Advertising vs. News Smackdown

The biggest commotion at the AMA Richmond panel discussion today was when Jason Roop, editor of Style, asked Scott Christino, retail and national manager of the Times-Dispatch, about where Brick drew the line between subjectivity and ads disguised as news. The audience, previously subdued, went into a low, humming buzz, whispering “What’s Brick?” We’ll get to that later.

The panel was Christino, (T-D Guy); Aaron Kremer, youthful owner of richmondbizsense.com (Web Guy); Don Richards, vp and gm of Channel 12 (TV Guy); Roop (Style Guy); and Bob Willoughby, general manager of Cox Radio (Radio Guy).

Round 1. Style Guy is thrilled to be in publishing and journalism right now. Good journalism is, like the Colbert Report, truthiness combined with fun. TV Guy yada yada. Web Guy says richmondbizsense has 3,000 daily readers. Radio Guy is all about making marketing work. T-D Guy, who wears a pencil behind his ear the whole time, reminds everyone the T-D is also three websites that offer “electronic solutions.” Advertising is like diet and exercise. Done regularly, your business will have a long and healthy life.

Round 2. Radio Guy says consumers are time-starved and radio is the only portable electronic media. (Huh? Everyone at Panera is carrying laptops and iPhones, not radios.) It has low production costs, offers websites, and client endorsements. (I assume he means all the announcers telling you how much they love their mattresses, or poor Glenn Beck shilling investing in gold. Even the mighty Limbaugh does endorsement ads.) Radio can become part of your story! Even stations with low ratings have loyal, responsive listeners. Style Guy (reading my mind) pipes in with the iPhone KO. Twitter, Facebook…all portable electronic media. Score 1, Style Guy.

TV Guy says they’re always fighting the impression that TV advertising is expensive, when they’re actually “pretty flexible.” (i.e, we’ll take what you got now). “We were wireless before wireless was cool.” Even with all the media available, TV still reaches 80 percent of homes weekly, same as always.

Web Guy says he has a niche audience, and his niche is “salivating” over his website. He gets the who’s who in Richmond business. Plus, he has low overhead. No legacy expenses or pensions. Since they only do web ads, they are the master of web ad technology.

Round 3. T-D Guy says the Richmond Chic column in the Sunday Flair section is barely disguised advertising that produces big sales after an item appears in the column. Radio Guy fesses up that the air talent have deals to promote products. (No kidding?!) They all agree it’s important to keep the news clean of advertising to maintain reader trust. Style Guy crows they have more readers than ever between the paper and online and Style strives for news purity, even though it is sad when adside co-workers lose commissions because of it. So sad. TV Guy assures us that the viewers know it when they see ad placement where it shouldn’t be.

Did we all know it when 30 Rock made the goodness of McDonald’s McFlurries a critical plot point?

Radio Guy backtracked that “people are really not coming to us for news.” T-D Guy moved forward that news is never impacted by advertising. “There’s a wall, but there’s a door on that wall…” conceding that without advertising, nobody gets paid. Style Guy steps in for the take-down. “Brick?” (Which is not above letting restaurant owners write their own reviews at times.)

The AMA audience has never heard of Brick. There is a what-is-this-thing-called-Brick buzz. Is there a magazine that will give them all the editorial support they crave and they didn’t know about it? Where is this Brick? The cornered T-D Guy flounders and turns to his reinforcements, for lo and behold, T-D Director of Product Innovation and Strategic Marketing Frazier Millner is in the audience. She is always in the audience when anyone from the T-D appears anywhere, and they always default to her. She pops up like a jack-in-the-box. “Non-core product,” she declares. (I’m going to use that excuse whenever I do anything unethical from now on. Non-core product!!) I couldn’t hear what else she said because my table was still aroused and rumbling about what-is-this-Brick? Brick should have been at the door, passing out cards. A fortune in advertising and product and story tie-ins was there for the taking!

Score 2 for Style.

Round 4. Audience member wants to know where marketeers can park their good news. Style Guy has two products, Giving and Belle, the latter soon to be a monthly, as avenues for success stories. T-D Guy says there’s not so much good news, except for the Public Squares they host. “I never saw an organization so open and engaged with the community,” he gushes.

Style Guy comes back with Style is a free publication so they know their readership wants it if they pick it up. Advertise with them and you’re “fishing in a well-stocked lake.” TV Guy says TV ads deliver with emotion. The average household has as many TVs as it has people. Everyone is watching what they want. Is TV also a well-stocked lake?

Young Web Guy said he thought his readers were going to be young, you know, with-it Web 2.0 types, but instead they’re older business people. Surprise! We oldies gotz mad web skillz! Web is the only media outlet actually growing. Radio Guy says 93 percent of everybody listens to the radio every week, and 70-something percent listen every day. (I miss the exact figure because a cell phone went off, which meant time-out for a round of cell phone jokes.) Radio advertising can be more creative. (It’s all happening in your mind!)

Cranky audience member says the mainstream media is relying too much on blogs and RSS feeds from dubious web sources for their online content and it’s confusing his clients because the blogosphere is not known for its truthiness. Style Guy says we’re not doing that. We all look at T-D Guy. (Hey, inrich.com, we're talking about you). TV Guy changes the subject. They get swamped with press releases which are useless to them. PR people need to develop a relationship with the assignment editor. Find out what they need. Give them only what they need. Not what you want. (This is the second time I've heard this. Nobody wants press releases.)

Round 5. What does the future hold? Style Guy can’t imagine newspapers will ever be completely dead. Good journalists will always be needed. TV Guy reminds us that 30 percent of people online are watching television at the same time. Web Guy channels Bette Davis. It’s going to be a bumpy ride. People will go to “where [the news] is well-written, well reported and they can trust it.”

Most of them agree that local content is the savior, and putting that local content behind a paid wall will save them. Like a peep show. Put in a quarter and turn the crank. See the local lady take off her clothes. Whoops. Show over. If you want to see more, pay another quarter. Radio Guy says local news is “more impactful to local communities.” I love being impacted. The conclusion: the media outlet that gets that and invests in the community will survive.

I would score this meeting Style: Win. TV: Place. Web: Show.

Lunch with T-D Guy

I went to the PRSA luncheon today to hear T-D Executive Editor Glenn Procter, who is not a quotable guy. There wasn't a "money quote" (words worth capturing for a story) until the very end when he answered a question about whether the citizenry was taking over journalism since they are everywhere with their blogs and camera phones. "For big news events, I want trained reporters on scene. Good content still sells. Watchdog journalism still sells."

Only the blogs are often better watchdogs. He did concede that a large part of the news website of the future was going to be contributed citizen journalism. (Don't have to pay them salaries or health benefits either.)

I wanted to ask what happened to the seasoned and senior reporters who all left in a mass exodus, but never quite got my hand up since I was not in the mood to pick a fight. 

Then he kind of answered my question anyway. He said reporters go out the door now with a "tool kit," a video camera, still camera, pad and pen, and an audio recorder, so they are prepared to report a story for multi-media. That's probably why the old-timers bailed. That's too much stuff to deal with. I know when I go out on a story, I can't really do justice to taking photos and taking notes at the same time. I end up doing a half-assed job when I have to multi-task with equipment. Imagine if I also had to do video and audio.

Other tidbits:

He wears ear rings.

Seventy percent of Richmond area businesses do not advertise in the paper.

"We're a media company. We're not the newspaper anymore."

Buying up all the suburban weeklies was to "get as much of the population into one of our products."

The priorities "going forward" (I hate that phrase) are 1) breaking news, 2) state government, 3) municipal governments, 4) health, 5) environmental issues, 6) education. Maybe not in that order since he came back a minute later and said state politics was No. 1.

(In retrospective, and I add this now in 2012 after Procter left, the priorities should have been 1) municipal government, 2) state government, 3) health, 4) technology. You can't do breaking news when you publish once a day the morning after the news happened.)

The most hated things about the T-D: the website and the half pages.

Since this was an audience of all public relations specialists, naturally they asked what is the best way to get their news into the paper, and Procter pretty much said no one at the paper looked at our press releases or emails. "Face to face is the way to play. Come and talk to us." He repeated it later on, too.

Now, this makes no sense because why do you need to come begging in person to have your press releases considered for story material unless....unless...

You make the appointment with the appropriate editor for the face-to-face, and when you get there, you find an ad salesman and a newspaper marketing person at the table, ready to pitch web and print ads...giving the illusion that if you buy in, your press releases will be read and considered. (Like, you don't have to buy magazines to be entered into the Publishers Clearing House Sweepstakes, but people still think it gives them an edge.)

When I was an editor, I didn't want to meet everyone sending in press releases. Who has time? I just looked at them and asked myself, is this a calendar item? Is this a feature story? Do my readers want to know about this? Where in the paper do I put this? Or does it go in the wastebasket? I could call them if I needed more info. I didn't need them to come for lunch.

The Richmond Voice (update 2022, long gone newspaper) is a case in point. I send them a press release about a community meeting, something my job is doing that is going to impact the community in their pocket books, something they need to know in case they want to protest or ask questions. The Voice calls me within minutes and asks if I want to buy an ad for the announcement.

No, I say, it's a public meeting. Just run it in your community calendar.

No, you need to buy an ad, they say again.

This is news. This is the sort of thing you're supposed to write about as news. (And I say that sincerely as a fellow journalist, not as a PR hack. We're not selling anything!)

No, you need to buy an ad. She even puts me on hold to talk to the editor, and still comes back and says I need to buy an ad.

So I don't send The Voice things anymore because after going through this twice, I get the message. You're not a newspaper anymore. You're a shopper. I got the same creepy vibe when Proctor told the room full of PR people they needed to come in and sit down at the table with his editors.

Which begs the question, how much can you trust the newspaper if story selection and placement might be influenced by face-to-faces?

Death of Newspapers - Colonial Edition

The first newspaper in the Colonies was Publick Occurrences, printing in Boston in 1690. Early American newspapers were inevitably weeklies because it took 16 hours to set in type four pages. The first “death of newspapers” in America was 1765 as a result of the Stamp Act, which levied a tax on every printed page. The second death of newspapers was the Sedition Act of 1798, a low point of the John Adams presidency, making it a federal crime to defame his administration. (whoa!) Thomas Jefferson once proposed newspapers should have four sections: Truths, Probabilities, Possibilities, and Lies. (Wouldn't it be great if someone did a paper like that now?) Objectivity in journalism is a creature of the 19th century. Prior to that (and apparently now) the whole point was to espouse a point of view.

Thanks again to The New Yorker for source material.

Mystery of the Missing Portrait

In 1969, a VCU freshman named Janet Johnson, who lived on the 8th floor of Johnson Hall, painted this picture, which amazed us all because she wasn't even an art major, so we took a picture of it.

She dropped out mid-semester because she never went to class. She got her days and nights mixed up and was up all night and slept all day. I think she was originally from Northern Virginia. She was very tall and liked to wear short, fluffy wigs. She also liked to party at Andy's, which was on Grace Street near the Mister Swiss, a few doors down from Lum's.

A few years later, someone told me they saw this painting for sale at Arts in the Park. That was almost 40 years ago. I wonder what happened to it.

My Secret Mentor

I went online to peek at Style Weekly a day early and saw that Rozanne Epps had died on Sunday. Rozanne was Style's "Rosie Right," the copy editor, and for a very long time, editor of the Back Page. She was The Decider during the 1990s who decided who got to be on the Back Page, and very, very often, especially in the early 1990s, she chose me.

I was very grateful because I couldn't get anywhere at the Times-Dispatch as a writer. Every time I applied, it seemed the editors found a new way to humiliate me, variously insulting me for having a child, being a woman, having gone to VCU, having majored in journalism...all things I couldn't do anything about. And they were not kind about it. I wasn't asking for a lot, but even collecting recipes and recording wedding submissions were jobs I could not get.

When Style began, its first editor, Laura Cameron, was encouraging. She bought my articles and said nice things. Then she left and the next editor, an elitist male, didn't like me at all, so I was out for many years. Then Rozanne came in and seemed to love everything I submitted, even things I now realize were half-baked. When I didn't have any ideas, she would prod me with an email to come up with something, and always requested "first rights," as if dozens of publishers were clamoring for my essays. Actually, for awhile I had a little racket going as Style's sister publications under the Landmark umbrella would buy the essays, too, as well as a weekly in Charlottesville. A quadruple score, Richmond, Norfolk, Charlottesville and Jacksonville, Fla., would net me a decent check. (Style alone paid $60.)

When I was at an all-time low in the early 1990s, unemployed and working part-time in a hotel gift shop, Style would run house ads proclaiming "the voices of Richmond" were found in its pages. There were only two women on that list. One was the richest woman in town who was active in the non-profit community, and the other was me. It was a strange situation to be in.

Musicians and writers tend to be at their most creative when they are miserable, broke, poor and desperate. As the 1990s progressed, my life improved and I wrote less. Than Rozanne was no longer the Back Page editor and nothing I wrote after that made it to the Back Page, which became serious and political and meaningful. So I have to say, thanks Rozanne for the ride. It was fun. I still run into people who remember some of my pieces, and that $60 was sometimes all the money I made that week.

Strangely enough, we never met or even talked on the phone. Our whole relationship was by email. One time I was in the office for some reason and she walked by me, and of course, didn't know it was me. And I didn't identify myself because...well, I have problems being even that marginally outgoing. But I knew it was her, the closest thing I ever had to a mentor. And I was grateful. Thank you for believing in me, Mrs. Epps. It is the most precious gift of all.

Bob Holsworth at St. Paul's

A couple of years ago, I heard Bob Holsworth speak at a Virginia Government Communicators conference and enjoyed it, so I rolled out for his Eyes on Richmond gig at St. Paul's Episcopal today. I knew I wasn't late when I found myself walking up the sidewalk right behind him. He was alone, which oddly surprised me, like political analysts should travel with entourages or be flanked with security and sycophants like the mayor?

Some of what he said was obvious -- like Obama brought out voters who don't usually go to the polls, the young, black, and Hispanic -- which turned Bush Red states in the Southwest blue, as well as Virginia. And then he'd pull some data out of the hat, which made me go whoa, he's doing this without notes.

So here's my notes.

Although nearly the entire full house raised their hand when asked if they'd rather see a four-week campaign for President, Holsworth said the way we do it now is just right. Limited campaign periods favor established people. It takes a long campaign to allow a new face to emerge and fight enough battles to earn the title.

Bush's approval rating now is lower than Nixon's was at the height of Watergate, and is matched only by Truman, who was later redeemed by history. Bush is hoping for such a redemption.

Bush pretty much elected Obama. It was too much of an uphill battle for McCain. Suspending his campaign to support the Wall Street bail-out was a huge political blunder. The 18-29 age group went 2-1 for Obama. "A party that's losing the next generation by 2-1 has to be very concerned," he said of the Republicans.

We tend to watch the TV network that supports our own views. Then he made a joke about Alan Colmes who is "paid to lose every night" opposite Sean Hannity on Fox News. (Actually, Colmes has a radio show I listen to every evening on XM Radio where he wins every night.)

Amazing fact: When Holsworth asked us to raise our hand if we read the newspaper every single day, the entire room, except me, raised their hand. But this was a decidedly old crowd. (When I pass by a mirror, I am always startled by the old woman who looks back. Who is she?) Young people, Holsworth said, are getting their news from The Daily Show, SNL and Letterman. (Letterman is old, I hate to tell you.) The Republican party needs to "develop conservative comedians."

What happened in Virginia was Northern Virginia. It has gone heavily Democrat with minorities, Hispanics, and post graduates working in high tech fields. Hanover County may be the last bastion of Republicanism in the state. (And where I first met Mark Warner in person, at a small gathering of the few Democrats in the county in someone's backyard. He gave a great speech, and I've voted for him ever since.)

Albemarle County, another Republican stronghold surrounding Democratic Charlottesville, is in the throes of high unemployment, which is how Virgil Goode's seat fell into jeopardy.

In the mayoral race, Grey dropped the ball with his enthusiasm-free campaign despite having a boatload of money, whereas Jones had all the traditional Democrat endorsements, and the good luck to be on a ticket where Obama was attracting new voters to pull the lever for the Democrats.

Obama proved it's possible to run a winning campaign on donations from small contributors, free of fat-cat money, which opens the door for anyone with an attractive platform and a good website. He was a "cool hand, smart guy" who never took the bait during debates and remained above the fray. While McCain was taking Virginia for granted until too late, Obama opened 50 campaign offices and inundated the airwaves with ads, even in the expensive D.C. market where he ran 1,342 ads versus McCain's 80.

One question from the audience was why couldn't the Republicans "swiftboat" Obama like they had Kerry? Because Kerry opened himself to attack, according to Holsworth, making a fatal mistake at his convention by "reporting for duty" and emphasizing his Vietnam service, without balancing it with his anti-war activities. "He only told half his story when he had a problematic second half." (I'm not sure talking about his anti-war activities would have silenced the swiftboaters, but you gotta love the new word.)

Tears for Opus

I've been snuffling all day about the death of Opus. Some of you may say, no, he's not dead, he just went to spend eternity asleep on the last page of "Good Night, Moon," which is how he's drawn in his final panel (which can only be viewed via a Humane Society web page.)

But he looks dead to me, with the added clues of the text, "Goodnight Opus and goodnight air. Goodnight noises everywhere."

When you say goodnight to air, that's pretty dead.

It was hard enough on me that he knew weeks ago his end was coming. He had to get to the place where he wanted to spend eternity, but didn't know where. Then, through a series of misfortunes, he ended up in a cell at an animal shelter with a dog that had never known a home. (What an allegory for life! Isn't our whole journey about getting to the place where we want to spend eternity, but we don't know where or how and end up in the wrong place?)

And if that wasn't hard enough, a trio of Tahitian beauties come calling, looking for a pet to take home to their island paradise, and Opus steps aside and lets the dog go. (Another allegory. Redemption through sacrifice.)

I was more a fan of Bloom County and Outland than this latest revival of the strip, but hats off to Berkeley Breathed for wringing me out emotionally over a cartoon penguin. I haven't been able to snap out of it all day.

(Then in 2015, the characters were back on Facebook. So death, not so permanent.)