[Ipg-smz] A question for everyone, particularly Esther Schindler

Tue Feb 12 20:45:41 UTC 2019

I miss cover art in general...at InfoWorld we used to have an art
department (long ago in days of print) and the cover art for some of the
monster articles I did with Wayne Rash, Oliver Rist and Curtis Franklin
were spectacular. I'm especially fond of the art for "Pimp my data center"
where the racks has spinners and gold chains draped around them.

/brian chee

On Tue, Feb 12, 2019 at 10:42 AM Stephen Lawton <sl at afab.com> wrote:

> When I was at Cahners in the early 1990s, I wrote for a couple of titles
> there. At one pub I wrote a cover story and used auto racing as a metaphor
> for getting off to a fast start but not being able to finish the race. Not
> sure who ultimately was responsible for the cover art but the cover was of
> a speed boat. It was a pretty cover but made absolutely no sense when  you
> read the copy. I too get some weird messages -- mostly postal mail with the
> cover torn off and the first page of the story -- asking me why I didn’t
> put racing cars on the cover and questioning my sanity and parentage. I
> asked my editor back then who was responsible for the cover art, to which
> he said something like: “What’s wrong – don’t you like boats?” End of
> conversation.
>
>
>
> When I ultimately became an EIC myself, I always was very careful to check
> the cover art and the cover story to make sure that I didn’t make that same
> mistake myself.
>
>
>
> Stephen
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> *Stephen Lawton*
>
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> *From:* Ipg-smz [mailto:ipg-smz-bounces at netpress.org] *On Behalf Of *Gabe
> Goldberg
> *Sent:* Friday, February 8, 2019 2:39 PM
> *To:* ipg-smz at netpress.org
> *Subject:* Re: [Ipg-smz] A question for everyone, particularly Esther
> Schindler
>
>
>
> Related: I wrote for Washington Post for a while (Hi, Rob) including (back
> when this was a thing) writing nugget website reviews. One was a
> handyman/DIY site. Post usually ran graphics -- which of course I had
> nothing to do with -- with these; this one showed slotted screwdriver
> pointing at Phillip's head screw (or the reverse).
>
> I GOT HATE MAIL. Dozens. Many dozens. "What kind of $%^^$# idiot are you
> to DARE writing about tools?!". If they weren't insane, I had a canned
> response: Don't blame me; I didn't see that until I bought the paper. That
> often led to funny/polite exchanges. But some responded brutally to that
> and some original notes were so bad I didn't engage. The Post made it worse
> by publishing letter-to-editor mocking the article/piece. I asked (Hi, Rob)
> Post to run correction/clarification/disclaimer that it was someone ELSE's
> bad idea of a joke but my editor (guess who) didn't think that would happen.
>
> Same problem as author being blamed for hed -- readers can't grasp so many
> roles at work.
>
> On 2/8/2019 10:46 AM, Joe Stanganelli wrote:
>
> I can top that: On a pub that no longer exists, the copy desk removed a
> joke of mine (which, if that was the only thing they did, fine) and
> replaced it with a worse, shittier “joke” that made no sense.
>
> It was so embarrassing that I never shared the piece on social, and
> distanced myself from it.
>
> I don’t mind having my jokes removed; just please don’t change or replace
> them.
>
> I’ve actually come to expect my editors to remove my jokes; these days,
> I’m surprised when one gets through.
>
> One of the inventors of CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing is named Jennifer Doudna.
> In a piece I wrote a couple of years ago about patent rights surrounding
> CRISPR/Cas9 gene-editing, I used the subhed “Doudna, Where’s My Cas?”
>
> I was shocked and disappointed in my editor.
>
>
>
> Joe
>
>
> ------------------------------
>
> *From:* Ipg-smz <ipg-smz-bounces at netpress.org>
> <ipg-smz-bounces at netpress.org> on behalf of Mac McCarthy
> <mac.mccarthy at gmail.com> <mac.mccarthy at gmail.com>
> *Sent:* Thursday, February 7, 2019 7:04:16 PM
> *To:* ipg-smz at netpress.org
> *Subject:* Re: [Ipg-smz] A question for everyone, particularly Esther
> Schindler
>
>
>
> We had a copy editor at Infoworld, "Jill," who edited for space by
> deleting the last sentence in a product review. Unfortunately, that
> sentence was the punchline for a joke. When I complained, she simply
> replied, "I didn't think it was funny."
>
>
>
> Editing can be maddening.
>
>
>
> Mac
>
>
>
> On Thu, Feb 7, 2019 at 3:58 PM Tom Geller <tom at tgeller.com> wrote:
>
> Oh, I have a good one about deleted ledes. (Getting deleded?)
>
>
>
> For my 2013 Lynda.com video course "Writing Articles" (
> https://www.linkedin.com/learning/writing-articles), I (of course) wrote
> a dummy article to study. Then in a video that shows how to construct an
> article, I say:
>
>
>
> "Then after everything else is done, go back and revisit that first
> paragraph to make it even stronger. One common trick is to simply delete
> that first sentence and then see if it's reads any better. A lot of
> writers, including me, need a sentence or two to get into the swing of
> things."
>
>
>
> Sounds good, right? Except that the producers said, "O.K., do that. Delete
> the first sentence." I... hadn't planned for that. Luckily, the piece still
> worked without it. I schooled myself!
>
>
> ---
> Tom Geller  *  Writer & Video/journalist  *  http://tomgeller.com
>        Rotterdam, The Netherlands, +31 (0)6 87071468
>             Oberlin, Ohio  *  +1-415-317-1805
>
>
>
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> Mac McCarthy
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> --
>
> Gabriel Goldberg, Computers and Publishing, Inc.       gabe at gabegold.com
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