Tag: Boston Globe

More on Boston.com

Two more points about the redesigned Boston Globe site at Boston.com:

  • Once you get past an ad and a few teasers (including one for “Government Center,” a terrific resource that can be hard to find), a good chunk of the right-hand column is taken up with “Reporter’s Questions” — possible future stories for which reporters are seeking information. This feature has been around for years, but I’ve never seen it displayed so prominently. All smart news organizations are looking for ways to build communities around their journalism, and this is one way to do it.
  • The blogs may be getting short shrift on the Boston.com front, but they’re being promoted heavily on the Globe page. Just scroll down the left-hand column a bit. So are the podcasts, which have been organized and promoted in such a way that I may give a few a try now.

More thoughts on Boston.com

The FAQ that accompanies the redesigned Boston.com says that more change is coming: “Different features and sections of the site are scheduled to debut on different days. While we realize that this might be confusing in the short-term, we’ve studied our options carefully and believe that the gradual switch we have planned will ultimately result in a better user experience.”

With that in mind, here are a few random observations offered in the hope that better things are yet to come.

The look. By switching from a tiny sans serif font to the same one used by corporate cousin NYTimes.com, the site is automatically more attractive and readable. I’ve heard complaints that the Boston.com front is too crowded. It is, but it’s less crowded than before. The front also seems a bit newsier than it did previously, with the wacky, offbeat stuff moved farther down the page. The Boston Globe front would benefit from the same look, and I assume that’s coming.

Split personality. One problem I’ve had with Boston.com for a long time is that the site comes across as very different from the electronic Globe. That stems in part from its legacy. Although the Globe has always been the driving force behind Boston.com, it started out as a partnership with media outlets such as Boston magazine, Banker & Tradesman and New England Cable News. These days, it’s pretty much just the Globe, with video from NECN and New England Sports Network. But the split personality remains. Particularly frustrating is the fact that the Globe site conspires at every turn to dump you into Boston.com, whether you want to go there or not.

There are also cool features on Boston.com, like the “Government Center” collection of databases, that are maddeningly difficult to find.

Now, some of this is just a naming convention. Both NYTimes.com and washingtonpost.com let you choose that day’s print edition, which isn’t much different from Boston.com’s letting you choose that day’s Globe. But Boston.com has always struck me as flightier and more superficial, more separated from the core journalistic mission, than those other sites. As I said above, maybe that’s changing. I hope so.

Sharing. The hot trend of the moment is technology that lets you share stories you like on various social networks. Washingtonpost.com is particularly strong on this, letting you post stories to Digg, del.icio.us, Reddit, Newsvine, Facebook and something called StumbleUpon, which is a new one on me. The Globe’s options are relatively paltry, limited to just Digg, Facebook and del.icio.us.

Comments. As Adam Reilly notes, Boston.com still doesn’t allow you to post comments to stories. I know that the issue has been one of computer capacity, but come on, folks – buy some servers. (Yes, the site does have message boards, but that’s rather old-fashioned.)

More stories like what? I found a new feature this morning, but it needs some work. Example: Go to Shelley Murphy’s story on MIT’s lawsuit against the architect Frank Gehry, scroll down a bit, and you’ll find a box titled “MORE STORIES LIKE THIS.” Here’s what you’ll find:

  • Patrick to consider replacing police details with flagmen
  • United Tech profit up
  • Massachusetts high schools vying to update old science labs
  • State to study plans for school construction

Obviously the algorithm needs some work.

Almost forgotten. The link to Boston.com/Globe blogs has been moved to the very bottom of the Boston.com front, which doesn’t strike me as a smart move. The outside blogs section needs serious updating. Let me point out just one example: Under “Politics & the media,” you will not find Reilly’s Don’t Quote Me or David Bernstein’s Talking Politics, both at ThePhoenix.com; Jessica Heslam’s Messenger Blog, at BostonHerald.com; or (ahem) Media Nation.

With the Herald unveiling a redesign in September, we can see two different philosophies at work. The Herald has done something rather daring — it has almost completely broken the tie between its Web site and its print edition. Stories are posted blog-style, in reverse chronological order, throughout the day, with no differentiation made between wire copy and staff-written stories. It’s impossible to know whether some of those stories ever made their way into the print edition. And though the Herald is not exactly rolling in cash, publisher Pat Purcell has somehow found enough computer capacity to allow comments.

That said, BostonHerald.com can be easier to admire than to use. You’re constantly forced to drill down through submenus of submenus. I also find that I’m often missing stuff that I would have seen if I’d picked up a print edition. The solution I’ve hit upon — subscribing to RSS feeds for the sections of the paper I’m most interested in — isn’t entirely satisfying, as I feel as though I’m missing the flavor of the site.

The philosophy at the Globe, on the other hand, is evidently to take the Globe as a starting point and to build on it. It comes across as being similar to NYTimes.com and washington.com, only not quite as smoothly implemented — at least not yet.

These are interesting times for newspapers. New circulation figures show that print continues its free-fall. At the same time, efforts are under way to find new ways of measuring total newspaper readership, online and in print. As my Northeastern colleague Steve Burgard tells the Globe today, “You’ve actually got more eyeballs looking at journalism than ever before.”

By putting so much of their resources into the Web, executives at the Globe and the Herald show that they understand print’s days are numbered.

A better Boston.com

The Boston Globe’s Web site, Boston.com, has unveiled a sparkling new design. Evaluating what’s there and what isn’t will have to wait, but my first impression is that this is much easier on the eyes.

The Globe’s own home page hasn’t changed, though I suspect it will. Choose any story, though, and you’ll see a huge improvement.

My biggest question — and one I’ll try to answer over the next day or so — is whether Dave Beard and company have managed to integrate Boston.com and the online version of the Globe better than they have in the past.

At first glance I’d say “not much.” But Beard, in his letter to readers, promises, “The changes won’t stop there.”

A note on quotes

I’m scratching my head over this, from a Boston Globe review by Brion O’Connor about two new Patriots books:

[H]e has an irritating habit of repeating pet clichés, including “mortgaging the future,” “in over his head,” and “slow slide toward mediocrity,” as well as setting up quotes — a gaffe usually corrected in Journalism 101.

Setting up quotes is bad? This Google search suggests the contrary. The very first hit is for a document called “The Art and Craft of Setting Up Quotes.”

I advise my students to tell the reader a little something about new interview subjects and what they’re going to say before quoting them, which is what I take “setting up quotes” to mean. O’Connor is a longtime journalist, and I’m guessing that what he means is different from what I mean.

Anyway, any insight would be appreciated.

The mother of all (potential) conflicts

You think the New York Times Co.’s 17 percent stake in the Red Sox creates a conflict of interest for the Times Co.-owned Boston Globe? It could have been worse — much worse.

Today the Globe’s Matt Viser checks in with a long front-page story on efforts by Joe O’Donnell, a part-owner of Suffolk Downs, to build a casino at the sagging track. Mayor Tom Menino seems to think it’s a good idea, which is a shame. It’s also a shame that so much of our local public discourse is now taken up by casino gambling.

Anyway, you may recall that last year retired General Electric chief executive Jack Welch and local advertising executive Jack Connors proposed to buy the Globe from the Times Co. Welch was the big celebrity, so he always got mentioned. Connors was the semi-celebrity, so he usually got a shout-out as well.

But there was a third member of the troika whose name often got left out — O’Donnell, who got rich selling hot dogs and popcorn at sporting events. How would you have liked the Globe to be reporting on a casino bid involving one of its co-publishers? Ugh.

My standard disclosure.

Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble

Who writes the blog “Paper Economy”? I have no idea. And that is why I’m writing this item.

“Paper Economy” is billed as “A US Real Estate Bubble Blog.” Based on a post yesterday about the Boston Globe’s paean to Arlington, I’d say the blogger falls into the category of “sharp but too caustic for his own good,” which is a bulging category indeed. But his anonymity makes it difficult to judge his credibility. The offensive picture above is what he uses for his Blogger profile, accompanied by the phrase “I don’t need no stinking housing bubble!” Really.

Mr. (or Ms.) Paper Economy’s numbers seem impressive. But he writes as though Globe reporter Sacha Pfeiffer pulled her numbers out of thin air, which is clearly not the case. For instance, here is an eye-opening statistic in Pfeiffer’s piece:

As of early October, the average number of days houses sat on the market in Arlington before selling was 83, substantially less than the 146-day average for all of Eastern Massachusetts, according to the Multiple Listing Service Property Information Network.

Mr. P.E. (also known as Dimitris) does not actually challenge that number. Instead, he uses another set of MLS numbers thusly:

[L]ooking at the completed single family home sales for 2007 shows that 156 of 235 homes sold, or a whopping 66.4%, were sold UNDER LIST while only 56 homes, or 23.8%, were sold over the list price.

Taking into account the fact that Arlington has seen an average of 50% of all listed single family homes have price reductions (currently 55%), the sheer number of homes still selling under list is staggering.

Now, that’s important information, and it does run counter to the main theme in Pfeiffer’s story, which is that the good times continue to roll in Arlington. Indeed, she opens with an anecdote about a guy who recently sold his home for more than its listed price. If two-thirds of homes in Arlington are selling for less than list, as Mr. P.E.’s numbers show, then she should have included that fact.

But just as she does not deal with Mr. P.E.’s numbers, so, too, does Mr. P.E. fail to engage with Pfeiffer’s numbers showing that homes in Arlington are on the market for a much shorter period of time than in other communities. That’s a pretty good hook for Pfeiffer’s story, I’d say.

Mr. P.E. also writes:

Still further, the year-to-date median selling price for a home in Arlington is in fact $465,500, the lowest seen since 2003, according to the Warren Group NOT the $510,000 as reported in the article.

In fact, I don’t see where the Boston Globe got the $510,000 figure as it doesn’t match the median number reported for the year-to-date figure, the latest reported month or the current calendar year.

He doesn’t see where the Globe got the $510,000 figure? Hmmm … I think I’ve found it: “Among single-family houses, the median price in Arlington is $510,000, according to Warren Group, a Boston publisher of real estate data.”

Now, if you follow the link offered by Mr. P.E., you will find that it takes you to the self-same Warren Group. But he doesn’t show anything reporting that the median housing price in Arlington is $465,500. Rather, you have to register (sorry; not going to do it) and track down the information yourself.

I don’t know whether Pfeiffer did that or if, instead, she interviewed someone at the Warren Group who gave her the $510,000 figure. What I do know is that Mr. P.E. blithely asserts that she’s wrong without having any way of knowing whether her number is based on the same set of assumptions as his.

As I said earlier, Mr. P.E. seems pretty sharp. His post is not without value. But at the root of his screed is his belief that the Globe is in the tank to the real-estate business. Are newspapers dependent on real-estate advertising? Oh, my. Of course they are. But there’s a long, long leap from understanding that obvious fact to believing that Pfeiffer would write a story claiming real estate in Arlington is hot when it’s really cold.

Mr. P.E. goes so far as to demand “a complete retraction” of what he calls Pfeiffer’s “fictitious article.” He even includes Globe editor Marty Baron’s e-mail address. And you should definitely check out his response to an e-mail Baron sent him. I recommend decaf.

Mr. P.E. may know his stuff. As he points out, his posts have been featured at the Motley Fool and TheStreet.com, among other financial sites. But his anonymity, the picture he uses and his assumption of ill will on the Globe’s part undermine his case to the vanishing point.

More alleged news

Would the New York Times Co. please, please, please sell its 17 percent stake in the Red Sox? Then, when the Boston Globe publishes a press release like this on the front of the business section, we can attribute it to simple bad news judgment rather than more nefarious motives. Good grief.

Oh, yeah, and this one too — although I suppose it actually qualifies as news.

Update: Boston Daily beat me to it.

What’s bugging Tim Cahill

State Treasurer Tim Cahill is very upset that U.S. Customs agents harassed his family when they flew home from Italy recently because one of his daughters was found carrying peaches (Globe story here; Herald story here). “As a citizen who cares about security, I think that the time needs to be spent better and maybe on less serious issues than peaches,” Cahill is quoted as saying.

Both papers report having made unsuccessful attempts to get government officials to comment (the Globe’s Andrea Estes appears to have tried quite a bit harder than the Herald’s Dave Wedge), and then leave it at that. But about three seconds of Googling would have revealed what their intuition should have told them in the first place — that fruit can carry non-native insects and other nasties that could wreak havoc if they get loose in the United States.

Here’s part of a press release on a food-sniffing dog that works for the Houston Airport system:

During their training, these canines are taught to alert their human counterparts when they sniff five primary odors: apple, citrus, mango, pork and beef. Plants and flowers are also at the top of the dogs’ target items list.

These target items are foreign to the United States and may contain certain diseases and insects that are not currently present in the country. The function of CBP [Customs and Border Protection] is to prevent these potentially dangerous items from entering the country and, by the same token, to prevent foreign items from the U.S. entering other countries.

Meats can carry livestock diseases, such as swine fever and mad cow disease that can kill American livestock. Fruits and vegetables, on the other hand, can carry insects or diseases, such as the Mediterranean fruit fly or citrus canker, which can wipe out hundreds of acres of the U.S.’s agriculture.

Or maybe we could review how Dutch elm disease, spread by bark beetles, came to wipe out the graceful elm trees that used to line the streets of Boston and other American cities. According to this Wikipedia entry (corroborated by the Encyclopedia Britannica):

The disease was first reported in the United States in 1928, with the beetles believed to have arrived in a shipment of logs from the Netherlands destined for the Ohio furniture industry. The disease spread slowly from New England westward and southward, almost completely destroying the famous Elms in the “Elm City” of New Haven, reaching the Detroit area in 1950, the Chicago area by 1960, and Minneapolis by 1970.

Maybe the agents who stopped the Cahills acted unprofessionally and didn’t bother to explain themselves. Maybe they were unnecessarily rude, the default mode for too many government officials with a little bit of power. But certainly they had a legitimate reason to confiscate the peaches. Too bad the papers didn’t make more of an attempt to find out why.

Even better: Steve finds the notice at left on the Customs Web site. It begins: “We regret that it is necessary to take agricultural items from your baggage. They cannot be brought into the United States because they may carry animal and plant pests and diseases. Restricted items include meats, fruits, vegetables, plants, soil, and products made from animal or plant materials.”

Teasing the Globe

Joe Keohane, Jeff Keating and Adam Reilly are all quite taken with the Boston Globe‘s new “In the news” front-page teasers, which run the length of the left-hand column. Joe even goes so far as to call the feature “a web-influenced sidebar.”

Well, pardon me, but there’s nothing even remotely new about what the Globe is doing. Certainly it’s no different from the “Newsline” column that appears on the front of USA Today (left). The Boston Herald ran similar teasers following its sparkling 1999 redesign, but gave them up after its New York Post-ification a few years later. (Unfortunately, Ron Reason, the consultant who oversaw the redesign, has removed the sample Herald fronts from his Web site.)

That’s not to say the Globe teasers aren’t a good idea. They are. They’re also intriguing from a strategic point of view. The vast majority of Globes are sold via home delivery, but there’s no need to flog the inside content for customers who are retrieving the paper from their front porches.

The teasers say that Globe executives have decided there’s circulation to be gained by persuading more people to buy a copy on their way to work. But aren’t these the same people who are reading the Globe online, for free, once they get to work?

That’s the 50-cents-per-copy question.