Categories: OLD Media Moves

BusinessWeek and banned words

Yvette Kantrow, the executive editor of TheDeal, went looking through the first issue of the renovated Bloomberg BusinessWeek to see if she could find some of the words — but, however, despite, although — that are banned from usage by Bloomberg News staffers.

Kantrow writes, “There was hardly a ‘but’ to be found, though I did spot some uses of ‘yet,’ including in Josh Tyrangiel‘s editor’s letter, as an apparent stand-in. I also noticed a paucity of adverbs and adjectives — another Winkler bugaboo — which does help keep the copy clean and clear, if a little bloodless. That’s not a bad thing, given how much copy there is, but it got me wondering if this strict adherence to a style designed to make stories easily readable on a terminal, by traders, is what makes Bloomberg’s other magazine, the monthly Bloomberg Markets, a little dull.

“The first issue of Bloomberg Businessweek is not a bore, though it’s not exactly a barnburner, either. It is well organized, however, with its ‘opening remarks’ essays on Goldman up front, followed by six distinct areas of coverage (global economics, companies & industries, etc.) and a feature well, plus a section in the back called Etc., where lighter subjects like travel and gadgets are covered. Overall, the issue is happily devoid of many of the ditzier features that have crept into business magazines in recent years — no pointless lists of the best this or the worst that — and, mercifully, no attempt to get you, the reader, to start blogging, tweeting, Facebooking, linking or job hunting right now!

“There aren’t any scoops, and there won’t be any, since, as the Times reported, stories broken by the Businessweek staff will run on Bloomberg’s terminals first. While that may be sad for the magazine’s reporters, it’s a sensible policy for a weekly in today’s always-on media. It doesn’t necessarily make Businessweek any less of a news magazine. After all, its role model, The Economist, doesn’t break news either.”

View Comments

Joey says:
May 1, 2010 at 7:38 am
>>a style designed to make stories easily readable on a terminal, by traders, is what makes Bloomberg’s other magazine, the monthly Bloomberg Markets, a little dull.
This is an insight that many editors still fail to grasp, and it works against efforts to become a cross-platform media company. I struggle with it in my magazine as well, but (oh no! a banned word!) at least I have the sense not to paint myself into a literary corner.