Thursday, September 13, 2012

USAT | No matter what, don't call it the 'paper'

The new USA Today is dropping its stock pages -- finally -- and replacing them with something much more abbreviated. The paper's newspaper's new press kit outlining changes also says that other media must follow the paper's newspaper's usage style. Word-for-word from the kit:
  • A new America’s Markets page that highlights how the average American investor is trading and what to watch for on Wall Street. This page replaces the stock pages, but not the commitment to bringing readers the latest market information. For the latest stock prices, consumers can go to USATODAY.com 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
  • USA TODAY must appear on the same line, do not break between lines of text.
 When referring to the newspaper, state as USA TODAY, two words, all caps. Never use USAT, USA Today and avoid breaking from line to line. Refer to USA TODAY as the 'newspaper' but never the 'paper.'

4 comments:

  1. John K. Hartman's piece in E&P is sadly true.

    Only bullet point I don't agree with is to bring back Neuharth as a consultant - ha, make him work for that $100,000 a year. It would result is his dragging a few Freedom Forum flunkies like Ken Paulson for the ride.

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  2. As a copy editor, the capitalization of TODAY offends me and I take pleasure in humbling it. As a worker far from the Crystal Palace, I am further offended when USAT usurps the credit at the top when it pulls stories from the other 80 papers, leaving only the original paper's name at the end.

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    Replies
    1. As a copy editor, you are fortunate (maybe) to still be employed with Gannett.

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  3. USAT does not take stories from the other Gannett properties, but uses correspondents from them. The stories are supposed to be different from what they write for their home property. That's why it says at the end if the story: also reports for ...

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