Hurray, Campaign's coming back at the end of the month! Will it have the same wit, bite and verve under new management at Motivate? Will it slag off its own advertisers? And, more importantly, will The Spin be back?
With the recent launch of Mediaweek by ENG, there's plenty of newsprint dedicated to marketing and advertising. Is the market big enough for these titles plus Communicate and Gulf Marketing Review?
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45 comments:
Let's face it, Campaign (and maybe Time Out back in the day) was the only decent magazine ITP ever did.
Middle East Facilities Management had its moments. ^^
anon@ 22:11 - brilliant!
Let's just forget the post and get straight to the ITP are shite comments shall we?
Construction Weekly? Come on... that's a quality publication.
ITP got found out with Campaign to be the shyster spivs they are.... same with their attempts to secure a newspaper license.
No-one with any sense trusts ITP. Even their own staff don't.
has anyone heard anything about Time Out in London refusing to renew ITP's license?
Wishful thinking?
what does it say about dubai that the best magazines are trade publications devoted to marketing? it says, among other things, that dubai is hilarious.
Can't see Mediaweek ripping up too many trees. Communicate is dull. Campaign to rule the marketing magazine roost within weeks, with the others dying a slow death?
Communicate is like a marketing student's version of what a marketing magazine should be like. Also horrible design and use of images. Media Week is predictably poor - with the professional nobodies at ENG Media, was anyone expecting any different?
Gulf Marketing Review - I'd almost forgotten that one. Same bracket as What's On - what are they for, exactly? Who reads them? I hope Campaign does live up to its former incarnation - the nearest thing we'll get to impartial coverage round these parts....
Yawn
What's wrong with Communicate?
'professional nobodies' at Mediaweek? Someone mentioned that they only have one writer, and use a multitude of freelancers rather than staffers. It certainly looks like a budget product.
I fully expect Campaign to regain its crown as the leading trade title in the region - unless Motivate have found a way to muck it up beyond recognition.
I have a question for the discerning critics posting here. Take a look at your own work and ask yourself if it's any good. Do it properly.
I've been in media for over 15 years now, and have had the privilege to work with some true talent. In my experience--and my time in Dubai has reinforced this viewpoint beyond question--it's only the shittiest, most talentless little weasels who betray the kind of arrogance and cleverer-than-thou attitudes I see here.
So, again, all you armchair media critics, take a long look at the highlights of your careers.
Depressing, isn't it.
i think Mediaweek is getting better. first couple of issues were very 'pro ENG' however i am told that was due to ramadan and a lack of content. has picked up since and i believe with its weekly frequency compared to campaign being fortnightly it will rule the roost. lets face it motivate will not be 'allowed' to even come close to ITP's edgy content...after all thats what got it closed down in the first place.
Hang on a minute anon @ 1125
Your post is completely riddled with "the kind of arrogance and cleverer-than-thou attitudes" you bemoan.
If the highlights of 1125's career were at ITP (what other company would employ such a moron) then we can only imagine the lows.
Henceforth, The National will be known as ‘Martin Newland’s Abu Dhabi Paper, a far more distinguished masthead I think you’ll all agree.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2008/oct/20/pressandpublishing
ITP's edgy content got Campaign closed down? How so? That's not the reason at all.
Media Week has one writer? Pah. It has six full-timers. And not a single one would make it as a sub, evidently.
Bang on, 11.25.
If I was pushed, I could probably name three or four of DMO's more prolific posters, none of whom are blessed with any more than, at very best, semi-average talent.
Come on 13.41 et al - cards on the table. Before you start slagging off, tell us what you've done of note. Any respected national newspaper experience? Maybe you've put the time in with Conde Nast on one of their top sellers? Years editing at Emap, even?
No. Thought not.
So fuck off back to your shitty little Dubai title, and come back when you actually know what you're talking about.
What is the reason Campaign was originally closed down?
I don't usually respond to stuff like this, but anonymous 13:41 has got my goat.
Yesterday, I wrote a post in which I referred to “the arrogance and cleverer-than-thou attitudes” of many people on this site. I was annoyed because I saw a lot of people building themselves up by knocking others down, but very little in the way of detailed criticism. It’s easy to say something’s rubbish, but a lot harder to pick out specific problems in editorial, design, etc.
So 13:41 weighs in:
"Your post is completely riddled with 'the kind of arrogance and cleverer-than-thou attitudes' you bemoan."
On the surface, this looks effective--you've turned my very own words against me!
Except it's an unfair accusation. I sounded peevish, maybe, but I did at least have a specific point to make: that, in my experience, there's an inverse correlation between a reporter's level of talent and his/her tendency to act like a bigshot.
So while 13:41's remark had a sheen of rhetorical guile, it's actually a half-baked retort--along the lines of "I know you are, but what am I."
After this, 13:41 hits his/her stride:
"If the highlights of 1125's career were at ITP (what other company would employ such a moron) then we can only imagine the lows."
Well, I've never worked at ITP, but that's beside the point. The point is, this person very likely works in media here, and probably struts around town being critical and clever, and is probably looked at with admiration by some. Now just take a second to look at the kind of argument he/she puts together. It’s pitiful, and it says a lot about what is wrong with Dubai media.
Dubai is filled with people like this: media types who have been fooled--by, say, being hired into an editor's position--into thinking they're more accomplished and talented than they are. It’s not their superiority but their mediocrity that feeds their superior attitude—deep down they know who they are. I walk into places like the Media Lounge or the Garhoud More Café and my skin crawls.
There are plenty of talented, smart people working here, but they’re not the ones shooting their mouths off about how shit everyone else is.
09:21 - very nice post, and very well said.
I would say the More cafe in Garhoud is relatively free of bile. It is much easier to be magnanimous when you're on top.
0921 - so it's ok for you to make completely unfair and groundless accusations aimed at everyone else but 1341 ain't allowed?
You've certainly painted a highly nuanced portrait but this is only based on your knowledge of one person's post.
If that's how you put together your 'journalism' god help us all.
Also these attempts to 'call out' what others work histories may or may not be reveals a real insecurity. It also shows a level of hypocrisy - those who always call for this are the last to offer up their own work history.
I'm the guy who posted the "cleverer-than-thou" comment.
Higlight of my career would probably be having spent the day at Norman Mailer's Provincetown house, a few years before his death. He spoke very frankly about how old he had gotten, and how he may not achieve the things he dreamed of in his youth. During the interview, I admired some really awful caricatures he had done of politicians (one, I remmeber, was Madeleine Albright). A few days later, I received a letter from mailer containing an equally crappy drawing he'd done of me. I was shirtless in it, for some reason.
I am always amazed, and slightly amused at how an original topic on DMO descends into a bit of playground pushing and shoving combined with laughable moral high grounds taken.
You still don't get it do you? And again I must tediously repeat myself. Dubai is about commerce. Not truth, not freedom, not honesty. Commerce. And if you look at how the investment bankers worldwide have operated, just magnify that 100 times for Dubai Inc.
If you're dreaming of being another Seymour Hersh or Duncan Campbell, dream on. However, if rewriting a press release on the new Jimmy Choo range or interviewing Jamie Oliver because of some dodgy property scam he's put his name to, then please carry on. Don't complain, accept the freebies, take the tax-free dollar and sink quietly into the banquette at the Radisson clutching your cold Sol whilst admiring the large breasted Levantine ad girls.
Guilty as charged... all of us.
As me old mate RW Emerson would say: “A little integrity is better than any career.”
anon @ 03.54.
' why was campaign closed down'
lets keep it short and sweet.
they pissed off AMG's head honcho who love him or hate him does have some serious Wasta. he told ITP to close it and close it now OR in the words of Tommy from Snatch 'you'll be proper fucked'
Is it being published in its old tabloid format?
Communicate was the best media magazine in the UAE, but that was back in the days of a previous editor.
campaign was great when it started, but then it lost its balls as well, even before the move to motivate. can't imagine it will have any backbone under fairservice - who is editing and writing it?
"Communicate was the best media magazine in the UAE, but that was back in the days of a previous editor."
MacMillan, get off the blog.
'why was Campaign closed down?' I understood the licence wasn't renewed by Haymarket..?
Media Weak is poor. Very low budget. Looks amateur in comparision to Communicate. Stevie Wonder head of design?
Typical DMO - 33 comments bitching about everything and anything under the heading Campaign the Sequel, but not a word on the actual paper itself AFTER it's hit the stands some two days ago.
Wankers.
1735 - so why the fuck didn't you post something you utter and complete fucking moron?
What's your problem? One chromosome too many?
Because I wasn't one of the 33, you fucking prick. But I bet you were. You can't even grasp the point, can you?
Hey everyone - look at me, I used the word chromosome.
You utter wankstain.
"One of the 33?" What is that? And what point was I supposed to grasp? The single fucking cell in your tiny idiot brain?
Obviously you're a total cretin. You have a chance to make a contribution but your only effort is to slag off other posters for not making one.
If you can't see the complete lack of sentient thinking in that then you are clearly suited to posting here.
Now now!
Can't you two just get a room and skull fuck each other?
Well I have a comment about the relaunch issue... It has already surpassed ENGWeek & Cummunicate though not a mammoth task. Wait n see how following issues pan out for a true judgement. GMR is a different kettle of fish. POW!
OK, I'll go slow for 3.57, as he/she's not very good at keeping up.
My original post: 'Typical - "33" (See what I did? I LOOKED AT THE COMMENT NUMBER) posts about Campaign, and nothing on the magazine - even AFTER it's hit the shelf. You wankers.'
3.57 came back with the brilliant: 'why didn't you post', and the fantastically amazing 'chromosome' comment (great days).
I then retorted: 'But I wasn't one of the "33" (as in original posters. You ok now, still with us?) - I didn't post, for I had nothing viable to say on the subject. Yet "33" still did.'
So I was making a comment about YOU. And the futile nature of this thread. And how people continue to post on here without any substance.
Now, I know you were all upset because I said you were a wanker. But there's still only one comment about Campaign, and that's hardly earth shattering. And, unless you were that poster, then - irony of ironies, given your 'make a contribution stance' - you've still contributed nothing in '40' (oh - too much for you there? There are '40' posts now. Get it? 4-0, those numbers make 40. See?).
So my point again - what IS the point, of this thread or, indeed, this web site?
3.57 - less of a handgun, and more of a handjob.
Less of handgun but certainly not as big a cunt.
And more importantly 0115, what's the point of you? I'd scuttle back to your desk at Garhoud if I was you.
ENG Weak certainly seems to have a better distribution than CamPlain...I've had for Weaks and not a single Plain in sight. I have heard it's terrible though.
Weak is, well, weak. And dull. But Ill wait until I've see Plain before I believe it's worse.
Not wanting to take sides, but 'You're a cunt' and some sweeping generalisation that everyone in Dubai media works in Garhoud isn't really helping your arguement, is it?
To get to the original point.... yes there is a lot of silly name calling on DMO, but you're wrong to say there's no point to the site. Given the state of UAE media this is one of the few real outlets for true comment. Don't let anon@12.29 put you off. Add something of your own instead.
I've finally seen the relaunch edition of Campaign and it is dull. Really uninspiring. Shame, I had hoped it would be worth waiting for
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