Everything About Business Except The Bottom Line: FunnyBusiness

Donald's Heart of Gold

  Fox News covered it as a FOX NEWS ALERT. As the media waited with baited breath to hear Donald utter the words he once tried to copyright-- Donald did what Donald does. He got more headlines.

If this whole MISS USA escapade were an algebraic equation it would look something like this Scandel + redemption =Rating Bonanza $$$$$$.

You can read the entire post at Blogher.

WCCO report on Black Friday Ads

 

The email came in a a few minutes before 5:00 pm  from Reporter Jason DeRusha of WCCO -TV , our CBS affiliate.

He had seen my post about Black Friday Ads on Blogher -- the network of women blogs that where I am a contributing editor and Jason wanted to chat. Then he wanted to do an on air interview. Did I mention that (a) my hair was a mess (b) my office was messier than usual and that is beyond comprehension for some and (c) I had to be on a webex facilitation at 5:50.

When Jason discovered I lived downtown he didn't think that my time crunch was an issue. He, the cameraman and the intern arrived at 5:30 and we were done by 5:45.So here it is, Jason's story on Black Friday Ads with me as his "marketing expert.

Besides the fact that he didn't mention the name of my blog, or Blogher and that my name is actually pronounced  e la na ( like sha na na) rather than e lay na -- I thought his story was great.

Check out his blog  he has a lot of info on Black Friday ads.

French Newspaper decides Bloggers are no longer second class citizens

For some journalists, it's akin to Chicken Little declaring, "The sky is falling. The sky is falling."  Not only is the French newspaper Le Monde,welcoming bloggers ---they are giving them equal billing as professional journalists.

Mon Dieu.

From Loic Le Meur blog,

Le Monde is one of the first newspaper in the World to offer blogs to their readers, under the Le Monde brand. They have also published a ranking of the 10 top blogs, mixing their journalists blogs and their readers blogs, showing them at the same level, based on blog readers recommendations.

The Le Monde blogging policy comes at a time when American newspapers are continuing the slippery slope into circulation oblivion. A slip, that Jennifer Saba reports in Editor &Publisher ,the financial experts expected.

"Circulation declined as expected," wrote John Janedis, senior analyst with Wachovia Equity Research, in a note. He, like others, points to the effects of the Internet that is giving print circulation a whipping.
 
"We expect the companies in our coverage universe to continue to improve their online presence, using both their own Web sites, as well as to purchase other online assets, to help combat the continued decline in circ trends," Janedis wrote.
 
Bear Stearns analyst Alexia Quadrani doesn't even think yesterday's bad news -- daily circulation plunged 2.8% and Sunday fell 3.4%, one of, if not the worst drop in recent years -- will do much to shake The Street's confidence. Or lack thereof.
 
"Overall we believe these results are in line with expectations of low to mid single-digit average declines and therefore do not expect a material impact [on] the publishing stocks," Quadrani wrote in a note. For that, she's waiting for October advertising results.

The folks at Freakonomics have different take on the situation.They say the circulation drops are intentional

Not everyone is convinced that newspapers are dying, of course. Jack Welch wants to buy the Boston Globe; Dow Jones just managed to find a buyer who paid $282 million for six smaller newspapers; and of course several months ago, McClatchy bought Knight-Ridder. Circulation declines notwithstanding, these transactions suggest an underlying value that the newspapers’ own articles do not reflect.

The media executive Allan D. Mutter makes a very interesting point on his blog about circulation declines: a lot of them are essentially intentional. That is, circulation figures are falling in part because many newspapers—in response, I am guessing, to recent audit scandals at Newsday
and elsewhere—have stopped distributing free or cheap copies of their papers, which used to be helpful in padding circulation figures.

But, as Music City Mafia pointed out,

Circulation is the least of the newspaper’s worries. Advertisers are heading for the exits in droves. Car dealers have traditionally spent more money in the local paper than all other media combined. And that has held steady for decades. But newspapers share of dealer’s budgets (according tot the N.A.D.A) has deopped from 51% to 36% in the last two years. I assumer that similar numbers exist for your favorites: Real Estate Agents

What do Tom Cruise,Mel Gibson and Forbes magazine have in common?

They said a bad, bad, thing. Mel apologized. Tom got the boot.Forbes pulled its article. You can read my entire post at blogher.

A Million Girls Would Kill For This Job

This is a story about bad bosses, books,blogs, movies and the influence they have on mass media. The book is The Devil Wears Prada. Until last weekend I had vaguely been aware of the book. Yes, I knew it was about a ridiculous boss but I just hadn't bothered to read it.(And, if I had not decided to wash my duvet cover on Sunday morning I would have finished the last 150 pages of the  book before going to the movie.)

Let me just ask, "Do you know what happens to a paperbook that goes through the washer with a Duvet cover?" While I'm at it, "Do you know how to get the pulp off the duvet cover after it's gone through the dryer?"  Your responses will be  greatly appreciated. The experience has given me a whole new appreciation for pulp fiction.


I picked up the book on Saturday afternoon after I noticed a media storm of attention on the topic of bad bosses. First, there was the contest on MSNBC.You can vote on Bad TV Bosses From Hell .There are 10 bosses to choose from ranging from speakerphone "Charlie" on Charlie's Angel, to Danny DiVito in Taxi,and C. Montgomery Burns on the Simpsons.

This contest is tied to a report scheduled for July 7th:Real Life Bosses You Have to See to Believe. For those who want to share their real life stories, MSNBC is inviting readers to share a bad boss story. They do have this disclaimer,"remember your emails may be published."  They then ask people for their names, city and state and email address.

I would be very surprised if many people share their current stories. There's something about giving your real name when asked to write about your boss that puts the fear of being dooced in  people.

If it had just been MSNBC I might not have read the book, but then, as I was driving around Saturday morning,I heard an invitation from NPR to go to their website and share bad boss stories. They are putting a slightly different twist on the story. They want to hear from people who have been bad bosses as well as from people who've had bad bosses.

The Bad Boss. Ever had one? Ever been one? Sometimes Hollywood inspires us. The new film The Devil Wears Prada is about an assisant to a powerful and difficult fashion editor, and it got us thinking. We want to hear about the bosses you've worked for -- and if you've ever been a bad boss yourself.

Not to be left behind, the AFL-CIO has just launched MyBadBoss    Contest which promises readers they can win a free vacation by telling their stories. The first winner is called Wounded Healer. Confirming my theory, Wounded Healer is sharing a story in the past-tense.

He paints by the number," was the excuse I was given when I wanted to okay a psychiatric hospital stay for a patient who was out of state. My patient was a veteran suffering from trauma triggered by watching news coverage of the war in Iraq. He had been taken to emergency and when they called for authorization, my boss said they cost too much. I tried to get the hopsital to bring the price down. So, they discharged my patient after making him put $5000 on his credit card. I tried to get the money back for him and get my boss to okay paying the hospital. It went back and forth for too long. The patient committed suicide. He shot himself in the head. I couldn't quit crying when I heard and took the rest of the day off. I used my personal time to do it. My boss complained to my supervisor . He said, "I don't know why she had to take the day off. People commit suicide everyday." I no longer work there. I'm in therapy now.

So far, over one thousand people have written their stories. The website is featuring an article by Barbara Ehrenreich, journalist and author of the New York Times bestseller Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America,who says  the problem isn't bosses by bossism.

Much as I'd like to see all these miscreants brought to justice--in something like the "thought reform" camps of the Chinese Cultural Revolution--I tend to think the emphasis on bad bosses is a little misguided.  The problem isn't particular bosses, but what I call "Bossism"--the hierarchical system that governs all known bureaucracies, both public and private.  Giving one person huge power over others is like giving a 3-year-old a hose: Not everyone will get soaked, but the chances of coming out dry are slender.

The Devil Wears Prada had a very successful weekend at the box office. Since I am not an entertainment writer I will refrain my sharing my review only to say I'm aligned with the Claudi Puig's review in USA Today.

I will watch Dateline Friday with lots of interest and I will look forward to listening to the report on NPR. The issue of bad bosses is important. I've had them. I've been one.

I once thought that simply sharing the stories of awful bosses  would help change attitudes and behaviors. I believed that if people had an opportunity to tell their real stories that corporate cultures would change. I'm not so confident. How many bad stories do we have to hear before we say-- you can't do that? As bloggers will attest, writing about bad bosses is risky business.Heather B. Armstrong, who coined the phrase Dooce shares---

I started this website in February 2001. A year later I was fired from my job for this website because I had written stories that included people in my workplace. My advice to you is BE YE NOT SO STUPID. Never write about work on the internet unless your boss knows and sanctions the fact that YOU ARE WRITING ABOUT WORK ON THE INTERNET. If you are the boss, however, please don’t be a bitch and talk with your hands. And when you order Prada online, please don’t talk about it out loud, you rotten whore.

Then there was Ellen Simonetti, the Delta Airlines Flight Attendent who was fired for some photos she shared--she is now writing a book.  And, there was Opinionistas who quit after she landed a book deal--just days before she would have been dooced for her tell all tales of life as a lawyer in a New York law firm.

And now there is J.Y.N's Pagan Girl In Corporate America. As far as I can tell she still has her job...but if the past predicts the future, it's only for the time being.

Elana is a Contributing Editor for Business & Careers at  Blogher-  And, at one time she too had a job that "a million girls would kill for this job."

Gray skies are gonna clear up,

You know when John Stewart leads his program with a clip that the intention of this  spot didn't quite hit the mark. Either the people who created this commercial just took a class in Advertising 101 where the professor demanded they figure out their "real benefits OR, actually, there isn't an "Or" that could possibly explain this asinine commercial. What were they thinking? . Click here to watch.

As I am sure the folks at WTWO are learning now that they've become the laughing stock of the country, is that when someone says "real benefits" what they mean is "benefits" that the target audience cares about.

While the folks at WTWO are probably "taking a meeting' today to figure out whether to pull the spot, apologize to their competitors, or just grin and bear the public ridicule,one thing is for sure, this spot will live in Advertising Infamy as one of the the worst commercials ever.

It's my Weltschmerz and I'll Cry If I Want To

Just One Day after International Women's Day,this headline graced the pages of Gawker  "Sawyer Scratches At The Glass Ceiling." The gist of the story is that pregnant Elizabeth Vargas is out and childless Sawyer is in as anchor of the ABC News.

Hence my Weltschmerz. Thanks to  A. Word.A.Day for sending me just the right word when I need it. Between Schadenfreude and Weltzschmerz I'm feeling i need to take German 101.

Weltzschmerz, according to AWAD means:

World weariness; pessimism, apathy, or sadness felt at the difference between physical reality and the ideal state.

And, used in a sentence,"I hate being told to have a good time! I'll feel the weltschmerz if I want to."

I'm definitely feeling the weltzschmerz about a pregnant news anchor given the boot. Over at Corsair, Ron provides some back story.:

"are we about to see a catfight on the evening news?...This is sure to start a debate about career-path versus having children. Of course women can, and do, do both; but in the hypercompetitive -- and hyper-observed -- TV News fishbowl, we ought to be asking the question: Is it possible to get to the top of the network news food-chain AND have children, if you are a woman.

Merideth Vieira, then at "60 Minutes (and, coincidentally, Diane Sawyer's replacement)," also faced difficult times navigating maternity leave, day care and, most importantly, the infamously grueling schedule at CBSNews. Ultimately Vieira left, but not without painting a particularly damning portrait of Don Hewitt and Mike Wallace -- who were the proximate causes of her leaving -- as leathery old bastards intent on making a young mother's life miserable in the newsroom. Having babies, they seemed to be implying, is for sissies; CBS News should be priority-one.

When Lucille Ball announced she was "with child", television networks censored the word pregnant. And, it was a big deal that a pregnant woman was shown on TV. The network suits almost wet their pants in fear of viewer backlash.

Fast forward 50 years and it appears that the network powers that be at ABC haven't learned a thing.

The real issue isn't that Vargas is having another child and may have to take a six week pregnancy leave. She's already a parent and obviously is balancing her work-home life in a way that is acceptable at ABC.

The issue  for them is  her pregnancy and what pregnancy does to a women's body.Pregnant women aren't thin. The network suits believe that their viewers won't take a pregnant woman seriously ( you know the hormone thing). They believe this because they don't take a  pregnant woman seriously. Oh, and also there is the loss of the F#@%able factor- which is still a criteria for choosing many women in network news.

Several years ago a friend told a story about a pregnant executive who was in charge of new business development. The executive  was around 7 months pregnant. My friend's assignment was to do some undercover work for her boss to find out if the potential client would be 'uncomfortable' with a 7 month pregnant executive pitching the business.

My friend had to find out if the decision maker was married with kids and a variety of other variables to determine whether the pregnant executive was a 'high risk"

It seems that ABC News feels a pregnant Vargas is 'high risk" It's simply weltschmertz.

Tulip O'My Tulip

NOTE: The spellchecker is not working again..jeez.

It was the first post I saw when I clicked onto Blogher this morning --Liza Sabeter's provocative post Is this blog history in the making? I am 1 of 24 bloggers invited by Holland.com to visit Amsterdam

Here's the deal : the bloggers are being invited to a five day all expense-paid trip to Holland. No blogging about the trip will be required.

"In exchange for the trip each blogger will [a] be interviewed about the trip (the Dutch Tourism Board may be using this for online/offline promotions), [b] give Holland.com one month of premium adspace, and [c] put the "Bloggers in Amsterdam" logo in their nav bar for one year, linking it to this blog post to disclose the nature of the trip. The mantra here is transparency. "

Here is my response that posted on Blogher.

Is it transparency, unconscionable, or the changing of the guard?

This junket is both fascinating and a bit horrifying to me because it is forcing me to debate with myself the very core of my blogging ethics.

I think it is absolutely brilliant on the part of the tourism bureau of Holland and their marketing strategists. Money well spent.
Even before people are leaving there is attention on the program...Holland is getting exactly what it wants...media time. Bravo to them. From a marketing perspective , it is fabulous.

On a personal level I would love for someone to invite me to an all expense-paid vacation to Holland. My ego would love it that someone thought my blog was adworthy enough to be included. I would love just going and being on a junket and hanging out with a bunch of bloggers who may or may not be blogging in the spirit of "transparency' about the junket. In many ways, I would finally feel like I was getting paid for my work.

On first read,my inclination was to think I would have to decline the offer. This in no way an indictment against the bloggers invited and who accepted the junket.

It just highlights the spectrum of personal ethics and backgrounds that bloggers have.

For many ,the "transparency" of the entire vacation provides the ethical window to go, imbibe and take in the sites. Maybe you'll blog and maybe you won't. Actually you already have. And that is making some marketing person very happy. They probably have promised that the entire program would deliver X amount of coverage and this post is helping them achieve that goal.

Then there are they recovering journalists like myself --the ones who went to journalism school in an era where we were taught that it was "unethical" to accept anything in exchange for coverage. The goal was to try to be as objective as possible and the ethics said, when you are given a gift you are more likely to write favorable stuff.

But here's where my struggle erupts. Am I so steeped in old-fashioned values that I am not being realistic of the new business model?

Is accepting this junket really so different than a newspaper,TV or radio station that accepts advertising? As bloggers we are both the reporter and the advertising department-- that is if we are trying to make a living at blogging.

Traditional media outlets all exist thanks to advertisers(or grants from foundations which in my mind is advertising)so what's the problem in accepting a junket? A girl has to live and take a vacation once in awhile.

The old mantra was "don't mix advertising and 'the news'." Advertisers supposedly couldn't pressure the newsroom and say cover this story( that of course is debatable)

If, as a blogger, I would accept advertisers to my blog ( and they are very welcome) then what is my ethical problem with the junket? If an adveriser were really paying me, wouldn't I self-censor myself just as I self-censor myself about sharing stories about current business clients?

If I will accept compensation via advertising, isn't the junket just another form of compensation- a lovely one at that.

The journalist blogger in me is fascinated by this story just as I am fascinated by product placement advertising in movies and television, and advertisers trying to figure out how to out TiVo, TiVo.

So while I did not get a dance card on this one, I hope to 'cover' this story on several levels. I want to understand the ethics of it. I want to understand the personal censorship of it ( If you have a horrible hotel room, will you blog about that and face the possibility that when Saint Bart's offers a junket you may be excluded for bad blogging)and,

I want to understand---- if transparency is the new ethical standard, will truth or truthiness prevail?

IPA Challenges Forbes

The comment from "TruthBearer" started out this way.

"It's sad. Very sad, actually. You managed to take a Daniel Lyons Forbes article at face value.

You just assumed that Lyons' account of the O'Gara story was correct. Not bothering to actually look around and see, well, him and O'Gara are the only ones who look at it that way."

TruthBearer was referring to a post I had written about a Forbes.com article , The Attack of the Bloggers ( The article is now archived).  The article included a sidebar story about a journalist, Maureen O'Gara who was supposedly fired after bloggers went on a rampage over her story and demanded that the online publication remove her story. The article included a quote from the editor in chief defending his decision to not publish future articles from Ms. O'Gara.

"What are my options?We have criminal people who were taking us hostage, trying to destroy my business,"says Sys-Con Chief Fuat Kircaali

TruthBearer then directed me to a link with the headline IPA Lashes Out Against Forbes.com. The link is to a copy of a letter that the Internet Press Guild sent to Forbes concerning inaccuracies in their reporting.

"Some facts, which were publicly available, were omitted in the story or given a different connotation that misleads the readers. For example,

1) "Bloggers all but got O'Gara fired." In point of fact, the parties lobbying most heavily for the termination of her contract were not bloggers, but the editors of Sys-Con's own LinuxWorld Magazine. And the statement is doubly inaccurate, because bloggers couldn’t have gotten O'Gara "fired," since she was not an employee of Sys-Con Media. She was a freelancer, and a blogger herself.

2) The story also omits such aspects of O'Gara's reporting, which caused the editors to ask for her contract's termination.

These included such stalking behavior as describing the interior of Jones’ alleged apartment, publishing photographs of the exterior of her and her mother's alleged dwellings, casting aspersions on Jones' religious beliefs and referring to Ms. Jones in inflammatory terms such as 'a harridan'. Is it any wonder that the Sys-Con editors were concerned with being associated with this type of yellow journalism?"

TruthBearer was absolutely right. I took the Forbes.com article at face value. I will admit that when I read the sidebar I wasn't sure it passed the smell test. I was particularly amazed at an editor saying they would pull a story because of hackers.

However, I made the assumption that Forbes.com was printing accurate, reliable and truthful information. When you read the entire letter from the Internet Press Guild you get the impression that the writer, Daniel Lyons, is an incompetent nincompoop.

While the letter sites many inaccuracies in Lyons' article, it does not challenge the quote from the editor, nor does the editor quoted sign his name to the letter to Forbes.

I guess its time for me to actually pick up the phone and try to contact the editor. I will try to reach him today.

I tried to contact TruthBearer. Turns out the email submitted to the blog is a "faux email address."

Maybe its me, but when someone named TruthBearer writes me, I expect a truthful email address.

Casualty of War

Scooter Libby isn't the only one feeling the pain of getting caught leaking information. Last week, Conde Nast fired one of Gawker's uber spies.

Gawker is the Manhattan-centric blog that snarks everyone and anything that is not deemed as hip as the Gawker's own inner circle.

Last week Gawker printed an internal memo meant for Conde Nast employees' eyes only.

Really riveting stuff -- a memo about their internal mail server being down.

Normally the spy used his g-mail to forward such scintillating and "stop-the-presses" information.However, on this particular occasion, the spy made a fatal error. He used the Conde Nast email system instead of delivering the covert data via g-mail.

As fast as you could say Patrick J. Fitzgerald ,Andrew Krucoff was dismissed.

This is how Gawker addressed the firing.

"We write lots of mean things about lots of people we’d love to see get some comeuppance. We run lots of leaked memos and internal communications, some of them rather embarrassing to the company from which they were leaked. What’s truly remarkable is that someone was just moments ago fired — and it’s someone we very much like — over an item that wasn’t mean, that didn’t attempt to deliver any comeuppance, and was in no way embarrassing to the company from which it was leaked."

Gawker is missing the point. And the ridiculous part is they know the point. The issue wasn't what was leaked or that it was harmless info, the issue was that a Conde Nast employee was leaking information--- even as inocous as a memo about an internal email server being down.

For Gawker to take on a "gosh darn what's the harm attitude" and to feign surprise that Conde Nast or any company for that matter would fire an employee for sharing that info, is simply disingenuous and laughable.

Gawker knows better. They also know that their uber spy lost his job because of friendly fire. Their pathetic response -- a plea to their readers to help Krucoff find a job.

Excuse me?  How about a public apology to Krucoff. How about Gawker hiring Krucoff?  Afterall,Gawker betrayed his trust. He served. He delivered the goods. He helped Gawker fuel their war.

As Valerie Plame will tell you, once you've been outed-- its kinda hard to stay in the spy game. Gawker needs to step up to the plate and protect their own.

While the memo that got Krucoff fired may not be embarrassing and harmful, most of Gawker's posts about Conde Nast are beyond acerbic.

What a newcomer to Gawker may not pick up from reading this particular post is that Gawker is at war with Conde Nast.

In 2003, when Gawker was a new phenomenon, mediabistro.com wrote about Gawker's Conde Nast obsession

"It's so media-obsessed—even, specifically, Conde Nast-obsessed—that it spent a good chunk of a recent week discussing and analyzing the ban on garlic in the mag company's famous cafeteria and whether said ban might mean Si Newhouse is a vampire."

Gawker is popular because they snark, they bite, and they delight in humiliating their enemies. It's a great read. but like all great powers, they can be blinded by their obsession.

This particular battle had a casualty. It was Andrew Krucoff. He lost his job. Gawker will survive just fine. Although it does feel like the master of comeuppance just got comeupped and maybe a dose of humility would be a bit refreshing over there.