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UNVARNISHED OPINIONS ABOUT THE CHICAGO NEWS MEDIA
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SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT
from the Publisher
The Chicago Media Examiner is now receiving heavy competition from the Red Eye and the Red Streak. It is obvious that they are copying our business model of free information, flashy graphics, and a hip attitude. Boo-yeah! In light of this new competition, the CME has decided to respond with our own hip version of the CME. We will be aiming this new version of the CME at a younger audience that does not read newspapers and is generally clueless. Please check out the Red Face
The Red Tide Will Engulf Us All!!!
By JOHN F. KUCZAJ
With the debut of the Tribune's "Red Eye" and the Sun-Times' "Red Streak", Chicago has an exciting little newspaper war going on. It's just too bad that the war is only among alternative editions of the parent papers. Oh, well.
While I think both papers are fun and easy to read, I think it is ironic that when you look at each red edition, you can see a little bit of envy--or is it respect--for the competition. That is to say, the Red Eye carries a lot of Sun-Times traits while the Red Streak carries a lot of Tribune traits. Fascinating. It will be interesting to see what the circulation ends up being once people actually have to plunk down two-bits for the papers. I will say this...the paper with less recyling from its parent will probably win this battle.
In regards to paper nicknames, I've heard "Black Eye" and "The Streaker" and "Sun-Times, Jr.' - none of which sound too good to me. Having to live with Jay Mariotti's lame "Tribster" nickname for all things Tribune, I'd like to propose equally lame official mocking nicknames for each paper. When mocking the papers, you should remember to be consistent and use the official mocking monikers so you can maximize your personal lameness:
Red Eye = Brown Eye
Red Streak = Yellow Streak
In case you need to clarify who published what, just remember that the Tribsters give us the Brown Eye and Hollandaise International has the Yellow Streak.
I'd rather not get deeper into my opinions of the papers in this forum (note that I work for a non-publishing unit of Tribune). However, here are some good links to other interesting opinions:
Chicago Business
Chicago Business
Chicago Business
Flak
Slate
Steve Rhodes
Editor & Publisher
Wall Street Journal
Tamron Hall Dodges A Bullet
By JOHN F. KUCZAJ
I wanted to make a point in this article, but I can't remember the name of a certain character on Comedy Central's South Park. It's the black kid who's in the same class as Cartman, Kyle & Stan. Oh, well. It'll come to me.
A few weeks into its run, the CBS Early Show appears to be as sucky as every other CBS Morning Show has been. This is amazing considering the show has the very talented Hannah Storm & Harry Smith, the extremely adequate Julie Chen and the seemingly capable Rene Syler.
Rene who?
Rene Syler was the last of the four recruits for the show. She comes from a Dallas TV station, and was definitely not the first choice to fill the 4th seat. Funny thing about that 4th seat-CBS made a great effort to fill that seat with an African-American woman. No one seemed to bat an eye, but I wondered why CBS had such a hard time tracking down a talented black woman, and why did they wait until the last pick? It seems like such an afterthought to me. With the exception of Bryant Gumbel, the network morning shows have relegated African-Americans to the doing the weather. Recently, some have been allowed to actually read the news, but when it comes to running the show, it appears that the glass ceiling is a tad thick.
By the way, for the record, the most talented & underutilized person on the morning shows is Robin Roberts. I can't believe she's just a newsreader on GMA. She has so much more to offer.
If, in fact, the CBS show is composed of 4 equals, then the position Rene Syler holds is quite impressive. However, it seems to me like she's #4 on a team led by Smith & Storm. So much for equality.
During CBS's "search for color", Channel 32's Tamron Hall was reportedly targeted, but either she turned them down or Fox wouldn't let her out of her contract. Ultimately, I think she's better off staying away from the CBS Titanic show. She deserves to be chosen by her talent rather than how she looks. Hey, has anyone ever noticed that Halle Berry looks a little like Tamron Hall?
Oh, yeah. Now I remember the name of the kid on South Park - Token.
Musings
By JOHN F. KUCZAJ
Check out the Channel 5 web site to see the interesting sequel to Channel 5's use of Dr. Phil McGraw as an on-air expert on October 16th. Viewers can now e-mail questions to Dr. Phil which will be relayed by Channel 5's own Dr. Deanna Lites. Dr. Lites will then report back on the 4:30 newscast later this month. This is a more acceptable way to have Dr. Phil pump up Channel 5 news ratings while retaining credibility. It looks like Channel 5 does, indeed, have some integrity and the use of Dr. Phil as an expert / promotional tool was just a momentary lapse of reason.
On Channel 32's 9pm newscasts last week, Walter Jacobson was needled by his colleagues to divulge why he didn't care much for Halloween. On Wednesday's show, he tried to explain why, listing a few things including (and I'm paraphrasing here) how unhealthy it is for kids to eat so much candy. Amazingly, he also mentioned how unsafe it is because people put razor blades in candy. Of course, the only problem with that reason is the IT IS 100% WRONG!!! It's an Urban Legend. According the Michael Moore in his movie "Bowling for Columbine", in the past 20 years, there have only been two incidents of tainted Halloween candy, and both incidents were perpetrated by the parents of the child. Unfortunately, the hysterical media seized on the urban legend and have totally ruined what used to be a fun holiday for kids. I can excuse Walter for believing and passing on the whole razor blade/poisoned candy myth (I myself used to believe the myths that females emotionally matured faster than males and that when voting in a Presidential election, your vote counts), I'm just disappointed that the media can't seem to correct this grave injustice.
Going back to Channel 5, I read a blurb last week that said, "WMAQ announced a newspaper partnership with The Times of Northwest Indiana. Beginning Monday, October 28, The Times will provide news headlines from Northwest Indiana for NBC5's 5 p.m. newscast, Monday through Friday. The news sharing relationship will be modeled after NBC5's partnerships with two suburban Chicago newspapers, The Daily Herald and The Daily Southtown." Okay, so now that Channel 5 has the resources of 3 newspapers, and even an occasional appearance by the Sun-Times' Michael Sneed, does this mean there are less people at Channel 5 actually gathering the news themselves? I mean, what's the deal with loading up on the newspaper partnerships...especially when the newspapers are very, very regional? Just wondering.
Channel 2's brought back their classic news theme. Very cool.
ESPN debuted their new show "Around the Horn" this week. I only have two things to say: The game aspect is dumb, and Jay Mariotti sounds awesome with the mute button on.
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Take a look at the new, hip: Red Face
Take a look at the previous issue: Tuesday, October 22
Take a look at the issue before that: Sunday, September 29
* Pseudonym
Published weekly...or so.
Contributions welcome--e-mail an article to the editor
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