Imagine Saving the New York Times

I really don’t like to sweat all over my iPhone. My iPhone is a thing of beauty and I hate to make it all yucky.

OK you say – so what?  Well – here’s the point.  I was reading the print edition of the New York Times today instead of reading it digitally on my iPhone or iPad as I mostly do.  I was reading print because I was on the bike at the gym. Sweating.  And then I turned the page and ran full bore into a lot of white space – and a love note from Yoko Ono. Of course. Today would have been John Lennon's 72nd birthday. “Imagine all the people living life in peace” Yoko wrote in big bold black letters in the middle of all that white. 
 

And even with our deeply polarized country about to vote for a president and a congress and then fall off the fiscal cliff  – for this morning at least Lennon’s wistful lyrics renew my foolish hopes for humanity.

So why am I telling you all this?  Because if I had been reading the Times digitally – on a smart phone/tablet app – I would have missed that full page message from Yoko Ono.  Or any other full page or half page or quarter page ad or public service message the Times would normally publish.  And it would have been my loss.

Print has not yet discovered how to create successfully such things as full page ads on an app.  Oh occasionally you’ll see an ad page briefly as you swipe through the pages. But only occasionally.  And never something like that “imagine” page.

And I think it’s wrong to blame just print.  Or broadcast.  Or cable.  Their corporate owners and the media advertising and marketing managers responsible for monetizing their product are still – for the most part – living in a siloed media world. Oh yes we have print reporters shouldering cameras. And local TV stations hiring “content” producers instead of reporters or writers. They all Tweet and Facebook and Storify that content in a frenzy of sharing.  It seems many media creators get it.  But somehow the marketing/advertising folks who pay their salaries – don’t.

People (like me) increasingly use ALL media – but at different times and for different purposes. Recently Nielsen reported that more than fifty percent of all consumers in this country have smartphones. iPad and other tablet sales are surging.  We stream movies and other video from our PC’s to our huge flat screen TV’s in the living or family  room.  And during last week’s first presidential debate – pundits discovered a new phenomenon. We were watching the debate on the big screen. But discussing it as it unfolded on Facebook and Twitter. It was the most tweeted-about event in company history with more than ten million Tweets.

The next morning maybe some of us new media mavens even read about it in a newspaper. Or at week’s end – in a magazine you could roll up and take out in the rain without getting your iPhone’s nice glass screen all spotted up.

I am as much in the new media moment as anyone who wasn’t born yesterday can be. But I have completely lost patience with the prognosticators who keep trumpeting the death of any media platform that wasn’t created by a guy in a hoodie.

Wake up advertising and marketing people!  Start putting ad packages together which span ALL media – not just an internet ad or a smartphone ad or a newspaper ad.  Yes you will have to be creative.  Find ways to make those smaller screens pay off without enraging those of us who like our apps and our content without annoying commercials. The expensive, award-winning ad for TV won’t work on a smartphone or tablet.  But something will.  Slice it and dice it and sell it as one integrated, pan-platform package. 

And I guess I’m slitting my own throat here but New York Times (and other newspapers and magazines) – find a way to single-price your pan-platform packages in the same way – so a little here and a little there in aggregate multiple platform ad revenue makes up for the bigger bucks lost in the smaller print runs.

Maybe then there won’t be so much talk about the death of print. 

After all -- if there are no more newspapers  -- what will you read while you’re eating that greasy burger and fries?  And how will you “paper train” your next puppy?  Or pack glasses and dishes for moving? What will you put under the bird cage? Or the litter box? Or on the floor when you’re painting that old chest of drawers? 

I’m writing this on my laptop, watching a TV news channel and using my iPad for research. That full page message from Yoko Ono which started it all – is sitting on the table with today’s print edition of the paper. The AP News app on my iPhone has just sent me an alert.

We need it all. New media, old media and media yet to be invented. You guys in marketing land – figure it out.  But remember.  One pan-platform ad package. Priced for the way we actually consume media today. Which is wherever and whenever and however we want it.

Our Kizzy Cat - in Memoriam

Our  Kizzy’s real name when we got him from the animal shelter was Kismet. Which means destiny or fate.  They had found him originally by the side of the road and picked him up.

He had already been returned once to the shelter – needed too much love the two men who took him had said.  Imagine. How can anyone or any animal need too much love.

Kizzy was a big Tuxedo cat.  With an offside white splotch on his mouth. When we adopted him we also had another very much loved cat – a small Siamese named Tempo.

Tempo was the top cat in the household until he died at age 18 about 10 years ago. The two of them were never exactly “fond” of each other but they accepted each other and occasionally would sleep together. Poor Kizzy was relegated to the foot of our bed because Tempo already owned the space between us just below the pillows.

After Tempo died and was buried in our yard, Kizzy took over.  He kind of demanded that we not get another cat and so we agreed.  He owned us now.

Our cats have always been indoor cats and have never traveled with us; we have always found a sitter who got to know them and love them too. Kizzy was no exception; he was always here when we got home – whether from a long, difficult day at work – or a trip.  Always running to the door, meowing with pleasure, so happy to see us again.  Asking to be picked up and held and petted.  And of course – fed.  Kizzy was very obvious with his “feed me” meow.

Two years ago our rather overweight cat began to lose weight.  Slowly. He stopped overeating. The vet (and we agreed) said older cats slow down this way. But then he developed a big lump on his side which lab tests couldn’t exactly identify.  The vet said it was likely a form of cancer which could mask itself in tests.

Kizzy survived our usual summer teaching months in Prague – here at home.  For a month with just Frank here and then for another month with the cat sitter.  It was his fifth year of this and we figured he knew we always came back.  And we did.  But Kiz was obviously failing.  We tried some digestive enzymes the vet recommended which seemed to help -- but slowly, our wonderful big cat was fading away.

This morning we came downstairs and he couldn’t move. Although he had eaten and been walking around when we went to bed.  The vet said later he probably had a stroke.  So we sat with him until the vet’s office opened and then had to call and take him on his final trip.

Tempo died at home ten years ago.  We cried and said our goodbyes and then buried him in the yard. Other cats died other ways. But we ourselves had never before had to take a beloved pet to the vet to be put to sleep.

It was horrible.  It IS horrible.  And yet so much kinder than what we do to our loved humans. Keep them barely breathing on intravenous lines hooked up to machines in cold hospital rooms.  Or the reverse – call in the hospice folks who say matter-of-factly your loved one is going to die and let’s just sit around and wait for it to happen.

Our wonderful cat was in our arms until the vet gave him something to put him to sleep.  We were there, petting him and talking to him as he fell asleep.  We kept petting him until the vet was able to inject the overdose of anesthesia which put him into his final, forever sleep.

And then we came home to an empty house.  And put all his cat things away.

His photo is on our mobile phones. And computers. And his spirit is everywhere we look. He was our special buddy, our wonderful friend and companion.  A cat with so much love he even lavished it on strangers who came over for dinner.  If you didn’t like cats you were plain out of luck around Kizzy.  He was determined to be liked.

Kizzy died about 8:30 this morning, September 27, 2012. There will be no big black and white cat to demand his dinner tonight.   Or to sleep in our bed.  Or on the rug outside the bedroom door when we stay in bed too long for him.  The cat dishes are washed and put away, his beds and special rug and toys – gone.  The litter box is empty – waiting for its next user.

Oh yes –there will be other cats in this house eventually; we can’t live in it alone. But not for awhile.

We are in mourning for our wonderful little friend. 

Goodbye Kizzycat. 

We will always love and remember you.

We hope you have crossed the rainbow bridge into a well-fed forever.

 

 

 

Fenway Park at 100

Friday the 13th may not seem like an auspicious day for the Red Sox home opener at Boston’s beloved Fenway Park. But it’s not the REAL opener anyhow for any red-blooded (or in the case of Beacon Hill – blue blooded) REAL Bostonian.

No – the REAL opener will come on April 20th –the actual 100th anniversary of the OFFICIAL opening day of what was then the brand new Fenway Park. On that date, the Red Sox hosted the New York Highlanders – who preceded today’s New York Yankees. Boston eeked out a win in 11 innings and went on to win the World Series that year--no hint of the “curse” that would settle on the team after Babe Ruth was sold to the Yankees. In fact the Red Sox won five World Series. And then came the Curse of the Bambino --- an 86 year drought finally broken with a series win in 2004.

I grew up just blocks from Fenway Park. I would often walk home from high school – and later from college -- through Kenmore Square. I think there were a lot more afternoon games then; apparently fans had no problem getting the time off from work because I could usually hear the cheers or the boos from the park – even over the traffic noise.

I loved the Red Sox as all of us did. And of course the Celtics and the Bruins. The Patriots too until they left home for somewhere in the middle of the state called Foxborough and dropped “Boston” from their name.

There wasn’t much to talk about in Boston when I was a kid except sports and politics. It’s probably different now. With no Kennedy on the state or national stage, sports are probably the ONLY thing people talk about.

As for the Red Sox -- so far this year hasn’t had an auspicious start. But then it’s not exactly great for the Yankees either. It doesn’t matter. It’s always been good baseball when Boston and New York play each other. And 100 years later --- it will STILL be good baseball at Fenway when they meet for the first time in this new season.

But only, of course, if the Sox sweep the three game series.