Comments on: Non-story? Then don’t write it

By: Drop the laptop « PolicyFrog

Drop the laptop « PolicyFrog — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 06:45:37 +0000

[...] Manitobans went outside and enjoyed the first nice day of spring. Or political events that offer no news value (two of every three announcements from the Doer government). Or rumours about which chain retail [...]

By: Hedda

Hedda — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 21:48:13 +0000

I’m the EIC of a business-to-business publication serving the jewelry industry. It happens to us in the trade media too. Most famously, it happened to me one morning at a trade show. Five days into a seven-day show with 20-hour days, there was a crack-of-dawn press breakfast to unveil “new research on trends in the bridal jewelry market.”

“Trends in the bridal jewelry market” is a subject relevant to my readers, so I hauled my over-exhausted, hate-mornings-anyway self out of bed to attend what turned to be nothing more than a big fat commercial for a particular wedding ring manufacturer.

His press person will never, ever forget the dressing down I gave her–nor has she ever asked me or my staff to attend one of those things again.

Sometimes ya just gotta take the bull by the horns.

By: B.J. Smith

B.J. Smith — Tue, 09 Dec 2008 21:36:47 +0000

Political parties staging an event? Trying to manipulate people? That’s news?

Daniel’s right. The blog post was interesting behind-the-scenes detail, though.

By: Why not writing a story is innovation - Publishing 2.0

Why not writing a story is innovation - Publishing 2.0 — Mon, 08 Dec 2008 05:12:15 +0000

[...] favorite recent example of innovation-by-omission is a blog post by Daniel Victor, a reporter at The Patriot-News of Harrisburg, Pa. Back in August, Victor was [...]

By: Jimbo

Jimbo — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 17:03:37 +0000

Yet, haven’t you written about it anyway? Now that you’ve blogged it, we get to see what the “event” was. The way I see it, it was just the Dems trying to say their piece (whatever it was) and looking for consistency. What does this say about politics, I wonder? Am I hearing the views of the particular leader, or are they just a puppet?

By: Katharine Lackey

Katharine Lackey — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 16:59:17 +0000

I was once asked to go to a hearing on touch screen voting machines in State College. Problem? I had covered the EXACT SAME hearing the previous week in Bellefonte. While there would have been different residents in the audience commenting, it would have been the same article (plus they weren’t even going to run an article it was just a go for the hell of it type of deal!). I told them I was too busy to go, along with my feelings that there was really nothing new there. Talk about trying to waste a report’s time (not to mention I’m a student and it was during finals week).

By: Terry

Terry — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 16:28:01 +0000

Steve has a great point, and he’s right: That really IS the story, but it would have to be more broad in scope. I’d like to see a piece titled “Election stories you WON’T see in this paper and why”

By: Steve

Steve — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 16:22:59 +0000

Daniel

Actually, you DO have a story here. A sad story about how the “hip” and “internet saavy” campaign for change uses traditional manipulation techniques– and gets called on it by a tech-saavy reporter!

Could you get your editor to run this mini-expose’?

Steve

By: Terry

Terry — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 16:22:56 +0000

Bravo, Daniel! Proud to know ya!