News University | Today's most popular courses on NewsU, Poynter's e-learning site for journalists. |
| |
Webinars | Our online classroom is just a click away. Learn more. | |
|
|
 
Romenesko
Latest News
Reporting
& Writing
Ethics &
Diversity
Leadership
& Business
Visual
Journalism
Online &
Technology
TV &
Radio
Journalism
Education
|
Article Feedback
View all feedback
Late Editor Blames Three Key People for Newspapers' Demise
(Read the Article)
Post Feedback |
Feedback Guidelines |
Report Feedback Abuse
Page 1 of 1
"art" vs. function
Posted by
Mike Laughlin
5/21/2009 11:58:12 AM
Horizontal modular layout is a functional and useful tool. Research proved it helped readers dive-into, and understand the news. Where it went wr...
Horizontal modular layout is a functional and useful tool. Research proved it helped readers dive-into, and understand the news. Where it went wrong is when the art dept. took over layout.
Acid test should always be: "Does this layout/type/element help the reader?" Instead, the arteest goes for art. Results are often dysfunctional.
As a reader you know the frustrations:
*Tiny sizes, obscure fonts, hopeless font/background color combos, type inside busy art.
*Layouts where heds and copy are treated as secondary art elements instead of News of the Day.
Put "functional" in front of horizontal modular and I believe we've got a winner.
Blaming the layout
Posted by
John Hopkins
3/30/2009 3:22:37 PM
I had thought it was the NY Herald Tribune that started us on the road to modular layout. Whether it was them or the Courier-Journal,...
I had thought it was the NY Herald Tribune that started us on the road to modular layout. Whether it was them or the Courier-Journal, though, the blame lies not with the design style but with the faith that Ed Arnold and his disciples placed in design to save newspapers from their congenital flaws.
Some of those flaws were very well described by our colleague from Atlanta.
Wicked Wall Street
Posted by
Etta Walsh
3/30/2009 11:49:35 AM
Too bad that he was a part of the problem, at USA Today. Hindsight, etc., etc.
Worst thing to happen to a lot of businesses...
Too bad that he was a part of the problem, at USA Today. Hindsight, etc., etc.
Worst thing to happen to a lot of businesses -- not just newspapers -- was the short-sighted, headlong rush into Wall Street for that "easy money" by going public.
"Heh, heh, right, sir. Just sign on the dotted line! Oh, and by the way, each quarter we expect you to post a profit and we will punish you if you don't! It's easy! All you have to do is charge more to advertisers, shrink the newshole, and layoff reporters! Simple. A child could do it."
Maybe we should shutter all those MBA schools, and kick all those leveraged-buyout asshats down the stairs. Really, could they have done any worse? Were they actually TRYING to ruin the economy?
1 out of 3
Posted by
Constantine von Hoffman
3/30/2009 10:07:42 AM
Hard to argue with a dead guy but ... in tagging Liebling he blames the messenger -- which is usually what people do when they...
Hard to argue with a dead guy but ... in tagging Liebling he blames the messenger -- which is usually what people do when they don't like those inconvenient facts they report. As to the layout editor -- go back and try to read old papers, I dare you. They were the very definition of reader-unfriendly. With Neuharth, I think he's nailed it.
Blame the designers?
Posted by
Seth Schrock
3/30/2009 6:06:53 AM
Oh sure, blame the design guys. If papers look like they did 60 years ago, things would be going so much better right now. I...
Oh sure, blame the design guys. If papers look like they did 60 years ago, things would be going so much better right now. I just hate it when I open my paper and see a big color graphic explaining why a building collapsed. Or a six-column photo of a city underwater. What were they thinking?
Some clues for you
Posted by
John klidney
3/28/2009 4:30:29 PM
Has anyone even considered that half of the country feels insulted by the overwhelming leftist/socialist/communist slant that the AP and Reuters...
Has anyone even considered that half of the country feels insulted by the overwhelming leftist/socialist/communist slant that the AP and Reuters serve up in print?
You have destroyed yourselves and are too brainwashed in your leftism to see it.
The left of this country are poor and under-educated. The right has money and can read.
What a bunch of economic geniuses you people are.
Blame, Blame and More Blame
Posted by
Fred Barrett
3/28/2009 2:05:09 PM
I have been in this industry for 7 years now. I knew when I entered this industry, it was in trouble. The industry is the...
I have been in this industry for 7 years now. I knew when I entered this industry, it was in trouble. The industry is the reason for its demise. There has been a true failure in the adaptation to the technological movement. This failure is based on editorial and especially advertising.
Mediocrity rules the world, especially the newspaper industry.
Dead Wrong, "Dead Wrong"
Posted by
Randy Campbell
3/28/2009 1:03:18 PM
Whatever you mean by the obvious statement "Revenue shortfalls causes the crisis, not changes to the editorial product," would require a belief t...
Whatever you mean by the obvious statement "Revenue shortfalls causes the crisis, not changes to the editorial product," would require a belief that the actual product being sold has no impact on sales.
I'm not buying it.
Off the mark
Posted by
Nimish Amin
3/28/2009 11:01:12 AM
The only place this story hits close to the mark is where it says newspapers began doing what other newspapers were doing. That's a rich...
The only place this story hits close to the mark is where it says newspapers began doing what other newspapers were doing. That's a rich newspapering tradition and continues today.
Time magazine hit a home run with its piece several weeks ago.
Most newspaper managers rose to their positions when innovation didn't matter. Obviously, today it does. But most newsrooms aren't led by innovators. Most are led by people who have to be told how to innovate.
This is why newspapers are more and more irrelevant in terms of being a source of news. Online news distribution has been around for more than 12 years and papers are only now acknowledging it as the place to get news.
Walter got it right
Posted by
Kirk Cheyfitz
3/28/2009 9:26:40 AM
I actually can recall having conversations with my editors in the late 70s and early 80s about the need to keeps newspapers doing what newspapers...
I actually can recall having conversations with my editors in the late 70s and early 80s about the need to keeps newspapers doing what newspapers do best--breaking news--instead of imitating magazines and TV. Regarding the three villains cited by John Walter: First, I understand (as some apparently do not) that his tongue was firmly in his cheek as he lodged these murder allegations. But, second, while I excuse Liebling and the design directors, I join in condemning Neuharth. Al not only helped destroy independent ownership of newspapers, ultimately putting the whole business under the management of managers instead of newspaper people, he also TV-ified the papers greatly. USA Today, his brainchild and the great proponent of the 10-second read, is certainly an instrument in bludgeoning the business to death, despite its initial success.
user-centric revenue model
Posted by
Allan Hoving
3/27/2009 2:25:06 PM
We're moving on now, folks, to the next stages of grief: "the upward turn" and "reconstruction and working through." We now focus on developing n...
We're moving on now, folks, to the next stages of grief: "the upward turn" and "reconstruction and working through." We now focus on developing new online revenue models that will support (we hope profitably) all these wonderful organizations and people. For your consideration: a User-Centric Online Revenue Model I call PayCheckr ("Keeping what's read in the black") at http://www.paycheckr.com
Thought provoking
Posted by
Charles Batchelor
3/27/2009 1:47:31 PM
John Walter's job was to do the newspaper, not reinvent the newspaper. It's a tough job that takes skill, courage and hard work.
This make...
John Walter's job was to do the newspaper, not reinvent the newspaper. It's a tough job that takes skill, courage and hard work.
This make me think. I take his points, made colorfully, to be:
1) It's not wise to discount the product and then ask people to value it. People expect the price to the price.
2) Many newspaper publishers (& especially their ad staffs) in many one paper markets became "dull as dog poop" because they ere arrogant, greedy and lazy after the merger mania. (This did and continues to make the web even more appealing than it would have been otherwise.)
3) Features with pretty pictures are easier and more fun to do that hard news, but many newspapers will not invest in the creative talent to pull it off in a compelling way, and instead are "soft and squishy as hell."
4) Investors are looking for the best return, not just a good return. If one day brass widgets make more money than publishing, that will be the day "when Wall Street wasn't going to love" newspapers. Short term investors are a problem for every firm--including newspapers.
Sounds like a nice guy. Too bad he's not around.
Dead wrong
Posted by
Alan Jacobson
3/27/2009 11:54:52 AM
Revenue shortfalls causes the crisis, not changes to the editorial product. Deep Throat got it right: "Follow the money," as explained back in 19...
Revenue shortfalls causes the crisis, not changes to the editorial product. Deep Throat got it right: "Follow the money," as explained back in 1998:
http://bit.ly/3L0K9S
Hypocrite
Posted by
John Telford
3/27/2009 11:51:35 AM
I love how a lot of old, retired "newspaper men" have plenty of fingers to point around the room at the people they imagine played...
I love how a lot of old, retired "newspaper men" have plenty of fingers to point around the room at the people they imagine played a role in the death of newspapers.
Funny how none of them see themselves as having anything to do with it.
Mr. Walters' career spanned more than 30 years, and he reached the heights of upper management. If he had such clear insight into what was wrong with newspapers, surely he was in a position to do something about it.
Instead he did nothing...except to write this little note which does nothing but expose his own hypocrisy.
Page 1 of 1
View all feedback
|
|
