Mine Magazine apparently not off to a great start
I subscribed to Mine Magazine a few weeks ago — so when I got an e-mail from them today, I had pretty much forgotten I ever signed up in the first place.
Mine is a cool idea from Time, Inc. that allows you to combine five magazines into one, effectively creating a personalized magazine suited to your tastes.
But this is what the e-mail said:
Dear Jordan,
Thank you for subscribing to mine magazine. We want to let you know that a computer error may have affected the first issue you received this week. It’s possible that this issue did not contain the combination of magazine content you selected. Please know that the problem has been resolved, and that each of your subsequent issues will reflect the exact content you originally requested.
In appreciation of your support, we have extended your five-issue subscription to include a sixth free issue of mine. You can also access real-time mine content through your smartphone device at http://mine.mwap.at.
We apologize for the inconvenience and, again, thank you for being among the very first to experience mine.
Best regards,
Wayne Powers
President, Time Inc. Media Group
I’m sure this was just an accident, but I hope it’s not an error that gets repeated in other ways. I’d like to see novel ideas like this more often in the print news industry, and one slip-up is enough to kill an idea.
TV station crosses the line
A Pennsylvania TV station censored a congressional debate after one of the candidates made a mistake, according to mccall.com.
The debate was recorded and aired later. Democrat Sam Bennett said that ”Wachovia Bank and Sovereign Bank folded and now those shares are only worth a dollar each.” This is, of course, not true. Neither bank failed — they were bought by larger corporations.
Bennett went on to say ”Wachovia and Sovereign Bank very well would not have failed if the right action had been taken at the right time, that’s the point I’m making.”
Fine. She messed up. But when WFMZ-TV muted the sound and blurred the lips of the candidate, they crossed the line of journalistic ethics.
The station put a disclaimer at the beginning of the broadcast, saying what happened. The station manager said that “because of the economic times we’re in …a statement on television can cause an immediate effect. These are unusual times, and it calls for extra measures of care.”
Fair enough. But viewers have a right to know when a candidate makes a mistake. It matters. Sometimes gaffes are genuine mistakes, and they aren’t repeated. But other times, the candidate doesn’t know what he or she is talking about. We can’t know what’s going on if we aren’t presented with the unedited comments.
Saturday Night Live: The Bailout Bill Song
It took me a week to find this, but it’s definitely the best part of last weekend’s SNL. I don’t know why NBC didn’t post it. Watch it before they find this one, though.
