Diary of a Magazine Editor (5)

July 9, 2010
Alex Russ skate shot

Alex Wade reports on his first press day with Cornwall Today.

Amazingly, it happened. I woke up, went to the office and came home again, having survived press day. The day itself was memorable, if not for its stress levels – all things considered, it was quiescent affair – but as a milestone. Sundry years in the worlds of law, freelance journalism and PR, not to mention occasional literary interludes and a spot of editing, had yet to see me steer a magazine to publication. A giant leap for yours truly, if, admittedly, a small one for mankind.

The days leading up to press day were hectic. It seemed, on Monday and Tuesday, that the list of tasks was endless, from proofing pages to administering competition draws, chasing tardy advertisers to proofing pages (yes, again), fixing last-minute glitches (“what do you mean, we have nothing on p156?”) and fending off well-meaning calls from PRs and freelancers. What possessed them to call on Wednesday, the day before press day, and then revive their efforts on Thursday, press day itself?

Only they can say, but while on the subject of PRs allow me to vent my spleen. Today’s journalistic world enables PRs to have one’s details, as an editor, employed journalist or freelance writer, at their fingertips. In my case, those details will reveal that I am a freelance, but so too the Acting Editor of Cornwall Today. Indeed, my details appear at the front of Cornwall Today, too, where it is crystal clear that I am the magazine’s editor.

As for Cornwall Today, I would like to think that its remit is clear. It’s an exceptionally well-produced, aspirational lifestyle magazine which seeks to celebrate all that’s great, attractive and interesting about Britain’s western-most county.  So why, then, given the magazine’s purpose and my role as its editor, have I received the following calls, on the magazine’s landline:

1. A call from a PR in Leeds who wished to alert me to a new cake. Cornish connection? Zero.

2. A call from a PR who wanted to know if I’d like to write a complex law story on DNA testing. Conceivably, yes, if I were still freelancing assiduously for the Times and its estimable law pages, but why call me on the Cornwall Today landline? Besides, I’m too busy – editing does not allow scope for much more than, er, editing.

3. A call from a PR in Devon who had a story about a sheep farmer. Getting close, but was there a Cornish connection? Sadly, no.

4. A call from a PR who insisted, rather breathlessly, that a revamped leisure centre would be just the thing for Cornwall Today’s readers. Trouble is, it’s in London.

The moral is that PRs should not, in their eagerness to place stories and feel that they’re doing their best to do so, adopt a scattergun approach. As the editor of Cornwall Today, I’m interested in stories which pertain to Cornwall, not cakes in Leeds or leisure centres in London. Please, if you’re a PR, remember that the tailor-made pitch, which shows you’ve understood an editor’s publication, is the one you’ll get away.

As for the magazine itself, thanks to the sterling work of Ed, Rob and Anne (designers), and Caroline (ads) and her team, it went to press yesterday. It celebrates surfing in Cornwall, a sport, art form or way of life (depending on your view) which has been hugely important to Cornish culture and its economy since it blossomed on the beaches of Newquay in the 1960s, but not in a surf-jargon to the max, exclusive fashion. I hope the surfing pieces – for example, those on Surfers Against Sewage, which is 20 this year, and Surf Action, a community action group which takes injured servicemen surfing – will be of interest to non-surfers as much as surfers. There’s also a host of stories on things which have nothing to do with surfing, from a profile on a man who eats Davidstow cheese for a living to a wildlife odyssey around Land’s End and a peak at the hidden story of the Minack Gardens.

The August issue of Cornwall Today is out around July 15. I hope it does the job – and that as the weeks go by, PRs become slightly more judicious with their calls.

To subscribe to Cornwall Today, click here.

Pictured courtesy of Russ Pierre: an editor relaxing after press day.

 

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From the inside of the maze, ethically outwards

February 9, 2012

Curious times in the media; strange days at The Times.

Would ‘Dacre Cards‘ – the system of licensing journalists proposed by Daily Mail editor Paul Dacre – have prevented the embarrassment now palpable at the Times over the NightJack story?

Times editor James Harding’s evidence to the Leveson Inquiry seemed heartfelt and contrite, albeit that the paper’s former long-serving and much-respected lawyer, Alastair Brett, seems to have been, er, rather dropped in it. Clearly, mistakes were made with regard to NightJack by young reporter Patrick Foster who, once he had hacked into NightJack’s account and thus discovered his identity, then embarked on a quest to expose it via legitimate methods. This, as Inquiry counsel Robert Jay QC put it, was “rather like working from the inside of the maze out”.

But had Foster been licensed via a Dacre Card, would this unsavoury episode in the Times’s history have been avoided?

We suspect not. A raft of laws were in existence at precisely the time when many News of the World journalists seemed to believe that they were entitled to hack any phone they liked. Those laws forbade them from doing so, and yet made no difference. Aside from the obvious objection to them – that they will squeeze out freelancers and citizen journalists – Dacre Cards would simply amount to something to circumvent.

What is really required is an ethical shake-up, from top to bottom. Society generally – not just journalists – needs a sense that some things are just plain wrong.

Supreme Court on Twitter

February 6, 2012

Something remarkable happened today. Yes, the Supreme Court launched its Twitter feed. It even has a Twitter policy, one of caveats, disclaimers and little by way of illumination but regardless: who would have thought that the successor body to the House of Lords would stoop to engage with the world of tweets, hashtags and retweets?

We look forward to the day when court business will be conducted via Twitter. Meantime, check out this link for an excellent blog on the Supreme Court.

Not so right said Fred

February 2, 2012
fred hat

So Farewell, then, Sir Fred Goodwin.

Now you are just Fred.

Not Right Said Fred, but plain Fred.

The Forfeiture Committee did for you.

No one had heard of it before,

But Dave said it had to act, and it did.

Trouble is that no one knows what to think.

Is it ‘Alas, poor Fred‘,

Or ‘Hurray! Sir Fred is dead!’?

We don’t know.

Do you?

By A. Mob, aged 1,378 and a half.