The Londoner - what's it for?

[scott_forester]

Frankly, what is your problem, other than spending public money on something that you don't personally benefit from seems to be a waste? I'm sure costs could be cut (they can always be cut!) but the principle has to be a good one.

But the Londoner doesn't seem to achieve anything. I've never seen a major story in it not already covered by local radio, papers or TV. I don't have a problem with PR spending, the oyster campaign seems perfectly sensible, but the Londoner appears to be campaign with no point.

 

[Skim]

Earlier this year there was a job vacancy at The Londoner for a layout subeditor, paying a whopping £34k – a very handsome sum and well above the market average.

Wish I'd applied... there must have been a lot of subs after that plum role.

 

[JWH]

London isn't covered by one newspaper alone: it's got a shitload of local paid and free newspapers, it's disproportionately written about in the nationals and there are no end of websites, books, leaflets and other shit available online, in shops and in libraries for anyone that takes an interest. The Evening Standard is shit - great, fine - it's not the end of the world and Livingstone is not so inept that he needs to publish his own newspaper at our expense to "redress the balance" i.e. get his words out unchallenged.

Are you arguing against the idea that he should engage in _any_ publicly-funded PR activities, or just this particular newspaper?

No. The problem with the Londoner is that it is whitewash and propaganda. If it was an honest, direct statement from the Mayor saying: "this is what I've done; this is what I'm doing; this is what I am going to do", then it would be OK. It would still be binned by 90% of people in London but it would be OK. The Londoner is full of political campaigning in the guise of journalism and made up letters. It's also dull, badly laid out and content-free.

 

[untethered]

The Londoner is a PR publication of the London mayor. It is not a newspaper. It is not journalism. It is not pretending to be. Everyone seems to understand that except you.

Your criticism is based on a fundamental misunderstanding and is totally invalid.

Just because it is "in the style of" a newspaper does not make it one. Your dissastisfaction with it stems entirely from expecting to behave like a journalistic publication and being disappointed when it doesn't.

I'm astonished.

And yes, I know it's cheesy crap. That's not the point. The point is that it's PR and every organisation does PR and is entitled to do so. For public sector organisations, that means doing so with public money.

The next time something in the Londoner offends you, try complaining to the Press Complaints Commission and see how far it gets you. You might want to post your reply here for our amusement, but I imagine it'd be something like,

"It's not a newspaper. It's a PR newsletter. They can write whatever they like."

 

[dynamicbaddog]

My job involves pushing free mail like this thru people's letterboxes, we don't actually do The Londoner but on my rounds the other month I ran into some people distributing it and was shocked to discover they get paid less per hour than I do!!

 

[JWH]

I'm astonished.

Oh, let's just agree to disagree. All this dog eat dog is so tiring!

 

[untethered]

No problem.

I'm kinda busy right now trying to get the next edition out the door.

 

[Donna Ferentes]

I think the point is that everybody knows it's propaganda. Of course. In its way every bit as biased as the Substandard. But it's better to have two propaganda sheets contradicting one another, than to have only the one.