Journalism: June 2008 Archives
Having spent a great deal of last year consulting for Fanista.com. I recently signed up with the Gerson Lehman Group as a consultant on media, technology and content.
As part of the GLG groups, I am asked to comment on certain news stories and trends. Asked to comment on the recent story about the LA Times intention to move to a 50/50 ad to edit ratio, and to comment in general on the cuts at the LA Times occasioned by Sam Zell's acquisition of the paper and the state of the newspaper industry, I offered up the following:
6/19/2008, 2:51 PM | Mr. Tom Teicholz - Producer and Content Consultant | Tom Teicholz Productions
Editorial cost is often the easiest to cut, and the first place new management turns to for cost savings.
However, quality editorial creates value and distinguishes product in the market place.
Publications that pay for top writers and produce a high quality product, such as The Financial Times and The New Yorker are thriving in a marketplace where others are suffering.
A depressed marketplace for content is an opportune time to invest in editorial, and recruit the best writers, reporters, editors to make a better product. Not better meaning hewing to a lofty ideal, but better in terms of reporting, scoops, service writing, and writing that grabs readers, and stories that readers talk about by the water cooler.
Excellence is a unique selling proposition.
Zell would be better advised to invest in editorial.
As part of the GLG groups, I am asked to comment on certain news stories and trends. Asked to comment on the recent story about the LA Times intention to move to a 50/50 ad to edit ratio, and to comment in general on the cuts at the LA Times occasioned by Sam Zell's acquisition of the paper and the state of the newspaper industry, I offered up the following:
The L.A. Times's Human Wrecking Ball
www.washingtonpost.com | (view article) Tech, Media, & Telecom > Media > Print > PublishingWill trimming editorial improve newspapers?
6/19/2008, 2:51 PM | Mr. Tom Teicholz - Producer and Content Consultant | Tom Teicholz Productions
Implications
Editorial cost is often the easiest to cut, and the first place new management turns to for cost savings. However, quality editorial creates value and distinguishes product in the market place. Excellence is a unique selling proposition. Publications that pay for top writers and produce a high quality product, such as The Financial Times and The New Yorker are thriving in a marketplace where others are suffering. Zell would be better advised to invest in editorial.
Analysis
The announcement by Sam Zell and the LA Times that they intend to move to a 50/50 edit to ad page ratio is the latest salvo in any attempt to cure the newspaper's ills. However, cutting editorial may not be, in the long run the best strategy.Editorial cost is often the easiest to cut, and the first place new management turns to for cost savings.
However, quality editorial creates value and distinguishes product in the market place.
Publications that pay for top writers and produce a high quality product, such as The Financial Times and The New Yorker are thriving in a marketplace where others are suffering.
A depressed marketplace for content is an opportune time to invest in editorial, and recruit the best writers, reporters, editors to make a better product. Not better meaning hewing to a lofty ideal, but better in terms of reporting, scoops, service writing, and writing that grabs readers, and stories that readers talk about by the water cooler.
Excellence is a unique selling proposition.
Zell would be better advised to invest in editorial.
This is exactly the question England's Guardian newspaper set out to answer. In today's installment, dance critics, visual art critics, and other arts writers, review horse racing, darts and crickets. Click Here.
Tomorrow the sports writers take on the arts.
Tomorrow the sports writers take on the arts.
Here's the link to "The Pariah Loophole" in today's LA Times in which I discuss how former Nazis remain free here because no country will take them.
Reports appeared today that the LA Times Sunday Magazine is no more (again). Or Rather than the current regime has all been fired and that the magazine has been turned over to the business side who will devise their own version of the magazine, free from the control of the editorial side, and engage writers as they see fit -- Annie Gilbar, who some of you may recall from LA Style days, but who more recently has been hosting a show on the Home Shopping network -- not that there;s anything wrong with that.....
I suppose this is the way of the world as extreme capitalism overtakes every institution and industry. Yes, the bean counters are in control. But is this any different than at the movie studios? Who runs the studios these days? In many cases it si executives who made their bones not in the creative ranks but rising from the marketing department -- Disney's Oren Aviv, Universal's Marc Schmuger come to mind. At Sony, their have both Amy Pascal and Michael Lynton, at the studio's helm
There is obvious concern that the editorial product will suffer as a result. It well may -- depeneding on what kind of magazine you are expecting. The Sunday Times may be less, say New York Review Books, and more Angeleno.
But in order not to be tossed out with other advertising supplements the Magazine will still need to have a voice, and there is no better distinguishing factor than excellence. At the end of the day, if you hire good writers, and pay them well, --- I would like to say that will guarantee success but it doesn't (BUT I AM ALWAYS IN FAVOR OF WRITERS BEING WELL PAID).
I suppose this is the way of the world as extreme capitalism overtakes every institution and industry. Yes, the bean counters are in control. But is this any different than at the movie studios? Who runs the studios these days? In many cases it si executives who made their bones not in the creative ranks but rising from the marketing department -- Disney's Oren Aviv, Universal's Marc Schmuger come to mind. At Sony, their have both Amy Pascal and Michael Lynton, at the studio's helm
There is obvious concern that the editorial product will suffer as a result. It well may -- depeneding on what kind of magazine you are expecting. The Sunday Times may be less, say New York Review Books, and more Angeleno.
But in order not to be tossed out with other advertising supplements the Magazine will still need to have a voice, and there is no better distinguishing factor than excellence. At the end of the day, if you hire good writers, and pay them well, --- I would like to say that will guarantee success but it doesn't (BUT I AM ALWAYS IN FAVOR OF WRITERS BEING WELL PAID).
Amy Fine Collins, who often writes on fashion, and who administrates the International Best Dressed List, has written an exclusive web piece for VanityFair.com called "Jewish Like Me" about her own feelings and experiences, and coming to terms with her Jewish identity.
Like many journalists, sometimes the best stories you have to tell, are the ones you avoid, that force you to discuss uncomfortable moments in your life and expose others -- going to those places and writing about them sometimes produces great writing, great stories (and in the case of the Judd Apatow gang, great comedies --but that's another story). Here, Collins has written a wonderful piece that deserves to be read far and wide, and she deserves kudos for doing do. Brava! and, more to the point, Mazel Tov!
Like many journalists, sometimes the best stories you have to tell, are the ones you avoid, that force you to discuss uncomfortable moments in your life and expose others -- going to those places and writing about them sometimes produces great writing, great stories (and in the case of the Judd Apatow gang, great comedies --but that's another story). Here, Collins has written a wonderful piece that deserves to be read far and wide, and she deserves kudos for doing do. Brava! and, more to the point, Mazel Tov!
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