Grumpy Editor

HGTV Magazine gets green light for additional issues

While many magazines are struggling to retain subscribers in a weak market, Scripps Networks Interactive Inc.’s HGTV and Hearst Corp. this week launch HGTV Magazine focusing on gardening, food, home and other lifestyle themes reflecting the cable channel’s programming, notes Grumpy Editor. 

The magazine, one of four issues planned this year, goes on newsstands following two test issues. 

Hearst and Scripps have gone against the tide before when they started Food Network Magazine, the print version of the popular Food Network.  That publication has more than tripled its circulation to 1.4 million since its debut in 2009. 

Scripps Networks Interactive’s other brands include DIY Network, Travel Channel, Cooking Channel and country music network Great American Country. 

Recently named HGTV Magazine publisher is Dan Fuchs, formerly associate publisher of O, The Oprah Magazine. 

Sara Peterson, HGTV Magazine’s editor-in-chief, says, “We wanted to strike a chord with Americans looking for a fun, approachable magazine about how they live their lives at home.”

 

Time editor finds breastfeeding cover art ‘whimsical’

Discussions on Time magazine’s current cover photo, showing a woman breastfeeding her almost four-year-old son, continued to bounce around television news channels over the weekend, observed Grumpy Editor. 

Time magazine selected the photo to illustrate a story on "attachment parenting.”  The cover art ran with the headline:  “Are You Mom Enough?” 

Focusing strictly on the cover art, not the story, many observers --- some pointing out the magazine is displayed on newsstands --- called use of the photo “sensational.” 

Even Playboy magazine hasn’t gone that far with its cover art. 

Rick Stengel, Time managing editor appearing on MSNBC, was asked by Mika Brzezisnki, co-host of the morning program "Morning Joe," if he winced when he looked at the picture. 

“I don't wince when I look at the picture," Stengel replied.  "I think its provocative.  It’s a little whimsical.” 

Whimsical? 

Going back to last December, some may recall Time magazine’s cover proclaimed “The Protester” as “Person of the Year” 

At that time, Stengel declared, “These are the folks who are changing history already and will change the future.” 

With these two examples, it looks like Time is changing magazine cover history.

 

Dual job: Turn in Money copy, then book boss’s flight

Money magazine has a job opening that should keep an aggressive multi-tasking reporter busy without too much time to check an iPad, notes Grumpy Editor who spotted the “help wanted” call in a TalkingBizNews.com Friday item.

The personal finance publication, in the Time Inc. family, is seeking a full-time contract reporter (with previous financial journalism experience a plus) who can handle various tasks --- including a chunk of time required for non-writing undertakings that, in prior days, were assigned to several staffers who never attended journalism school. 

Multi-tasks on the editorial side include writing beat stories and front-of-book articles, finding real people anecdotes for features, creating data visualizations, helping senior writers and fact checking.

But the position requires 20 percent of the job --- that’s equivalent to one day a week --- assisting Money’s managing editor with administrative tasks, such as answering phones, making travel arrangements, coordinating the M.E.’s schedule, submitting expense reports and helping with presentations.

The only things missing:  fetching coffee and fresh doughnuts.

 

Newspaper reporter nears bottom of 200 jobs list

Journalism students hoping to don press hats and write exciting front-page stories should be aware that newspaper reporter ranks near the bottom of the worst jobs for 2012, warns Grumpy Editor. 

That’s something journalism professors won’t mention. 

A Jobs Rated Report by CareerCast.com puts newspaper reporter --- with mid-level income of $35,275 --- at number 196 on a list of 200 professions, between waiter/waitress (No. 195) and oil rig worker (No. 197). 

Newspaper reporter slips eight places from the last tally. 

Doing slight better is broadcaster (No. 191), with mid-level income of $27,324.  But the position drops 63 places on the list since the last time around. 

“Many jobs in the media are characterized by high stress, short deadlines, long hours and a poor hiring outlook,” mentions Tony Lee, publisher of the report. 

“Despite these poor working conditions,” he adds, “competition is steep for what jobs remain after massive consolidation and layoffs in the media industry.” 

Media positions ranking higher on the list are public relations executive (No. 70 with the media group’s best mid-level income of $92,156), advertising account executive (98), author (113), publication editor (119), photographer (147) and photojournalist (166). 

Topping the jobs list?

Software engineer.

 

Oops! Food writers miss ‘pink slime’ ingredient in recipes

Grumpy Editor wonders why newspaper and magazine food writers didn’t raise eyebrows in preparing tasty meat recipes when one of the “hidden” ingredients --- used for two decades --- recently surfaced, branded as “pink slime,” a ground beef additive made from butchered scraps.

Perhaps food writers were too involved in getting the right amount of cayenne pepper, smoked paprika, chopped ginger, steamed snow peas or cilantro leaves into recipes. 

Furthermore, in most cases, ground beef bolstered by the filler then was treated for bacteria with ammonium hydroxide (two words normally not found as mouth-watering ingredients in recipes). 

The so-called pink slime recently made the rounds on the Internet, bringing it to light and triggering supermarket chains to proclaim they would phase out the ground beef containing the mysterious filler. 

Among them:  Safeway Inc., Kroger Co. and Supervalu Inc., which operates Albertson’s and Jewel-Osco. 

Despite this and knowing about the meat filler coupled with the ammonium hydroxide treatment, the U.S. Department of Agriculture maintained all was safe for the pink slime-laced ground beef highlighted in backyard barbecues and in preparing culinary delights when relatives visit.

 

It’s adieu to ‘mademoiselle’ on official French forms

Using “mademoiselle" on official documents in France is now banned and will be replaced by “madame,” learns Grumpy Editor.

Mademoiselle, since around 1635, was regarded as a title of respect, equivalent to “miss” and used in speaking to or of a girl or unmarried woman. 

This week, the French prime minister’s office --- after a campaign by feminist groups calling the word sexist --- announced mademoiselle will be gone from official documents and advised that all women should be referred to as madame, whether they are married or not. 

Now, while madame (or madam in the U.S.) is a polite term in addressing a woman, it also is defined as “the woman in charge of a house of prostitution.” 

French feminist groups, including Osez le féminisme and Les Chiennes de Garde in their campaign to ban mademoiselle, probably didn’t think of that. 

The alternative could have been the English word going back to the 1150-1200 era:  damsel. 

Damsel is defined as “a young woman or girl; a maiden, originally one of gentler or noble birth.” 

In the U.S., Mademoiselle was widely seen on newsstands since 1935.  But the popular Condé Nast magazine, socked by the economy, rolled out its final issue in November, 2001.

 

Sacramento Bee nixes altered art, but not Businessweek

Two cases of “manipulated photos” in the past week resulted in the firing of an award-winning photographer at the Sacramento Bee but not much static with the other on this week’s Bloomberg Businessweek cover, notes Grumpy Editor. 

What’s going on? 

In the Sacramento Bee case, photojournalist Bryan Patrick digitally merged two shots into one showing a snowy egret trying to steal a frog from a great egret. The art was published on Jan. 29. 

Seems in the original image the frog was not as visible. 

Because of that, the Sacramento Bee charged Patrick with “violating the paper's ethics policy forbidding manipulation of documentary photographs."  And out he went. 

Meanwhile, the Bloomberg Businessweek cover in the Feb. 6 to 12 issue showed a digitally-altered Continental Airlines passenger jet riding piggyback on a similar United Airlines craft as the sun sets behind clouds.  The cover headline: "Let's Get It On." 

The cover story focused on merging of Continental and United “means endless decisions, from uniforms to coffee.” 

Manipulating photos is nothing new. 

Long before digitally-altered art, print editorial artists would enhance crime scenes or eliminate movie stars' wrinkles via airbrushing photos. 

Nobody complained. 

Now there seems to be some sensitivity --- or super-strict honesty --- in situations that don’t really matter…like two birds and a frog in the wilds.

 

Good Housekeeping needs some marketing housekeeping

With national magazines keenly eager to keep readers subscribing these days, confusion grows not only in prices, but in all sorts of wild “deals” and marketing tactics, finds Grumpy Editor. 

A good example this week is with Good Housekeeping. 

The Hearst magazine (a unit of Hearst Corp.) sends two subscription pitches, with variations, arriving at the same household on the same day. 

Pitch No. 1, labeled “rate adjustment” and “this is a non-transferable discount offer,” indicates the magazine with an annual cover price of $41.88 can be had for $7.97 --- and a Good Housekeeping tote bag will be tossed in with the offer that expires Feb. 15. 

Pitch No. 2, labeled “preferred subscriber claim form” for Good Housekeeping, also includes a one-year subscription to Redbook, another Hearst publication, at a combined price of $8. 

That form notes “combined annual cover price” of $77.76.  The $8 comes after a “credit adjustment” of $69.76.  The offer, good until Feb. 13, also cautions, “This credit is not transferable.” 

But wait. 

While the two-magazines-for-one-small-price in pitch No. 2 shows the other magazine as Redbook on the mail-in slip, the bottom part indicates the other Hearst publication in the deal is Woman’s Day, complete with reproduction of a cover photo and one paragraph description of that magazine’s highlights. 

A plus, however:  Unlike some other publishers’ pitches these days, a prepaid envelope accompanies each. 

Among Hearst’s other magazines are Cosmopolitan, Esquire, Popular Mechanics and Harper’s Bazaar.

 

Ladies' Home Journal cuts pro writers, greets amateurs

What could be the start of something --- frowned on by veteran professional writers --- is a major content change among women’s magazines when readers start writing most of the material, debuting with the March issue of the 129-year-old Ladies’ Home Journal, notes Grumpy Editor.

LHJ will be the first major mass-market magazine to utilize reader-generated content.

Seasoned past contributors to LHJ are wondering if the trend toward using amateur writers will spread to other Meredith Corp. magazines.

The New York Stock Exchange-listed company also produces Better Homes and Gardens, Parents, Family Circle, Fitness, More, American Baby, Every Day with Rachael Ray and FamilyFun.

Veteran writers compare summoning amateurs to fill editorial pages of a well-known magazine with switching a backyard barbecuer to chef at a swank New York restaurant (with entree cost unchanged on the menu) or calling on a junior high school nurse to perform a tricky gall bladder operation.

Seasoned LHJ contributors, who have provided quality articles over the years, see editors straining to obtain publishable material.

Editors’ eyes may be strained, too, in editing copy.

Readers also may notice the difference.

Eyes also will be on LHJ’s future circulation figures --- and advertising revenue.

 

Time magazine hails protesters as ‘Person of the Year’

According to Time magazine, the “Person of the Year” is not an actual, individual person at all, but groups summed up as “The Protester,” observes Grumpy Editor.

High-tech developers, scientists, politicians, sports figures, entertainers, military commanders, etc. all were shelved in favor of  a cover story spotlighting demonstrators, including the Occupy Wall Street crowd.

And some magazine editors wonder why circulation is slipping. 

Time said protesters were recognized for "redefining people power" around the world.

Sounds like turning news pages back to the 1960s.

The weekly news magazine put the focus on dissent in the Middle East and Europe that spread to the U.S.

Protesters had been the force behind the largest news stories of the year, claimed Time editor Rick Stengel.

"They dissented, they demanded, they did not despair, even when the answers came back in a cloud of tear gas or a hail of bullets," he trumpeted.  “They literally embodied the idea that individual action can bring collective, colossal change."

Grumpy Editor wonders how many protesters are scanning Time magazine to savor the “colossal change” they brought in 2011.