Categories: OLD Media Moves

Puff PR — about the NYT biz section — that any biz editor would hate

Hal Morris, writing on his GrumpyEditor.com blog, doesn’t like the soft press release that the New York Times distributed earlier this week about its business section.

Morris writes, “Just about every newspaper business editor, contends Grumpy Editor, would grumble when reading a news release with self-praising corporate puffery — including mentions of ‘rapidly establishing itself,’ ‘preeminent sources…of news,’ ‘scoops,’ ‘highly regarded names’ and ‘must-read blogs and columns’ — all in the lead of the material distributed by Business Wire.

“The organization being touted: The New York Times.

“Here’s the unedited intro of what the N.Y. Times public relations people produced:

“‘The New York Times business section, Business Day, is rapidly establishing itself as one of the preeminent sources of business, corporate and financial news and information as evidenced by recent scoops and many coveted industry awards, including the Pulitzer Prize and Loeb Awards. Additionally, recent investments in the business section have translated into many must-read blogs and columns authored by many of the most important and highly regarded names in business journalism.'”

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Willie says:
July 9, 2010 at 3:17 pm
What were they supposed to say? That they're dull, rarely compelling, poorly read and not a good venue for advertising? Why wouldn't they talk up a Pulitzer and a Loeb? It's a marketing release, for heaven's sake, not an investigative article. Caveat reader.