I find myself really torn when tempted to pounce on the folks at the Victoria Advocate for their almost Laurel and Hardy slapstick approach to reporting, editing, and managing a daily newspaper. On the one hand, I try to tell myself to consider the caliber of the management, and the size of the market, and cut Cobler's Kids some slack for what they have allowed it to become. On the other hand, I recall what a once respectable, and professionally presented daily it was to fetch from the driveway, and read the likes of Jim Bishop, Henry Wolf and Pat Hathcock, and see the type of feature stories, national, state and local news stories, columns, and serious editorial issues that one expects from a real newspaper.
Of late it has taken on the appearance of a tabloid rag, and the reporting, editing, and layout are simply down the dumper. Each edition is expected to be loaded with spelling and grammatical gaffes, and week old local news, and riveting stories of things like two cars that didn't crash into one another, or a hijacked order of McNuggets on the hoof from an outlying suburb's Mickey D's.......and that is just in the print edition. And as further proof of their cluelessness, their "medical reporter" is online, appealing to his (legions of) followers, to drop him a line and give him the names of friends who are struggling with AIDS or are HIV positive. How is that for both inconsiderate and ballsy? That's called coffeeshop and or cubicle based begging for a story reporting folks. Dare I tackle the issues with their online circus? You know, the one area that their esteemed editor is supposed to be a whiz kid in?
That is debatable at best. He seems to be obsessed lately, despite claims to the contrary, with getting in the LAST WORD, and micromanaging the online content and those who offer any input to HIS FORUMS. I am learning just how powerful a Blackberry can be.......
But then, seeing what gets posted there, is becoming more comical by the day, regardless of how long it is allowed to stay, before it gets nuked by the BOSS.
While it is obvious that Cobler is personally riding herd on the online Vicad, and has his underlings armed with hatchets as well, there are a number of folks just rubbing his nose in his you know what, and he doesn't even realize it. Take the new guy, "BigolJay, going crazy today......just being a pain, and using an obvious name referenced to the late littlej. Then there is Gay4matt, and g4further, and who knows how many more. These folks slipping back in and using multiple ambiguous screennames to wreak havoc on the forums has become commonplace there. My friend Furthur tried to toe the line, but apparently went one toke over........with his copy of my Christmas rant......
On top of all of that, I was "permanently" banned from commenting on the Vicad webcast this morning........funny thing was Gabe apparently did it. I could see Cobler when it happened(my banishment in mid sentence), and he was across the room from Gabe who was moderating. Now I wasn't watching his hands that closely, so maybe Cobler was doing his Palladin "Have Blackberry, will travel", impersonation.......
And as a parting shot, the moderator cleared the comments at the end of the meeting, rather than leaving them up until they start the meeting again tomorrow. As the photo above indicates, I saved a copy........
4 comments:
Stop it! You are absolutely killing me over here! I am about to wet my pants! You are so spot on right, it's scary.
Getting banned in mid-sentence--now that's cool! I must admit, I AM impressed.
Yeah, I do not know where the Advocate took the turn for the worse, but it might have been when they brought that dude in from elsewhere that convinced the owners that they needed to start trimming. So they trimmed off anyone who was drawing a reasonable salary and replaced them with folks who you know are being paid next to nothing. And we know you get what you pay for.
Maybe it WAS a money thing. How much do you think Cobler makes? Not nearly as much as he could have made if the Poynter Institute had not recinded their job offer. Imagine, editor of an online newspaper versus editor of a small circulation local paper.
They still haven't published, online, their editorial about the chicken in Refugio. I think once they saw it in actual print, they realized how really stupid it was, and they are saving themselves the embarrassment of the posters' critical remarks.
Having the last word, and micro-managing? Absolutely. And I bet he is just going nuts trying to keep up with all the new posters. I don't know when he sleeps. As far as I am concerned, Cobler need not worry about me showing up anymore on HIS forum. Over on MY blog, the freedom of speech rules, and it is phenomenal!
Hysterical!
I bet that Chris is on so much anti-anxiety medicine that he has to get an industrial-sized "pill reminder box." (You know the ones where you put your meds for the week.) If he isn't, maybe that is the key, he needs to be. He needs to just "chill" a litt bit and tackle the big issues at his paper--those being lazy reporters and bad writing habits.
Pilot, you made a reference to "one toke.." and it took me back to my college days when I used to hang out with Brewer and Shipley (actually more Shipley, than Brewer, but I digress.) I guess that tells my age/background when I recognize the beginning of a song, "One toke over the line, Sweet Jesus," huh? Yeah, I actually do remember part of that foggy past. Sometimes, though it seems that it actually was someone else and not me. But then again, I wouldn't be who I am without what I have done/learned. I feel that I might need to reveal more in a blog, but that will come later.
Pilot, I will miss seeing you on the ten o'clock broadcast. Without you it will be basically George telling people to register to vote or some athletic supporter wanted to talk about scores or some such nonsense. (You know how those athletic supporters can be irritating.)
Do you think that Chis reads these blogs, or do you think that he gives that assignment to a staff member and reports to him? I bet he checks these blogs constantly and loves to see that the paper is getting publicity.
Have you read all the stuff today about the deletion on comments/commentors? CJ wrote a shame on you bad posters blog and she really opened herself up to hearing about credibility (or lack of)difficulties with the paper.
Post a Comment