Video: Harry Evans on Future of Journalism, Newspapers and His “Love” for Murdoch
Sir Harold Evans, or Harry Evans as he is more commonly known, gave a great talk earlier this week at DeSilva & Phillips’ Media Dealmakers conference here in NYC. Funny, pensive, direct, and tweetworthy with every sentence. He was interviewed by Chrystia Freeland, US managing editor of Financial Times. You have to watch this one in full.
Some of his choice lines which I live tweeted from his lunch talk:
– It is so much easier to be a journalist these days; piece of cake
– Disappointed that newspapers are cutting investigative journalism. They don’t do journalism at all these days.
– Quoting someone: news is what someone wants to suppress; rest is all advertising.
– Don’t blame the web for lazy journalism
– The heterogeneity in journalism has disappeared; it us all homogeneous now with journalism schools and other institutions.
– Rupert is doing brilliantly with WSJ. I find it a very stimulating paper. The previous management was inept.
– It is no use printing the truth once. You just have to persist.
P.S.: They gave away signed copies of his new book, My Paper Chase, at the conference. Digging into it now, and digging reading it…
Hi, Yo,……. Say…… DANNY BLOOM with a IMPORTANT word maven
message for you……..
As you might know, the New York Times recently ran an excellent
article on ambiguous newspaper headlines, called crash blossoms,
coined by me, reported
by Ben Zimmer in his Jan. 31 ON LANGUAGE column, with the ghost of
William Safire looking down from Heaven, British Left Waffles on
Falklands
“For years, there was no good name for these double-take headlines”,
wrote Ben Zimmer in the Times snailpaper edition and online, too.
Last August of 2009, however, one emerged in the TestyCopyEditors.com
online discussion forum. Mike O’Connell, an American editor based in
Sapporo, Japan, spotted the headline “Violinist Linked to JAL Crash
Blossoms” and wondered, “What’s a crash blossom?”
… Another participant in the forum, Dan Bloom in Taiwan, suggested
that “crash blossoms” could be used as a label for such infelicitous
headlines that encourage alternate readings, and news of the neologism
quickly spread.
I am now sendiing out this SOS — SAVE OUR SNAILPAPERS! — in the
hopes of finding a sympathetic newspaper columnist or reporter or
editorial page editor even (!) — an oped columnist would be cool, too
00 and I am hoping YOU can direct me to that person, if it is not YOU!
Can you? I hope this reporter/columnist can do a cute, humorous,
serious story about this new
coinage I concocted out of snailmail’s earlier appearance and my love
of real paper newspapers, which I call SNAILPAPERS as a TERM OF
ENDEARMENT, not derision.
http://zippy1300.blogspot.com/2010/02/confessions-of-old-fuddieduddy-ofd-his.html
A word maven in the UK just wrote me and said “”Danny, …. It’s a
neat neologism that promises to have a
future!”
And a novelist from Canada now living in Scotland told me this
afternoon: “Danny, your idea of calling newspapers as snailpapers and
the piece you wrote was beautiful and charming! You actually made me
want to go get a newspaper – which is saying something. And the
clipping idea had never occurred to me, despite the fact that I’m
constantly doing that with electronic information. Thanks for sharing
it with me :)….”
So I was there when “crash blossoms” bloomed, so to speak, and now I
am pushing SNAILPAPERS up the hill, and I feel snailpapers as a term
of endearment for paper newspapers is even MORE IMPORTANT that the
silly ”crash blossoms” meme. Can you help me bring this word to the
attention of newspaper editors worldwide, via your friends in the
business? If you cannot write a story about this, can you refer me to
a friend who might be interested. One good print story about
SNAILPAPERS will get the word out. Jim Romenesko will pay attention.
Bill Keller
will take notice. Alex Beam in Boston will smile.
Paul Gillin at Newspaper Death Watch gave this neologism a boost on
his blog last week. Google it.
And A. Barton Hinkle at the Richmond Times Dispatch gave a further
boost this week on his blog there, too. Google it too.
So here’s my SOS — can you help me get the word out about SNAILPAPERS
as a term of endearment for print newspapers? If so, give me an email
holler. I am in Taiwan, marooned here for the rest of my life, and
loving every moment, too. But even though I am far away overseas on an
invisible island in the western Pacific, I am still a part of this
world, too, and I got a few good ideas left in me, too. Holler me.
SOS!
Cheers,
Danny Bloom
http://zippy1300.blogspot.com/2010/02/confessions-of-old-fuddieduddy-ofd-his.html
what was he doing with those white leggings showing outside his pants legs in the beginning? was that because of the cold weather or a knee injury?
Harry… do you have any reporter friends anywhere who might be interested in my snailpapers meme as a term of endearment for print newspapers. so far, most of the reax is negative, on the part of print reporters and editors, but a top media critic this morning told me that using humor to turn the word around the be a warm positive term for our daily print newspapers, which we cannot afford to lose, as a culture that is: “Danny, It’s great that your’re building this as a postiive story and blog meme. What you really need is an attack by some newspaper executive denouncing the word, then it paradoxically will become news. The enemy is always indifference. And I’m glad you’re combining the word with a positive message about the medium, and the implied idea that handwringing and doomsaying are just making the problem worse, so manybe humor can help turn things around. Remember what they said in old Vienna: The situation is hopeless but not serious.” And this PR maven added: “Danny, Even if I knew the right reporter to report on the snailpaper meme, a bottom-up campaign would be more likely to get an editor’s green light than a pitch based only on a blog and personal correspondence.” So Harry, Clay Shirky won’t answer my emails, but I know you are clued in on the paper vs screen brouhaha, and you know i like both, 24/7/365/4ever…..but i really hope we can save the snailpaeprs. We need a word to help the news execs smile and get over these tough times……Can you suggtest a columnist or humorist who mgiht write about snailpaeprs in a print place?
A top reporter in NYC tells me: Danny, I like this snailpaper concept and know precisely what you mean. What you need is a quasi-serious Humor column or radio commentary. Let me give this some thought.
Mainstream NYT won’t touch this but you just never know who might.
Best,
John