Friday 27 February 2009

Quotes of the Week:

Oscar winner Kate Winslet: "I feel like an unlikely hero. I was not the privileged kid things like this could happen to. My mum won a pickled onion competition in the local pub and the Reading Evening Post sent me a picture of her holding her jar. Well, Reading Evening Post, here's your next Winslet picture!"

The Guardian's Steve Busfield on James Murdoch: "When asked if he will succeed his father at the head of their international media conglomerate, James had a very neat way of evading the question: "My father will never stop working." Ah, but what about when he dies? "He thinks he will live for ever." I never worked out the follow-up question to that one as it seemed pretty heartless to tell a son that his father will definitely die."

Debra J Saunders writing in the San Francisco Chronicle which faces closure:"As for those who only read their news online, here's a news flash: News stories do not sprout up like Jack's bean stalk on the Internet. To produce news, you need professionals who understand the standards needed to research, report and write on what happened. If newspapers die, reliable information dries up."

Jeff Jarvis, on the "should newspapers charge for online content?" debate in The Guardian: "Like a gopher in the garden, the notion of newspapers charging for content online keeps popping its nose up out of the dirt. Pardon me while I whack this pesky rodent in the skull."

'Disgusted, of Derby ' posts on the HoldtheFrontPage website, about Northcliffe's plan to bring in centralised subbing: "I can't believe the Derby Evening Telegraph plans to get rid of its sub-editors by making half of them redundant and shipping those that remain to a centralised subbing pool over the border in Shottingham. Isn't this the same newspaper that ran it's "Hoot" campaign only a few months ago to keep Inland Revenue jobs in Derby instead of sending them down the A52? And now the DET plans to do exactly the same! HYPOCRITES! This would be funny were it not such a farce."

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I tried tiptoeing up to the what-happens-to-the-brand-after-you-die question in a phone interview with Richard Branson once.

Despite the delicate way I put it, he knew straight away what I was getting at: "If I drop dead, they'll just have to spend mroe on advertising", was pretty much how he answered it.

Sadly it wonlt be quite as straightforward for News Corp...

Cheers,

Tim