The write stuff - ThomasRMartinez's Blog

The write stuff - ThomasRMartinez's Blog - Victoria Advocate http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez As one of the top editors of the Victoria Advocate, I will strive to ensure we accurately and thoroughly reflect our community. I won't hesitate to answer your questions or jump in the online conversations here on www.VictoriaAdvocate.com. As one of the top editors of the Victoria Advocate, I will strive to ensure we accurately and thoroughly reflect our community. I won't hesitate to answer your questions or jump in the online conversations here on www.VictoriaAdvocate.com. en-us The great comics survey http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8836 http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8836 I’ve written before that when I was a kid, I used to love reading comics in the newspaper every day. I liked Charlie Brown. I mean, I wanted him to kick that ball so badly! (That darn Lucy). I loved <a href="http://www.comics.com/comics/marmaduke/">Marmaduke</a>, the big dog that wreaked unintentional havoc on his owners. Perhaps my favorite was <a href="http://www.comics.com/comics/drabble/">Drabble</a>. I had a lot in common with that lovable loser, Norman. Later, <a href="http://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/">Calvin and Hobbes</a> became a must read for me. That one is still my favorite all-time comic strip. I curse Bill Watterson for stopping it. Lately, until the past year or so, I’ve really enjoyed the strip called <a href="http://www.comics.com/comics/pearls/">Pearls before Swine</a>. That one is really funny, laugh out loud funny. Never heard of it? That’s because we don’t carry it here at the Advocate. One thing I’ve learned as a newspaperman is that you just don’t mess with the comics. You can run a photo of a dead man on the front page and get a few nasty and angry calls. You mess with comics? You’re likely to receive hundreds of calls, and that’s just in the first 15 minutes of the morning. Phone operators actually want us to alert them when we mess with the comics so they can call in sick. So, what recent assignment did I receive (thanks Chris!)? That’s right, take an in-depth look at our comics. So, the first thing I’m doing is a comics survey. It ran first in the Sunday paper. It will also be in the next two Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Take a look at it. Rank your favorite comics. Let us know your opinion. We also want to know what comics you like that we don’t run in the Advocate. Who knows, maybe there’s a strong desire to run a comic we don’t carry. If we find there’s a great demand for a new comic, or that we carry a comic strip that just isn’t popular, then we may consider making some changes. Maybe we can have a Survivor-like contest and vote out the least favorite comic strip. That may be fun. Or, maybe we won’t make any changes at all. I wouldn’t want to shut down our phone system. As always, thanks for reading and your comments. Thomas Quiet before the storm http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8783 http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8783 It's eerily quiet here today at the Advocate. We're all working hard to keep everyone updated through the day on our web site and with a special Ike print edition on Saturday. The whole town is kind of quiet -- I'm wondering actually how many people are left here waiting out Ike. The traffic on the streets is down, half the town is boarded up, and there's not much to do. So, anyone out there having a cool hurricane party? Let me know what you'll be doing to wait out Ike, and what you'll be doing through what promises to be a long, quiet weekend. Thanks, and stay safe. As always, thanks for reading and posting. Thomas Are newspapers objective? http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8404 http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8404 We are taking a beating over our Fatal Funnel series on a different part of this site. In one of the forums, someone made this comment: "When it comes to the press it is not like the old days where unbiased reporting stood as a standard to reporters just like the Hippocratic oath stands for physicians. Times have changed." That is an interesting observation. In my opinion, journalists back then probably weren't any more objective than journalists are now. Everyone has biases. Reporters and editors aren't any different. The difference is we must recognize those biases and guard against them. Every reporter I've ever worked with had biases, some pretty obvious. Almost all of them, though, worked hard to ensure their reporting was balanced and fair. I think that is really the key here: fairness. Did we give both sides of the story a chance to comment? What it comes down to for a lot of people is this: If we report a story that you don't agree with, no matter how balanced it is, you tend to think it's biased against you. An old newsroom joke goes: We must be doing our job well if both sides are mad at us. Case in point, the indicted officials vs. the district attorney stories. Both sides have claimed, some rather pointedly, that we are biased. It is an interesting debate. What do you think? Are we biased? Thanks as always for reading and commenting. Thomas P.S. If you ever do see unbalanced reporting, please let me know. Death of newspapers? Nah http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8221 http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8221 Chicago -- A lot of discussion this week has centered around the future of newspapers, and what that future will look like. Talk of the newspaper's death has been circulating for some time now. However, recent struggles in the industry have left people wondering whether that future is now. The major players, companies such as Tribune Co. and Gannet and others, have seen huge decreases in revenue -- in some cases in the 30 percent range. Some media reports indicate 3,500 people at newspapers across the United States have lost their jobs -- just this summer alone. A  <a href="http://www.newspaperdeathwatch.com/">Web site</a> is even dedicated to the death of newspapers, well at least covering it. The buzzards are circling -- or are they? One of the lecturers this week reported that the industry probably will continue a  decline for a few more years. By 2017, newsrooms will be 50-70 percent of what they are today. But then he sees a long period of stability. Still sounds grim, right? You can look at that way. I, like many others, choose to look at it with a different perspective. What better time is there to be in the industry? Think about it. We steer the ship through these rough waters and we come out on the other side. Whatever that other side looks like is the fun part. We will be the ones reshaping the industry and delivering news to you in what could be a fascinating fashion. And at your local newspaper, the Victoria Advocate, we still will specialize in bringing you the best local news report and happenings in Crossroads region. Some things won't change. How to cover a community? http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8178 http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8178 Chicago -- A main point of discussion today in our Leadership Summit at Unity was how a newspaper thoroughly and accurately covers its community. One way to cover your community is to make sure you reflect part of that community. Here in Victoria, we have a large percentage of Hispanic population. So a number of our news staff should reflect that. We should also reflect diversity in religion, sexuality and gender, among other things. But it goes beyond race and ethnicity, though. One obvious way to cover the community is to make sure we know what's going on in it. We do a decent job of that, especially with our ranging reporters, but we can always do a better job. Community involvement is good. We have owners who are strongly involved in the community. Editor Chris Cobler has made great strides in the community in the year he's been here. I just signed on to serve on my first board. As a newsroom we try to keep the community involved as much as we can. We'll soon debut our reader advisory board (more on that later), and we're always searching for innovative ideas. It's a tougher challenge than it looks. How do you think we can accurately and thoroughly cover our community? Or, how good of job are we doing? As always, thanks for reading and commenting. Race and the media http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8164 http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8164 Chicago -- I'm  in the Windy City attending the <a href="http://www.unityjournalists.org/">Unity -- Journalists of Color</a> conference. I was selected along with 12 other editors to participate in a leadership summit meeting at this conference. Today's topic was how we talk about race, centered around/between blacks and whites. An interesting debate started: Should the United States apologize to blacks over slavery? The Rev. Al Sharpton recently called the Rev. Jesse Jackson out on the carpet for his recent remarks about Barack Obama. Part of the debate centered around <a href="http://www.swamppolitics.com/news/politics/blog/2008/07/al_sharpton_civil_rights.html">responsibility vs. accountability</a>. That tied back to whether the U.S. should formally apologize. Some in our group said the U.S. should step up and take accountability. Others point to the fact that it's been only 44 years since blacks have had legally sanctioned equality. That's about only one generation. Amazing. Others said there has been precedent, when the U.S. apologized to Japanese Americans for that debacle in WWII. One group member pointed out that Germany is still paying displaced German-Jews from WWII. I know these are kind of broad topics, but what are your thoughts? As always, thanks for reading, and commenting. A brother's suicide http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8034 http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/8034 About six years ago, my brother committed suicide. He did it in a very public way. On Wednesday, I posted a reply on a thread of <a href="http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/ViewPost/28670">comments</a> about the photo we ran in the second installment of the Fatal Funnel project we're doing. The gist of my comment was basically, you'll better understand the scope of the project when it's finished. We really believe readers will be more educated about the immigration issue and the tragedy than ever. A poster in that thread asked the question "Could you find a few pictures of some of your close relatives (that you like) who have died tragically and print them along with some tasteless comments about how important it is to picture them in all their dead detail?" When I read that, I immediately thought back to my brother's suicide. In the last year of his life, my brother was troubled. Drugs, alcohol, my mother's death and bad decisions put him in a hole in which he thought he couldn't climb out. So one day, he took his girlfriend and her estranged husband hostage and threatened to kill them and himself. The hostage standoff lasted all day. Media swarmed. It became somewhat of a spectacle. He eventually let both go, and with police bearing down on him, committed suicide. TV cameras had a shot of his body being carried out of the house The newspaper did a story on his standoff with photos. Because I was in the media, I was our family's spokesman. It wasn't easy dealing with the media, and seeing the stories printed about him, our loving brother portrayed like a monster. So to the poster, ThisnThat: Yes I understand very much about how tragedy can affect families. And during my years in newspapers, I've tried to be true to that. As always, thanks for reading. My love of newspapers http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/7939 http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/7939 I know this is kind of long for a blog, but I thought I'd share this column I wrote with you online folks. tm  <o:p></o:p> I didn’t grow up in a newspaper family, but rather I grew up in a family that read newspapers. What I mean by that is no one in my family had ever worked in newspapers before me. In fact, in my family, my generation was the first to speak English as a primary language. My uncle remembers his grade-school teachers sending notes home with him telling my grandparents to speak English at home so he could learn English and become a better student. But, every person in my family loved or loves reading newspapers. I can trace that love of newspapers (and reading, really) directly back to my Mother, who was a connoisseur of all things words. The love of reading newspapers is a tradition I try to instill in my son still today. First, a little history: In my hometown of Denver, two newspapers battled it out for supremacy. One, the Rocky Mountain News, a tabloid, was my family’s paper of choice. My Mother, God bless her soul, used to tell me she liked how easy the smaller paper was to read. To this day, I’m still biased toward the Rocky, as are my brothers, who still read that paper every day. But there was conflict. You see, my first job was delivering the “other” paper, The Denver Post. The Post at that time was an afternoon paper. So I delivered it, on my bicycle, after school and still had time to do my other activities, such as playing sports and what not. The two newspapers still exist today, albeit under a joint operating agreement. Their highly covered circulation battle in the late ’90s and early this decade almost destroyed them both. At one point, you could buy a year’s subscription for about $3. I had both papers delivered to my house for less than $7 for a year. Crazy! As I said, growing up at my house in South Denver, the newspaper of choice was the Rocky Mountain News. My Mother, a single parent, would read it every day. I can remember reading a newspaper, literally, before I ever read books. I used to read the comics every day with my Mother. I was about 4. In my house, if you didn’t play sports, you just didn’t fit in. I had three older brothers and an older sister who were top athletes. I was not only expected to play sports, but also to excel at them. I tried to excel at sports, really, with some success, but I also read about them -- in the newspaper. Of course, I remember pouring over the Rocky’s sports sections, learning everything I could about my beloved Broncos and Nuggets. Back then, Denver didn’t have a Major League Baseball team, but we had the lovable Denver Bears, a AAA team from the American Association. I couldn’t get enough information about the local teams. I thought every 8-year-old kid read the sports section and memorized all the players’ and teams’ stats. Actually, my brother still kids me about memorizing those stats. Even today, he’ll ask me random questions, like who was the home run leader for the 1980 Denver Bears, one of the greatest minor league teams ever. (The answer is Randy Bass, who had 37 dingers and 143 RBI. Bass never made a splash in the Majors, but he did enjoy success playing in Japan.) In 1977, Denver’s passion was the Broncos. And the newspaper couldn’t write enough about them. Of course, as a young reader, I couldn’t read enough about them, either. Even if they did lose Super Bowl XII 27-10 in early 1978 to the hated Dallas Cowboys! Eventually, my love of sports and newspapers merged when I was sports editor at two different newspapers. Fun stuff. Of course, newspapers are about more than comics and sports. I learned about the world, health, business, state and politics. (One of my first lessons in politics was when Denver/Colorado basically turned down the 1976 Winter Olympics over concerns about the environment and failure to pass a multi-million dollar bond. I think we are the only city/state EVER to turn down the Olympics.) I never took debate class in high school, but I knew what good debate was because I read the opinion page of the newspaper almost every day. I wasn’t an arts and entertainment geek, but I stayed current on new bands and local clubs and Hollywood trends through my newspaper. Yes, a newspaper is educational on so many levels. One of my roommates in college thought I was crazy because I subscribed to three different papers -- and that I read them all. He thought the time I spent reading papers would be better spent, say, drinking beer and eating pizza -- or even going to class. Snoopy, Dear Abby and Ann Landers were too interesting to me for that other stuff to really matter. So it wasn’t a big surprise to me, then, that my love of newspapers would eventually become a career for me. I started in the business at my college newspaper and never looked back. Here, now in Victoria, I am part of a great team of journalists and other dedicated professionals who are committed to bringing you the best product every day. We tell the stories -- the tragedies, the heroics, the ordinary -- that make up our community. We care about our community, and we work tirelessly to make it better through our newspaper. Eevery day, we get to start with a blank canvas and do it all again. That’s one of the many things I love about newspapers. And somewhere up there my Mother is smiling down on me -- with the latest newspaper in her hand. Out of the comfort zone http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/7430 http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/7430 The recent debate online about our decision to run a Gay pride <a href="http://www.victoriaadvocate.com/847/story/244018.html">story</a> on the front page of the newspaper conjured up some memories for me. The newspaper industry used to celebrate a week every year in May called Time out for Diversity and Accuracy. The project's goal  was to get newspapers thinking and focusing on diversity. Participating newspapers performed projects and reported back. One year, I solicited volunteers at my Colorado newspaper to do a project. Our goal was simple: To do something that would take us out of our comfort zones and then write a first-person account on the experience. I chose to spend a night at a <a href="http://greeleytrib.com/article/20030627/NEWS/306270011/0/ARCHIVES">gay bar</a>. A couple of people spent time in the local jail. One went to church for the first time in many years. Current Advocate editor, Chris Cobler, then the editor of our Colorado paper, waited tables at a restaurant for the first time in his life. But back to the gay bar .... I must admit, I didn't go by myself. I coerced another co-worker to go with me. The experience definitely took me out of my comfort zone. I had preconceived notions that ultimately proved false. Basically, everyone was pretty cool. And that brings us back to point on the Gay pride festival. I'd challenge those people who squirm at the idea to take themselves out of their comfort zone and attend the festival. You just never know what you might learn. A special night http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/7339 http://community.victoriaadvocate.com/home/Blog/ThomasRMartinez/7339 Sometimes in the news business, we get to be part of something cool and special, not just the negativity that seems to overwhelm us most days. We were part of something special this past week with the Chris Cagle story. If you haven't heard about it or read it, you can do check out the video, story and photos <a href="http://www.victoriaadvocate.com/847/story/239973.html">here</a>. Sometimes a story lives up to its hype, and this one certainly did. As we prepared for the story during the course of the week, the thought did cross our minds that maybe this was too good to be true. But <a href="http://chriscagle.musiccitynetworks.com/">Cagle</a>, the country music star, delivered when he took Victoria 17-year-old Danielle Corder to her prom on Saturday night, giving her a night she'll never forget. And sometimes, we in the news business get to deliver to our audience good-hearted stories we soon won't forget either.