The vexed issue of "private treaties"

Should a media company disclose to readers of its newspapers its interest — in this case an ownership stake — in companies that are regularly featured on its news pages?

Are media companies taking enough steps to insulate their news and opinion writing from growing business interests of the firm itself?

And in a market where newspapers are significantly subsidised by advertisers, does it matter whether such conflicts of interests are divulged or not to readers who have been reluctant to pay for what it costs to produce a daily newspaper?

Mint posed these questions earlier this year in an article on the issue of private treaties. And last month it carried a report on a move by Sebi, the capital market regulator, to make private treaty deals more transparent (Page 12: "Sebi seeks more transparency, orders media firms to declare stakes in other companies").

Reading both these articles will give you a good idea of the stakes involved here for both journalists and the reading public.

What do you intend to do if you are a journalist?

And what do you have to say about the issue as a reader?

The inviolable line between news and advertising at Mint

In this era of paid news, and Medianet, and private treaties, how refreshing — and comforting — to read this note from the editor on the front page of Mint (Friday, September 3):

Note to readers

Dear Reader,

From time to time, you will see a page or a feature in Mint clearly labelled as Media Marketing Initiative. Such content is entirely generated by an advertiser or Mint's marketing department on behalf of an advertiser, and does not involve any editorial staff.

Such pages/features also have a different font and style to help you identify that they are not part of Mint's editorial content. As clearly stated in Mint's journalistic Code of Conduct, available on our website www.livemint.com, there is an inviolable line between news and advertising at Mint. We thought it would be useful for us to reiterate this to you.

As always, feel free to contact us at feedback@livemint.com

R. Sukumar

Editor

Here are just a few of the many pertinent points in Mint's Code of Conduct:

In the 21st century, ... news is transmitted in more ways than ever before — in print, on the air and on the Web, with words, images, graphics, sounds and video. But always and in all media, we insist on the highest standards of integrity and ethical behavior when we gather and deliver the news.

• That means we abhor inaccuracies, carelessness, bias or distortions. It means we will not knowingly introduce false information into material intended for publication or broadcast; nor will we alter photo or image content. Quotations must be accurate, and precise.

• It means we always strive to identify all the sources of our information, shielding them with anonymity only when they insist upon it and when they provide vital information — not opinion or speculation; when there is no other way to obtain that information; and when we know the source is knowledgeable and reliable.

• It means we don't plagiarize.

• It means we avoid behavior or activities that create a conflict of interest and compromise our ability to report the news fairly and accurately, uninfluenced by any person or action.

• It means we don't misidentify or misrepresent ourselves to get a story. When we seek an interview, we identify ourselves as Mint journalists.

• It means we don’t pay newsmakers for interviews, to take their photographs or to film or record them.

• It means we must be fair. Whenever we portray someone in a negative light, we must make a real effort to obtain a response from that person. When mistakes are made, they must be corrected — fully, quickly and ungrudgingly.

• And ultimately, it means it is the responsibility of every one of us to ensure that these standards are upheld. Any time a question is raised about any aspect of our work, it should be taken seriously.

There's so much here to admire — and learn from.

The king of the sting

That would be Mazher Mahmood whose latest expose has blown the lid off the so-called "spot-fixing" scandal involving Pakistan's cricketers. Who is Mazher Mahmmod? There's a bio on Wikipedia, the most interesting fact in it being the enigmatic nature of the man on account of his job profile:

Mahmood works secretively, rarely going into the News International offices. Written into Mahmood's contract is a clause stating that his photograph will never be published in the newspaper. If he features in photos that accompany his stories, his face is always concealed and a silhouette is used next to his byline.

And here's another interesting tidbit from that bio:

News Of The World claims he has brought 234 criminals to justice. He often poses as a sheikh in order to gain his target's trust, and is also known as the "Fake sheikh." In September 2008, he wrote a book titled Confessions of a Fake Sheik: The King Of The Sting Reveals All, published by Harper Collins.

Wouldn't we just love to get hold of a copy of that book? We would get to learn how an undercover reporter gets information that translates into a worldwide scoop. We would also get an insight into an aspect of journalism — sting operations — that, in the wrong hands, can have many unpleasant ramifications.

In the meantime, we can only watch this particular sting operation unfold before our eyes (check out the four-minute video) and marvel at the chutzpah of the reporter and the advances in technology that made it possible for News of the World to make headlines around the world this week.

• UPDATE (July 20, 1011): What really prompted Rupert Murdoch to shut down a 168-year-old newspaper? Read about it here: "The end of the News of the World".

6 money mistakes to avoid when you've just started working

Today's Mint has a very helpful piece by Harshada Karnik for youngsters who are into their first job. That first cheque may give you a high, she says, but before blowing it up, you should take a look at what a small part of it can earn in the long run. And then she lists the mistakes many youngsters make when it comes to financial planning:

• Mistake 1: Don't really know where I spend
• Mistake 2: I saw, I liked, I shopped
• Mistake 3: I live on plastic
• Mistake 4: Not now, maybe later
• Mistake 5: I like risks and adventure
• Mistake 6: My uncle has it, I'll also buy one; it'll save my tax, too

If you are making all or any of these mistakes, you need to read this: "Into your first job? 6 mistakes to avoid"

Sloppy subbing/house style

1. DNA (Bangalore), August 26

• Page 12: Pullout quote in first editorial

Vedanta has got its just desserts, but we need greater transparency in rules

That should be "just deserts": (From Dictionary.com) A deserved punishment or reward, as in He got his just deserts when Mary jilted him. This idiom employs desert in the sense of "what one deserves," a usage dating from the 1300s but obsolete except in this expression.

(We all know what "dessert" means.)

• Page 17: Headline

Mail on Flintoff auction raises a storm

That should be "email" or "e-mail", depending on house style. Why do so many of us, including journalists who should know better, write (or say) mail when it should be email?

In the news report below that headline, we read "e-mails" in some paragraphs and "mails" in other paragraphs. It's so confusing for readers.

2. The Times of India (Bangalore), August 26

• Page 1: Headline

INDIA SETS UP TITLE CLASH WITH SL

Here India is apparently a singular noun. Now go to the fourth paragraph of the match report on Page 23:

Now India have a chance to gloss over their weak links and get their hands on the trophy if they can contrive to run through the Lankans next.

Here India becomes a plural noun. So what is the house style?

Most newspapers allow collective nouns such as the cricket or football teams to be treated as plural subjects to make for ease of reading. For example: India have reached the final. To my knowledge, The Hindu is the only mainstream Indian newspaper that persists in treating, say, cricket or football teams as a singular subject. That is the newspaper's house style. But for The Times to treat India as singular and plural on different pages in the same issue is perhaps an indication that house style is no longer as sacrosanct as it used to be.

3. Open, August 20

• Page 41: Fifth paragraph

Before the channel began operating, a former bureau chief says, there was an unofficial list of dos and don’ts for reporters to follow. He recalls an unstated rule: “‘We will not do byte reporting’ …aisa hi kuch thha  (it was something like that).” The place became a haven for journalists, but it struggled to maintain its ideals. Slowly, quietly, the bureau head believes, the rules disappeared.

Byte? Here's a dictionary definition of byte: "adjacent bits, usually eight, processed by a computer as a unit". So clearly it is a computer term.

Now here's the definition of sound bite: "a brief, striking remark or statement excerpted from an audiotape or videotape for insertion in a broadcast news story".

So Open should have used "bite reporting" in that sentence, not "byte reporting".

In Mint Lounge on May 15, a caption on Page 15 read:

Byte-hungry: Indian news channels were criticized for the way they covered the 26/11 terror attacks

But Open and Mint are not the only culprits. For some reason, universally, we will see a reference to "byte" when what is meant is "bite" or "sound bite". Even television journalists are not immune to this disease. A few months ago I sent an email to Rajdeep Sardesai about this and he replied, "It should be sound bite. But you are right, several of us, myself included, use sound byte. Am not sure why."

A new kind of brand manager

STEVE STOUTE

Steve Stoute, according to Time, has changed the way companies look at branding.

"Brands don't often speak to young people in a way that is representative of them," says Stoute. "What I do is contemporize a brand." But, he says, "I don't take the brand away from what it stands for. I don't change who they are in order to appeal to the next generation."

Read the full article by Stacy Perman: "Where Shop Meets Hip-Hop".

• Photo courtesy: Time

How do you stand out from competition?

Will you send a shoe to your prospective employer with the message, "I want to get my foot in the door"?

Read this helpful little feature by Peralte C. Paul in Mint (reproduced from the New York Times) to learn what candidates are doing in the US to impress their potential bosses: "Do you stand out in a job market?"

"The Afternoon Despatch & Courier", the newspaper closest to my heart

The newspaper I helped to launch in Bombay in March 1985 is still the closest one to my heart, though I enjoyed my time with Mid Day, Bombay (where I began my career); Khaleej Times, Dubai (where I launched special sections and where I first learnt to work with computers); and CIO magazine, Bangalore (I helped to launch this magazine in India for TMG in 1999. TMG also ran a national technology channel for which I was a news anchor for some time and also a chat show host).

BEHRAM CONTRACTOR

I CONSIDER MYSELF privileged to have been given the opportunity to work with the brilliantly talented team, led by Behram "Busybee" Contractor, that launched The Afternoon Despatch & Courier on March 25, 1985. At the time it was Bombay's fourth evening paper, and our competitors were the formidable Mid Day (which we had quit to start a newspaper "owned" by journalists), The Evening News of India, from the Times of India stable, and Free Press Bulletin, owned by the Free Press Journal group.

I remember being asked by a good friend who was concerned about my future: "What kind of research have you people done? Have you carried out any surveys? Is there room in Bombay for one more eveninger?"

We had all left Mid Day sometime in January. And we were planning to launch The Afternoon a few weeks later, in March.

Did we have time for surveys? No.

But what we had going for us was belief. The belief that we had a lot going for us.

What we had going for us was gut instinct. Not for a moment did any of us think that it couldn't be done.

What we had going for us was confidence. We knew we were good at what we were doing.

Above all, what we had going for us was an editor all Bombay loved and respected, and 30 or 40 people — from office assistants to experienced journalists — who believed in the idea of a newspaper that would be run without any interference from "owners".

Sure, there were problems on the way, mainly financial, but all of us stuck to our task. And not too long after it was launched, The Afternoon became the city's No. 2 newspaper because both Evening News and Free Press Bulletin, unable to stand the competition, closed down.

Twenty-five years on, The Afternoon and Mid Day (the latter now owned by the Dainik Jagran group) are still the only English evening newspapers in Mumbai. The Afternoon, now led by the redoubtable Carol Andrade, is back on its feet after a particularly troubling phase and it continues to make its presence felt. And afternoondc.in is a great example of how the sensibilities, tastes, and needs of readers can be incorporated into a newspaper website.

Five months ago, on March 25, The Afternoon's 25th anniversary, I was thinking back to those frenetic early days. So guys, this one is for you: Behram Contractor, Mr Kanangi, Carol Andrade, Shashi Jadhav, Mark Manuel, Archie D'Cruz, Sabbas Joseph, Leo Manickam, Suresh Baliga, Mobin Pandit, Sharad Kotnis, Glen D'Souza, Anthony D'Silva, Arvind Kulkarni, Tara Patel, Menka Shivdasani, Conrad Prabhu, Anthony Azavedo, Jerry D'Souza, Dinshaw Dotivala, Mario Miranda, E.P. Vijaykumar, P.S. Rajan, Elias Hendricks, Prabhu, Jadhav, Ramdas, Vasant, Hari, Prashant, and many others who made such vital contributions to our great newspaper experiment. Salud!

• Read Outlook editor-in-chief Vinod Mehta's tribute to Behram Contractor: "My friend Behram".

• You can feast on the "Round and About" archives here: "Busybee Forever".

• Read Carol Andrade's take on faith in Open magazine: "My Kinda God". 

PAPER VIEW: One of my best friends, Sunil Maurya, and his daughter, Ankita, are engrossed in reading The Afternoon. This picture was taken sometime in the Eighties in the Mumbai suburb of Borivli, where Sunil lived before he and his family moved to the US. I am indebted to Ankita for giving me permission to use this photograph, which I discovered recently on her Facebook timeline.

UPDATE (June 21, 2013): Commitscion Natasha Rego (Class of 2014) lived up to my expectations (and perhaps exceeded hers) when she filed this brilliant story for The Afternoon: 10/10 for a newspaper story written by an intern from Commits.

"If you never hit the word limit assigned to you by a teacher or editor; if anyone has ever called your prose "flabby"; if a critic condemned your first novel as being twice the desired length"...

...you need to read this superlative column by Roy Peter Clark of Poynter. (Poynter Online claims it has "everything you need to be a better journalist". I believe it.) And you will get even more helpful advice on writing tight by reading the transcript of the chat Clark conducted on Poynter — "How can I tighten up my writing?" is fascinating reading for both novice writers and experienced ones.

Descriptive writing at its best

Ryan Murphy is the man behind television's smash-hit musical, Glee. He has also directed Eat Pray Love, the just-released movie starring Julia Roberts. What is Murphy like? And how did he get to direct one of the world's biggest stars?

Look at how Brooks Barnes, reporting from Los Angeles, sets up the story for us in this New York Times feature (reproduced by arrangement in today's DNA):

How had a man with almost no film experience wormed his way into directing a big, juicy movie? Curious, she [Julia Roberts] agreed to meet Mr. Murphy at a Malibu restaurant and realized the answer before the first Arnold Palmers arrived. “I fell totally under his spell,” Ms. Roberts said. “We’re sort of like best girlfriends now.”

Mr. Murphy is nothing if not seductive. Self-assured to the point of cockiness, a wicked sense of humor, scary-ambitious yet charmingly eager to please, fashion-forward: it’s an intoxicating brew. Not to mention the literal light-headedness you feel standing near him. This is not a man who is bashful about his Yves Saint Laurent cologne.

“Ah, my famous cologne,” he said over a dinner at the Chateau Marmont here. “It’s because when I was growing up, I could only afford that cheap Halston stuff.”

Don't you feel like reading on?

And then, a point of style: The film is an adaptation of the best-selling memoir by Elizabeth Gilbert. The book is called Eat, Pray, Love. The movie is called Eat Pray Love. Notice the subtle difference?

Now here is the intro:

WHEN Julia Roberts got word that Ryan Murphy planned to turn the best-selling memoir “Eat, Pray, Love” into a movie, she had a fast response: “Who?” You know, her agent explained, the guy who created “Nip/Tuck,” that sick and twisted plastic surgery show. “Oh, the ‘Nip/Tuck’ guy, that pricked up my ears a little,” Ms. Roberts recalled.

And here's the fifth paragraph:

He’s plenty rich now. Mr. Murphy, who followed up “Nip/Tuck” with “Glee,” the smash Fox musical about a high school choir, has become one of the most sought-after talents in Hollywood. His name is swirling as a candidate to direct a big-screen version of “Wicked” for Universal Pictures. Sony Pictures Entertainment, which will release “Eat Pray Love”  (without commas) on Friday, just paid him $2.5 million to write a romantic comedy — with Ms. Roberts — and another $2.5 million to direct it. “I’ll do anything Ryan wants,” said Amy Pascal, Sony’s co-chairwoman.

Did you notice those two words in parentheses? For the NYT, the devil is in the details. And it is for this attention to detail, among many, many other attributes, that the NYT is acknowledged as one of the world's great newspapers.

Now here's how Mary Pols dealt with those commas in Time:

[The book's] fairy-tale quality, the one by which a woman's quest ends with a man, seemed less like real life and more like a Julia Roberts movie.

Which is why I found myself rather happily anticipating Eat Pray Love, the big-screen version of Gilbert's book directed by Glee and Nip/Tuck creator Ryan Murphy. (He shares a screenplay credit for the movie with Jennifer Salt.) Now that Eat, Pray, Love had lost its commas and become a movie actually starring Julia Roberts, I was no longer annoyed by how much it seemed like one; it had assumed its rightful place in the entertainment universe.

Once again, that attention to detail. Once again, a "problem" tackled with style.