Hardened hacks are throwing down their quills and taking up comfortable jobs on the other side of the fence, either for PR, government, or DubaiInc.
Anyone else swapped newspaperdom for PR? If so, any regrets?
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18 comments:
i personally didnt start in 'real media' (in the UAE? hah!), but a lot of my colleagues did. seems like we get new faces in every month but they to stick around long. yeah we get the better pay but there's no respect and definitely no bragging rights for the real journos to take home with them. they cross back over fairly quick. jankewicz to name one.
you can tell i'm of the pr branch of the family tree. pardon my typos. "but they DON'T stick around long."
Flacks, we have to read the dirges that pass for your press releases. Please, let's not pretend you can write.
So why do you all put your names on them and pass them off as your own articles? They're good enough to plagiarize.
Because we need stuff to fill the space inbetween the real stories.
The glare from Adam Jankewicz's tan once defeated an entire invading task force. The marauding army was all set to conquer the island of Mui-mui, which is just off the coast of Bali, when the blinding glare of AJ's deep, lush tan dazzled them, forcing them to turn back.
Adam was in Scotland at the time.
Use them as filler all you like, but you needn't put your name on them. I've heard this argument before - that it's good for the paper, readers need to think that the reporters are providing them special stuff, staff bylines or no bylines look bad, etc. Rubbish. It's a cheap way for an individual reporter to look like they've been earning their keep. The switcheroo is for the benefit of your boss, not the reader, who couldn't care two f***s who write the damned bit of print they're reading.
Someone's getting a bit grumpy! Anyway I thought the normal route was for 'Staff Reporter' for press release stories, rather than a byline. Hence Gulf News is written by one very busy and anonymous hack. In truth I don't think many reporters would be happy to attach their name to a press release - which papers do that? Story examples please... Press releases, like it or not, are usually an embarrassment - unless extensively reworked.
Publishing press releases as a bona fide article is so common out here that the PRs actually write on their emails such crap as: "We look forward to you publishing this press release and photograph." And it's always a really shit photo.
A brief analysis of the business section of Gulf News in September, revealed that, on average, fewer than 20% of stories are actually produced by GN. The rest are "borrowed" under licence from such insightful and relevant titles as the Christian Science Monitor, or are cut'n'pasted press releases.
But hey, when you're producing 83 classified supplements a day, who cares about quality? Feel the width!
its true!!! at my paper i heard some reporters nearly got in big trouble for putting thier names on press relaeses. like they were their own stories. not just you know using the release but really submitting it as thier own work. weird thing is some of the editors knew and ddn't care and no body got fired when it got out what they were doing. so yeah, so much for 'i don't think they would' cuz they do!!!
Fill up the paper with press releases? Everybody does it. GN might be the most visible example but it's certainly not alone. As for bylines, journos should only put their name to a story coming from a press release when they do some original reporting. But that can be as easy as changing the lede and adding a quote. It happens far too often but this is Dubai - not exactly on the map for prestigious journalism.
The nightlife editor of Time Out Dubai has a habit of putting his name at the end of articles he did not write - one laughable case was an Oasis interview. Professional.
What's the email address for submissions - there's a super rumour doing the rounds. And no, it's not about an individual's moustache or penchant for chasing skirt and stealing mobile phones, etc.
**ANNOUNCEMENT**
In other news, as you may have noticed we're a bit up against it and would welcome more contributors. Just drop us an email if you are interested. And do it from an anonymous account, not your itp or toady.com address.
So what's your email address then?
send to dubai.anonymous@gmail.com
What funny little country uae is. did gulf snooz get its birthday wrong or is math diffrent there?
they say 30th is this year but, they start in 1978, wich make them 29 - is this the best they can do - cant even count!
They said that this is their 30th year not that they are 30. I'll leave you to work it out.
But yes I agree it would have thought it would be better to wait until they were 30 and then celebrate, but hey, it's their train set, they can play with it.
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