when is it time for the axe to fall?

Maybe the copy desk let it run on purpose so he would have that clip in his portfolio and look like an ass? Although I don't think I know anyone who would actually do that.

 

so flash, as girl viewing girl, she was kinda hot, right?

 

Ci, on both counts. Except it wasn't in the lede, but it was still in the story.
I felt bad for the kid. We have a real Cinderella story up here, a team that originally left out of the playoffs (got in when another team had an ineligible player) is making a lengthy playoff run. First playoff win, district title, state game win -- yada yada yada.

So his whole lede is about that, except that the news is three weeks old and even the team is sick of hearing about it.

Ah, to be young and think you're breaking new ground.

 

She was cute in an 'aw, look at the stupid puppy chase its own tail' kind of way. Stupidity takes away all levels of hotness ...

 

Headline: At Podunk, destiny is spelled P-O-D-U-N-K

 

not to be argued, just those seem to get away with it longer than the ones who look like my dog named stupid.

 

Sounds like me in Grade 11 math. Luckily, I already had the two math credits I needed in order to graduate.

 

You should count yourself blessed that you walked into your first job with 10 years or so of experience out of nowhere and overachieved every day of your career. Not everyone can pull that off. I can only hope to be half the journalist you are today, sir.

 

Tom's sniping notwithstanding, his point is well-taken:

It takes 18 years of your life for you to get into college. Then once you get to the real world, you start all over again. What you did in college means squat after about six months in the workforce. Some learn that the hard way.

 

buck - i refuse to believe i didn't allude to the same point just as nicely somewhere way up the page.
<wink>

 

I refuse to believe that at some point Mr. Petty didn't start at the bottom like the rest of us. I refuse to believe that he didn't struggle some at the beginning. I refuse to believe that when he started, a bitter, older reporter or editor didn't tell him that his work until that point didn't mean squat. I am neither impressed nor intimidated by his sense of self-importance. He had to start somewhere, too.

I also refuse to believe that he didn't have some kind of guidance to help get him where he is now.

So, I find it confusing that so many here scoff at young hires when they were young hires at some point.

The difference, it seems, is that many don't want to provide guidance to their young hires. How can we learn squat if no one cares to teach us squat? (More specific to my case, how can I learn anything at a place that employs mostly young hires?)

Going back to the original post, perhaps scribe is failing as an editor when it comes to young hires. True, many of us don't know much when we start, but just because he's the boss doesn't mean he's never at fault. We don't know him or his situation like he does. But while the experienced crowd takes what he writes at face value and resort to berating young hires, I'm just playing devil's advocate.

Mr. Petty is right.

Work done for college papers or for real newspapers while attending college doesn't mean squat. But if editors do not make genuine attempts to guide young hires, the editor's leadership, the hire and the final product won't mean squat. I do hope I can be half the worker he is. At this rate, I certainly don't think my work is as strong as it could be.

 

Tide -- nobody's "berating" young hires here. It very well may be a bad hire by TxScribe, and his fault for not being judicious enough in screening the applicants.

But when you've been in the business a while, you see that college grads with self-important attitudes are a dime a dozen. Half of 'em don't last past a year or two. They've just come out of environments where they were largely BMOC's, and allowed to write however they want with little supervision. They think they can jump right in and work at a major metro based on their college "experience," not realizing that it doesn't matter how many years you spent in the minor leagues -- you're hitting .000 the second you step into the real world.

The Bill Simmons Effect (and that's as good a name for it as any) is devastating on newspapers. The difference is: Simmons is a good writer (and a shitty reporter) who found a niche, albeit online. But half of the generic 25-year-old middle-class suburban white males who apply to work in sports journalism think they can be the next Bill Simmons -- and it ain't gonna happen. He's a good writer and a shitty role model. He failed in newspapers for a reason ...

You're right: you probably can't learn a lot at a place like yours ... you can't learn a lot from other people, if they're all like you. But don't expect that you're going to get that guidance from anyone else -- more than likely, you'll have to learn on your own, and that's a better education than you can ever get in college anyway.

(If you do get guidance, be grateful. I was lucky to have some vets show me the ropes, too. But with the ownership that's in place at most newspapers, and the hiring trends that are not going away, you're going to be among inexperienced peers a lot ... get used to it. You're on your own now ... get comfortable with that, too.)