It's true that I don't usually dislike being right. But when it means the people of Maine are less informed than they ought to be, I do.
I'll give the Press Herald credit for having today's top story be about Maine, even if it is a "lookee-here" story that a national television program is going to interview someone from Maine. In addition to the fact that Mainers appear on national TV far more often than even rates a mention in the PPH, I'm still not convinced that is the most important thing that happened in Maine yesterday - nor will it be today, nor even tomorrow, which is when the program actually airs.
For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, I predicted yesterday that the PPH would spend a lot of its front-page space on Michael Jackson's funeral, and that the dominant art would be about that story. (I didn't actually get into predicting whether the story would jump to the back page of the front section, occupying half of that, and include three more photos back there as well.)
I was right, despite what is technically the top story - the major story, and the major art, are clearly the MJ funeral. And I'm righter still, because the lead story and lead art on the PPH Web site is about the MJ funeral. (Images of the front page and the Web site are below.)
I also didn't predict who would write the story - I had a vain, and, apparently, totally unjustified, hope that the PPH might find a local angle on the MJ funeral. I thought maybe with some new energy infused by the new owner - which is to say, the fact that the union members themselves now own a part of the paper - the PPH would localize a national story. Maybe they would send a reporter to any number of funeral-watching parties and talking to people about what MJ meant to them. Or find someone in Maine who actually knew him. Or do a profile on a Mainer - a singer, dancer, choreographer, something - who was inspired by MJ and found their life's calling.
Nope. It was an Associated Press story written from Los Angeles. It was available online, for free, at 7:30 pm last night. Talk about yesterday's news tomorrow.
I'd stop there, but I remain disappointed that the new owner of the Press Herald seems to be making the same mistake as the old one. Try giving us just three things:
1) What was the most important thing that happened in Maine yesterday?
2) What is the most important thing that's going to happen in Maine today?
3) What have you chosen to address in-depth today, from among the most important issues facing Mainers down the road - whether short, medium, or long term?
Sometimes a couple of those - or even all three - will overlap. That's fine. But a national TV show airing a Mainer, the still-going-on death/mourning of Michael Jackson, and a story about how the weather is stalling a paving project are not it. Maybe, with a deeper treatment, the story about non-profits and state agencies buying fishing rights to protect fishermen would have been good, but it was based on press releases and statements by officials of the state and non-profits involved.
Here's the statistic that'll tell you all you need to know about that story:
Number of fishermen quoted about what they thought of the efforts by the do-gooder non-profits and state officials: Zero.
There's a word for that. It's not journalism. It's lazy.
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