Disqus - Latest Comments for RogerWilsher

Re: Geordie Greig: Murdoch has philosophical problem with free - Press Gazette

RogerWilsher — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 08:37:03 -0000

Sadly Murdoch's problem is even more deep rooted than Geordie outlines here.
For Murdoch's plan to end unlimited access to all News International newspaper websites to work he needs to turn his whole modus operandi almost on its head and start investing heavily in content, and inspiring the most creative modern forms of journalism and information communication possible.
The future, I am sure, is free ink on paper, linked to the fantastic forms of content that the technology of cyber space can offer and will continue to develop.
These forms of creative content can be sold for peanuts, but a lot more people would buy into them than have been willing to spend cash on newspapers, certainly in the last 20-30 years.

Re: The internet does the funniest things

RogerWilsher — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 09:16:43 -0000

This doesn't surprise me. It's the way Google ads work - they pick up key words in the article and generate the ads they consider relevant.
One incidence I thought more shocking than this, appeared during the London Mayoral election.
I was reading a pro-Boris blog but the only adverts generated down the side were either promoting Ken Livingstone's campaign or blonde hair dye.
Ah, the democracy of the web!

Re: Abrupt departure for PPA chief Shephard - Press Gazette

RogerWilsher — Tue, 20 Oct 2009 10:34:34 -0000

I've only just spotted this. What great news. Jonathan Shephard and his views on the magazine publishing industry - particularly contract publishing - were so far away from reality I decided not to continue our membership of the PPA. We'll now have another look at the change of policy direction and senior PPA personnel and reconsider whether we join again or not.

Re: Tabloids silent over filmmakers' hoax story claims - Press Gazette

RogerWilsher — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 12:07:40 -0000

Before anyone thinks there’s anything new under the Sun (or indeed any other tabloid newspaper), and that it's only today’s media (and readers) who are celebrity obsessed, I am reminded of a story Ray Boston, the former director of Cardiff University’s Centre for Journalism Studies, used to tell.
One of Boston’s early breaks in the Street of Shame was when he was despatched by the Daily Mirror to gatecrash a photo opportunity at a London’s theatre to discover whether there was any truth in the rumours about opera diva Maria Callas having a love affair with shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis – despite them both being married!
When young reporter Boston burst into the melee of snappers, he just had enough time to fire off the question: “Are you having an affair with Onassis?”
The smile that appeared on Callas's face was enough for the Mirror backbench to clear the front three pages, break the news to the world - and sell a fair few extra copies.
Risk is what newspapers are all about, for God’s sake!
Deal with it.

Re: Journalist editor contenders Simcox and Watts point to high-profile backers

RogerWilsher — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 11:31:00 -0000

Please add my name to the list of Mark Watts's supporters.
He has a fine track record for keeping high quality journalism alive - which is no mean feat in this day and age.
We used to work together at The Sunday Times and I can vouch for his integrity.
Journalists need to know what's going on in this heady world and the editor's seat of The Journalist is a good place to be sitting to keep a handle on this heady world.

Re: Express rapped by ASA for paid-for editorial - Press Gazette

RogerWilsher — Wed, 12 Aug 2009 12:25:05 -0000

Has everyone gone mad?

1) Why did reporter Alison Coleman allow this to happen? If she is acting as an advertising copywriter she should make sure she is paid an advertising copywriter's fee, which I imagine is a lot more than a jobbing hack on the Express gets these days.

2) Why are the companies - Orthotics Online, Goldshield and LadyCare - not being charged for advertorial, as well as advertising space. If this is the case then Richard Desmond should be asking some serious questions of his advertising team and their commerciual savvy and of his commercial seniors like Stan Myerson?

3) And the advertisers? What are they bothering to buy advertising space for if they are getting free puff editorial anyway? It's a complete waste of their money.

4) And the editor? Doesn't he realise that readers hate little more than being sold to in this way. Over 13 years in customer publishing has taught me that the worst way to promote a company's products is to puff it. Readers are intelligent, and realise where a customer publication is coming from. They therefore don't expect the journalism within to attack the client company's products, but they do expect it to be informed and informative. Having not read any of the articles in question I have no idea if this was tha case, but for the matter to have been escalated to the ASA I can only assume the journalism didn't make up for its lack of integrity.

Re: Which? reveals 11 per cent rise in online subscriptions - Press Gazette

RogerWilsher — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 10:15:36 -0000

Congratulations Which?
Beware The Sunday Times.
The reason for the former's success is that it is full of imperative content.
The danger for the latter is that it is not!

Re: 'The people who run newspapers know nothing about newspapers' - Press Gazette

RogerWilsher — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 10:42:10 -0000

Arnold Hadwin was my first editor, when I joined the Bradford Telegraph & Argus on work experience in 1979.
He is right to say that "if newspapers want to make money they should look to invest in editorial staff".
But what he doesn't develop is the idea that with the Press now able to offer what it does on many platforms - through ink on paper, digitally online and on mobile - what journalists need to be doing is finding ways of extending (not replacing or repeating) the experience of absorbing information from ink on paper to the digital world, using the technologies only that new world can deliver to enhance what ink on paper does best.
The majority of us still prefer to receive infomation as ink on paper, but increasingly as our curiousity is allowed to roam widera nd deeper, we want to be able to do more with that information.
For example, we want o extend our understanding of what's going on by harnessing the technologies that are increasingly available as the web matures.
The only limit to what journalists can do to keep people better informed and armed to understand the information they receive is their imaginations - and the penny pinching, risk averse nature of too many media executives.
If we journalists, working with creative accountants, could work out how to let people have their information cheaper, making increasing but small amounts of money from the much larger audience the web offers, then we would not only be able to move on, we would have found the holy grail of the news media, in all its guises.
Sadly, though, as Hadwin says and as I fear: “The people who run newspapers know nothing about newspapers.”