You Know Things are Bad When the LAT Sells an A-1 Ad -- and Not a Wrap

Tell me how credibility has been sold.

 

It hasn't. Sounds like their biggest complaint is with the execution of this particular ad more than philosophy of whether to place an ad on 1A.
I'd agree with that as well. Could have been better.
But I'd still sell it every damn day they wanted to buy it.

 

Pretty sure anyone complaining about the idea of selling an ad on A1 should go back to 1999, where everyone had jobs.

If you want to complain about the execution and concept, that's a valid argument.

 

According to the NY Times, it looks like exactly what I cited earlier that I was afraid would happen, actually did, at least in NBC minds.

NYT: NBC's exec says, "What was great about this ad unit is it gave us a quote-unquote ‘editorial voice.'"

And, a former Times editor objects, and puts his money where his mouth is.

Full link on LAObserved:

http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2009/04/one_ex-timesman_im_done.php

 

Pretty sure nobody's complaining about an ad on A1. We all know that ship has sailed. But blurring the line between editorial and advertising like this should concern all of us ... a lot.

 

Then why not go whole hog and just call it, "The Los Angeles Times, Presented by Pepsi"? If you're going to put your face up for sale, might as well throw in the body, too.

If they want to skew younger, they can always switch to Mountain Dew.

 

If you can't figure that out, then I can't help you.

 

I really think this is a case of newsroom vanity. The readers won't give a flying rip if it *is* "The L.A. Pepsi Times." This is a generation raised on pervasive advertising.

They will care when you make a huge, ridiculous mistake on the front page because you fired all the copy editors.

 

Right. Nothing in the paper is believable because there's an ad on page one. Got it.

 

When there is an advertisement that looks like it's editorial content, then yes, I have a real problem believing anything that's in the newspaper.

You sure don't seem to have much of a grasp of ethics.

 

They'll never figure out that it's an ad, because they cleverly made it blocked off, in a different typeface and put a big label "advertising" at the top to trick the readers into think it was editorial content.