Newspapers never have a "typical" week
One of the best things about the job of Reader Representative is that, unlike an editor who actually participates in the daily production of the newspaper, I have a fair amount of control on my schedule.
One of the worst things about the job of Reader Representative is that, unlike an editor who can plan and schedule and assign reporters to cover stories that need to be in the paper, sometimes someone else’s mistake can completely destroy my plans for the day.
Mondays, in general, can be a challenge, but last week was full of those kind of days.
•
A very nice gentleman called the Reader Representative line Monday to check on the Louisiana Power Ball numbers and to ask why we “never” get them right.
I dug a bit deeper into the conversation, because sometimes a caller’s “never” means we messed up one other time two years ago.
He said, specifically, that he knew we hadn’t had the results of the Wednesday and Saturday drawings (published in the Thursday and Sunday newspapers) correct in at least the last two weeks.
Promising him I’d check his facts, I discovered he was absolutely right.
In fact, he was more than right. Going back more than a month, we’d had many Powerball results left out because of deadline, but we hadn’t managed to get many of the ones we published correct.
As a problem solver, I thought I had this one figured.
I assumed that we’d instead run results from the previous drawing because we’d checked the lottery Web site before current results were posted.
No, not at all. The numbers we printed appeared to be pulled out of thin air.
So, we were wrong and we’re sorry. We’re watching that much more closely, but I’d be happier if we had an explanation for that long-term error.
•
Running the Powerball correction along with three others on Tuesday meant that corrections took up so much space that we left out the “Today in History” column popular with many readers.
Tuesday brought calls about the omission of that column. As one reader put it, “Why don’t you just leave out an ad, but don’t leave out the history?”
Of course, we can’t just leave out an ad: Advertisements are paid space.
But what we can do is rearrange things a bit and make sure that we have room both for corrections and for the “Today in History” column, so that’s what we are doing now.
•
Wednesday, yeah, we had the “Today in History” column in the paper. The problem was, it was Wednesday, Jan. 27, and the column clearly contained the history for Wednesday, Feb. 3.
It marked the anniversary, a week early, of “the day the music died,” the tragic plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and Beaumont native J.P. “Big Bopper” Richardson.
If you missed it, don’t worry. It will be back in the paper this Wednesday.
We made good on the missed history column in Thursday’s paper.
•
Thursday was the day Martians, or gremlins, visited The Enterprise, wreaking havoc on our Jumble puzzle, which appeared to have been written in complete gibberish.
Those designing the pages assured all concerned that it looked fine not only on the computer screen but in the printed proof as well. Somewhere in computer world, between printing the proof and outputting the page for publication, chaos reigned.
The only explanation we had was that it was a computer processing error.
•
In between all the errors and problems, I had many discussions with readers, including one who was disappointed that we did not have front page coverage of the Hot Hearts Christian youth rally that took place the previous Friday and Saturday at Ford Arena and Ford Exhibit Hall.
The Enterprise did send a staff member to the event, and that staff member posted more than 30 “Seen” photos Beaumont Enterprise.com
Didn’t matter. It wasn’t a full story with photos on the front page.
When I explained to the caller that the electronic media — the Seen photos — was a much more likely venue for the program’s audience of young people, she was still offended that it wasn’t on the front page.
It gives me one more chance to reemphasize the rapidly changing media.
There are many platforms and many outlets for us to share photos, stories and reader comments. The printed paper is just one of those.
Not everything can be in the printed paper and, certainly, not everything can be on the front page.
Today’s news is multimedia. So is The Enterprise.
One of the worst things about the job of Reader Representative is that, unlike an editor who can plan and schedule and assign reporters to cover stories that need to be in the paper, sometimes someone else’s mistake can completely destroy my plans for the day.
Mondays, in general, can be a challenge, but last week was full of those kind of days.
•
A very nice gentleman called the Reader Representative line Monday to check on the Louisiana Power Ball numbers and to ask why we “never” get them right.
I dug a bit deeper into the conversation, because sometimes a caller’s “never” means we messed up one other time two years ago.
He said, specifically, that he knew we hadn’t had the results of the Wednesday and Saturday drawings (published in the Thursday and Sunday newspapers) correct in at least the last two weeks.
Promising him I’d check his facts, I discovered he was absolutely right.
In fact, he was more than right. Going back more than a month, we’d had many Powerball results left out because of deadline, but we hadn’t managed to get many of the ones we published correct.
As a problem solver, I thought I had this one figured.
I assumed that we’d instead run results from the previous drawing because we’d checked the lottery Web site before current results were posted.
No, not at all. The numbers we printed appeared to be pulled out of thin air.
So, we were wrong and we’re sorry. We’re watching that much more closely, but I’d be happier if we had an explanation for that long-term error.
•
Running the Powerball correction along with three others on Tuesday meant that corrections took up so much space that we left out the “Today in History” column popular with many readers.
Tuesday brought calls about the omission of that column. As one reader put it, “Why don’t you just leave out an ad, but don’t leave out the history?”
Of course, we can’t just leave out an ad: Advertisements are paid space.
But what we can do is rearrange things a bit and make sure that we have room both for corrections and for the “Today in History” column, so that’s what we are doing now.
•
Wednesday, yeah, we had the “Today in History” column in the paper. The problem was, it was Wednesday, Jan. 27, and the column clearly contained the history for Wednesday, Feb. 3.
It marked the anniversary, a week early, of “the day the music died,” the tragic plane crash that killed Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and Beaumont native J.P. “Big Bopper” Richardson.
If you missed it, don’t worry. It will be back in the paper this Wednesday.
We made good on the missed history column in Thursday’s paper.
•
Thursday was the day Martians, or gremlins, visited The Enterprise, wreaking havoc on our Jumble puzzle, which appeared to have been written in complete gibberish.
Those designing the pages assured all concerned that it looked fine not only on the computer screen but in the printed proof as well. Somewhere in computer world, between printing the proof and outputting the page for publication, chaos reigned.
The only explanation we had was that it was a computer processing error.
•
In between all the errors and problems, I had many discussions with readers, including one who was disappointed that we did not have front page coverage of the Hot Hearts Christian youth rally that took place the previous Friday and Saturday at Ford Arena and Ford Exhibit Hall.
The Enterprise did send a staff member to the event, and that staff member posted more than 30 “Seen” photos Beaumont Enterprise.com
Didn’t matter. It wasn’t a full story with photos on the front page.
When I explained to the caller that the electronic media — the Seen photos — was a much more likely venue for the program’s audience of young people, she was still offended that it wasn’t on the front page.
It gives me one more chance to reemphasize the rapidly changing media.
There are many platforms and many outlets for us to share photos, stories and reader comments. The printed paper is just one of those.
Not everything can be in the printed paper and, certainly, not everything can be on the front page.
Today’s news is multimedia. So is The Enterprise.
posted by Sheila Friedeck at 5:31 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home