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The Newspaper Guild recently circulated links to an advertisement by the National Writers Union following its victory in the U.S. Supreme Court on rights of freelance writers in the case, Tasini v. New York Times.These issues are very much alive here in Hawaii. Some local publications are already demanding freelance writers waive all future rights in order to get anything in print, and if writers aren't balking at this, they certainly should. Freelance issues have been pretty low key here, considering how many local pubs are 100% dependent on freelancers for content. It's a situation ripe for an uprising of writers.
But even the dailies are struggling with the issue, with the companies trying to eliminate any claims by reporters for compensation if prior news stories are packaged for resale in new forms, electronic or otherwise. The crossover between the dailies and their weekly offspring could raise the issue in new forms.
Dave Shapiro's Volcanic Ash column this week put the Felix questions being asked in the ongoing legislative probe into context. Apparently his regular spot will be in the Wednesday Advertiser. Always worth reading, even when he writes about that dog of his.
And I made it back into print in this week's 10th anniversary issue of Honolulu Weekly. Those of you here in Honolulu still have time to pick up your own copy. I did some writing for them a decade ago, while I was publishing the Hawaii Monitor newsletter, and it's been fun to make connections again. Former Advertiser investigative reporter Sally Apgar did the cover story in the last issue, a good analysis of Kakaako development issues. I guess the Weekly is becoming a home for refugees from the news wars.
Another Friday the 13th.I started the morning a few minutes ago out on the deck, just before 5 AM, catching an initial glimpse of what is supposed to be an unusual lineup of planets. I had a good view of the first pair, Venus and Saturn, before a cloud moved over to obscure that whole part of the sky. I'll just have to jump up and check back every few minutes.
A couple of comments about Gannett's Honolulu Advertiser have come in over the past few days.
The first:
"notice how red has become the color of the post-joa advertiser? in the letterhead stationery. at the top of page one. all over the web site. can we think of any cultures in which red is an auspicious color?"psy-ops. or marketing. same thing."
And #2:
"Have you noticed how some sections of the online Advertiser are kept online for several days, with no updating? For instance, today's (Thursday's) Entertainment section is from (last) Friday. And the tech stuff is old, too. I realize that something like tech may only print once a week, but entertainment seems to be a topic that would lend itself to daily updating -- as I think the print version reflects. "
I've been out to check the sky several times. So far, I've gotten another look at Venus and Saturn, which are up relatively high in the sky, and I might have caught a glimpse of Jupiter, but there are quite a few clouds on down towards the horizon which are blocking out the rest of this celestial show.
It was much more threatening a couple of mornings back, on Wednesday, when I got this photo of the clouds towards Kualoa and Kaneohe.
Cat lovers are going to have to protest the anti-cat bias in reporting of an unusual incident of "cat bites woman" reported by the Star-Bulletin yesterday. One little incident, resulting in "a seven-inch long scratch" and a few punctures, and suddenly cats are a menace?"Martin (the victim) said this is the first time she saw the cats attack a person and fears for the safety of children and senior citizens who walk in the area."
But dog bites don't make the news unless someone's killed or mauled. Where's the fairness here?
And, while we're at it, down with that dogs 'n cats movie and its attempted demonization of cats!
Posters in local 7-11 stores are offering the Star-Bulletin for half-price during July--25 cents daily, and 75 cents on Sunday. An earlier special offered a free S-B with a cup of coffee, or something along those lines. Actual sales appear to vary quite a bit from store to store.Press problems delayed some Star-Bulletin deliveries yesterday. With those MidWeek presses running pretty much 24-7, there just isn't much room for error and no redundancy in case of problems. Of course, the Gannett presses were breaking down just about every day back when the S-B was still dependent on their production, so this really isn't any worse.
There hasn't been any recent reporting of audited circulation numbers for the two dailies. I wonder what those figures will show, now that we're almost four months into this head-to-head competition.
Lucinda Fleeson, the freelance writer who did a long American Journalism Review story on the battle to save the Star-Bulletin ("Pulse of Paradise"), has a thought provoking piece in the current AJR ("Where are the Watchdogs?") on the evolution in news coverage of the federal bureaucracy that has implications for similar coverage at the state and local level. She's also working on a follow-up on the Honolulu news war.
I had a call yesterday from a reader in Montana in response to yesterday's Donnelly item about Peggy Buchwach. He said the Buckwach's bought his family home in Honolulu years ago when his parents moved their brood out of the islands. He still remembers sitting at the kitchen counter as a 13-year old, counting coins earned selling the Star-Bulletin. Now he's over there in Montana surviving occasional binges of island nostalgia. Small world.
In case you missed Dave Donnelly's column in the Star-Bulletin yesterday, here's his latest snippet on the state of the newspaper war: "And Peggy Buchwach, widow of former Advertiser managing editor Buck Buchwach, startled some by announcing she'd dropped the Advertiser and was now subscribing to the Star-Bulletin. Was Bucky spinning in his grave? "Today he would have approved," said Peggy ... "Okay, and the S-B's former managing editor is now a columnist for the Advertiser. Things are getting pretty twisted.
I'm told Gannett recently brought in a hired gun from the mainland to try breathing some life into it's recently acquired free community paper, now being positioned to compete directly with David Black's MidWeek. Strategically, they can't afford to give MidWeek a free ride, which allows Black to focus resources on building the Star-Bulletin. By introducing a competitive weekly, or even making a believable threat, Gannett forces Black to spread his resources, and they're hoping, of course, that the spread is too thin.
If you're up early next Tuesday, you can always listen in on the Gannett's second-quarter 2001 earnings conference call with financial analysts, which will be available via a link on the company's web site. Scheduled start time 4 AM Hawaii time. More details available in a recent Gannett press release.
And I added some new photos to the gallery over the weekend, so click the photo gallery banner (or this photo) for the latest.
Trouble at Channel 2.It's probably old news by now, but I just got around to looking at the lawsuit filed last month against Emmis Communications, owner of KHON-TV, by reporter and anchor Mary Zanakis, who is now on the news staff at rival KITV. The suit, filed by Zanakis' husband, attorney Tom Pico Jr., alleges that Emmis violated the Medical and Family Leave Act when they demoted and then terminated Zanakis following several months of maternity leave in early 1999. She had worked at the station for 18 years in a variety of capacities.
According to the suit, Zanakis was morning health anchor and producer of medical news segments at the time she went on leave, but three days before her scheduled return she was notified of a reassignment to general assignment reporter. Zanakis repeatedly questioned the reassignment, complaining that it amounted to a demotion because the new position was not equivalent to her former position, had "significantly less status", entailed a change in duties and required a change in hours. Station management took the position that the law was not violated because her salary had not been reduced.
Less than three months later, she was informed the GA position was being eliminated and she would be terminated, a move the suit calls "willful retaliation" for her continued complaints about the demotion and insistence on her legal rights.
The suit calls Zanakis' firing "both shameful and an affront to all women."
Emmis and KHON already face a discrimination suit filed in May by former reporter Barbara Marshall.
I think there's general agreement that the news media would be negligent if coverage of politics were limited to stories gushing with praise, uncritical commentary, and unrestrained boosterism. But for some reason, we appear resigned to reporting of business and sports that often veers in that direction.Take the reporting since the Star-Bulletin broke the story of the resignation of the St. Louis High School football coach. Everyone's piled on the story. As one reader commented to me: "You look at the coverage of Cal Lee's decision to step down and you'd think Pope John Paul II had just died. But even the pope's obituary would be laced with some critical analysis of his tenure."
Pat Bigold, who has covered the prep sports beat for years, offered up this commentary:
Lee did make a big impact on the local sports scene and future winners will be measured against his legend.But his tenure at St. Louis was clearly a checkered one. With all the hosannas from the Honolulu media, no mention is made of several embarrassing incidents under his watch.
There was the incident in which a Las Vegas hotel was trashed a few years ago by his players in the wee hours of the morning while he went out to the Strip. There was also evidence that players partied with strippers that night. It was a story that made front-page news, inspired one local TV station to send a camera crew to the scene of the incident and found its way into many mainland media.
There have been arrests of St. Louis football players that came to light over the past few years and an incident in 1999 in which a St. Louis assistant AD invited strippers to party inside the athletic complex.
The timing of Lee's announcement, coming in the wake of the Damien president's plan to forfeit against the Crusaders next season, raises questions that should be explored. This action by Damien, which spotlights how overbearing the St. Louis football program has become, also has been exposed nationally (ESPN website).
Was there pressure brought to bear upon Lee by trustees to step down? Or has Lee simply decided that ILH changes galvanized by Brother Greg O'Donnell's unprecedented action will make business as usual impossible for St. Louis?
One thing is sure now, and that is that if the HHSAA does indeed arrange a match in 2002 between St. Louis and national power like De La Salle (longest unbeaten streak in the nation), Lee will not be the coach of record. It's been a long time since St. Louis played a major mainland program, and a loss for Lee as a head coach next year would have made his exit more difficult.
It was a mini-feast in our Kaaawa household last night. One thick boneless pork chop cut into two portions, sautéed in garlic, powdered jalapeno and the juice of a couple of lemons, a bit of water and white wine to keep it moist while cooking, and sliced apple bananas and diced red and orange peppers added in the final minutes of cooking. Served with mashed potatoes whipped with nonfat half and half, and a vegetable plate with fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots, olives and avocado.
Maybe it wasn't so mini after all.
Click for larger version
Another summer Sunday.
Poor Ms. Miki. Nearing her 15th birthday, she's got arthritis in both front legs. Some days it's obviously painful to move around, so she spends more time curled up around the house. Her current favorite spot is a chair at the dining table, or on the table itself. She's also, at this advanced age, learning about laps. She appears to prefer sneaking unnoticed into a vacant lap, ignoring active invitations and watching instead for those unguarded moments.
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