Los Angeles Times Outsources Reporting to NBC, and Hopes You Notice
by Peter Kafka
Posted on April 9, 2009 at 4:43 AM PT
Remember when the New York Times (NYT) started selling off part of its front page to CBS (CBS) earlier this year, generating a brief bit of buzz? The Los Angeles Times does, and now it’s trying to one-up that stunt: Instead of just running an ad on the paper’s front page, it’s running an ad that’s masquerading as one of the paper’s news stories.
The stunt is designed to promote “Southland,” a new cop drama that debuts on GE’s (GE) NBC tonight. The fake “story,” which runs on the bottom-left column of the page, follows one of the show’s characters on a “ride-along” through LA.
The (not very good) lede: “It’s not every assignment that puts you in the back of a squad car, especially one that gives you a true glimpse into the hearts of the heroes behind the badge…”
Here’s what it looks like in print:
Like the New York Times ads, this might have seemed controversial several years ago, when newspapers weren’t shaking the couch cushions to try and find spare change. Now it’s just inevitable, especially given that Tribune Co., the LAT’s corporate parent, has already filed for Chapter 11.
Tellingly, the ad doesn’t show up on the homepage of the LAT’s Web site (though there is a review that calls the pilot “strangely bland”). If you want people like me to write about an Internet ad, it’s got to be truly interesting, like the Apple (AAPL) campaign that ran earlier this year.
UPDATE: The embattled editorial staff of the Los Angeles Times, which has endured round after round of cuts, isn’t as blase about this as I am. They’re circulating a petition that describes the fake story as “embarrassing and demoralizing“.
Comments
Having grown up in LA I must say I always thought the LA Times was an uninspiring paper to have to wake up to in the morning. I now live in NYC and find the layout of the NYTimes to be downright boring and overpriced.
Posted by hubert bruce at April 9th, 2009 at 6:19 amSo, Hubert to sum up: You didn’t like the LA Times, and now you don’t like NY Times. Am I missing anything?
Posted by Peter Kafka at April 9th, 2009 at 7:51 amApple ad on NYTimes.com? Doesn’t everyone use AdBlock+ ?
Posted by Terrencebone Bonerson at April 9th, 2009 at 8:50 amHi Terrence! Nice to hear from you. But to answer your question about AdBlock, no, not everyone uses it. The CondeNast folks tell me about 20% of Reddit’s audience uses some kind of ad-blocking software. I’d be surprised if ATD’s audience used it in greater numbers.
Posted by Peter Kafka at April 9th, 2009 at 11:04 amNo pity for the media high priests who now have to grovel for money to pay the bills. sorry. no pity. get a business model!
Posted by Jon Greer at April 9th, 2009 at 12:30 pmthe faux article does clearly state at the very top that it is an “NBC Advertisement”. The Times was trying to fool anyone.
Not every publication can be as bullet-proof as WSJ.
Posted by enrique rea at April 9th, 2009 at 2:53 pmI don’t know who you are, Peter Kafka (love the name), but your comments about the ad today on the Los Angeles Times’ front page are spot on. But you needed to go further.
Speaking as a former newspaper art director, the problem that’s truly posed by this abominable advertisement is very similar to the problem I faced in the fall of 1976, when, working with Marianne Partridge and Milton Glaser, I completely revamped New York’s messy, confusing Village Voice, cover to cover.
One of the problems I had to contend with immediately was that some Voice writers and editors simply couldn’t see the need for a beautiful, well-designed newspaper. No surprise there; I was one of the very few newspaper art directors at the time. Thankfully, Marianne, who had been ported to us from Rolling Stone in October ‘76 (I’d come from the New York Times that spring), could indeed see what a beautiful page was. (She hired Sylvia Plachy, the genius photographer, with my full support.)
The bigger format problems lay elsewhere. They involved much diplomacy with the ad department, something journalists of my generation were reluctant to do: that old “wall of separation” haunted us every day. I think that that wall, insofar as the LAT is concerned, has been seriously breached. “Raped” isn’t appropriate but might be a better term.
But, giving NBC and the Times their due (i.e., their desperation at the moment) my question is, why does the ad have to be so goddamned UGLY? It doesn’t even resemble the rest of the page, it’s awkwardly boxed and ruled, the typography sucks. Serious readers should be able to see that.
The answer is that it doesn’t have to be so hideous. Someone higher up is asleep at the switch. But whether that someone is at the Times itself or at NBC is anyone’s guess.
As for your point about fooling readers into thinking the ad is a legitimate story: my answer is, only the dumb ones. It’s true, as Milton said, that most of the world is, at most, 15% VISUALLY literate. This ads lowers that percentage significantly insofar as LAT management is concerned. The real tragedy is that the honchos at neither the Times nor NBC can literally see this cheapness, this ugliness right in front of their eyes.
Do they really think no one else cares about this crummy layout? It affects their corporate image drastically, just as those info-commercials cheapen cable news. Surely these people with their hemorrhaging cash flow care about this?!
Newspaper ad design has always been at the very bottom rung of the design ladder. But this slovenliness can be compounded by visually impaired editors and publishers. It has always amazed me how often “word people” or “ad people” sometimes can’t see the forest for the trees.
Posted by George Delmerico at April 9th, 2009 at 4:38 pm