In which the pond deals with correspondence, celebrates Ando from the bush, and provides a dinkum Groaning for the cultists ...

 

Before moving on, the pond would like to deal with a matter arising from correspondence. It required getting past the Crikey paywall's to read Luke McIlveen confirmed as new Nine executive editor and thereby get to a link, in order to get to the real juice, a long ago June 2010 interview in the lizard Oz (the pond never links to the reptiles).

Therein were ten questions and much juice ... because the man was a visionary ...

What does an increasingly-digital world mean for newspapers? It was looking dire for a while, but I think the iPad, from what I've seen, has the potential to give digital audiences a genuine print experience. If we make it work, we can retain the spirit of papers the clever headlines, the captions, photos and ads that actually bring in revenue. But I think papers have a bright future in their own right you cant really imagine slopping your Weet-Bix all over an iPad. And how do you pull the sports section out of your iPad so the missus can read Body and Soul? These are troubling questions that must keep Steve Jobs awake at night.

The man clearly saw the future of local rags, what with the Manly Daily now a tragic branch of the Daily Terror , but then...

Are you optimistic about the future of suburban newspapers? Absolutely. Suburban readership numbers stack up extremely well when you look at how large metros are performing here and overseas. The Manly Daily is a unique beast in that were the only daily suburban paper home delivered free in Australia. That means many of our readers don’t bring a second paper into the house. They know well be covering the news that affects their suburb and street. We can’t fall back on a skirmish in the Gaza Strip or a Newspoll on Rudd on a quiet day if it’s not local they’ll eat you alive in this part of the world!

The man was a devotee of hatchet job Hadders ...

Which journalists do you most admire? When you've seen journos in their natural environment it’s hard to admire them, but there are plenty I respect. This will give Liz Jackson chest pains, but the most influential and effective working journalist in this country at the moment is 2GB's Ray Hadley. Here's a guy who has pretty much single-handedly exposed the deadly stupidity of Rudd's insulation scheme and breaks story after story on state and federal politics, crime, sport and general news. But will he get the Gold Walkley? Probably not. That will go to an SBS series on Tanzania that ran at 11pm on a Friday, following a special screening of Three Colours Blue. Elsewhere, Laurie Oakes for politics, Phil Rothfield for sport, Dave Penberthy for commentary, Gemma Jones for news and Chris Masters for investigations.

The man was deeply interested in commentary on the media ...

Describe Media Watch in 50 words or less? Is it still on? I think it clashes with the Monday night league post-game press conference on Fox Sports. No, they've given me a couple of sprays I deserved, some that Penbo (David Penberthy) deserved, so well call it a draw.

The man had a tremendous idea of what mattered ...

Your favourite story? Easy: the cat in the washing machine. Look, it’s not Watergate, but the story of Kimba the Burmese kitten surviving a full cold wash cycle in the family Westinghouse was a major coup for The Manly Daily. That cat went around the world, The Times, BBC, NBC, some Pravda-esque news service in Lithuania. I went with "Soggy Moggy'' but I think I preferred (News Limited veteran) Martin Beesley's suggested headline: "Eight left''.

Cats! Lolz for sure, and the man had learned much at the Terror ...

The Daily Telegraph news desk taught me? To spot a time-waster from a mile off. When the splash has gone arse-up at 6pm and the editors on the phone from Beppis for a briefing, you can't be arguing with a reporter about why we're running their story on page 16. Having said that, it also taught me to be more patient it’s not the job of a chief of staff to come up with all the ideas and if you are, it’s usually because you’re not listening to anybody else. And sometimes your page 16 should have been the splash.

And the man is intrepid ...

Your most challenging interview? That hairy Glen "Steeley" Steele who became the poster boy for the Cronulla riots. He was about seven longnecks down by the time the trouble started and just insane with anger. He was bad enough, but as I was talking to him empty bottles started to fly in from his mates, who had formed a circle around us. I copped one in the back but it didn’t smash. I often wonder what happened to that bloke and whether he mows the lawn on Saturdays and drops the kids at daycare or whatever. You know, whether he was relatively normal and just went off the deep end that day, ruining his life forever.

What frustrates you most about journalism today? The number of pious sloths who mistake laziness for journalistic ethics, without bothering to find out how their readers or viewers might see a story. Take Channel Seven's David Campbell story. I thought it was an absolute cracker. I read a piece by a media academic on Crikey slamming Peter Meakin and Adam Walters for the yarn and it was just embarrassing. The Herald also runs that dross by David Marr, despite devoting the entire front page to following up Walters yarn. I mean, when was the last time David Marr broke a yarn that didn't involve Patrick White? And if Campbell was a conservative Liberal, would David have bashed out a pithy 350 words in his defence? I doubt it. A fairly incompetent Minister cavorting in a gay sex club, who then quits his post following the revelations. It's a legitimate news story where I come from.

Your biggest mistake? Media knows full well what it is. Look, sitting in Bangalore pooing through the eye of a needle while a major bank launches a full-scale PR assault against your front page on Aussie jobs being shifted to India was not the ideal way to take in the subcontinent. But you live and learn. I also follow the Roosters.

Context update:

McIlveen found himself in hot water as a Daily Telegraph reporter in 2006 over a story about an ANZ bank technology centre in Bengaluru.
McIlveen’s report incorrectly claimed the building was a call centre that employed 1,300 workers who handled Australian customer accounts. ANZ pulled $4-5m worth of advertising from News and threatened legal action. The Telegraph’s then editor David Penberthy later said the error was his.

Once a boofhead, always a boofhead? 

Whatever, the pond is too busy with its reptile studies to bother with the Nine rags and that's likely to continue, and so to today's digital edition, and talk about a lay down misère ...

Some might think the pond should pay attention to the reptiles paying attention to the ABC, but that's just the reptiles off on another jihad ...

Strange, that story was there late yesterday, but then fell off the front page.

Never mind, there was a cartoon that dealt with all that ...

In any case, it wasn't any of that which caught the pond eye. It was the boy from the bush, who at time of writing sat proudly on the top far right perch in the digital edition, and late yesterday had been the reptiles' centrefold playmate ...

Reptile centrefold display art at what currently passes for its finest, and Ando himself was on fire and maintaining the Oz day rage, a vast relief to the pond ...

Now some might think this is just the tedious spluttering of a boring old fart with weird ideas about retailing.

After all, why not just fill your store with whatever junk you can't sell, and then have a tremendous fire sale and just wear the loss ... that's how to do Ando style retailing.

More to the point, the pond had thought this culture war had died a premature death, but the old corn cobber from the bush had revived it in the nick of time, and it was a tremendous platform for the shouting at assorted other clouds ...

Here the pond must interrupt. Apparently the boy from the bush is unaware that "from the river to the sea" has a whole new meaning, per a sample from WaPo's What Netanyahu sees from the river to the sea (paywall) ...

And with that done and dusted, and a true understanding of river to the sea now in place - collective punishment, ethnic cleansing and a dash of genocide - time to finish off the loon from the bush ...

Is there anything remarkable about this? The pond suggests its more than remarkable, it's astonishing. 

This man was once a former deputy PM, but then the pond recalls that Mike Pence was once the Vice President of the United States, so perhaps it isn't that astonishing, perhaps it's just the way of things ...

And so to the commentary section to see what gives on a Tuesday ...

Oh dear, a serious clash ... the pond can walk past dimmable Dimitri and the bouffant one blathering on about the latest "huge risk", but the pond is intensely loyal to Killer and so must rustle up a late arvo slot, so that in the meantime, it can serve up the usual Dame Groan to her devoted cultists ...

Now the pond hasn't the slightest interest in the current dispute, and thought it might be more amusing to do a cut and paste so that passersby might exclaim  "Gott in Himmel" or perhaps "oh mein Gott"...

The only interest for the pond then was whether Dame Groan might, in her wondrous groaning, mention Dubai  and the Dubai royals ...

Nope, yet it was all mein Gott could think about ... what with suggesting that the Dubai royals were being almost provocative in their actions ...

The pond was reminded of that other cartoon about negotiations ...

Then it was on to the last Groaning and the last chance for the old Groaner to mention the Dubai royals ...

The pond couldn't believe it and did a word search, and it seems that the old Groaner managed to get through it completely without mentioning Dubai or the Dubai royals once, yet again proving that the reptile cornfields are a splendid way to disappear things ...

What's that, mein Gott, there's another gobbet of him to go, so the pond can end on a royal note ...

Perhaps it was wrong to pit mein Gott up against mein Groaner, but it was easy, and all it left was for Killer to turn up in an arvo slot, and the immortal Rowe to round out the morning with an illustration of that huge risk ...