Old news, again
The Enquirer doesn't understand speed. On Wednesday morning, it had a front-page story about a skier killed at Perfect North. The skier died on Sunday, and I saw it on Ch. 12 news on Monday night. This is something I've written before: If something big happens on the weekend, it takes the Enquirer a few days to recover because they're so understaffed on weekends. This week was especially bad because of the holiday on Monday.
This morning brings the front-page story about people clogging the iTunes site in a post-Christmas rush. What good does this story do the reader? The news was two days old. The story doesn't tell me anything useful to help me get through to iTunes. And, if I already tried and failed, then I already know the site was overrun so it's not news to me. This is unsophisticated news judgement, that anything having to do with Apple gets onto the front page whether or not the editors understand it.
I couldn't find another newspaper in Ohio or anywhere else that put this story on the front page. Apple's two hometown newspapers did have Apple stories on the front page, but it wasn't iTunes. Both the San Jose Mercury News and the San Francisco Chronicle reported that Apple may have forged documents to backdate Steve Jobs's options.
This morning brings the front-page story about people clogging the iTunes site in a post-Christmas rush. What good does this story do the reader? The news was two days old. The story doesn't tell me anything useful to help me get through to iTunes. And, if I already tried and failed, then I already know the site was overrun so it's not news to me. This is unsophisticated news judgement, that anything having to do with Apple gets onto the front page whether or not the editors understand it.
I couldn't find another newspaper in Ohio or anywhere else that put this story on the front page. Apple's two hometown newspapers did have Apple stories on the front page, but it wasn't iTunes. Both the San Jose Mercury News and the San Francisco Chronicle reported that Apple may have forged documents to backdate Steve Jobs's options.
posted by Newsache at 3:42 PM
2 Comments:
News Ache,
Have you seen this story about Gannett's dispute with the Guild at The Indianapolis Star? The corporation wanted reporters to write ad copy. Think The Enquirer will try that next?
http://www.ibj.com/html/detail_page.asp?content=170
If the report of the death at Perfect North happened a few days late, what is the effect? Reporting that someone is killed in an accident a day or so later doesn't really make the person more or less dead and the report is not needed to prevent another dead. So what is the big deal.
Now if the reporter got all of the information on how many of these falls occur and what should be done to avoid them and included the report of the death and ALL of the information surrounding the death, we might have something.
But the Enquirer seldom answers all of the questions, ever.
Dieter Schmied
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