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"Athletes tend to be pretty boring"

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by Dick Whitman, May 1, 2009.

  1. RickStain

    RickStain Well-Known Member

    Because my boss tells me too and I'm just clock-punching.
     
  2. dargan

    dargan Active Member

    Good point.

    Also, people like crap, and there's nothing better to feed them than the same, repetitive, feature garbage they love.

    There are great features, don't get me wrong. It's just that when you're covering preps and the sappy, lengthy, feel-good story ain't your cup of tea, it gets really old.
     
  3. STLIrish

    STLIrish Active Member

    I mean no offense, Dargan, but I fear that "people like crap" thinking is part of what put us in this hole. We underestimate, and thus under-serve, our readers. And so we don't surprise them. The brain-dead are lost to us anyway and the smart ones, the ones who should be reading newspapers, decide newspapers aren't worth their time because newspapers are dumb. So where does that leave us smart folks who write for newspapers?
    Don't get me wrong, I've written plenty of crap stories because some editor needed to fill newshole. But I think we've gotten to the point now as an industry where we need to quit that, and just do what we do as well as we can, so that someone might actually care that we're dying, and so that if the Great Layoff hits tomorrow, at least our last stories weren't crap profiles of boring high school soccer players.
     
  4. jlee

    jlee Well-Known Member

    If I go out and interview a kid whilist charging the company for my time and possibly mileage for driving somewhere and possibly long distance minutes on the office phone, I'd better bring back some dang copy. Remember, we don't tell stories anymore, we produce content to sell.

    Sorry, this is the one minute every day when I give up and contemplate my happy life as a Subway sandwich artist. It's over. Back to the happy 23:59.
     
  5. Dick Whitman

    Dick Whitman Well-Known Member

    Wow, you're kind of a dick, huh?

    And to address the other branch of this thread: Preps have to be covered. And if a kid is running blazing times or swimming blazing times or rushing for 200 yards a game, that kid has to be written about, especially at smaller or preps-heavy newspapers. You can't go talk to the kid, decide there's no there there, then drop it.

    In a perfect world, everyone has a great story to tell, and we find those stories daily and tell them. In the real world, we have to churn out a handful of features a week, on top of some game coverage, and you just don't have time to go Gary Smith on everybody.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 1, 2015
  6. JackReacher

    JackReacher Well-Known Member

    Read the thread. I apologized for that post.

    But to answer your question...yes.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 1, 2015
  7. RickStain

    RickStain Well-Known Member

    My wife was definitely happier as a sandwhich artist. She had that job for years paying for college and loved it. By the end, she was only making $1 less per hour than she is now.
     
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