Meryl Streep essayed her role in the Oscar-nominated film The Devil Wears Prada. In the documentary The September Issue, which releases in New York today, Anna Wintour plays Anna Wintour. The legendary editor of the Baghwad Gita of the $300billion fashion industry, Vogue, takes off her trademark goggles and allows director R.J. Cutler to scrutinise…
Monthly Archives: August 2009
‘Editors and senior journos must declare assets’
Indian Express editor-in-chief Shekhar Gupta attacked environmentalists in a recent column. “Drive out… don’t fly,” he wrote, and you will find bounteous fields in Punjab and Haryana, and not the caked, cracked and dried mud-flats with withered saplings that characterise drought that afflicts half the districts in India today. Reason: the foresight of regional leaders…
German fellowship open to Indian journalists
The International Journalists’ Programmes (IJP) is inviting applications from newspaper, TV and radio journalists in Asia and the Pacific, for an eight-week exchange fellowship programme that will take them to Germany in May and June 2010. Journalists between 28 and 38 years of age, working in India, China, Korea, Thailand, Indonesia and Vietnam are eligible…
‘Univerisity offers trainings from Indian origin’
Private education—professional colleges, B-schools, deemed Universities, journalism schools, etc—is one of the most under-reported scams in the Indian media today. This advertisement for one such J-school, which spells “University” wrongly, is a proof reader’s delight. Click on the image for a larger frame.
Who are the journos ‘running & ruining’ the BJP?
PRITAM SENGUPTA writes from New Delhi: Former Indian Express editor Arun Shourie‘s explosive interview with the paper’s current editor, Shekhar Gupta, while revealing the deep schisms within India’s principal oppostion party, the BJP, has also once again thrown light on the less-than-professional role political journalists have been playing. For the second time in two months,…
How this baby made a lensman cry 19 years later
For news photographers life is one endless “assignment”. The ticking timepiece, the pressure to capture The Moment better than the others on the beat, the boxing for space between “video” and “still” leaves little room for reflection, even less for poetry. In staff-strapped Indian media houses, the sublime and the ridiculous—ministerial visits, seminars, crime scenes,…
How not to ask right questions (an ongoing series)
When he made Sicko, Michael Moore got into a flap with CNN on the mainstream media’s inability to ask tough, searching questions. “Just apologize to the American people and to the families of the troops for not doing your job four years ago. We wouldn’t be in this war if you had done your job.…
Newspaper websites get less than 1% page views
Traditional media—newspapers, TV stations, magazines—live under the assumption that the current drift away from them towards new media is something that will get corrected as the consumer begins pining for “credibility”—stuff they can trust!—and once he does so, they can start charging for content which will bring their businesses back on track. India is still…
It’s all official about the return of Sanjaya Baru
For days and weeks, New Delhi was abuzz with rumours of the return of Sanjaya Baru (in picture). Would he go back to the Prime Minister’s Office, where he had served as media advisor? Would he be sent to the Planning Commission? Would he be in charge of programme implementation? Well, it turns out he…
Sure, but would he like to receive them today?
Watching TV used to be simple in the age of terrestrial broadcasting. The advent of satellite, cable and dish have made viewing a more pleasurable experience, of course, but there are also some unintended consequences. This afternoon, after news emerged that India’s principal opposition party, the BJP, had sacked its leading light Jaswant Singh against…
The lady, obviously, will have something to say
Foundation for Media Professionals Dialogue: Undercover reporters, scam busters or abettors? Thursday, August 20, 10.30 am to 1 pm India International Centre, New Delhi Partner: Friedrich Ebert Stiftung
Did media overreact to SRK? Press QOTD ‘Y’
“Film maker, TV producer, businesswoman, writer, blogger, teacher and the main slave to an imperious hound”, Harini Calamur on the Indian media’s reaction to the detention of movie star Shah Rukh Khan by officials at Newark airport: “At first, when my nani called me up to tell me that SRK was arrested in the USA,…
Good heavens, yet another Mario Garcia redesign
In a nation of a billion (plus a few hundred million) people, in the outsourcing capital of the world, Indian publishers continue to face enormous trouble in finding a designer with a pulse on local tastes to redesign their products. And the only name on the speeddial of otherwise extremely stingy proprietors—be it in the…
Move over Irving Wallace. Wallace Souza is here.
In Irving Wallace‘s 1982 thriller The Almighty, the protagonist Edward Armstead inherits from his father a newspaper called the New York Record (and his mistress). But the former comes with a rider: the Record will become his if and only if he can overtake the circulation of the New York Times in a certain timeframe.…
Don’t ask me, ask her. Don’t ask me, ask him.
How differently can two journalists of the same house and the same media house think on the same issue at the same time, said issue being West Bengal governor Gopalkrishna Gandhi‘s stand on violence in the State? Exhibit A is Rajdeep Sardesai, editor-in-chief of CNN-IBN, seven hours ago from the web. Exhibit B is Sagarika…
An example to emulate for Indian journalists
Not too many working Indian journalists are in the book-writing habit. At least not in English. Pesky bosses who don’t give leave from work, the effort involved in finding a publisher, the commitment entailed in pursuing a different form of writing, not to speak of the fear of failure, etc, all play a contributing part.…
Journalism can’t be taught, but it can be learnt
The Indian Express group, which announced the setting up of a media school a few weeks ago under the aegies of Newschool Ventures Limited, has announced its first academic course: an 8-month programme beginning October 1. Content sutra reports the course costs Rs 1.75 lakh. Download the application form here Also read: Those who can…
‘The name is Gajwani. Satyan Suresh Gajwani.’
PRITAM SENGUPTA writes from Delhi: Although they run India’s largest home-grown media empire, the seamer side of which unabashedly peeks into the lives of people, the Jains of The Times of India group treasure their privacy like they do, well, their marketshare. (Almost.) Elder son Samir Jain, 55, rarely makes public appearances of the sort…
How to wish ‘Happy Birthday’ without a script
On his 48th birthday, US President Barack Obama wishes the grande dame of the White House press corps, Helen Thomas, on her 89th. Let history record that the Wisher-in-Chief did not use a teleprompter when he wished her Happy Birthday. Link via Juan Antonio Giner/ Innovation in Newspapers Also read: The fastest 100 days in…
The face behind a famous byline behind an Award
Indian media advertisements are largely anonymous. When a newspaper touts its circulation or a television station toots its own horn, or a staffer wins any of the many awards, the ads are mostly built around the organisations. If there has to be a face, it is usually of the founder or promoter or some pumped-up…
IJR 