Top ten alternate headlines for "Publisher's Note: Our Editorial Board Doesn't Take Dictation"
Dan Petegorsky
Today's piece by the Oregonian's new publisher was a real classic, but I thought the headline needing some tweaking. The top ten entries are:
10. "Our Editorial Board Doesn't Take Dictation, Unfortunately."
9. "Our Editorial Board Didn't Used to Take Dictation"
8. "Our Editorial Board Doesn't Take Dictation, But I'm Working On It."
7. "I Promise to Do for the Oregonian what I Did for the Orange County Register. Except Maybe the Bankruptcy Part."
6. "Really, I'm Just a Man of the People, by N. Christian Anderson III."
5. "Bob, Come Here and Take this Down: 'Our Editorial Board Doesn't Take Dictation.'"
4. "Stay Tuned for More Opinions Oregonians Won't Subscribe To"
3. "Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain."
2. "Voting is for Little People. Influencing Elections is for Publishers."
And the #1 alternate headline is:
1. "Rosebud."
Of course, 10 is just an arbitrary number, so...who's got more?
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Jan 24, '10
How about "Progressive shill doesn't pay the bills"
4:33 p.m.
Jan 24, '10
Ethics? We don't need no stinking ethics!
Jan 24, '10
Nice work, Dan. Great stuff.
how about:
"Hegemony: Like Totally Better than Dictatorship."
Jan 24, '10
Hey Dan, I was with you until the Wizard of Oz reference. I think that one needs to be retired, don't you? Maybe?
Jan 24, '10
The Oregonian is important to Oregonians and we will strive to make it more so in the months and years ahead.*
*Actual quote from Thurston B. Howell, III a.k.a. N. Christian Anderson III, October 26, 2009
Jan 24, '10
If the Oregonian were going to be smart about business, they'd consider the following numbers
P2+ Total Day (January 21, 2010) FNC – 1,801,000 viewers CNN – 594,000 viewers MSNBC –408,000 viewers CNBC – 205,000 viewers HLN –375,000 viewers
And, recall that the AirAmerica experiment proves that a snobby group of aloof elitist wanna-be's is a failed business model
Geoff
5:09 p.m.
Jan 24, '10
I think you're reading the wrong tea leaves, Geoff.
Jan 24, '10
Cancel your subscription to the Oregonian
5:16 p.m.
Jan 24, '10
And, recall that the AirAmerica experiment proves that a snobby group of aloof elitist wanna-be's is a failed business model
Because everyone knows that we should run the country based on cable ratings, right? LOL
Seriously..if that's your metric, color me elitist. I'd rather fall under that label than "fascist"--which is where Fox would take us.
Jan 24, '10
Keep your day job.
Jan 24, '10
Our Editorial Board Doesn't Take Dictation, But It Can Spot a Hint a Mile Away. ("Nice paper you got there. Be a shame if something happened to it.")
Jan 24, '10
If it matters to Oregonians, the publisher of The Oregonian will oppose it!
Jan 24, '10
Unlike RW, I loved the Wizard of Oz reference....never gets old....and actually works for this. Thanks for the chuckle!
8:20 p.m.
Jan 24, '10
Geoff, you righty troll, look up Citadel
Jan 24, '10
I love these daily visits to the liberal echo chamber.
10:57 p.m.
Jan 24, '10
From Christian Anderson after his hiring by Advance Publication*, owners of the Oregonian:
"In my world, the measurement of greatest success is whether we are profitable and whether we are growing revenue..."
Trying to distance himself from editorial and news decisions:
"...there are many things I don’t do. Most important, I don’t edit The Oregonian. That means I don’t decide news coverage, except in a strategic way...."
What the h--- does "in a strategic way" mean? Go back to the first statement.
Simply put, news organizations aren't about the news, and certainly not about the news that is most critical to the community. It's about selling the product and making dollars. Period.
...and this should worry you whether you are part of the "leftie echo chamber" or trying to disrupt it.
Advance Publications, Inc. is a privately held, leading newspaper publisher in the U.S. It owns daily newspapers in about 20 cities and is a top magazine publisher with its Conde Nast unit. It is also a major online publisher of local news web sites as well as owning television assets. Top competitors are Gannett, Hearst Corporation, and Time Inc. (under Time Warner). [1]
Samuel I. Newhouse, Jr., who has a personal fortune of US$7.5 billion, and his brother Donald E. Newhouse, who has a personal fortune of US$7.3 billion, together own the company. According to Forbes, their fortune is "inherited and growing"
Jan 25, '10
@Carla -- not elitist ... wanna-be.
Jan 25, '10
I just hear another cynical right winger saying, "I am not a crook".
Guess I'm guilty of the Oz thing too, rw, having said a number of times that the President's job is to distract from the men behind the curtain. So you would suggest?
Jan 25, '10
this very useful and informative news for me i like to share it with my friends.
Jan 25, '10
KC Hanson commented: Simply put, news organizations aren't about the news, and certainly not about the news that is most critical to the community. It's about selling the product and making dollars. Period.
Forgive the pun but this isn't 'news'...
That's the way it's been with newspapers since the first printed news pamphlets and broadsides (which, to promote distribution/sales, were often highly sensationalized in content) appeared in Germany ~500 years ago. You think Benjamin Franklin started in the newspaper business at a young age as a philanthropic endeavor? (BTW, it was Franklin's publishing business that largely made him the then equivalent of a millionaire and financially independent by about age 40 - freeing him to pursue his philanthropic, political, and scientific interests) Maybe you've been listening too long to all our talking heads and/or 'journalists' prattle on about their slavish devotion to their journalistic integrity. Suggest you read up on William Randolph Hearst - or at least watch Citizen Kane. Hearst Castle was not built at taxpayer expense as a tourist attraction.
What news is 'most critical to the community' is highly subjective... what YOU think may be most important may not be of the slightest interest to your neighbor(s).
8:10 a.m.
Jan 25, '10
At least some in the O's news crew are still on the case:
Oregon's rich getting richer and all others falling behind, wage study shows
9:01 a.m.
Jan 25, '10
Alactross,
So the excuse of some dark history makes today's darkness ok? I don't think I intimated in the least that the press had morphed from perfection to where it's at now.
Swindlers, tycoons and power thugs will always and have always lived amongst us and will make there play wherever they can. And yes, owning a paper then and now was and is a business endeavor.
But shrugging off unregulated media conglomeration as simply another bad act is like ignoring a tumor because you already have corns.
Media, by nature is tightly spun, glossy and appealing. The package well presented is easily sold and swallowed. The real questions is what are we not getting?
At what point is it worse now than it was then? I don't and can't know. We get news from overseas and cyber media of huge stories that become page 16 snippets in regular print press. The revelations from the Downing Street memos should have been scandalous for the Bush presidency, but most people don't even know about them.
...and what will we not learn about locally because the new corporate boss is looking over the shoulders of the remaining Oregonian staffers?
9:02 a.m.
Jan 25, '10
^%$#* "their" not enough coffee yet
Jan 25, '10
"Our Editorial Board Doesn't Take Dictation.... But They Do Frequently Work As Stenographers."
Geoff: We are talking about news, not "American Idol." Anyway, how's profits at "The Washington Times," these days? What, they've never, ever made a profit? I'm shocked, shocked I tell you that ultra rich conservatives have used their wealth to subsidize their money losing propaganda outlets.
Give me the facts and the truth please and let the chips fall where they may.
Jan 25, '10
howdy mel and z, no suggestion as yet, but it is just a dated reference point, and surely we have others to sprinkle in. I suppose it's like using "Hitler" or "Nazi" each time one means to introduce the concept of flavor of fascism, nationalistic frenzy, totalitarianism or genocidal agenda... there are so many delicious despots to choose from, why limit your brain to just one, always?
I wish I knew of another reference. Surely there's one from Matrix, and maybe some from even older auteurs?
I'm happy we've not been treated to "brownshirt", "jackboot" or "lockstep" in a while. :)....
1:03 p.m.
Jan 25, '10
Bad news, rw: Matt Davis really doubled down on Oz last night.
Jan 25, '10
"a snobby group of aloof elitist wanna-be's is a failed business model"
I guess the bankruptcy of the Orange County Register proves that, eh?
Jan 25, '10
Re: oz- "Puppet" is as old as the hills, but has great phoneme value!
<h2>I think it gets repeated because it can be regarded rather like Watership Down. In a sense it IS about the political and social machinery. His juxtaposition of the American "anything is possible" with "who's in charge" can't help but be relevant. Kinda like the end of the day take home, that you can change it, and you have always been able to change it.</h2>