Monday Morning Media Quarterback

After promoting its new Airbus A380 first-class service, which includes 12 sleeper compartments with the ‘world’s first airline double beds’, Singapore Airlines suddenly realized the implications.

Although their marketing team had spoken of “a class beyond first”, the airline is now apparently concerned that couples (perhaps even those of the same sex) will show no class and make the beast with two backs.

“All we ask of customers, wherever they are on our aircraft, is to observe standards that don’t cause offence to other customers and crew,” the company told Reuters in a statement.  As Singapore Airline has engaged in the long-term promotion of the “Singapore girl“, you can add hypocrisy to this brewing public relations disaster stew.  Just wait until the first ‘violators’ are apprehended!

At $7350 round trip from Singapore to Sydney (that’s per person, and everyone knows it takes two to tango), I’d expect to celebrate–and not just with the included champagne.

Two ways: relevant content from reporters and editors who know the niche, plus compelling cover lines.

Top Business Priorities (HealthImaging&IT, October 2007):
Increasing Procedure Volume

Maximizing Reimbursement

Improving Workflow

No beating around the bush here. 

As we all listen to WII-FM–What’s In It For Me–and this song is about money–who wouldn’t read that?

LA may look like a big, ‘civilized’ city, but there are tell-tale signs of ungovernability.  Last month we had the fourth power outage in Encino in the last six months. Previously, transformers have blown up and cars have hit power poles; this last was because a cat (who survived!) got into the power equipment.

Southern California is wealthy and cultured, but sometimes the edges show.  The fires this time (to paraphrase James Baldwin) burned 509,024 acres, destroyed 1,997 homes, injured 98 and killed 7, according to the LA Times of October 28.  

“All the ingredients for disaster came together last Sunday.   A massive high-pressure system moved across the western United States, and Santa Ana winds began to howl at speeds sometimes reaching hurricane force as they squeezed through the canyons and passes of Southern California.  A year of record-low precipitation had created a tinderbox, and all it took was a spark from a downed power line or a careless welder to ignite blazes that were quickly blown into firestorms that spread across the regions.  Before the winds died down late in the week, massive blazes had charred thousands of acres between Ventura Couny and the Mexican border.”

Eighty-foot flames roared near Ramona, and Roger and Dena Bielasz survived the Witch Fire while others died by taking shelter in their swimming pool, to emerge to a house leveled by flames–but alive.

Barbara Davidson / Los Angeles Times

Dena Bielasz and her husband, Roger, of Escondido, sought refuge in their pool as the fires raged through their property. Roger said to his wife after they were rescued “lets promise each other that was the worst day of our lives..it can only get better from here.”

But disaster sometimes plays as hapless comedy here as well: The huge lines of people snaking through the TSA lines at our airport, beloved LAX, were recently doused by a sprinkler failure.  It sent soaked people and their wet luggage fleeing from yet another evacuated terminal.  Of course, to return they had to go through security again, costing an hour and no doubt missing their flights.

Los Angeles International Airport

Then there are those lost even before they hit bumper to bumper traffic–inexplicably, the 101 freeway, which basically runs east and west in LA, is labelled the North/South 101, leaving thousands befuddled.

In Annie Hall, Woody Allen said LA’s only cultural advanatage was making a right turn on red.  In some parts of LA, now you can’t make a right turn on green without our hated motorcycle cops giving ticket after ticket. 

Rather than find some other way to deal with protecting pedestrians, the traffic geniuses of LA decided to put up a sign, which of course drivers ‘didn’t see.’  One woman got off without a ticket because the officer gave out so many he ran out.

The news cycle has come and gone, but it’s remarkable how little outrage there was over the fake press conference the Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) threw during the Southern California fires. 

The agency, widely reviled for its horrendous performance during Katrina, gave 15 minutes notice of an upcoming press conference.  When reporters couldn’t attend with such little notice, they had FEMA staffers play the part.

Keith Olbermann treats it as a joke .  I don’t agree, but because the Bush administration has already credentialed a fake but syncophantic reporter, “Jeff Gannon“, better known for gay porn than any journalistic credentials, you could say a fake press conference is par for the course.

The staffers asked predictably lame questions, like “What kind of commodities are you shipping to California?”  Then there was the more ominious ‘obey Homeland Security/blame-the-victim’; “There are reports that people were not heeding evacuation orders.  Can you comment?” 

Parts of the ‘news conference’ were carried live on MSNBC, Fox and other outlets,  according to the Washington Post, which noted,

“FEMA press secretary Aaron Walker interrupted at one point to caution he’d allow just “two more questions.” Later, he called for a “last question.”

“Are you happy with FEMA’s response so far?” a (fake) reporter asked. Another asked about “lessons learned from Katrina.”

“I’m very happy with FEMA’s response so far,” Johnson said, hailing “a very smoothly, very efficiently performing team.”

Dana Perino, the White House Press Secretary, was compelled to go to call it “an error in judgement.”  Michael Chertoff, head of Home Security, which includes FEMA, said  “I think it was one of the dumbest and most inappropriate things I’ve seen since I’ve been in government.”

But is all the contrition only because they were caught by one of those vanishing ‘real journalists’?

Vice Adm. Harvey E. Johnson, the agency’s deputy director.

My post on the poor writing and editing in the Huffington Post is getting lots of comment.  For the record, I have nothing against blogger Kristen Reeves, who I don’t know and to whom I wish every success.  But a ‘publication’ like the Huffington Post does its readers—and its writers–a disservice when it posts something like this. (By the way, the original seems to have been re-edited without noting the changes, although it still makes little sense.)

As I see it, there are two issues for holding bloggers to a basic standard of written communication (and I don’t care if this comment makes me a dinosaur, school marm or copy editor wanna-be):

Amateur or professional?

Blogging–writing or conversation?

If you’re blogging about your love of cats or Jean-Claude Van Damme, I don’t care about your grammar or spelling–I’ll make the effort to understand what you have to say.  I’ll see it as a conversation.

But if you’re running a commercial enterprise like the Huffington Post festooned with Subaru advertisements (and as LAObserved notes, not paying writers–not an issue for Laurie David, but a problem for the average freelancer) I expect readibility and cogent arguments. 

Ariana Huffington was originally known for her writing; if your name is on the publication, whether it’s Hearst or Huffington, your reputation is ultimately at stake.

Conversation or written communication, amateur or professional, here’s the bottom line: if I can’t discern your argument or understand your point, I can’t respond to your blog. 

Newspapers are edited for style, consistency and accuracy, among other things.  Should a group blog like The Huffington Post be as well? 

The question gains weight today with this post on the Malibu fires.  Although this blogger does capture memory and imagery, her post on a national site is remarkably poorly written.

The writer asks “Since when were there track homes in the multi-million dollar mansion area?” Perhaps she meant “tract” homes?

Both the first and last sentence make little sense, as the author can’t figure out what the subject is:
“Born and raised in Los Angeles, breaking news of a fire in Malibu is caught by a local resident to be no big surprise.”

The subject appears to be “breaking news” which was of course born and raised in Los Angeles.  Unless she meant ‘thought’ instead of ‘caught’, which still doesn’t make sense.  Simple would work better: “To a local resident born and raised in Los Angeles, breaking news of a fire in Malibu is no big surprise.”

The last sentence is even worse:

“Anticipating the idea that Britney Spears, Paris Hilton, or Lindsay Lohan’s beach houses in Malibu aren’t burning anytime soon, Malibu will be on the back burner once again until another premiere disaster strikes or is sent to rehab!”

All of Malibu needs to go to rehab? No no no!

I’m hearing a little about the Fox Business Channel, but not very much.  A large part of that is because of the traditional reluctance of the broadcast media to comment on anything that occurs on another network/channel, while feverishly promoting its own entries.  (Why is it “news” on the KABC 11PM news what happens on Dancing with the Stars? One guess which network it’s on.)

The mainstream media criticism of Fox Business is predictable.

“At a time when the bull market seems to be breaking down, when investment banks are beginning to cope with the aftermath of a credit orgy, at a time in which income inequality has surged to levels not seen since the 1920s, and when even rich people are abandoning the Republican Party—you have to wonder whether this is the most auspicious time to launch a new TV network that combines GOP talking points and simplistic market updates.”

Or this:

Fox News’s bread and butter is the culture war, and it’s forever inventing new campaigns to boil viewers’ blood in the dead space between celebrity scandals. But how do you translate that to business? Where’s the us-versus-them? The obvious answer would be to embrace O’Reilly-style ostentatious populism: the forgotten little guy against the sinister corporate interests.

But that’s not the biggest problem.  The true test of a business channel is whether you can watch it for 20 minutes straight, which I reluctantly admit I can do with CNBC.  (And not because of my secret love for the ‘money honeys’.) 

Can Fox Business meet that test?  I don’t know–because when I tuned it in, Time Warner’s (yes, a competitor) channel 223 said “Fox Business is not available; call your cable operator.”  

Speaking of music, Amy Winehouse got busted in Norway for marijuana possession.  Setting aside the question of whether she dropped the dime on herself for extra publicity, (or is randomly/deliberately traveling down the ) it brings up another: Isn’t “Norwegian wood” yet another slang term for marijuana? 

 ”Isn’t it good–Norwegian wood?”

The humble hard drive is the ultimate repository for music in your home, office and car.  But mobile music increasingly sits on flash memory, whether in an iPOD, a more humble MP3 player, or on your cell phone.

Now USB flash drives you can wear on your wrist are bridging the gap between concert and computer, with artists like Matchbox 20, Willie Nelson and even the Bob Marley fan club selling memory sticks packed with music and memories (like photos) of the artists. 

Fans can not only leave a Willie concert stoned and satisfied, but take with them a special keep-sake; a downloaded version of that night’s concert.

It’s good to see the discoverers of the basic science around hard drive technology winning the 2007 Nobel Prize.  The hard drive has become the ultimate commodity product–everyone reading this has one, but like Rodney Dangerfield, the spinning disk that stores your applications, music and porn ”gets no respect.”

One industry spokesperson described manufacturing disk drives as “the longest-running industrial philanthropy.” If someone could find a way to make money with hard drives, that would be worthy of an economics Nobel!