of the former FJ Editor who is now the content czar at AnnArbor.com.
Hat tip to Inside Out for calling my attention to this article.
It's line up time at the Optometrist, dentist and doctor
Stopped by to make get my routine eye appointment, only to learn there is not such thing as a walk-in eye exam there until after July 1.
My eye doctor's office said with the end of vision benefits for car company employees, certain retirees and others by the end of June they are booked to the gills with appointments and walk-ins and not being taken. My doctor is scheduling extra weekend and evening hours to clear her backlog.
We're in the same boat here, with my wife's retirement some of our better benefits run out on June 30.
I'm on a waiting list for a day next week, but it doesn't look good. They said dentists and doctors are experiencing the same rush as people try to get in a last minute appointment under the wire.
So, if you are one of those folks, better get on the phone right away.
My eye doctor's office said with the end of vision benefits for car company employees, certain retirees and others by the end of June they are booked to the gills with appointments and walk-ins and not being taken. My doctor is scheduling extra weekend and evening hours to clear her backlog.
We're in the same boat here, with my wife's retirement some of our better benefits run out on June 30.
I'm on a waiting list for a day next week, but it doesn't look good. They said dentists and doctors are experiencing the same rush as people try to get in a last minute appointment under the wire.
So, if you are one of those folks, better get on the phone right away.
A story worth telling, a follow up worth really telling
This is the kind of story I loved to find and cover. It starts out as kind of a formula story, in which you are telling your readers about an important issue, in this case the release of jail inmates early, in some cases way early, because of jail overcrowding.
You do your due diligence, find an inmate willing to talk and then the story gets way, way better.
Now, I'm sure the guy getting thrown back in jail is angry that he ever cooperated with the reporter/reporters in the first place, but who is really to blame here?
A reporter asks you a question about how you feel about being released early from jail.
In response you:
1.) Express your gratitude to the sheriff for giving you a new lease on life.
2.) Keep your mouth shut.
3.) Criticize the sheriff who released you.
I submit that no one in their right mind would ever pick answer No. 3. Yet, here in Flint, we have such a person.
Johnny, tell our contestant what he has won.
A quick trip back to jail. Sure the sheriff could have been magnimous and looked the other way, but the liklihood of that was slim and none, and slim left town.
You do your due diligence, find an inmate willing to talk and then the story gets way, way better.
Now, I'm sure the guy getting thrown back in jail is angry that he ever cooperated with the reporter/reporters in the first place, but who is really to blame here?
A reporter asks you a question about how you feel about being released early from jail.
In response you:
1.) Express your gratitude to the sheriff for giving you a new lease on life.
2.) Keep your mouth shut.
3.) Criticize the sheriff who released you.
I submit that no one in their right mind would ever pick answer No. 3. Yet, here in Flint, we have such a person.
Johnny, tell our contestant what he has won.
A quick trip back to jail. Sure the sheriff could have been magnimous and looked the other way, but the liklihood of that was slim and none, and slim left town.
AnnArbor.com meets, discuss moderation guidelines
AnnArbor.com advises "diligent moderation" for new site. The most important topic (judging by its position in the content czar's story about it) was how to moderate comments on the new site.
I hope they didn't pay a lot for the donuts and coffee to come up with that suggestion. I think any blogger who has been doing this for more than one month and who gets a fair number of comments will learn that comment moderation is necessary if you want to keep things fairly civil.
Even I could have told them that and saved them the price of the donuts.
Here's a summary from the czar's post:
"Our Web advisory panel met for the first time this morning in a community room at the Ann Arbor Public Library to see how our site is developing so far, to ask questions and give us input. We listed the names of our advisory group in an earlier post.
They urged us to take a strong hand in moderating conversation on AnnArbor.com right from launch. One warned us that the failure to do so could allow our site to degenerate into a "wretched hive of scum and villainy.''
To avoid that, we should have norms for conversation on the site, clearly enforce those norms, and be transparent about what we're doing.
That's interesting, because I talked about our plan to moderate "aggressively'' in an earlier post, and that intention was immediately challenged by blogger Mark Maynard. In the spirit of viewer discretion, I should mention that if you follow the link to Maynard's blog, the comment thread includes an impressive array of vulgarities. Even Maynard was moved to joke that "On second thought, maybe aggressive moderation is a good thing.''
Despite having already been taken to task on this subject, I still believe our technology advisers are right on this one, and that we'd better be prepared to moderate conversation consistently from the start. We've begun work on guidelines for moderation, and will share them here prior to launch."
As frequent readers here know, there are loose guidelines for posting here. The rules are mine and are meant to keep comments in hand. If, on the other hand, AnnArbor.com starts using those rules to clear out comments that are critical of them or talk about competitors, then that would be a mistake.
Also in that post it appears that AnnArbor.com learned its lesson with the New York designed "Acorn" logo and hired an Ann Arbor marketing firm to help them.
I hope "The Deuce.com" appreciates all the traffic I send their way. If you put Thedeuce.com into your browser you will go to GoDaddy.com.
I hope they didn't pay a lot for the donuts and coffee to come up with that suggestion. I think any blogger who has been doing this for more than one month and who gets a fair number of comments will learn that comment moderation is necessary if you want to keep things fairly civil.
Even I could have told them that and saved them the price of the donuts.
Here's a summary from the czar's post:
"Our Web advisory panel met for the first time this morning in a community room at the Ann Arbor Public Library to see how our site is developing so far, to ask questions and give us input. We listed the names of our advisory group in an earlier post.
They urged us to take a strong hand in moderating conversation on AnnArbor.com right from launch. One warned us that the failure to do so could allow our site to degenerate into a "wretched hive of scum and villainy.''
To avoid that, we should have norms for conversation on the site, clearly enforce those norms, and be transparent about what we're doing.
That's interesting, because I talked about our plan to moderate "aggressively'' in an earlier post, and that intention was immediately challenged by blogger Mark Maynard. In the spirit of viewer discretion, I should mention that if you follow the link to Maynard's blog, the comment thread includes an impressive array of vulgarities. Even Maynard was moved to joke that "On second thought, maybe aggressive moderation is a good thing.''
Despite having already been taken to task on this subject, I still believe our technology advisers are right on this one, and that we'd better be prepared to moderate conversation consistently from the start. We've begun work on guidelines for moderation, and will share them here prior to launch."
As frequent readers here know, there are loose guidelines for posting here. The rules are mine and are meant to keep comments in hand. If, on the other hand, AnnArbor.com starts using those rules to clear out comments that are critical of them or talk about competitors, then that would be a mistake.
Also in that post it appears that AnnArbor.com learned its lesson with the New York designed "Acorn" logo and hired an Ann Arbor marketing firm to help them.
I hope "The Deuce.com" appreciates all the traffic I send their way. If you put Thedeuce.com into your browser you will go to GoDaddy.com.
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Linking to competitors, newest sign of newspaper surrender
One of the huge changes in journalism may be the white flag that newspapers are now waving to the broadcast competitors.
Recently there have been stories on the MLive site that simply link to a broadcast outlet's coverage of a breaking story. In the "old days" this would have been unthinkable. Editors and reporters would have scrambled at any time, day or night, to pull together their own sources and do their own coverage.
It appears that once the newspaper reporters have done their own reporting, sometimes a half a day later, the story with the link is updated and the link to the broadcast account removed. That is apparent because when I try to link to the broadcast link story, it simply comes up with the new account done by the newspaper staff. It would be a little more honest to leave up the original post and then add your own coverage when it becomes available.
This just seems to be another concession by the newspapers that they are not able to cover the breaking news like they once did and have surrendered that to broadcast outlets.
Recently there have been stories on the MLive site that simply link to a broadcast outlet's coverage of a breaking story. In the "old days" this would have been unthinkable. Editors and reporters would have scrambled at any time, day or night, to pull together their own sources and do their own coverage.
It appears that once the newspaper reporters have done their own reporting, sometimes a half a day later, the story with the link is updated and the link to the broadcast account removed. That is apparent because when I try to link to the broadcast link story, it simply comes up with the new account done by the newspaper staff. It would be a little more honest to leave up the original post and then add your own coverage when it becomes available.
This just seems to be another concession by the newspapers that they are not able to cover the breaking news like they once did and have surrendered that to broadcast outlets.
Inside Out: More Advance Newspaper cuts in Ohio
Tech savvy Inside Out has a good post today about the evolving situation in Ohio and Advance Newspapers weekly chain in the Cleveland area. There are enough good links to stories and Advance newspaper sites to keep a newspaper junkie busy for an hour.
The long and short is that more cuts have arrived. When you read the links make sure when you are done reading the Advance party line, scroll down and read what the subscribers are saying.
The long and short is that more cuts have arrived. When you read the links make sure when you are done reading the Advance party line, scroll down and read what the subscribers are saying.
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
J-schools in flux, student papers cut publication days
Over on Inside Out (I know this is becoming a habit) another wonderful post this morning with great links. This site is beginning to look like what AnnArbor.com wants to be - a link list.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Another golf slip up on the Flint Journal
This time the commenters are not happy with the Flint Journal coverage of the FJGA tournament. If I remember my history right, the Flint Journal may have had a hand in starting this organization.
Check out the comments.
Check out the comments.
OK, I'll put this up
I've resisted for awhile putting up this very funny You Tube about newspapers. At the end it refers to "boobs," so if that would offend you, please do not play the video. There is no nudity, but there are quick glimpses of bikini tops. But because someone put a comment on one of the posts that links to this anyway, I'll put it up. You've been warned.
"Deuce" an obscure Ann Arbor nickname
I've been following the discussions over on AnnArbor.com about the nickname for the City that will figure prominently in the new news website scheduled to launch in late July.
I've lived in Michigan for 32 years and until AnnArbor.com offered up deuce, I had never heard A-squared (that's the one I've heard since I've been here) referred to as "the deuce." A couple commenters are doing their best to dissuade the site from using it, but apparently to no avail.
During my police department days in the 1970s, officers frequently called drunk drivers "deuces," and urban dictionary's first, and most of the top 10 definitions have an equally unflattering definition for deuce.
In friendly conversation "deuce" is more commonly the term used for a bathroom function, as in do you have to go "Number 1 or number 2."
Of the 96 definitions of "deuce" not one refers to Ann Arbor on urbandictionary.com and nearly 90 percent of the meanings of deuce are pretty offensive. If you put in "The deuce" you get one reference - May 9, 2006 - that Ann Arbor is called "The Deuce." Another term that shows up in some places as Ann Arbor is "Ace deuce."
By the way, urbandictionary.com, is the place to look for modern words. Kind of like a resource for those of us who wear out hats on backwards.
I've lived in Michigan for 32 years and until AnnArbor.com offered up deuce, I had never heard A-squared (that's the one I've heard since I've been here) referred to as "the deuce." A couple commenters are doing their best to dissuade the site from using it, but apparently to no avail.
During my police department days in the 1970s, officers frequently called drunk drivers "deuces," and urban dictionary's first, and most of the top 10 definitions have an equally unflattering definition for deuce.
In friendly conversation "deuce" is more commonly the term used for a bathroom function, as in do you have to go "Number 1 or number 2."
Of the 96 definitions of "deuce" not one refers to Ann Arbor on urbandictionary.com and nearly 90 percent of the meanings of deuce are pretty offensive. If you put in "The deuce" you get one reference - May 9, 2006 - that Ann Arbor is called "The Deuce." Another term that shows up in some places as Ann Arbor is "Ace deuce."
By the way, urbandictionary.com, is the place to look for modern words. Kind of like a resource for those of us who wear out hats on backwards.
More info on new Ann Arbor print weekly
Offline a loyal FFE reader sent me a link to the new start-up free newspaper seeking to fill the hole left by the departure of the Ann Arbor News.
The person that sent this to me, a woman by the way, made mention of the interesting clothes choice made by the editor for this important public relations moment. In the interest of not getting in trouble with my wife or other female readers, I'm offering no further comment.
It is interesting that JRC, the Journal Register Company, who has rolled through the journalism landscape like Sherman to the sea in the Civil War, is up for trying yet another newspaper experiment.
At the end of the post, the editor mentions the bankruptcy, but says JRC is on the verge of emerging from it. That's kind of news.
The person that sent this to me, a woman by the way, made mention of the interesting clothes choice made by the editor for this important public relations moment. In the interest of not getting in trouble with my wife or other female readers, I'm offering no further comment.
It is interesting that JRC, the Journal Register Company, who has rolled through the journalism landscape like Sherman to the sea in the Civil War, is up for trying yet another newspaper experiment.
At the end of the post, the editor mentions the bankruptcy, but says JRC is on the verge of emerging from it. That's kind of news.
A lost opportunity to talk to grandma
Earlier today I was driving down a side street and saw a great sight. An elderly woman was out walking with a young teenage girl and it appeared that it was a grandmother and her granddaughter out for a stroll.
Then I noticed that the two were not talking and that the young girl had ear buds and was holding an MP3 or other digital music device. I wanted to stop and tell the young girl to turn off the device and engage her grandmother, of course I didn't.
It was at that point that I felt bad for both of them. Some of my great childhood memories are those times that I sat at the feet of my grandparents and listened to their stories of the "old days." Those lessons gave me a perspective, even though I didn't get it at the time, that would come back to serve me later.
In recent months, my wife and I have spent a lot of time with her aging parents. They have shared stories I had never heard before and that my wife had not heard for a long time. It is a fascinating look into a time gone by, never to return.
Turning the TV off, or pulling the ear buds and talking to those a generation or two ahead of us might be the best entertainment of all.
Then I noticed that the two were not talking and that the young girl had ear buds and was holding an MP3 or other digital music device. I wanted to stop and tell the young girl to turn off the device and engage her grandmother, of course I didn't.
It was at that point that I felt bad for both of them. Some of my great childhood memories are those times that I sat at the feet of my grandparents and listened to their stories of the "old days." Those lessons gave me a perspective, even though I didn't get it at the time, that would come back to serve me later.
In recent months, my wife and I have spent a lot of time with her aging parents. They have shared stories I had never heard before and that my wife had not heard for a long time. It is a fascinating look into a time gone by, never to return.
Turning the TV off, or pulling the ear buds and talking to those a generation or two ahead of us might be the best entertainment of all.
Monday, June 15, 2009
Ireland Post mirrors current journalism trends
Not quite sure where this survey was done (Ireland - America or both) but it appears that the salary losses are across the board here and elsewhere. Thanks to Fading to Black for this.
Inside Out: Your source for Booth News today
No time to blog today, but a quick glance over at Inside Out, shows a couple of good newspaper reads there.
1.) A post on newspaper cartoons. (I haven't followed all the links yet, but they look tasty). Also a link to a column by the Muskegon Chronicle editor about his decision to first cancel a cartoon, then reinstate it. I should note that the Chronicle editor is a former editor from the Flint Journal. During his tenure at the Journal, he also seemed to have a continuing fascination with newspaper cartoons, with several columns about the subject here. The Chronicle editor is a very nice person, but did little during his time at the FJ to encourage or demand tough investigative journalism here (kind of a Booth trait). As an editor he's just a little too fluffy for my tastes, but again, a very nice person.
2.) Another link to a Muskegon Chronicle column about some encouraging economic signs for that paper. The numbers seem a little confusing (readership up, but circulation down), but it would certainly be good news for the newspaper folks there if the recession is easing.
1.) A post on newspaper cartoons. (I haven't followed all the links yet, but they look tasty). Also a link to a column by the Muskegon Chronicle editor about his decision to first cancel a cartoon, then reinstate it. I should note that the Chronicle editor is a former editor from the Flint Journal. During his tenure at the Journal, he also seemed to have a continuing fascination with newspaper cartoons, with several columns about the subject here. The Chronicle editor is a very nice person, but did little during his time at the FJ to encourage or demand tough investigative journalism here (kind of a Booth trait). As an editor he's just a little too fluffy for my tastes, but again, a very nice person.
2.) Another link to a Muskegon Chronicle column about some encouraging economic signs for that paper. The numbers seem a little confusing (readership up, but circulation down), but it would certainly be good news for the newspaper folks there if the recession is easing.
Best assignments? A poll
A few months ago, I shared a listing of my favorite assignments. But it occurred to me on the way home from Buffalo - four hours in a car alone gives one a lot of time to think - that I haven't done enough interactive stuff on this blog.
Because a lot of folks who stop by are reporters, editors and others in the field, I thought it might be fun to just solicit the best assignments or stories that each reporter has covered in their career.
I'll try and keep this up toward the top for awhile so people can weigh in with their very favorite assignments. It could be an interview, an out-of-town trip, a special feature that you covered, etc.
If you are concerned about the assignment giving away your identity, change enough of the facts that the story so it is still essentially true, but won't give away your identity. (If the trip was to Tuscson, change it to Seattle, that kind of thing).
After 18-months of doing the Free From Editors blog, the one most disturbing thing that I see is the fear that many reporters and former reporters have of expressing their opinions in a way that might bring retribution from a former employer if their identity was known.
I spent many years questioning and taking a hard look at authority and not even for a moment have I ever worried about what would happen to me. But I understand the concerns of folks who are still in the job market and don't want to jeopardize a prospect.
It says volumes about the management and ownership of news organizations that their own employees cower in fear over doing precisely the kind of introspective questioning that newspapers are supposed to encourage.
So let's try this. If you can't figure out the anonymous posting feel free to send me your assignment at my e-mail address: jlsmediaservices (at) gmail (dot) com. (Of course, turn the "at" and "dot" into the symbol when you send the message. I just don't need any more spam.
Because a lot of folks who stop by are reporters, editors and others in the field, I thought it might be fun to just solicit the best assignments or stories that each reporter has covered in their career.
I'll try and keep this up toward the top for awhile so people can weigh in with their very favorite assignments. It could be an interview, an out-of-town trip, a special feature that you covered, etc.
If you are concerned about the assignment giving away your identity, change enough of the facts that the story so it is still essentially true, but won't give away your identity. (If the trip was to Tuscson, change it to Seattle, that kind of thing).
After 18-months of doing the Free From Editors blog, the one most disturbing thing that I see is the fear that many reporters and former reporters have of expressing their opinions in a way that might bring retribution from a former employer if their identity was known.
I spent many years questioning and taking a hard look at authority and not even for a moment have I ever worried about what would happen to me. But I understand the concerns of folks who are still in the job market and don't want to jeopardize a prospect.
It says volumes about the management and ownership of news organizations that their own employees cower in fear over doing precisely the kind of introspective questioning that newspapers are supposed to encourage.
So let's try this. If you can't figure out the anonymous posting feel free to send me your assignment at my e-mail address: jlsmediaservices (at) gmail (dot) com. (Of course, turn the "at" and "dot" into the symbol when you send the message. I just don't need any more spam.
Sunday, June 14, 2009
No mention of Flushing connection in Michigan Open story Sunday
Finally got around to looking at my Sunday Flint Journal. I went to the sports section to see if J.R. "Jeff" Roth ever got his proper mention for his second place finish in the Michigan Open.
The brief coverage of the Michigan Open talked about winner Ryan Brehm, of Mt. Pleasant, of course, and mentioned the two golfers who tied for second. Mentioned first was Matthew Thompson, of Battle Creek and then two-time defending Michigan Open Champion Jeff Roth.
What apparently wasn't worth mentioning even now was the Roth is from Flushing, a key area in the Flint Journal's coverage. That makes it a clean sweep for the Journal's coverage of the Open, not one story pointed out the local angle of Roth's Flushing connection.
Incredible. If there was any doubt that the copy desk is tilted to the north end of the three newspapers' areas, there was no better illustration than this. "More than just the Score and we mean it!" That's a laugh.
The brief coverage of the Michigan Open talked about winner Ryan Brehm, of Mt. Pleasant, of course, and mentioned the two golfers who tied for second. Mentioned first was Matthew Thompson, of Battle Creek and then two-time defending Michigan Open Champion Jeff Roth.
What apparently wasn't worth mentioning even now was the Roth is from Flushing, a key area in the Flint Journal's coverage. That makes it a clean sweep for the Journal's coverage of the Open, not one story pointed out the local angle of Roth's Flushing connection.
Incredible. If there was any doubt that the copy desk is tilted to the north end of the three newspapers' areas, there was no better illustration than this. "More than just the Score and we mean it!" That's a laugh.
Great sayings, by a great editor
Some time again I wrote about one of my favorite editors, the late Larry Laurain. I was remembering Larry the other day and two funny things he once told me about my job.
Larry was a former police reporter, so there weren't many secrets I could keep from him.
Larry assigned me to fly to Tucson, Arizona to cover the arrest of a suspect in a case that originated in Pontiac, Michigan. The story I wrote for the Oakland Press ended up attracting the interest of a producer for the then popular show "Unsolved Mysteries."
It had to do with a man who had befriended a local woman, who prompty disappeared. To make things even just a little more suspicious, it was the fourth woman he had been acquainted with in his life who vanished off the face of the earth. (You would think the authorities would have gotten curious after the disappearance of the second woman, or maybe even the first).
The day after the show aired, the suspect who was watching the program, was caught after his Tucson landlord recognized him and called police.
When I returned from Tucson three days later, I was filling out my expense forms and Larry looked over, winked at me and said: "Any good reporter who files an out-of-town expense report and doesn't end up with enough extra money to buy a new sport coat has done something wrong."
Don't worry, I didn't pad my expense sheet, but it was a funny saying.
A couple weeks before Christmas, I was complaining to Larry that I didn't have time in my personal life for anything because of all the time (mostly unpaid) that I was putting in at work.
"If you aren't able to do your Christmas shopping on company time, I'm very disappointed in you."
That's why I loved Larry Laurain.
Larry was a former police reporter, so there weren't many secrets I could keep from him.
Larry assigned me to fly to Tucson, Arizona to cover the arrest of a suspect in a case that originated in Pontiac, Michigan. The story I wrote for the Oakland Press ended up attracting the interest of a producer for the then popular show "Unsolved Mysteries."
It had to do with a man who had befriended a local woman, who prompty disappeared. To make things even just a little more suspicious, it was the fourth woman he had been acquainted with in his life who vanished off the face of the earth. (You would think the authorities would have gotten curious after the disappearance of the second woman, or maybe even the first).
The day after the show aired, the suspect who was watching the program, was caught after his Tucson landlord recognized him and called police.
When I returned from Tucson three days later, I was filling out my expense forms and Larry looked over, winked at me and said: "Any good reporter who files an out-of-town expense report and doesn't end up with enough extra money to buy a new sport coat has done something wrong."
Don't worry, I didn't pad my expense sheet, but it was a funny saying.
A couple weeks before Christmas, I was complaining to Larry that I didn't have time in my personal life for anything because of all the time (mostly unpaid) that I was putting in at work.
"If you aren't able to do your Christmas shopping on company time, I'm very disappointed in you."
That's why I loved Larry Laurain.
Saturday, June 13, 2009
A reporter chimes in on the topic of the year
A Kansas City Tribune reporter chimes in on newspaper standards. It's a good read, except for the slightly gratuitous bone she throws to her own employer at the end.
My favorite paragraph:
"Today, corporate owners of newspapers have turned our newsrooms into little more than sweat shops. While we lofty public servants, otherwise known as working journalists, agonize over the facts and minute details in each piece we prepare for print, corporate has another goal. It seems the companies that make it their business to own daily newspaper chains are obsessed with trying to squeeze more profit from those who, like me, entered the profession believing we are providing our readers with the truth about the conduct of the public’s business."
My favorite paragraph:
"Today, corporate owners of newspapers have turned our newsrooms into little more than sweat shops. While we lofty public servants, otherwise known as working journalists, agonize over the facts and minute details in each piece we prepare for print, corporate has another goal. It seems the companies that make it their business to own daily newspaper chains are obsessed with trying to squeeze more profit from those who, like me, entered the profession believing we are providing our readers with the truth about the conduct of the public’s business."
The pen is mightier than the sword, but a lot easier to lose
Over on Inside Out there is an interesting post today about pens.
As I said in my comment there, I am rarely without a pen in my pocket. A lifelong habit that is simply too hard to break. If I leave the house without a pen, I can usually find one under the seat of the car, in the trunk or any number of other places that I have dropped or stashed one.
For a reporter the pen is, or at least was, the most important tool of the trade. Next was the notebook. Some folks preferred the little flip Reporter Notebooks you see on television and movies, but I always preferred a large legal pad.
When I'm writing quickly, which as a reporter was always, I needed lots of room to write. The lines on the paper were unimportant, just the large space. Sometimes I wrote at an angle, so for me it would have been better if the pages had been blank. It was just my personal preference.
I didn't save my notes either. Some reporters save everything, I saved nothing. When my story was complete and published, the notes went into the trash. Every time, no exceptions. Even a great lawyer can't subpoena notes that no longer exist.
The one time I was called to testify in a murder trial over the interview I did with one of the killers, the end result was that I testified from a copy of my published story and simply verified what everyone had already read. Piece of cake. No notes, no problem.
But back to pens.
Once when I admired a pen being used by a friend and colleague, he referred me to a Flint lawyer, Sheldon Siegel (not the author), who as a hobby makes beautiful wooden pens. They are round and fat and the ink flows out of them like oil from a can.
Although I was notorious for losing pens, I never lost my Siegel pen and still have it, although it has been retired to my memorabilia drawer.
Many reporters can be particular about their pens, I was. In a pinch a black Bic would do, but when I really wanted to do my best work and be comfortable I wanted one of my "fatties" in my hand.
As a police reporter, much of my reporting was done outdoors. In Michigan that means it can get really, really cold. So cold that ink freezes. Usually when it is 10 degrees or less. That's a problem when you're trying to interview a fire chief in the dead of night and he's only given you a couple minutes to talk.
So my trick was to have two pens, one that I kept warm in my mouth, until the other pen's ink froze. A quick switch and I was back in business. By the time the "outside" pen froze up, the "inside" pen would have thawed. It probably looked silly, but it worked.
It's also tough to write in gloves, so Jane, a FJ photographer, purchased me a pair of woolen gloves that had a detachable set of "fingers" so you could keep the rest of your hand warm while writing. As soon as you were done taking notes, you could flip the "fingers" back over and keep your digits warm as well.
As I said in my comment there, I am rarely without a pen in my pocket. A lifelong habit that is simply too hard to break. If I leave the house without a pen, I can usually find one under the seat of the car, in the trunk or any number of other places that I have dropped or stashed one.
For a reporter the pen is, or at least was, the most important tool of the trade. Next was the notebook. Some folks preferred the little flip Reporter Notebooks you see on television and movies, but I always preferred a large legal pad.
When I'm writing quickly, which as a reporter was always, I needed lots of room to write. The lines on the paper were unimportant, just the large space. Sometimes I wrote at an angle, so for me it would have been better if the pages had been blank. It was just my personal preference.
I didn't save my notes either. Some reporters save everything, I saved nothing. When my story was complete and published, the notes went into the trash. Every time, no exceptions. Even a great lawyer can't subpoena notes that no longer exist.
The one time I was called to testify in a murder trial over the interview I did with one of the killers, the end result was that I testified from a copy of my published story and simply verified what everyone had already read. Piece of cake. No notes, no problem.
But back to pens.
Once when I admired a pen being used by a friend and colleague, he referred me to a Flint lawyer, Sheldon Siegel (not the author), who as a hobby makes beautiful wooden pens. They are round and fat and the ink flows out of them like oil from a can.
Although I was notorious for losing pens, I never lost my Siegel pen and still have it, although it has been retired to my memorabilia drawer.
Many reporters can be particular about their pens, I was. In a pinch a black Bic would do, but when I really wanted to do my best work and be comfortable I wanted one of my "fatties" in my hand.
As a police reporter, much of my reporting was done outdoors. In Michigan that means it can get really, really cold. So cold that ink freezes. Usually when it is 10 degrees or less. That's a problem when you're trying to interview a fire chief in the dead of night and he's only given you a couple minutes to talk.
So my trick was to have two pens, one that I kept warm in my mouth, until the other pen's ink froze. A quick switch and I was back in business. By the time the "outside" pen froze up, the "inside" pen would have thawed. It probably looked silly, but it worked.
It's also tough to write in gloves, so Jane, a FJ photographer, purchased me a pair of woolen gloves that had a detachable set of "fingers" so you could keep the rest of your hand warm while writing. As soon as you were done taking notes, you could flip the "fingers" back over and keep your digits warm as well.
Friday, June 12, 2009
AnnArbor.com to reporters: "Stay out of the newsroom" - It's a good thing
It looks like my old boss has seen the light and now believes that reporters should be heard and not seen.
During his tenure as editor of the Flint Journal there were tight controls on many folks making sure they were in the office, attending meetings and under the watchful eye of an editor. If you were out of sight in the office too long, editors started getting nervous. That was even when you were producing a lot. To be fair, they didn't bother me much about it, but there were other examples of folks that were kept on a pretty tight leash.
But now, as head of the new AnnArbor.com venture, the content czar has come over to the other side. I sincerely praise him for it.
In his recent post, the czar has opened the door to the new journalism with this promise:
"At AnnArbor.com, I've been assuring the community that we will have a staff of professional trained journalists, and what we're looking for are people with strong traditional reporting skills, but a willingness to use all the tools of the digital age to report the news.
We do plan to equip our journalists with a laptop, and an air card, and we're looking at supplying them with a Flip video camera as well."
If that's a Booth/Advance wide policy that will be a good thing for the new (and old) reporters working at the publications in Saginaw, Bay City and Flint, as well as other Booth cities.
It's a welcome breath of fresh air that the company is now going to supply air cards along with computers so reporters can do their jobs. When I worked there you either supplied your own Internet connection or you had to come back to the office to file a story.
During his tenure as editor of the Flint Journal there were tight controls on many folks making sure they were in the office, attending meetings and under the watchful eye of an editor. If you were out of sight in the office too long, editors started getting nervous. That was even when you were producing a lot. To be fair, they didn't bother me much about it, but there were other examples of folks that were kept on a pretty tight leash.
But now, as head of the new AnnArbor.com venture, the content czar has come over to the other side. I sincerely praise him for it.
In his recent post, the czar has opened the door to the new journalism with this promise:
"At AnnArbor.com, I've been assuring the community that we will have a staff of professional trained journalists, and what we're looking for are people with strong traditional reporting skills, but a willingness to use all the tools of the digital age to report the news.
We do plan to equip our journalists with a laptop, and an air card, and we're looking at supplying them with a Flip video camera as well."
If that's a Booth/Advance wide policy that will be a good thing for the new (and old) reporters working at the publications in Saginaw, Bay City and Flint, as well as other Booth cities.
It's a welcome breath of fresh air that the company is now going to supply air cards along with computers so reporters can do their jobs. When I worked there you either supplied your own Internet connection or you had to come back to the office to file a story.
Flushing's Jeff Roth makes a run, finishes tied for Second
Flushing's golf pro Jeff Roth made a pretty good run at the Michigan Open, but couldn't overcome Ryan Brehm. The Grand Rapids beat writer did a good job of including Roth in his final round coverage, but it still hasn't translated to a headline or story over on the Flint Journal site.
Roth tied for second with a 272.
Maybe on Sunday the Journal will think Roth's second place finish is worth a mention?
On the other hand, plenty of good Red Wings coverage over at the Journal's MLive site.
Roth tied for second with a 272.
Maybe on Sunday the Journal will think Roth's second place finish is worth a mention?
On the other hand, plenty of good Red Wings coverage over at the Journal's MLive site.
Pick your cliche, tonight's the night
Pick your cliche:It's for all the marbles.
One and done.
Sudden death.
End of the line.
No place to go.
Something's gotta give.
This is it.
Do or die.
The final curtain/showdown/countdown.
On the brink.
Or feel free to leave your favorite cliche.
Tonight is the seventh game of the Stanley Cup Finals. Will it be the the Red Wings or Penguins who raise the cup in victory tonight? Whatever happens, this has been a great run for the Red Wings. I attended 7 games this season and only saw one loss.
Also whatever happens, I want the Osgood doubters to leave the building once and for all. The young man should get the credit he deserves. The Red Wings wouldn't even be in the position for a seventh game were it not for Osgood and his rock steady goaltending.
GO WINGS!
Game time 8 p.m., NBC, be there or be square. I'll be watching in Buffalo.
Late add: This joke from a former colleague by way of e-mail:
It's Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final, and a man makes his way to his seat right at center ice. He sits down, noticing that the seat next to him is empty.
He leans over and asks his neighbor if someone will be sitting there.
"No," says the neighbor. "The seat is empty."
"This is incredible", said the man. "Who in their right mind would have a seat like this for the final game of the Stanley Cup play-offs and not use it?"
The neighbor says, "Well, actually, the seat belongs to me. I was supposed to come with my wife, but she passed away. This is the first Stanley Cup we haven't been to together since we got married in 1967."
"Oh ... I'm sorry to hear that. That's terrible. But couldn't you find someone else, a friend or a relative, or even a neighbor to take the seat?"
The man shakes his head. "No. They're all at the funeral."
Thursday, June 11, 2009
A new Audi for a newspaper exec? A gag order for FJ employees?
Early today someone posted a comment (which I can't find because it was left on a much earlier post) that a current Booth executive has recently traded in an American mid-range car and purchased a very expensive "$80,000" Audi sports car which employees, all who have taken huge pay cuts, now see parked in a newspaper parking lot.
The commenter mentioned that the sight of the car has caused at least some employees extreme disgust as they ponder their new lives under tightened budgets and friends who are now gone through layoffs.
I'm not going to get any more specific that that until I get more information - or hopefully a photo of the vehicle - and at this point will assume that the report may be false. Do they make Audis in Michigan now? The foreign car aspect of this story is as troubling to me as the obvious tone deafness such a purchase would signal, again, if true.
Making things more difficult to get news about the newspaper is the new "Free From Editor" clause in the buyouts and severance papers of recently severed employees.
This is rich. A newspaper, a business that makes a living (although not much of one anymore) demanding transparency and frankness from everyone else, has inserted a "gag" (my word) order for employees leaving the paper saying they are prohibited from speaking ill of their former employer. If they do, they risk financial sanctions from the company.
The irony of that needs no further discussion from me.
Again, employees - past or present - are free to post here, anonymously if need be, as long as their comments are within loose civil bounds, don't contain obscenities, don't mention full names of people (with some rare exceptions) and that don't involve the families of employees or other personal, non-newspaper issues.
If you post anonymously (or make up a fake name) rest assured I do not see any e-mail address or direct link to you. I'm still trying to figure out who "inky" is and they have been commenting here since the beginning. I do get a Google Analytics report that tells me generally, by city, where posts are coming from. So far people from 275 Michigan cities, all 50 states, the District of Columbia and 75 other countries have stopped by.
Do NOT post from work and if you see the Audi parked anywhere, let a friend or non-Journal employee snap the photo for me.
The commenter mentioned that the sight of the car has caused at least some employees extreme disgust as they ponder their new lives under tightened budgets and friends who are now gone through layoffs.
I'm not going to get any more specific that that until I get more information - or hopefully a photo of the vehicle - and at this point will assume that the report may be false. Do they make Audis in Michigan now? The foreign car aspect of this story is as troubling to me as the obvious tone deafness such a purchase would signal, again, if true.
Making things more difficult to get news about the newspaper is the new "Free From Editor" clause in the buyouts and severance papers of recently severed employees.
This is rich. A newspaper, a business that makes a living (although not much of one anymore) demanding transparency and frankness from everyone else, has inserted a "gag" (my word) order for employees leaving the paper saying they are prohibited from speaking ill of their former employer. If they do, they risk financial sanctions from the company.
The irony of that needs no further discussion from me.
Again, employees - past or present - are free to post here, anonymously if need be, as long as their comments are within loose civil bounds, don't contain obscenities, don't mention full names of people (with some rare exceptions) and that don't involve the families of employees or other personal, non-newspaper issues.
If you post anonymously (or make up a fake name) rest assured I do not see any e-mail address or direct link to you. I'm still trying to figure out who "inky" is and they have been commenting here since the beginning. I do get a Google Analytics report that tells me generally, by city, where posts are coming from. So far people from 275 Michigan cities, all 50 states, the District of Columbia and 75 other countries have stopped by.
Do NOT post from work and if you see the Audi parked anywhere, let a friend or non-Journal employee snap the photo for me.
Props where they are due
The beat writer from Grand Rapids has continued to include J.R. "Jeff" Roth, of Flushing, in his coverage of the Michigan Open in Orchard Lake since I brought it up a couple days ago. So props to him for that.
On the other hand, I received my home delivered copy of the Flint Journal today, and the brief coverage of the Michigan Open doesn't even include a line that Roth is currently in fourth place at the Open.
The leader of the Michigan Open is Ryan Brehm, of Mt. Pleasant, and that location is obviously closer to Saginaw than Flushing, so he received 100 percent of the golf coverage in the Flint Journal. Note to Saginaw copy desk: Flushing is just about 5 miles from Flint and Roth is worth a mention in the Flint paper even if he is only in fourth place, nine shots off the lead.
(Late add: I just checked MapQuest and actually Mt. Pleasant (52) is 18 miles further/farther away from Saginaw than Flushing is (34) .)
On the other hand, I received my home delivered copy of the Flint Journal today, and the brief coverage of the Michigan Open doesn't even include a line that Roth is currently in fourth place at the Open.
The leader of the Michigan Open is Ryan Brehm, of Mt. Pleasant, and that location is obviously closer to Saginaw than Flushing, so he received 100 percent of the golf coverage in the Flint Journal. Note to Saginaw copy desk: Flushing is just about 5 miles from Flint and Roth is worth a mention in the Flint paper even if he is only in fourth place, nine shots off the lead.
(Late add: I just checked MapQuest and actually Mt. Pleasant (52) is 18 miles further/farther away from Saginaw than Flushing is (34) .)
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
A full-time daily to hit the streets in Detroit again
Someone apparently believes that a full time daily can work in Detroit.
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Local golf angle completely lost in new Journal golf coverage
As a golfer I'm a bust, but I do like to follow the sport. So it was interesting to notice on the Flint Journal coverage of the Michigan Open in Orchard Lake that a Flushing golfer, who was always covered like a blanket, doesn't even rate a mention in the MLive coverage on the Flint site.
(Update Wednesday morning: An hour after I posted this last night a new story was up on the MLive golf site that included a mention of Jeff Roth down a few paragraphs. That story is still not up on the Flint Journal site on MLive. If the late add was a result of this post, I'm glad to be of assistance. No charge.)
J.R. Roth has always had first rate coverage in the Journal. If memory serves he has won a championship or four and is in the hunt for the Michigan Open this year at -2 in fifth place at the close of the tournament today.
But apparently the beat writer from Grand Rapids doesn't know this, nor does the copy desk who is editing the wire and Booth copy from the tournament that is being posted on the Flint MLive site.
The Michigan Open is the biggest pro tournament in the state next to the Buick Open and J.R. Roth is a perennial high finisher and one of the very best Michigan golfers. But despite the protestations that the new online coverage would be as good, or superior, to what we are used to has slipped on a banana peel with this coverage.
In fact, it appears that Saginaw merely used a PGA press release, one that didn't even mention Roth's name. Very disappointing.
(Update Wednesday morning: An hour after I posted this last night a new story was up on the MLive golf site that included a mention of Jeff Roth down a few paragraphs. That story is still not up on the Flint Journal site on MLive. If the late add was a result of this post, I'm glad to be of assistance. No charge.)
J.R. Roth has always had first rate coverage in the Journal. If memory serves he has won a championship or four and is in the hunt for the Michigan Open this year at -2 in fifth place at the close of the tournament today.
But apparently the beat writer from Grand Rapids doesn't know this, nor does the copy desk who is editing the wire and Booth copy from the tournament that is being posted on the Flint MLive site.
The Michigan Open is the biggest pro tournament in the state next to the Buick Open and J.R. Roth is a perennial high finisher and one of the very best Michigan golfers. But despite the protestations that the new online coverage would be as good, or superior, to what we are used to has slipped on a banana peel with this coverage.
In fact, it appears that Saginaw merely used a PGA press release, one that didn't even mention Roth's name. Very disappointing.
AnnArbor.com content czar: Blogs are good and bad
The content czar from AnnArbor.com is doing the 'on the other hand' dance about the future of blogs on the new AnnArbor.com site. In a nutshell, he believes that blogs are both good and bad and that AnnArbor.com will link to the good ones.
One of the sources he cites is Jeff Jarvis, best known around here for his influence in the MLive site. Nuf' said.
Wonder if they'll link to my blog?
Also, the more I look at the acorn the more it looks like a Frenchman in shadow with a really cool beret.
One of the sources he cites is Jeff Jarvis, best known around here for his influence in the MLive site. Nuf' said.
Wonder if they'll link to my blog?
Also, the more I look at the acorn the more it looks like a Frenchman in shadow with a really cool beret.
Monday, June 8, 2009
An 'old timer's' lament
This is a great read by a reporter who I remember reading. She has captured perfectly the demise of newspapers. It's a long tome (well worth the time), but here are three of my favorite parts:
"Page redesign – that harbinger of newspaper death -- had already hit The Record. Seeking answers elsewhere, the business managers bought in to another notion of what could save the day: "CI," short for "Continuous Improvement." Some called it "Constant Insanity." It was a business improvement model, inspired by the Japanese, meant to impose greater order and efficiency on the daily newspaper."
And then this that could have been written about the ninnies who prowled the Flint Journal newsroom during the last several years:
"Our percentage of days meeting deadlines was supposed to improve, our general wastefulness decline. Signs went up around the newsroom, with the word "Muda," or mess, in Japanese and the international interdiction sign across it. We received threats and reprimands about the pileup of papers on our desks. Had my fourth-grade teacher, Miss Dade, been reincarnated as a Twenty-first Century newspaper editor? It was hard to know whether this was a misguided business department mandate or one person's obsessive-compulsive disorder. Either way, it was an unconscious metaphor. By definition, journalism was creative and untidy and all of the efforts to treat it like banking or insurance or accounting misunderstood its essential nature – and would be sure to fail.
Panic seemed to intensify at the Record, in the form of quantification. How large is the mess on your desk? How many minutes late is your copy? How many words are in your lead? There should be no more than 26, it was rumored. There were edicts against anecdotal leads, and leads with dependent clauses. Annual reviews included byline counts – how many stories could you write in how short a time?"
And this is rich also:
"Still, many editors were driven by an opposing motive to win journalism prizes. Bad ideas floated downward from sterile news meetings where editors tried to second-guess an imagined Pulitzer board. Or they recycled old ideas that had already won prizes. Police brutality was a favorite. Nursing home abuses. Kids who kill. These were often more topics than stories. Let's write a 10-part series on PCP – so we did. But the winning-prizes motive could occasionally leave room for serendipity, for real, original creations to emerge from the notebooks of reporters who were out in the world. There was still hope for the languid."
Candy Cooper nailed it. Wish I'd written it.
"Page redesign – that harbinger of newspaper death -- had already hit The Record. Seeking answers elsewhere, the business managers bought in to another notion of what could save the day: "CI," short for "Continuous Improvement." Some called it "Constant Insanity." It was a business improvement model, inspired by the Japanese, meant to impose greater order and efficiency on the daily newspaper."
And then this that could have been written about the ninnies who prowled the Flint Journal newsroom during the last several years:
"Our percentage of days meeting deadlines was supposed to improve, our general wastefulness decline. Signs went up around the newsroom, with the word "Muda," or mess, in Japanese and the international interdiction sign across it. We received threats and reprimands about the pileup of papers on our desks. Had my fourth-grade teacher, Miss Dade, been reincarnated as a Twenty-first Century newspaper editor? It was hard to know whether this was a misguided business department mandate or one person's obsessive-compulsive disorder. Either way, it was an unconscious metaphor. By definition, journalism was creative and untidy and all of the efforts to treat it like banking or insurance or accounting misunderstood its essential nature – and would be sure to fail.
Panic seemed to intensify at the Record, in the form of quantification. How large is the mess on your desk? How many minutes late is your copy? How many words are in your lead? There should be no more than 26, it was rumored. There were edicts against anecdotal leads, and leads with dependent clauses. Annual reviews included byline counts – how many stories could you write in how short a time?"
And this is rich also:
"Still, many editors were driven by an opposing motive to win journalism prizes. Bad ideas floated downward from sterile news meetings where editors tried to second-guess an imagined Pulitzer board. Or they recycled old ideas that had already won prizes. Police brutality was a favorite. Nursing home abuses. Kids who kill. These were often more topics than stories. Let's write a 10-part series on PCP – so we did. But the winning-prizes motive could occasionally leave room for serendipity, for real, original creations to emerge from the notebooks of reporters who were out in the world. There was still hope for the languid."
Candy Cooper nailed it. Wish I'd written it.
Northwestern computer nerds to the rescue?
A hybrid journalist/computer nerd is the newest graduate type out of Northwestern University. A great journalism school, by the way. Not quite as good as Michigan State University, but close. This came from Fading to Black.
Daily Derelict reports new paper coming to Ann Arbor
In the wake of the departure of the Ann Arbor News, another company is planning to move in and publish a new paper. Not sure I get the economics, considering it is a JRC project and everyone knows all their problems.
A look at the disappointing Chicago meeting of newspaper types
Another Facebook find. A story by John Temple, former Rocky Mountain News guy.
Forbes.com: The future of journalism
Found this article about the "shoot-out" over news gathering in San Diego. Thanks to a Facebook friend who posted this there this morning.
Acorn has many meanings, but so far none about the news business
Offline I was contacted with the suggestion to check the term "acorn" in one of my favorite sources - urbandictionary.com.
Obviously, this is in relation to the new logo for AnnArbor.com and not one of the definitions on the Urban Dictionary relates to the news business. But if you go there, be warned that some of the acorn definitions of acorn are adult oriented.
But when young people dump a new term on me, urbandictionary.com, is where I go to find out what it means. That way I don't have to look stupid, or unhip, by asking the person what the terms mean.
Obviously, this is in relation to the new logo for AnnArbor.com and not one of the definitions on the Urban Dictionary relates to the news business. But if you go there, be warned that some of the acorn definitions of acorn are adult oriented.
But when young people dump a new term on me, urbandictionary.com, is where I go to find out what it means. That way I don't have to look stupid, or unhip, by asking the person what the terms mean.
Sunday, June 7, 2009
A little bit of optimism for those left behind
For the folks still laboring in the trenches at newspapers comes this bit of optimism from Fading to Black.
And I will admit, that for me, there is no excitement and satisfaction as fulfilling as that when I found a juicy or unusual story that I could not wait to investigate and tell.
I get the attraction.
And I will admit, that for me, there is no excitement and satisfaction as fulfilling as that when I found a juicy or unusual story that I could not wait to investigate and tell.
I get the attraction.
MLive moves Red Wings up front
OK, I ripped MLive previously for not prominently displaying the Detroit Red Wings news up front on the various newspaper web pages. This morning on the Flint page, the Red Wings were front and center. So props from here.
Saturday, June 6, 2009
An idea for young families
My stepdaughter sent this along from ABC News and if you are just starting out with a family, kind of a cool idea. (Click on the link near the top of the page for the ABC News report.
A little 'cool' for a Saturday
One of my favorite songs, from my favorite play - "Phantom of the Opera" - done as I haven't seen it done before.
Help me on the comments
1.) No comments will be posted here on personal issues related to family leaves or employee's children. That is out of bounds. So please refrain from leaving any more of those.
2.) When you leave a comment on a post that is more than 4-5 days old, please put a note in the comment about what post you are commenting on. Today someone posted about the Flint Journal pulling Doonesbury back in 1995 or 1996. They wanted to know the reason. I posted the comment, but it had to be from a post two or three weeks or more old because I couldn't find it.
I remember some controversy back in the 1990s over Doonesbury's rather tough treatment of Bob Dole and his war record during the 96 campaign and also the use of a sexually explicit term in relation to a situation about then President Bill Clinton. If the cartoon was pulled in 95 or 96 it could not have been related to Bill Clinton's situation.
If anyone remembers why the Flint Journal pulled Doonesbury, please feel free to respond.
2.) When you leave a comment on a post that is more than 4-5 days old, please put a note in the comment about what post you are commenting on. Today someone posted about the Flint Journal pulling Doonesbury back in 1995 or 1996. They wanted to know the reason. I posted the comment, but it had to be from a post two or three weeks or more old because I couldn't find it.
I remember some controversy back in the 1990s over Doonesbury's rather tough treatment of Bob Dole and his war record during the 96 campaign and also the use of a sexually explicit term in relation to a situation about then President Bill Clinton. If the cartoon was pulled in 95 or 96 it could not have been related to Bill Clinton's situation.
If anyone remembers why the Flint Journal pulled Doonesbury, please feel free to respond.
Friday, June 5, 2009
A couple more new hires at AnnArbor.com
One of the new hires at AnnArbor.com can't be all bad, she's a graduate of Michigan State University.
Not quite sure what they will be doing, but it looks like part-time blogging, plus more.
Not quite sure what they will be doing, but it looks like part-time blogging, plus more.
One more acorn video
Offline I received a link to this because someone thought they saw something that resembled the new AnnArbor.com logo.
Some Flint Journal notes
Came home from the gym this morning (I ride a bike for 40 minutes and do some light weight work) and there was my Flint Journal in the box. Again, a decent design effort, but it is really light on breaking news. Nothing from the overnight cop or fire beat and nothing from the day before either.
Some good local court coverage, but my wife was complaining last night (she's the Journal dead tree reader in the house) about the lack of any "new" news. The deadlines must be horrendously early not to allow for some overnight (or at least late night sports and cops news).
No Red Wings game news either, which in this case was a welcome thing. (They lost 4-2).
In another unrelated item, a former Flint Journal advertising employee will now work for the new chain of weekly newspapers in the Thumb and Genesee County. I believe Tom, a nice person, may have taken the same buyout that I did, but I could be wrong about that.
His connections in Genesee County will not bode well for the "new" Flint Journal and its competition with the View newspapers in Genesee County.
I wrote about the View purchase of The County Press in Lapeer and other Thumb newspapers on Wednesday.
Some good local court coverage, but my wife was complaining last night (she's the Journal dead tree reader in the house) about the lack of any "new" news. The deadlines must be horrendously early not to allow for some overnight (or at least late night sports and cops news).
No Red Wings game news either, which in this case was a welcome thing. (They lost 4-2).
In another unrelated item, a former Flint Journal advertising employee will now work for the new chain of weekly newspapers in the Thumb and Genesee County. I believe Tom, a nice person, may have taken the same buyout that I did, but I could be wrong about that.
His connections in Genesee County will not bode well for the "new" Flint Journal and its competition with the View newspapers in Genesee County.
I wrote about the View purchase of The County Press in Lapeer and other Thumb newspapers on Wednesday.
A new defense tactic: The spray tan did it
A man in Florida is pleading his innocence by claiming that his wife died from an overdose of "spray tan" and not by asphyxiation.
Thanks to my sister, Pam, the newest, biggest Free From Editors fan. Not all are fans, however, a former editor (a really good one, by the way) has decided she is going to start a blog called: Freefromthatd***JimSmith.com. blog.
Here's some local news coverage on the case. He seems to be eyeing the television camera and maybe even blowing the reporter a kiss.
Thanks to my sister, Pam, the newest, biggest Free From Editors fan. Not all are fans, however, a former editor (a really good one, by the way) has decided she is going to start a blog called: Freefromthatd***JimSmith.com. blog.
Here's some local news coverage on the case. He seems to be eyeing the television camera and maybe even blowing the reporter a kiss.
Leopard versus rat: A peaceful coexistence
My stepdaughter sent me an article that has some incredible pictures with it. In the Bible there is the story of the lion being friends with the lamb. Here's a leopard that, at least for a time, is living in peace with a rat.
Thursday, June 4, 2009
This one is going to leave a mark
Someone named William Fagan is not happy that his company was evicted from their downtown office space by AnnArbor.com. Here is the comment he left on the following AnnArbor.com post.
William Fagan in June 4, 2009 8:17 PM
Hi Stephanie,
I have 7 "local professionals" who would be interested in being on the advisory panel that you mentioned. All seven are staff members of my company- Fuji Arts. We're being displaced by AnnArbor.com's take over of our downtown office. We were told that AA.com refused to share the floor and made an "all or nothing deal" that forced us out. So, my first bit of advice would be- if you want to be a part of the "community" don't start by forcing successful companies out of their spaces.
William Fagan
Fuji Arts Inc.
301 E. Liberty Suite 725
William Fagan in June 4, 2009 8:17 PM
Hi Stephanie,
I have 7 "local professionals" who would be interested in being on the advisory panel that you mentioned. All seven are staff members of my company- Fuji Arts. We're being displaced by AnnArbor.com's take over of our downtown office. We were told that AA.com refused to share the floor and made an "all or nothing deal" that forced us out. So, my first bit of advice would be- if you want to be a part of the "community" don't start by forcing successful companies out of their spaces.
William Fagan
Fuji Arts Inc.
301 E. Liberty Suite 725
Not that I like acorns, but here's my idea
If you are going to use an acorn as a logo why not incorporate it into your name, like this.
Acorn logos that are better than AnnArbor.com's
Just a quick check of companies and businesses with cooler Acorn logos than AnnArbor.com.
Acorn Landscaping.
Acorn Recycling.
Vanderbilt coffee mug logo. (Click on picture for larger version)
Acorn Partnership.
Acorn Award.
Acorn Interactive.
Acorn Electron Computer. (This looks like an upside down AnnArbor.com acorn)
MWS League Logo (acorn).
Acorn Media.
Acorn CS.
Acorn Alternative Strategies.
Stone Acorn Logo.
Squirrely's Nuthouse.
Acorns Children's Hospital.
Acorn CRO.
Acorn Landscaping.
Acorn Recycling.
Vanderbilt coffee mug logo. (Click on picture for larger version)
Acorn Partnership.
Acorn Award.
Acorn Interactive.
Acorn Electron Computer. (This looks like an upside down AnnArbor.com acorn)
MWS League Logo (acorn).
Acorn Media.
Acorn CS.
Acorn Alternative Strategies.
Stone Acorn Logo.
Squirrely's Nuthouse.
Acorns Children's Hospital.
Acorn CRO.
Acorn vs. Buckeye, a logo too far
Someone pointed out offline that an acorn is not much different than an Ohio buckeye, which may explain why the new logo may not be getting rave reviews on 
the AnnArbor.com site. Not much love for the old Buckeye in Ann Arbor.
the AnnArbor.com site. Not much love for the old Buckeye in Ann Arbor.Top photo: Buckeye, Bottom photo, acorn (squirrel at left)
Flint Journal arrives early, an improvement
OK, I was critical last week of the new Flint Journal design and some obvious copy editing problems and spelling errors, but I have to give them a little credit for today's paper.
Not as many problems, and although I still don't like the font styles, the paper looked a lot better today than the first attempts last weekend.
No breaking news to speak of, but some decent features in the front section of the paper. Still, I don't understand why Midland, Bay City and Saginaw news are included in my Flint area paper, but it must be a function of a central copy desk.
The Sports section continues to carry the motto: "MORE THAN JUST THE SCORE AND WE MEAN IT." As one of the posters here said, it is sophomoric. If you must have a motto, how about "More than just the scores." Says the same thing without the snarky add on. Or maybe they had the same design company that came up with the Acorn logo for AnnArbor.com come up with the motto.
It will be interesting to see if people arranging funerals delay the services until days when the paper is publishing. I only saw a couple of instances in the obituaries where people who died last weekend or Monday had funerals that had already occurred. It might be that people will delay services a day or two to make sure people see the notices in the paper. I could very well be wrong, but we'll watch it.
Not as many problems, and although I still don't like the font styles, the paper looked a lot better today than the first attempts last weekend.
No breaking news to speak of, but some decent features in the front section of the paper. Still, I don't understand why Midland, Bay City and Saginaw news are included in my Flint area paper, but it must be a function of a central copy desk.
The Sports section continues to carry the motto: "MORE THAN JUST THE SCORE AND WE MEAN IT." As one of the posters here said, it is sophomoric. If you must have a motto, how about "More than just the scores." Says the same thing without the snarky add on. Or maybe they had the same design company that came up with the Acorn logo for AnnArbor.com come up with the motto.
It will be interesting to see if people arranging funerals delay the services until days when the paper is publishing. I only saw a couple of instances in the obituaries where people who died last weekend or Monday had funerals that had already occurred. It might be that people will delay services a day or two to make sure people see the notices in the paper. I could very well be wrong, but we'll watch it.
Some times you feel like a nut, sometimes you pick it for your logo
I don't know whether to laugh or cry with the selection of an acorn as the new logo for the new AnnArbor.com.
Most of the people responding - and this has by far been the most commented on post yet - are flabbergasted that the new company ("by and for the residents of Ann Arbor") picked a New York firm to come up with a logo so colorless and uninteresting as to be a joke.
Once again, the poor quality, the inside-the-box thinking, does not bode well for the future of this enterprise. This is so bad you have to believe it is a joke meant to garner a lot of comments and then create a change.
Can I get a witness?
Most of the people responding - and this has by far been the most commented on post yet - are flabbergasted that the new company ("by and for the residents of Ann Arbor") picked a New York firm to come up with a logo so colorless and uninteresting as to be a joke.
Once again, the poor quality, the inside-the-box thinking, does not bode well for the future of this enterprise. This is so bad you have to believe it is a joke meant to garner a lot of comments and then create a change.
Can I get a witness?
Where have all the magazines gone?
At the time I left the FJ there was much excitement and talk about a new era of "niche" publications that would help rescue Booth/Advance.
In recent weeks it appears that the new era is over. After spending a lot of money to remodel and furnish a new office in the Journal building for the magazine operations, I'm told that the experiment has ended.
I only saw a couple copies of the slick magazine called YOUR Magazine and it looked good, but obviously must not have fed the Advance coffers enough to continue its publication although the website is still up.
The fare in the magazine was light, and much of it written by former colleagues which was very good for them. Sorry that another venue for colleagues to keep writing for money has ended.
In recent weeks it appears that the new era is over. After spending a lot of money to remodel and furnish a new office in the Journal building for the magazine operations, I'm told that the experiment has ended.
I only saw a couple copies of the slick magazine called YOUR Magazine and it looked good, but obviously must not have fed the Advance coffers enough to continue its publication although the website is still up.
The fare in the magazine was light, and much of it written by former colleagues which was very good for them. Sorry that another venue for colleagues to keep writing for money has ended.
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
This is who I wanted to be when I was in high school
For some reason Ricky Nelson popped into my head today. When I was in high school in the early 1960s more than anything else I wanted to be like Ricky Nelson. All the girls I knew loved his "dreamy" eyes and I just knew if I could just be like him, I might have a chance to get a date. Of course, he died way too young in 1985 in a plane crash. One of my favorite songs of all time is "Garden Party" because it so perfectly expresses what I believe that "you've got to please yourself." Which means to me you do what is right no matter what others think about you or expect.
The embedded song is probably half the reason I ended up joining the Navy. You can figure it out.
The embedded song is probably half the reason I ended up joining the Navy. You can figure it out.
JRC sells off my hometown weekly and several others
Not everyone has given up on newspapers. A relative newcomer to the newspaper business in Lapeer County has purchased the venerable longtime Lapeer weekly - The Lapeer County Press.
Bob Myers, whose family owned and operated The County Press for 60 years, sold the paper to Capital Cities/ABC in 1990 (which also owned my former employer The Oakland Press). Bob and I became friends during my time as a beat reporter for The Flint Journal here in Lapeer.
Bob once told me the biggest mistake he ever made was selling the love of his life, The County Press, to Capital Cities. I think Bob would be somewhat happy that the newspaper was back in the hands of local folks and not some corporate entity.
The View Newspapers group, which began just a few years ago, has swallowed up more than a dozen of the Thumb area newspapers owned by Journal Register Co., which is currently in bankruptcy.
The purchase was announced tonight on the View website.
This will be huge news here tomorrow when the LA View comes out. Looks like the sale won't officially occur until July and it's hard to say what the new publishing schedule will be.
I'm sure the View Newspapers got a good price for the papers, considering that JRC is holding a fire sale for many of its assets.
I'd love to see this work and prove all the naysayers wrong who say newspapers no longer work.
Bob Myers, whose family owned and operated The County Press for 60 years, sold the paper to Capital Cities/ABC in 1990 (which also owned my former employer The Oakland Press). Bob and I became friends during my time as a beat reporter for The Flint Journal here in Lapeer.
Bob once told me the biggest mistake he ever made was selling the love of his life, The County Press, to Capital Cities. I think Bob would be somewhat happy that the newspaper was back in the hands of local folks and not some corporate entity.
The View Newspapers group, which began just a few years ago, has swallowed up more than a dozen of the Thumb area newspapers owned by Journal Register Co., which is currently in bankruptcy.
The purchase was announced tonight on the View website.
This will be huge news here tomorrow when the LA View comes out. Looks like the sale won't officially occur until July and it's hard to say what the new publishing schedule will be.
I'm sure the View Newspapers got a good price for the papers, considering that JRC is holding a fire sale for many of its assets.
I'd love to see this work and prove all the naysayers wrong who say newspapers no longer work.
Apocalypse hits MLive site, unknown origin
Some of us thought that maybe MLive was running a test of a new site when it posted a strange message a little before noon today.
When you logged onto MLive there was a message "Apocalypse begins. Four Horsemen spotted in Otsego."
Don't know what happened after that, but obviously the gurus of the site got it fixed. If anyone knows what happened (the site doesn't acknowledge the message) drop a note here (anonymous, if you want).
When you logged onto MLive there was a message "Apocalypse begins. Four Horsemen spotted in Otsego."
Don't know what happened after that, but obviously the gurus of the site got it fixed. If anyone knows what happened (the site doesn't acknowledge the message) drop a note here (anonymous, if you want).
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
Detroit Free Press reporter tries to buy octupus in Pittsburgh
I don't usually like gimmicky news stories, but this video on the Detroit Free Press site was kind of cool. For those not familiar with the Detroit hockey tradition, fans throw octupus on the ice before (during and after, sometimes) playoff hockey games. The story is that the eight tentacles of an octupus signified the eight games it used to take to win the Stanley Cup. Now it takes 16 wins, but haven't seen anyone throw two octupi yet. Red Wings play the Penguins tonight at 8 p.m.
I'm taking this video down because it launches automatically and that is annoying many folks.
I'm taking this video down because it launches automatically and that is annoying many folks.
Conan hits it out of the park with this one
Gotta love this funny compilation from the new Tonight Show.
One more newspaper article for today
This from Fading to Black about newspapers which are still making money.
Forwards: The fastest rumor mill in the history of the world
I get lots of forwards. Many of them are interesting and a few contain interesting information, but most are simply what the cow leaves behind in the pasture.When I get an outrageous forward I always check it with Snopes.com. When I find one that is simply not true, I usually send a polite message back to the person who sent it to me with a link to the Snopes.com post that debunks it.
Last night I received a forward about a "Hotelicopter" which included photos of the alleged flying hotel. A quick check with Snopes yielded this information.
I imagine most people are familiar with Snopes.com, a site I used frequently when I was a working reporter. E-mail forwards may be contributing to a dumbed down America, one that believes anything it receives in the mail.
By the way, I never forward, even when it has one of those "please send this back to me to show me that you like me too" things. Nothing personal meant. I wish all of us would check out these ridiculous forwards and do our part to stop the spread of false information.
A profile of S. I. Newhouse Jr.
Lots of interesting insights into the head man in the Newhouse empire are found in this article. It's long, but worth the read, especially if you are a Booth/Advance person. Not much on the newspaper side of the business, but a good look at the Newhouse empire, both present and future.
Two articles worth the read
Thankfully, this blog, which gets an average of 480 hits per day (about 20 percent of them new visitors) has very informed readers who often send along links to really good stories about journalism and newspapers.
Here is one of the best summaries I have read so far.
Just a small excerpt, but the rest is worth reading as well:
"When you hear a newspaper executive claiming that his industry is an essential bulwark of society and that it stands threatened by a new technology that is, as of yet, unready to shoulder the same responsibility, you may be inclined to empathize. And indeed, that much is true enough as it goes.
But when that same newspaper executive then goes on to claim that this predicament has occurred through no fault on the industry's part, that they have merely been undone by new technologies, feel free to kick out his teeth. At that point, he's as fraudulent as the most self-aggrandized blogger."
Here's another from the Huffington Post.
Thanks to the two readers who supplied the links.
Here is one of the best summaries I have read so far.
Just a small excerpt, but the rest is worth reading as well:
"When you hear a newspaper executive claiming that his industry is an essential bulwark of society and that it stands threatened by a new technology that is, as of yet, unready to shoulder the same responsibility, you may be inclined to empathize. And indeed, that much is true enough as it goes.
But when that same newspaper executive then goes on to claim that this predicament has occurred through no fault on the industry's part, that they have merely been undone by new technologies, feel free to kick out his teeth. At that point, he's as fraudulent as the most self-aggrandized blogger."
Here's another from the Huffington Post.
Thanks to the two readers who supplied the links.
Sunday, May 31, 2009
Home again, home again jiggety jig, the end of a FJ era
Made it home from Buffalo in almost record time. Thanks to our Nexus passes at the border we do not have to wait in long lines at the customs stations there.
Settled in, got ready to catch up on the Detroit Red Wings game last night in my Sunday Flint Journal and, voila!, no game coverage at all. And with no Monday paper, no coverage of either Saturday's game or tonight's game until Thursday. (Go to MLive.com and see how poorly displayed - read not displayed - game coverage is there). Go to Freep.com and Detnews.com and see the difference between online game coverage.
Update: Here's the deal. If you have set your MLive.com to the Flint Journal page as a favorite you won't see any of the Red Wings coverage. But if you go to the overall site - MLive.com - You'll see some coverage. It only took me 20 minutes to figure this out. Why wouldn't you put a link at the top of the Flint Journal page for Red Wings coverage for folks who are going directly to your site. This is why the MLive format may just be the worst newspaper website design in the country.
Also whoever designed Page (Sports) B6 may have put together the ugliest newspaper page I have seen in a long time. No photos, no graphics and a major league bumping headline at the top of the page. Get a clue.
The new Executive Editor who wrote a glowing column about "A new era for your paper" didn't bother to mention new deadlines that didn't allow a Stanley Cup Finals game that ended before 11 p.m. on Saturday to be in Sunday's paper. Looked for a link to his column on MLive.com and couldn't find one.
What are the new deadlines anyway? I could find no breaking news (maybe the GM bankruptcy story qualifies, but it stands alone) in Sunday's paper, lots of features, including a Page 2 story out of Duluth, Minnesota about a voyage to discover if lake temperatures in Lake Superior are changing.
The new executive editor suggests going to MLive.com to keep up-to-date. Apparently, the new executive editor hasn't been to MLive.com to realize how impossible it is to find anything there. I like reading my old column, now Bryn's column "Off Beat." Try and find that anywhere on MLive.com. Oh, I'm sure it's there, but finding the most recent one is difficult, too difficult to waste much time doing it.
Look through the list of columnists and check out how old some of those columns on the home Flint Journal page are. One of the columns featured is still talking about how there is still time to research candidates for the early May city elections.
So while it may be a new era in the Flint Journal, I think I'm going to miss the old era, a lot. The old era actually had news and sports. And I mean it.
Settled in, got ready to catch up on the Detroit Red Wings game last night in my Sunday Flint Journal and, voila!, no game coverage at all. And with no Monday paper, no coverage of either Saturday's game or tonight's game until Thursday. (Go to MLive.com and see how poorly displayed - read not displayed - game coverage is there). Go to Freep.com and Detnews.com and see the difference between online game coverage.
Update: Here's the deal. If you have set your MLive.com to the Flint Journal page as a favorite you won't see any of the Red Wings coverage. But if you go to the overall site - MLive.com - You'll see some coverage. It only took me 20 minutes to figure this out. Why wouldn't you put a link at the top of the Flint Journal page for Red Wings coverage for folks who are going directly to your site. This is why the MLive format may just be the worst newspaper website design in the country.
Also whoever designed Page (Sports) B6 may have put together the ugliest newspaper page I have seen in a long time. No photos, no graphics and a major league bumping headline at the top of the page. Get a clue.
The new Executive Editor who wrote a glowing column about "A new era for your paper" didn't bother to mention new deadlines that didn't allow a Stanley Cup Finals game that ended before 11 p.m. on Saturday to be in Sunday's paper. Looked for a link to his column on MLive.com and couldn't find one.
What are the new deadlines anyway? I could find no breaking news (maybe the GM bankruptcy story qualifies, but it stands alone) in Sunday's paper, lots of features, including a Page 2 story out of Duluth, Minnesota about a voyage to discover if lake temperatures in Lake Superior are changing.
The new executive editor suggests going to MLive.com to keep up-to-date. Apparently, the new executive editor hasn't been to MLive.com to realize how impossible it is to find anything there. I like reading my old column, now Bryn's column "Off Beat." Try and find that anywhere on MLive.com. Oh, I'm sure it's there, but finding the most recent one is difficult, too difficult to waste much time doing it.
Look through the list of columnists and check out how old some of those columns on the home Flint Journal page are. One of the columns featured is still talking about how there is still time to research candidates for the early May city elections.
So while it may be a new era in the Flint Journal, I think I'm going to miss the old era, a lot. The old era actually had news and sports. And I mean it.
Newspaper slogans draw attention
The "More than just scores and we mean it!" slogan in the new Flint Journal has garnered a few pointed comments on my post about the new FJ design. Points I agree with, by the way.
The famous New York Times slogan "All the news that's fit to print" was often modified to "All the news that fits we print." But there were some bad slogans for real.
But it got me thinking about the old (don't know if it is still in place) Oakland Press motto that was at one time plastered on the building in downtown Pontiac.
"Delivered to a door step near you."
Of course, the jokes were that you would have to walk over and take it from a doorstep "near you" and brought a lot of pointed jabs at such a stupid slogan.
So if you have any more silly newspaper slogans, put them right here. Here's a funny site to get you started.
The famous New York Times slogan "All the news that's fit to print" was often modified to "All the news that fits we print." But there were some bad slogans for real.
But it got me thinking about the old (don't know if it is still in place) Oakland Press motto that was at one time plastered on the building in downtown Pontiac.
"Delivered to a door step near you."
Of course, the jokes were that you would have to walk over and take it from a doorstep "near you" and brought a lot of pointed jabs at such a stupid slogan.
So if you have any more silly newspaper slogans, put them right here. Here's a funny site to get you started.
Saturday, May 30, 2009
AnnArbor.com announces sports leaders
A Booth retread and an Oakland Press (Journal Register Co.) refugee will head the new sports coverage at AnnArbor.com.
I know nothing about either man so don't know if this is good or bad. Both will undoubtedly be glad to land on their feet (at least for a little while) as they dive off the deck of the two Titanics they are currently sailing on.
I know nothing about either man so don't know if this is good or bad. Both will undoubtedly be glad to land on their feet (at least for a little while) as they dive off the deck of the two Titanics they are currently sailing on.
Buffalo gas, cheaper than Michigan gas
For the first time ever, I paid less for gas in Buffalo, New York than I did in Michigan. Like 25 cents a gallon cheaper, which really makes me wonder (again) what is going on with gasoline prices.
Usually the gas here (because of much higher taxes) is 25-35 cents a gallon more expensive than Michigan, but not on this trip.
Time to punch some holes in U.S. territory and bring up some black gold, Texas tea and drive those prices down again. We can work on the green technology, but we are never going to be completely free of oil. Might as well dig up our own.
My thought for the day. Home tomorrow.
Usually the gas here (because of much higher taxes) is 25-35 cents a gallon more expensive than Michigan, but not on this trip.
Time to punch some holes in U.S. territory and bring up some black gold, Texas tea and drive those prices down again. We can work on the green technology, but we are never going to be completely free of oil. Might as well dig up our own.
My thought for the day. Home tomorrow.
Friday, May 29, 2009
Back to Buffalo and FJ party notes
Time to head back to Buffalo and collect my wife and bring her home for a couple of weeks. Things are going as good as can be expected there and we appreciate the concern and prayers of our friends.
Blogging will be light this weekend, but I will be thinking of my friends at the Flint Journal both those leaving and those staying. All good people. Wish I could be at the party tonight at PDs, but alas, I'll be in the land of Beef-on-weck and chicken wings.
Also, I earlier posted a note (sent to me by a Journal friend) that indicated that there might be a gathering on Saturday at 9 p.m. at the White Horse in Flint. In the interim, a lot of people who should know said they didn't know anything about that gathering. So you might check with someone before burning the gas to go to the White Horse in Flint on Saturday night.
The big party is at PDs and it is tonight, so enjoy. Let me know who shows up.
Blogging will be light this weekend, but I will be thinking of my friends at the Flint Journal both those leaving and those staying. All good people. Wish I could be at the party tonight at PDs, but alas, I'll be in the land of Beef-on-weck and chicken wings.
Also, I earlier posted a note (sent to me by a Journal friend) that indicated that there might be a gathering on Saturday at 9 p.m. at the White Horse in Flint. In the interim, a lot of people who should know said they didn't know anything about that gathering. So you might check with someone before burning the gas to go to the White Horse in Flint on Saturday night.
The big party is at PDs and it is tonight, so enjoy. Let me know who shows up.
An interesting 'outsourcing' article
A loyal reader sent along this link about the effects of "outsourcing" news coverage.
Thursday, May 28, 2009
Newspaper executives 'plotting' new course
Slate.com has an article about a Chicago meeting involving a number of newspaper company executives, including Advance Publications.
The article seems to imply that the executives are in collusion (actually the headline says that) about a common agreement to charge for Internet content.
Some are alleging that would be an anti-trust situation, if true. An embedded link is a really detailed summary of the meeting.
One of my favorite paragraphs:
"There are various ways to go about it, and one size won't fit all. During their days of print advertising plenty, the people in this room, or their predecessors, made the catastrophic, myopic decision to not charge. They gave away their expensive efforts for free. They by and large misjudged the significance of the internet."
Yes they did, and they ignored those of us who questioned the wisdom of such a move. Yet, we are gone and they are still there. Go figure.
The article seems to imply that the executives are in collusion (actually the headline says that) about a common agreement to charge for Internet content.
Some are alleging that would be an anti-trust situation, if true. An embedded link is a really detailed summary of the meeting.
One of my favorite paragraphs:
"There are various ways to go about it, and one size won't fit all. During their days of print advertising plenty, the people in this room, or their predecessors, made the catastrophic, myopic decision to not charge. They gave away their expensive efforts for free. They by and large misjudged the significance of the internet."
Yes they did, and they ignored those of us who questioned the wisdom of such a move. Yet, we are gone and they are still there. Go figure.
A short history of newspaper despair
Although it only covers about 50 of the top newspapers a Wall Street Journal map and chart does a pretty good summary on the travails of newspapers in the last couple years. For the record, I found this item on Newspaper Death Watch.
Flint Journal test fires its new design
Just plucked my Flint Journal out of the box and immediately noticed the redesign.
Apparently ahead of next week's three-day-a-week launch the paper decided to test fire its new design. Design is a matter of personal taste, so take this criticism as such. Yuck.
First of all, this is about the 18,123rd (only a slight exaggeration) redesign of the paper since I've been involved with it since 1989. Management somehow believes that by changing type fonts and rearranging sections readers will come flocking back to the paper.
Change the name of the Entertainment Section from "Entertainer" to "Let's Go" and you're off to the races in their mind.
Hint: It's about news and content. It has always been about news and content. Even on the Internet, it was always be about news and content. Good, clean layouts help, but if there's nothing to read, it won't matter if it's a masterpiece design.
Maybe it's just me, but I didn't see one crime or breaking news story in the paper today. Hopefully that means that crime has stopped in Flint.
I'll digest more of the changes and come back later, but (again this is personal choice) I have never like all-capitals anything and from a first glance it appears that all bylines will be all caps, jump headlines will be all caps and some of the light font headline versions disappear off the page.
They did leave the flag (masthead) pretty much untouched, but give them time.
Apparently ahead of next week's three-day-a-week launch the paper decided to test fire its new design. Design is a matter of personal taste, so take this criticism as such. Yuck.
First of all, this is about the 18,123rd (only a slight exaggeration) redesign of the paper since I've been involved with it since 1989. Management somehow believes that by changing type fonts and rearranging sections readers will come flocking back to the paper.
Change the name of the Entertainment Section from "Entertainer" to "Let's Go" and you're off to the races in their mind.
Hint: It's about news and content. It has always been about news and content. Even on the Internet, it was always be about news and content. Good, clean layouts help, but if there's nothing to read, it won't matter if it's a masterpiece design.
Maybe it's just me, but I didn't see one crime or breaking news story in the paper today. Hopefully that means that crime has stopped in Flint.
I'll digest more of the changes and come back later, but (again this is personal choice) I have never like all-capitals anything and from a first glance it appears that all bylines will be all caps, jump headlines will be all caps and some of the light font headline versions disappear off the page.
They did leave the flag (masthead) pretty much untouched, but give them time.
Brittany Hart Smith - Graduate
While I'm bragging about granddaughters let me just say how very, very proud I am of my oldest granddaughter, Brittany, 17, who is graduating from high school this June.Too bright for a regular high school, Brittany finished many of her required classes at the local community college - Cabrillo, in Capitola, California.
I love our political discussions and love how she holds her own with her own beliefs. Oh, and for teaching me that hair extensions are not permanent like a tattoo.
Yeaaah Red Wings! Noooo Penguins!
I already bragged about this over on Facebook, but last year I taught my then 2-year-old granddaughter to say "Yeaaaah Red Wings! Nooooo Penguins!" during last year's Stanley Cup Finals between the Detroit Red Wings and Pittsburgh Penguins.So let me just say how proud I am that at 3-years-old she is already up-to-speed on this year's Cup Finals and has never forgotten the "Yeaaaah Red Wings! Nooooo Penguins" chant. Of course, it does cause some minor problems when she sees the cute little creature that is a penguin.
It's not like she would club a real baby penguin, or anything.
Showing the love here to my favorite team - The Detroit Red Wings.
And to all my California friends who root for the Anaheim Ducks (bad name for a sports team) and the San Jose Sharks (which is a great name for a team that provides really good practice for the Red Wings annual playoff run), just wait'll next year.
A tough week for Flint Journal employees
Just wanted to note that with the looming layoffs/buyout departures tomorrow, Friday, May 29, that many of my former colleagues are struggling through a tough week. I've seen their countdowns on Facebook and their poignant comments.
Some of them were actually asked to stay, but at such a reduced rate of pay that they made the decision to leave. Good for them. Until management announces what pay cuts they took, there will always be a high level of suspicion over whether the pain is being equally shared. Not saying it isn't, but it should be shared with the staff.
Some familiar columnists bylines will stay on, but on a freelance basis. There has been much talk about freelance pay here in recent days, but I'll bet some freelancers will make a lot more than others.
The paper will pay only as much as they have to and as little as people will accept. Nothing wrong with that from a purely business sense, but the paper will limit the quality of its product by hiring on the cheap. Not because the people left aren't good people, some are great people, but low pay and long hours will hurt morale and that will translant into quality issues.
This is not a business plan for survival, it is death by a thousand cuts. The only constant is that the people who led the company through this decline, continue to lead it. There's an old saying about continuing to do the same thing, but expecting a different result.
Someone from Bay City or Saginaw has been posting this stupidity: (I'll paraphrase) With the departure of so many people and with pay cuts "now we'll see who is just working for a paycheck."
That may be the dumbest thing I've ever heard. Who doesn't work for a paycheck? Has the guy who is posting that nonsense agreed to work for free now? Unless he has volunteered to do his job for nothing, I guess he has put himself in that same category.
Most people at the Flint Journal worked for many more hours than they were paid and worked odd strange schedules that no union organization would ever tolerate. They have done that because they love what they do and want to do it well. They also did it for a paycheck.
I once argued with a Board of Directors member (a publisher of a string of Michigan weeklies) at The State News over his comment that "reporters aren't motivated by higher pay." That's when the maximum pay for student journalists at The State News was $25-$35 a week for about 25-35 hours of work.
I vehemently objected to his premise. I may have even referred to it as solid cow exhaust. While many of us loved our work, we like everyone else, have bills to pay and children to raise. That doesn't happen without a paycheck.
Back to my colleagues. Keep your heads up, the demise of the Flint Journal is the result of a number of factors, the economy, the general decline of newspaper advertising and the incompetence of the Booth/Advance leadership, but you have done your jobs and done them well.
Good luck to you all.
Some of them were actually asked to stay, but at such a reduced rate of pay that they made the decision to leave. Good for them. Until management announces what pay cuts they took, there will always be a high level of suspicion over whether the pain is being equally shared. Not saying it isn't, but it should be shared with the staff.
Some familiar columnists bylines will stay on, but on a freelance basis. There has been much talk about freelance pay here in recent days, but I'll bet some freelancers will make a lot more than others.
The paper will pay only as much as they have to and as little as people will accept. Nothing wrong with that from a purely business sense, but the paper will limit the quality of its product by hiring on the cheap. Not because the people left aren't good people, some are great people, but low pay and long hours will hurt morale and that will translant into quality issues.
This is not a business plan for survival, it is death by a thousand cuts. The only constant is that the people who led the company through this decline, continue to lead it. There's an old saying about continuing to do the same thing, but expecting a different result.
Someone from Bay City or Saginaw has been posting this stupidity: (I'll paraphrase) With the departure of so many people and with pay cuts "now we'll see who is just working for a paycheck."
That may be the dumbest thing I've ever heard. Who doesn't work for a paycheck? Has the guy who is posting that nonsense agreed to work for free now? Unless he has volunteered to do his job for nothing, I guess he has put himself in that same category.
Most people at the Flint Journal worked for many more hours than they were paid and worked odd strange schedules that no union organization would ever tolerate. They have done that because they love what they do and want to do it well. They also did it for a paycheck.
I once argued with a Board of Directors member (a publisher of a string of Michigan weeklies) at The State News over his comment that "reporters aren't motivated by higher pay." That's when the maximum pay for student journalists at The State News was $25-$35 a week for about 25-35 hours of work.
I vehemently objected to his premise. I may have even referred to it as solid cow exhaust. While many of us loved our work, we like everyone else, have bills to pay and children to raise. That doesn't happen without a paycheck.
Back to my colleagues. Keep your heads up, the demise of the Flint Journal is the result of a number of factors, the economy, the general decline of newspaper advertising and the incompetence of the Booth/Advance leadership, but you have done your jobs and done them well.
Good luck to you all.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Daily Derelict chimes in with customer subscription story
Over on Daily Derelict there is more about the new subscriptions at the Flint Journal.
Happy Birthday William!
My oldest, William, is 39 years old today. Now I officially feel old. William has had to overcome several challenges in his life, for which I am very proud of him. Enjoy your day and your Michigan State jersey is on its way!That's him giving me the hand at an outdoor, beachfront restaurant in beautiful Capitola, California. And him again sitting in my late brother's chair (his Uncle Mike). That's my sister-in-law Barbara next to him.
Monday, May 25, 2009
Callen Courtemanche a life to remember today
For those who have not been touched directly by the losses in war, I'd like to give you a name to think about today. When I put my flag out this morning, it will be in honor of Callen Courtemanche, a high school classmate and friend, who lost his life in Vietnam on January 31, 1968. (For newspaper editors who love birthday connections, it was five days after his 21st birthday).The several times I have visited the Wall in Washington, D.C., or the traveling wall when it comes locally, I always look for and pray over Cal's name.
I'll also give a salute to my brother, a Vietnam vet, who died of an infection on New Year's Day. A lot of my brother's medical problems were believed related to his service and he was just days and weeks short of getting his disability payments for them when he died.
My grandfather served in World War I, my uncle, father and stepfather all served in World War II, so service comes naturally to our family.
At the same time Cal was shot and killed, I was aboard the relative safety of a Navy destroyer in the Gulf of Tonkin rescuing Navy fighter pilots and providing shore bombardment support for Marines like Cal. Cal and I were not close friends in school, just the kind of friends who had known each other through elementary, junior high and high school. We would stop and talk or each lunch together if our best friends were not available.
My mother and stepfather knew the Courtemanches and I heard the name in our house frequently. So it came as a bit of a shock when I received a letter from my mother, about a month after Cal died (remember no e-mail and only snail military mail - which had to be where snail mail got its name) telling me of Cal's death. He was one of two men (William James Burke was the other) that I knew personally who were killed in Vietnam, but Cal was the one I was closest to
o. I left a message on a Virtual Wall message board a couple years ago.Sometimes I think how much Cal missed. He and I were the same age, graduated from high school in 1965. I've enjoyed a short police career and a long newspaper career and have seen two of my boys raised and my two stepchildren grow in to maturity. I have the joy of two grandchildren with another on the way, and a wife to love and grow old with. Cal had none of that. His life ended in an inhospitable jungle in a war that probably should never have been fought, could have been won, but that people and politicians simpl
y tired of.My fellow Vietnam veterans are universally adamant that our current military will never suffer the disgust and hate we did when we arrived home. But to put things in perspective, I may not have had a big parade or welcome home, but at least I had a life, that's something Cal and 55,000-plus did not have. Give that a thought today.
So when I don my American Legion outfit today and salute, I'll have the names of two men firmly in my mind. If you have someone in your life who was lost due to war, please post them in the comments and let us all remember them today.
The top picture is Cal after his graduation from boot camp. The second picture is his Crescenta Valley High School senior picture and the third image is a tracing down of his name at The Wall.
This will be the only post today.
Sunday, May 24, 2009
FJ Adios Party at Pds on Friday, White Horse on Saturday
I have been asked to spread the word that current and former Flint Journal employees are invited to two good-bye parties for current Journal employees who will work their last day on Friday, May 29.
The first party is at Pds (PDs) Pub, 5153 Fenton Road in Flint starting at 5 p.m. until the last dog has died.
The second party is going old school at the White Horse Tavern in Flint starting about 9 p.m. until the cops (the ones who aren't there already) shut it down. (That was a joke).
Unfortunately, I have to return to Buffalo Friday afternoon so I won't be able to attend either party, but I'll tip a root beer in Buffalo to so many fine journalists now back on the shelf. All of them will be better off in the end, and the Journal will be worse off for their loss.
The first party is at Pds (PDs) Pub, 5153 Fenton Road in Flint starting at 5 p.m. until the last dog has died.
The second party is going old school at the White Horse Tavern in Flint starting about 9 p.m. until the cops (the ones who aren't there already) shut it down. (That was a joke).
Unfortunately, I have to return to Buffalo Friday afternoon so I won't be able to attend either party, but I'll tip a root beer in Buffalo to so many fine journalists now back on the shelf. All of them will be better off in the end, and the Journal will be worse off for their loss.
Just in case you thought you were having a bad day
Probably staged, but still should make you feel like your day is better than the guy in the convertible.
Thanks to my cousin Cynthia for this photo.
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