I’m not sure what you are getting at, since I’m not from the ST.

In fact, if you have been following my columns and comments, the ST has been, by far, the newspaper which I have criticised the most.

This column is actually the first in which I made extensive comments about Today.

The pot should not call the kettle black.am i right?
i hva estopped subscribing to ST cos it’s a load of BS.
And,on top of that,you got to pay extra on weekends!
For what?…the vendor told me for the advertisements!
You mean i can opt not to have the adverts which are already paid for
by the advertisers anyway?
And,btw, your news are stale,i can get faster news from the many sites in the
internet and they are for free!
Remove the speck in your own eyes before trying to remove that of the TODAY,which contrary to what you said , is in fact more entertaining.
And,yes,it’s a good read while commuting.
At least,they don’t try to pretend to be another boring ST,which despite its
long existence,it’s very much a backward drudgery!
So much for trying to sell apeice of stale bread…we are not yet starving,so you can keep it for yourself especially the “loaves”(loads) of paid advertisements which you charge us unfairly for helping you to attract the advertisers in the first place.
So,before you open your mouth the next time,take a good look in the mirror!

“Problem is, they are trying to run a business, no? What kind of business aims to flatline profit margins? Otherwise, they are a philantrophic entity, or angling hard at bankruptcy come the first shock to the industry. Neither makes sense.”

The news media is big business. But as I have pointed out, there are many directions a news organisation can take in its attempt to meet competing priorities. The bottomline is the most important from a business POV, but there is still space for other goals to be met.

The two London freesheets – the Evening Standard and Metro (distributed on the underground network, hence a close comparison with Today) – never sell their front pages. They have always used news to attract their readers, bearing in mind that even in this point in time, neither paper has a direct freesheet competitor – Evening Standard being a late afternoon to evening paper, and Metro being a morning paper.

@Annonymous

I hope you have a sense of irony, Annonymous.

My arguments will speak for themselves, and if they are flawed you are welcome to criticise and refute them. Attacking the person who makes the arguments don’t advance anything.

You are right. Any profit made, if channelled to beefing up the newsroom, will of course result in improvements in editorial coverage, writing standards, and so on.

Problem is, they are trying to run a business, no? What kind of business aims to flatline profit margins? Otherwise, they are a philantrophic entity, or angling hard at bankruptcy come the first shock to the industry. Neither makes sense.

“The problem is the dominance of the profiteering motive, at the expense of quality journalism.”

You know this already, but anyway: the really big difference between a freesheet like Today vs say, NYT, is that while a great expose on NYT directly contributes to the bottom line – better stories = more newsstand buys – Today’s finances are entirely padded by pandering to the advertiser.

Its challenge is in doing this without completely turning off the readers. You may disagree, but I think the increasing readership proves it is just about on the right side of this line. That or its circulation dept is doing wonders. Either way, it is doing something right.

ST, on the other hand, might be more culpable. It should be selling newspapers based on great investigative journalism of the level you desire. But it is nowhere near world-class.

Who to blame? Maybe the undiscerning masses who buy into the generic crap on ST Page 1?

I agree with you, though, that Today standards aren’t as high as they pretend to be. That is a shame. I suspect its increasing link with CNA and newsradio is a negative factor, rather than the positive you say it should be. It is weighed down by dinosaur parent co deadweight.

Actually, there is nothing wrong with the idea of weekly newspapers. All Sunday newspapers are weekly newspapers – Observer, News of the World, Mail on Sunday, Sunday Times, etc.

“TODAY’s declaration of taking on ST does not mean “more of the same”. My view on whether it has in recent times produced anything original differs from yours. I bellieve they have.”

Today hasn’t done any journalism, that I’ve seen anyway, that rises above the reactive – it covers diary stories, like scheduled events, govt reports, hard news. I don’t remember seeing any in-depth features, apart from occasional commentary. If you do, please direct me and I would like to see it myself.

In this regard, even the New Paper does better. It does investigations and digs stuff up. It goes after stories. The problem is their focus is on the sensational human interest stories (which can be expanded into more in-depth reporting on the wider social problems they reflect, but TNP usually doesn’t).

ST does a lot of this reactive reporting too, but sometimes they go deeper – with some insightful reporting into social issues (that don’t fall outside of govt OB markers), like with their Saturday special.

Despite what Today claims, I don’t think they have actually done anything to take on ST, which is unfortunate. It is merely focusing on its own market and playing to it – giving commuters some reading material on their way home. No time for in-depth material, just hard news mostly, with entertainment, sports and business tagged on.

Conrad in the business sections have addressed SGX issues which BT/ST had not. The sports guys write provoking articles on the state of foobtall in Singapore, although NewPaper is not too bad on this one.

Competing does not mean, I feel, that you need to go head-on. Given the monopolistic press situation, competing means taking the strategic approach of offering something refreshing to readers, which in turn attract advertisers. Their success is reflected in the (yet again) change in strategic approach of having the Chinese section as a pull-out, under the guise of serve-the-readers-better spin.

What SPH has done is converting MyPaper into an English free sheet. Presumably, the decision was based on research.

The point really is this – whether the front page is news filled or not is not the crucial point, I believe. A beautiful woman is a beautiful woman – with or without make-up. And beauty is in the eyes of the beholder.

This disappearing front page is a symptom. Not a problem in itself. The problem is the dominance of the profiteering motive, at the expense of quality journalism.

When was the last time you opened Today, which claims to want to compete with the ST, and read anything truly original, compelling and insightful? Even the ST, if it wants to and if the issue does not touch upon an area which the govt frowns upon, can produce some compelling journalism, like on regional piracy, the tsunami aftermath five years on etc. Today doesn’t.

And it doesn’t seem to be for want of resources – it shares its news gathering resources with Channel News Asia. The articles you read either on Today or on CNA website are often written by the same journalists. In this sense, it is similar to My Paper, which shares its news pool with ST and Zaobao.

Today appears to be earning the advertising dollars, but not using the money to produce the journalism it could do. Where does it go? Profits I imagine.

This is all good in the short-term, but I suspect an ultimately myopic strategy. Instead of investing in quality, training and developing journalistic talent, MediaCorp is content to earn the dosh and pay it out as dividends.

Something tells me you didn’t read the earlier comments.

The more ads you get, the higher the chance of Today staying alive.

The reason My Paper has fewer ads (vs Today, and currently vs 2 months ago) is fewer advertisers want to place ads in them, because they have lower visibility compared to Today. They were more ad-filled 2 months ago cos they slashed ad prices by up to 75% then. Once the discount was withdrawn, so were the ads.

If My Paper could, they would go 75% ads and beyond. But they can’t for now.

Your Saturday ST costs like, $2/issue to print. You pay $1. What makes up the shortfall? Ads.

Without ads – front page, cover wrap, quarter-page, popup 3d technicolour etc etc, it doesn’t matter – no paper will survive, let alone be profitable.

The only way it’ll survive if it were to be propped up by parties with vesteds. So what do you get? Unabashedly state-run press or, perhaps in a freer country, newspapers with overt leanings in favour of whoever’s signing the paycheques.

So you have 70% ads in an 80-page copy of Today. That means you get the equivalent of 24 pages of news. But if you look at a typical low-ad day (say 1st day of CNY, or maybe the Monday edition) you have 60% ads in a 40-page paper.

That makes … 24 pages of news.

So you’ve lost the front page, such that you can’t see what’s hot by glancing at a copy on your doorstep.

Don’t fret. Just, you know, pick it up and, like, open it to the “fake” Page 1. The “front page news” is there. Not on the front page. But it’s there.

Short of your philantrophically offering to underwrite the entire costs of putting together a newspaper, I don’t see why you should bemoan getting free news. If you don’t think it’s of adequate quality then just … don’t read it.

Free kitty litter lining! You even get like $0.0005 cents per copy from the larung guni man! What is the negative here?

To Objective,

Free doesn’t mean good. Price doesn’t mean quality. If anything, it seems that you epitomise the unfortunate Singaporean mentality that puts a premium on price and practicality over all else.

Hmm ok, the MCS has since changed its name to Audit Bureau of Circulations Singapore.

According to their website, they are “a private limited company incorporated in Singapore in accordance with the provisions of the Companies Act, Cap. 185.” and “a not-for-profit organization and is controlled by a Board of Directors with equal representation from the three constituent associations.”

http://abcsingapore.org/about.html

ACNielsen is a global marketing research firm. Their clients…too numerous to list, I’d imagine.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ACNielsen

Who audits Nielsen?
Who is Nielsen’s Client(s)?

Circulation is audited by the Media Circulations Services.

http://presspedia.journalism.sg/doku.php?id=advertising_and_circulation_trends

Readership numbers is audited by Nielsen.

http://sg.acnielsen.com/site/20091022.htm