Monday, October 07, 2013

USAT | Here's Day 5 of homepage held hostage

USA Today's apparent sellout of its homepage to the cruise industry entered Day 5 this morning with the paper's latest tour de farce: Celebrate Halloween on the high seas.

This is now the fifth consecutive day Gannett's flagship (pun!) has designated a cruise-advertiser friendly story as being one of the world's top news events. This morning's Halloween item by industry-connected freelance writer Fran Golden is ranked No. 7.

But there's progress: At least today's story isn't a repeat of yesterday's.

8 comments:

  1. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  2. More sponsored content: Check out "Digital Tools are Key in Small Business Growth" at #8, part of teh "Smart Small Business" four-part series. I'm curious about who picked the small businesses featured in the stories. Go to the story, and at the top in a color bar is "Sponsored by Dell". If you click on the topics in the color bar -- "about", resources", etc. -- it goes to advertising or content "provided by Dell". The entire thing looks like a content package designed around an ad package, although somewhat more sophisticated than old-fashioned advertorial and special section copy. Yes, folks, this is the wave of the future.

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  3. You may have missed it. A few weeks ago, Toyota purchased ad space next to the states briefs but demanded only good news in the briefs. So if you think Travel has sold out, it's nothing. And dont blame Stoddart for the travel editorials. This ismcoming from above.

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  4. Who won USA Today's free Norwegian Cruise contest?

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  5. Hostage Jim, seriously?

    You're incorreclty using a leaning politically charged phrase instead of what one here has already more correctly suggested...the practice of the world's oldest profession.

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  6. Spell her name right, Jim: Stoddart.

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    1. Excellent job 9:56. Deflect from the REAL issue with a spelling complaint. That's PR hack 101.

      Delete

Jim says: "Proceed with caution; this is a free-for-all comment zone. I try to correct or clarify incorrect information. But I can't catch everything. Please keep your posts focused on Gannett and media-related subjects. Note that I occasionally review comments in advance, to reject inappropriate ones. And I ignore hostile posters, and recommend you do, too."

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