Wheel of Fortune?

So did the Toronto Sun pay the anonymous contributor of that widely-used video of a wheel falling off a plane landing in Buffalo?

Was it a Wheel of Fortune - or a mere thanks and a handshake for footage that was used by major networks across North America with Sun Media credits?

The passenger who shot the amazing footage from a seat on the plane has not been identified, so he or she is not receiving world-wide attention via the Internet.

It would be comforting to know Sun Media wrote a cheque.

With amateur videographers gladly providing media with free footage of whatever, exclusive footage that once fetched handsome prices is being aired and posted online for a handshake.

That just isn't right, but the potential value of exclusive video footage is something the public has to comprehend. Don't expect all media to be up front with the worth of exclusive footage.

You said it

Recommended weekend reading: Harry Bruce, a second-generation newspaperman, tells readers of the Nova Scotian what print media means to him.

Bruce, whose father, Charles Bruce, was a general superintendent of Canadian Press, says of print newspapers:

"What they once were, for me, was not only the very foundation of the work in Toronto that enabled my father to support me and the rest of his family, but the indispensable ingredient of a boyhood ritual."

Boyhood newspaper reader, paperboy, office boy, journalist, it has been all print for Harry Bruce.

Ottawa Tweets

The Ottawa Sun gets a mention in the Toronto Star today for its Twittering live from a courtroom during the ongoing trial of Ottawa Mayor Larry O'Brien.

Joanna Smith at the Star's Ottawa Bureau quotes Shane Ross, the Sun's reporter who was frantically tweeting from the courtroom this week, a recently approved media breakthrough.

Ross told Smith: "We knew that people would want minute-by-minute, blow-by-blow accounts of the testimony and fortunately Twitter is something that can provide that kind of analysis."

Veteran court reporters remember the day when newspapers were not allowed in courtrooms. Small electronic gadgetry filled that void.

OPC tease

Rob Granatstein, the Toronto Sun's editor, Twittered this on Friday:

"Heading to an Ontario Press Council meeting. Should the press council have rules about online commenting on stories?"

(Granatstein was elected to the OPC earlier this year to replace Mike Burke-Gaffney, managing editor, who took early retirement.)

Looking forward to coverage of that meeting, or comment on that subject in general.

Having viewed a wide variety of racist, libelous and downright guttural comments on media articles and, in YouTube's case, videos, host moderation is much needed across the board.

Who is accountable for libel, slander and hate messages in the online abyss?

It was unnerving to discover the Toronto Sun's online comments are not moderated after a recent damaging comment was left unchecked for several hours.

LFP cloning 4

Chapter 4 . . .

National Life pages

• National Life pages are built with 100% Sun Media content.

• Please DO NOT use tab versions of PDFs because they contain styles that do not conform to our styles. As a rule all of these PDFs are available in broadsheet form.

• Try to avoid mixing local and national copy on these pages, unless space doesn’t allow. If you must mix the two then the ads dictate which runs at the top of the page. We never want to disassemble a PDF, so fit a National half page in first.

• National Life page should always be slotted in your paper ahead on World News and the Money Page.

• The top half of the Life page will contain content indicated below.

• Bottom half of the page will include another lifestyle column as well as the chain’s new advice columnist.

• The bottom half of the page cannot be broken up into quarters.

• These pages must appear on the following days:

Monday: Health/Keeping Fit column/Advice

Tuesday: Life/Dr. Beliveau column/Advice

Wednesday: Eat/Elizabeth Baird column/Advice

Thursday: Discovery/Dr. Gifford-Jones column/Advice

Friday: Gadgets/Web Page column/Advice

Saturday: Green Planet, Style, Life/Waters on Wine column/Advice

National Entertainment
• Try to avoid mixing local and national content on these pages, unless space doesn’t allow. If you must mix the two then the ads dictate which runs at the top of the page.

• Never use wire content in place of national entertainment PDF.

• The bottom half of the page can be broken up into quarters.

Feature pages
• Periodically Sun Media produces some great features that are produced for our broadsheet papers. Please monitor all lookahead skeds and check the Bulletin Board for the PDFs.

• Features vary in theme and topic but are great additions to any of our larger Saturday products when space allows.

National PDF Order of importance
• Comment, Comics/puzzles, National News, National Sports, National Life, National Entertainment, World News, Money

TSF note: There is also a colour-coded section on page flow for 16-page papers.

Sun Media broadsheet publishing 101.

Thanks to the tipsters who provided the PDFs. It has been illuminating.

Over and out.

LFP cloning 3

We're almost done . . .

Classified pages
• Classifieds should be placed vertically on a page to allow for a page topper to sit overtop of any editorial content.

• Classifieds should NEVER run under an editorial page topper. For example, having Death Notices under an “Entertainment” page topper is something that lacks taste and can be seen as offensive.

Shared comics/puzzles
• Standard PDF from Sun Media that must run on an open page.

Local Sports pages
• Local sports should always be at the front of the sports section and come before national sports.

• Pages should be 100% local copy.

• At least one story on each locally generated page should have a standard online throw.

• Wire and local copy should never mix on this page whenever possible. Please choose the best Sun Media story that doesn’t appear on a PDF that you are using.

• Do not turn a local story onto a page that will mean you have to break up a national PDF.

National Sports pages
• National News pages built almost exclusively with Sun Media content.

• Standard PDF from Sun Media, this PDF should never be broken apart if it can run in its entirety.

• Updated throughout the night with new results, including game stories with quotes.

• National Sports PDFs can be divided by halves and used over two pages.

• If a page has a quarter-page ad on it, use the full PDF minus the ad space. These pages are designed for exactly this purpose.

• Secondary sports pages may be offered. These including (sic) NHL playoffs, auto racing, baseball, golf etc.

• Auto Racing should run Wednesdays, Golf on Thursdays and Baseball on Saturdays.

• National Sports agate pages are always built as a half page and should run at the bottom of a page unless ad stacks prevent it.

• Can be packaged with the top half of the National Sports page or with local agate or community sports calendar.

• Updated throughout the night with new results and for Western time zones.

More to come.

LFP cloning 2

By popular demand, more of the Sun Media broadsheet page flow and PDF guidelines:

Local News pages
• Pages should be 100% local copy.

• Local news/turns from the front page.

• At least one story on each locally generated page should have a standard online throw.

Comment page
• Standard PDF from Sun Media.

• Local letters (if any) should conform to LFP style. Template that includes standard throw asking for reader input will be made available.

• Local column (if any) should always match our style guide.

Local Forum pages
• Pages should be 100% local copy.

• Local letters (if any) should conform to LFP style. Standard throw asking for reader input should be used.

• Local columns (if any) should always match our style guide.

National News pages
• National News pages, build (sic) exclusively with Sun Media content, always take precedent over World News, but should never run at the expense of local news.

• Any combination of Local/national and world content should never appear on the same page (See right).

• Standard PDF from Sun Media, this page should never be broken apart if it can run in its entirety.

• National PDF can be divided by halves and used over two pages.

• If a page has a quarter-page ad on it, use the full PDF minus the ad space. These pages are designed for exactly this purpose.

World News pages
• World News Pages should never run at the expense of local or national news.

• Any combination of Local/national and world content should never appear on the same page.

• Standard PDF from Sun Media, this PDF should never be broken apart if it can run in its entirety.

• World News PDF can be divided by halves and used over two pages.

• If a page has a quarter-page ad on it, use the full PDF minus the ad space. These pages are designed for exactly this purpose.

More to come in this journalism-by-numbers series.

Print TV listings

The tradition of buying a weekend newspaper for its TV guide is all but dead now that the Globe and Mail has dropped its full week of daily listings grids.

If you don't have Toronto Sun home delivery in the GTA, your only choice for a worthy television guide package is the Saturday Star.

As of today, the Globe has dropped the TV grids in its Friday 7 section, advising readers to check out daily listings on the paper's website.

So people who have been buying the Friday Globe for its 7 package with TV listings are being encouraged to read the online listings for free.

That does not make sense to print media traditionalists.

Gord Stimmell, Starweek's tireless TV guide editor for almost a decade and a Sunday Sun TV guide editor for 25 years before leaving in 1999, has been working wonders with 36 pages.

An added bonus for Star readers: Cover stories by Bill Brioux, one of the many quality Toronto Sun writers shown the door in recent years.

The Star recently dropped its glossy Starweek cover to save big bucks, but with few complaints. As they say, it is what's inside that counts.

So this print media traditionalist will continue to look forward to the Saturday Star for TV programming planning, a good read or two, a crossword puzzle, TV Q&A etc.

Bell's often outdated satellite listings and the various inconvenient online listings just don't beat the ease of a handy print guide by your side.

LFP clone factory

Broadsheets across the Sun Media chain will be identical in layout, if not always in content, with publishers and editors restricted to new page and content guidelines.

So much for local autonomy and innovation.

This, in a nutshell, will be the face of Sun Media broadsheets, all mirroring the London Free Press from front page to back.

The new page flow and Sun Media PDF guidelines, include:

Page Content and Design
• The following is a list of pages that currently make up the bulk of our papers.

• National Life, Sports, Entertainment and News pages will now have throws to Canoe. These are built in a manner that will allow you to use the bottom half of national pages as half pages when you replace the throw with a page topper.

Front Page
• Pages should be 100% local copy.

•All front pages will now contain an online throw built into your mastheads as well as a cropped photo throwing to something inside the paper. (See attached PDF on next page)

• There will be a detailed index down the left-hand side of the page that will include our standardize web throws.

• We will create several versions of front page templates with pre-built designs for your editors to choose from and then fill will (sic) copy and photos. (More later on this)

• All design work on these pages will be done (sic) Sue Batsford and will be modelled directly from the London Free Press. She will then work with your paper to build templates suited to your needs.

Pagetwo (sic)
• The following are acceptable items on pagetwo:

• “How to reach us” box containing all the info readers and advertisers need.

• Other items such as: Weather map and Lottery numbers.

• Local news/turns from the front page.

• Other local items that are acceptable, but not required on Page Two include Death Notices, Community Calendars (with standard brand badge).

Get the drift? There is much more for editors to absorb in conforming to Quebecor's cut and paste journalism, but from the PDFs TSF received, it is clear broadsheet sameness in print and online is now the brand across the board.

Much of the same foreign strategy has been applied to the print and online pages of the Sun tabloids in recent months.

Local pride in assembling community newspapers from scratch and playing the news, sports, entertainment etc. as experienced editors see it, is obsolete at Sun Media.

It is publishing by numbers, from front to back, with numerous PDF pages being provided by outside sources to conform to Sun Media edicts.

So much of what made newspapers a success is now obsolete.

Dare to be different at a time when print media desperately needs to be different to survive? Not in PKP's domain.

Late, great newspapermen we have known and admired over the decades would be shocked by the emasculation of Sun Media publishers and editors.

Short shorts

If you missed any of the animated Andy Donato cartoons by animator Greg Parker you can catch up to them all here.

A new Remembering George Gross video tribute taped during a recent reception at the Variety Village Lounge can be found here. There are photos of the late, great Toronto Sun founding sports editor, plus testimonials by friend Joe Millage and others.

So who wants to be first to provide TSF with details of the sale of 333 if, indeed, it has been sold? Who bought it and for how much? When does the deal close? Future site of a condo? Will the elaborate exterior Sun mural be saved? What next for Sun/Canoe employees?

A PKP quote from yesterday re whether Quebecor Media's recent decision to go online only with its free French-language ICI weekly will be repeated: "I can't say that it will never happen and I won't say it will never happen."

As if in preparation for the next step in the evolution of Sun Media weeklies, take a look at a Lacombe Globe story in Alberta that informs readers they no longer have to wait for the paper to be published to read about breaking news.

For those who speak French, here's PKP talking all things Quebecor at a press conference in Montreal yesterday. But darn, English translation of his comments for thousands of interested employees across Canada couldn't be found online.