Grumpy Editor - Articles - Zimbio

Valley News blushes with its misspelled masthead

Thu, 25 Jul 2008 05:41:09 GMT

posted by GrumpyEditor

Editors were blushing at the Valley News, Lebanon, N.H. this week after an extra S somehow was added to the newspaper’s masthead atop the front page on Monday, making the title read VALLEY NEWSS, notes Grumpy Editor.

Typographical errors in news stories or advertisements do happen on occasion.

But for a newspaper’s large nameplate to be misspelled is rather embarrassing.

The day after the king-size mistake, the newspaper explained, "Readers may have noticed that the Valley News misspelled its own name on yesterday's front page. Given that we routinely call on other institutions to hold themselves accountable for their mistakes, let us say for the record: We sure feel silly."

But the biggest front page error ever observed by Grumpy Editor was in the Los Angeles Times when the main headline rolled off the presses with large, bold, block type that turned Navy into NVAY. It appeared in a weekday “bulldog edition” --- in the days when the early evening first edition of the next day’s paper appeared on newsstands.

Grumpy Editor’s end-of-week leftover notes:

Remote printing: The Modesto Bee is making plans to print the newspaper at sister publication Sacramento Bee --- 70 miles away. Moving the printing to Sacramento is expected to result in cutting about 80 equivalent full-time positions…For reporters who are assigned new beats that lead to fresh contacts not familiar to them, one of the chapters in the new AMACOM book, Persuasion IQ: The 10 Skills You Need to Get Exactly What You Want, author Kurt W. Mortensen, supplies this advice: Overcome skepticism and quickly establish genuine, lasting trust through competence, confidence, credibility, character and consistently matching words with actions….The New York Times newsstand price goes up 25 cents to $1.50 on Aug. 18…Associated Press, sifting through 449 candidates, named long-time staffer Jesse Washington race and ethnicity writer. Previously, he was AP’s entertainment editor…Look for the Chicago Tribune to test a new format in a Saturday edition… Also changing its approach is the Wisconsin State Journal in Madison. It plans to go from four sections to two on Mondays in August to reduce the overall number of pages “without substantially reduce the news hole,” says Tim Kelley, managing editor. The two-sections format eventually may run Mondays through Wednesdays…A Scarborough Research study finds coupon clippers prefer Sunday newspapers as their top source…The University of Florida’s Center for Media Innovation and Research will start training students in digital media. It also will house a think tank conducting research in that field.

L.A. Times tops list of newspaper staff sheddings

Thu, 18 Jul 2008 04:53:22 GMT

posted by GrumpyEditor

It’s been a tough week for newspaper employees as managements hauled out axes to chop payrolls in an effort to improve bottom lines as advertising and circulation revenue slump and production costs ---from fuel to newsprint --- mount, notes Grumpy Editor.

Hardest hit is the Los Angeles Times.

About 250 people, including 150 from the Times newsroom, will be cut by Labor Day. The reductions take the editorial department staff down to about 700. That’s almost a 50 percent reduction from a decade ago.

Along with the decrease, David Hiller, who took over as Times publisher in October, 2006, is departing.

Elsewhere:

• The Atlanta Journal-Constitution is cutting 189 jobs, mainly affecting the news and advertising departments, between August and October. This will be accomplished through buyouts, layoffs and job eliminations.

• The Wall Street Journal, reorganizing its copy-editing system, is eliminating about 50 jobs at its South Brunswick, N.J., operation.

• The Baltimore Sun is chopping 60 newsroom positions by August.

• The Press Democrat, Santa Rosa, Calif., is laying off 17 full timers, including four in the newsroom. Others are in advertising and production.

• The Honolulu Advertiser, a Gannett Co. publication, is dropping 54 workers.

Subscribers are getting uneasy.

Going to court is News & Observer subscriber Keith Hempstead, a Durham, N.C., lawyer, who maintains the Raleigh newspaper, after laying off 70 staffers last month and cutting news pages, is now not worth what he signed up for in a recent renewal and therefore the cuts breached the paper’s contract with him.

"I hate to see what companies that run newspapers are doing to the product," says Hempstead. "The idea that taking the most important product and reducing the amount of news and getting rid of staff to me seems pointless to how you should run a newspaper business."

Hempstead, by the way, is a former reporter for the Fayetteville Observer.

Grumpy Editor’s end-of-week leftover notes:

A Tuesday report that Russia is sending warships to patrol Arctic waters for the first time since the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union left out the “w”: why?...Another illustration why important baseball games should be played in the daytime: Tuesday’s All-Star Game on Fox, which went to 15 innings, ended at 1:37 a.m. in New York. The late ending meant the final stats didn’t make deadlines of Wednesday newspapers in the East and elsewhere. It also saw a big drop in TV viewers as the game went past the usual nine innings…Another example of watching the bottom line at TV networks: Starbucks coffee no longer is provided free to Law and Order staffers at NBC…Still photographers will welcome word that Tokyo-based Canon Inc. in January starts construction for a digital camera plant in western Japan. This runs counter to most other camera companies that go to China and other cheap labor areas…Starting July 28, newsstand price of The Wall Street Journal goes to $2 a copy, up from $1.50, putting it on par with the Financial Times…Expecting big news on the economy and energy matters, the broadcast networks --- NBC, CBS and ABC --- joined the cable news networks in airing “live” President Bush’s Tuesday news conference…A year-long Washington Post investigation has produced a 12-parter, “Who Killed Chandra Levy?” Chapter 6 runs today. The series focuses on what the Post calls “Washington's most famous unsolved crime” in which police and prosecutors suspected a congressman was responsible. ..Fox News’ Brit Hume is expected to leave his anchor post after the November election but continue with his input as a "Fox News Sunday" panelist.

IndyMac coverage sees media confused: bank or thrift?

Mon, 15 Jul 2008 14:07:35 GMT

posted by GrumpyEditor

CNN was live in Pasadena, Calif., on Monday with an identification line on the TV screen reading: Bank customers in limbo.

It related to a long line of account holders waiting to enter IndyMac Bank offices in groups of 10. The financial institution was shuttered Friday by federal officials and reopened, under federal supervision, Monday as IndyMac Federal Bank, FSB.

The customers were surprisingly fuzzy on whether their deposits were covered by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (Depositors’ accounts at IndyMac are insured up to the statutory limits by the FDIC’s Deposit Insurance Fund.)

Equally fuzzy were many reporters, editors, headline writers and broadcasters on the type of institution that was closed, notes Grumpy Editor.

Most simply used the word “bank.”

That was partially correct --- but technically wrong.

What confuses things is “bank” in the name of the institution. The full name of the failed operation: IndyMac Bank, FSB. The FSB stands for federal savings bank, which is different from a commercial bank such as Bank of America.

A savings bank’s primary purpose is accepting deposits and putting those funds to work as a mortgage lender. Clouding things somewhat is that since deregulation in the 1980s, a savings bank can offer services competitive with many commercial banks.

Along with savings and loan associations, savings banks also are called “thrifts.” So thrift, correctly, should be in headlines and texts relating to IndyMac.

Some stories leading up to and beyond the closure of IndyMac used both bank and thrift in describing the financial institution.

Regulating and supervising the thrift industry (including IndyMac) is the Office of Thrift Supervision, an office of the Department of the Treasury.

IndyMac specialized in making and selling so-called Alt-A mortgage loans, a category of loans to consumers more creditworthy than sub-prime borrowers but typically without the complete documentation of income or assets necessary to receive a prime-rate loan.

Stung by loan defaults, it was the largest OTS-regulated thrift ever to fail and the second largest financial institution to close in U.S. history.

IndyMac coverage sees media confused: bank or thrift?

Sun, 14 Jul 2008 22:19:03 GMT

posted by GrumpyEditor

CNN was live in Pasadena, Calif., on Monday with an identification line on the TV screen reading: Bank customers in limbo.

Equally fuzzy were many reporters, editors, headline writers and broadcasters on the type of institution that was closed, notes Grumpy Editor.

Most simply used the word “bank.”

That was partially correct --- but technically wrong.

What confuses things is “bank” in the name of the institution. The full name is IndyMac Bank, FSB. The FSB stands for federal savings bank, which is different than a commercial bank such as Bank of America.

Along with savings and loan associations, savings banks also are called “thrifts.” So thrift, correctly, should be in headlines and texts relating to IndyMac.

Some stories leading up to and beyond the closure of IndyMac used both bank and thrift in describing the financial institution.

Regulating and supervising the thrift industry (including IndyMac) is the Office of Thrift Supervision, an office of the Department of the Treasury.

Stung by loan defaults, it was the largest OTS-regulated thrift ever to fail and the second largest financial institution to close in U.S. history.

Credit crunch holds back housing market recovery

Tue, 9 Jul 2008 19:08:39 GMT

posted by GrumpyEditor

Many newspaper readers today will see an Associated Press story noting pending home sales in May fell to the third lowest level on record “as the housing market’s recovery continued to prove elusive.”

"Pending homes sales" refers to sellers who have accepted offers but transactions haven’t closed.

Delaying completion of home-selling deals, in many cases, is financing, notes Grumpy Editor.

That’s where there is a hang-up.

Most business writers --- including those focusing on consumer confidence reports --- just don’t see the link between pending home sales and attempts to obtain loans.

Home seekers are having a difficult time obtaining mortgages. That’s because lenders, from community banks to giant nationwide operators, are feeling the squeeze from defaults.

Just Monday, major mortgage lender IndyMac Bancorp Inc., smacked by borrowers with faulty income or assets, announced it is curbing most types of home loans. This follows last week’s “rescue” acquisition of Countrywide Financial Corp., largest U.S. mortgage lender based on loan volume, by Bank of America Corp.

On the other end of loan sources, many start-up banks (more than 600 of them since 2003) are struggling with problem loans on their books.

More home loan applications stamped “approved” will give a lift to home sales.

Many newspaper business writers fail to see that until home sales improve, display and classified advertising in the (formerly lucrative) housing category will continue to suffer, affecting their publications’ bottom lines. Continued emphasis on sluggish home sales only prolongs the situation --- and contributes to additional layoffs of fellow editorial staffers.

So with so many loan sources displaying “out to lunch” signs, home buying naturally is up against a wall.

Tip from Grumpy Editor: Rather than awaiting the next monthly figures, alert business writers should contact financial institutions, including those in their circulation area, and members of Congress linked to financial services committees to get their latest input --- beyond remedies discussed for weeks --- on immediate solutions to get out of the deep housing hole.