Thursday front pages show iPod hype done right — for the most part
The most disgusting display of Apple iPad hype I found on pages posted today at the Newseum was this one by the New York Daily News, circulation 544,167.
I mean, how much more of a Steve Jobs cheerleader can you be?
Oh, wait. They’re not talking about Steve Jobs. They’re talking about the State of the Union address.
We’ll look at a few of those pages in a moment. First, though, let’s carry on with a few more iPad announcement pages.
Not surprisingly, one of the better iPad pages today was by the Mercury News of San Jose, Calif.:
You’re seeing ASF material about the iPad superimposed onto the iPad itself. Dangerous to do, in fact, unless you have perfect press registration. We’ll assume the best today.
What I like the most, though, is that the Merc showed the iPad at actual size, with dimensions labeled along the side and bottom, and hands for scale. It’s easier to get a grip on what we’re talking about when you see hands with a grip on what we’re talking about.
The photoillustration/infographic is credited to the Merc’s Karl Kahler and AndrĂ©a Maschietto. The Mercury News has an average daily circulation of 225,175.
Down the road in Oakland, the Merc’s sister paper — the Tribune, circulation 92,794 — used the same approximate art at the same size, only without the hands:
The Merc’s version was stronger and included more info, as well.
The Times-Union of Jacksonville, Fla., went with a blueprint theme with both its headline and its actual-size art:
The disadvantage here is that you’re not seeing the actual device like you do in the two pages above. The advantage, though, is that if your presses get even a little out of register — and they always do, don’t they? — you’re not going to get screamed at by your editor. The text of the story and the pullout material will still be readable.
The Times-Union circulates 109,476 papers daily.
The Denver Post – circulation 340,949 — also went with actual-sized art but added a nice side view to show how thin the iPad is and not-quite-so-witty headline:
If the main art afront today’s Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J. isn’t actual size, it’s pretty close. And the Star-Ledger’s headline was much better than Denver’s:
I also like the summary boxes across the bottom of the package. Nice work, youse guys. The Star-Ledger circulates 246,006 copies daily.
The News-Press of Fort Myers, Fla. — circulation 92,340 — took the same infographic-like approach to the iPad info…
…but overdid it a bit, unfortunately. All the little chunks of text tend to blend with the chunks in the story below and with the mugs-and-chunks on the right. The result is a nice enough presence above the fold but awfully disjointed below it.
When is the last time you saw me post a nice presentation from the Wall Street Journal?
It’s “only” a three-column package, but three columns is pretty damn big for the 2,024,269-circulation WSJ.
Some papers played off the overhype angle. I loved the photo afront today’s Contra Costa Times of Walnut Creek, Calif., circulation 174,852:
Oh, the pomposity. And that’s apparently the illustration that Jobs had projected onto the wall behind him!
A.M. New York — circulation 266,852 — played off the same idea for its page one photoillustration:
And the headline was a scream — especially if you weren’t exactly bowled over by the iPad itself.
The Union Leader of Manchester, N.H. — circulation 51,782 — was a little more reverent:
I think including a secondary photo with the package was a good thing. But this particular photo seems a bit redundant — you can see the iPad quite well in the lede art.
I love the deck, though: NH, not so much.
The San Francisco Chronicle — circulation 251,782 — seems to have completely drained the pitcher of Apple Kool-Aid:
And, perhaps, the same for Metro. Here’s the New York edition:
The Herald-Sun of Durham, N.C. — circulation 32,845 — went for a local angle, sending someone down to shoot the Apple store at the mall:
It didn’t make for particularly dynamic art, though. Nor did that secondary choice. Nice idea, execution not so much.
And I’m conflicted about today’s Philadelphia Daily News. It was genius to combine the iPad and State of the Union stories into a single photoillustration. What a talker.
What wasn’t so good was putting references to the Maxi iPad and iTampon wisecracks. Funny stuff, I suppose, but not on page one, please.
The Daily News circulates 107,269 copies daily.
That example does make a great segue into State of the Union pages.
Lots of papers put President Barack Obama’s speech out front today. Most went with similar quotes, photos and very standard treatment. What drew my attention, scrolling through the Newseum today, were dramatic crops, tight headlines and nice ASF-like material or quotes that pulled out highlights from the evening.
Best of the lot was this one by the Salt Lake Tribune, circulation 112,585:
A close second is this one by the Eagle of Reading, Pa., circulation 59,272:
The Gazette of Colorado Springs, Colorado, stripped its SOTU photo across the very top of the page, superimposing its nameplate into the dead space above the president’s head:
It made for a fresh, dynamic look.
The Washington Post’s commuter tabloid, Express, used nice contrast in headline intensity and oodles of white space for dramatic effect:
Average daily circulation for Express is 183,916.
Odd crop of the day was this one afront the Star Bulletin of Honolulu, Hawaii, circulation 64,305:
I see what they were trying to do. I applaud their spirit of adventurous design. Part of taking chances, of course, is failing occasionally. So that’s OK.
I’d have to say the same for the Review-Journal of Las Vegas. I’ve seen a repetition of mug shots and quotes work and I’ve seen it fail. This one didn’t exactly work, I fear:
The Review-Journal circulates 175,841 copies daily.
And no look at notable State of the Union fronts could be complete without this one by the Washington Examiner, circulation 260,950:
I have no clue how you can justify dumping the president off the front and focusing on the guy giving the official Republican response. Any questions I’ve had about the entire Examiner operation are certainly magnified today.
And, speaking of questionable, I found myself enraged by the front of today’s Tampa Bay Times, the youth-oriented tabloid of the St. Petersburg, Fla., Times.
I’ve heard folks bad-mouthing the idea of making donations to Haiti relief and it’s disturbed me greatly. My jaw hit the ground today when I saw this.
So naturally, I went to the TBT web site to see what the story said. (And man, talk about a mess of a web site. I groped around for a while, but I’ll spare you the trouble. Go here, click on “today’s edition” and then jump to page 29. The next time a Poynter employee tells us how to set up our web operations, please remind me to laugh in their face.)
And what was the story? It was a relatively straight Associated Press story, presented as an alternative story form, describing where your donated dollars go.
The story indicates that your donations go to good use and that the somewhat questionable government there gets its hands on only a miniscule portion it.
Therefore, I think neither the illustration nor the headline accurate reflect the story. More to the point, both seem inflammatory. Sensationalistic, even.
Please tell me I’m not the only person offended by this today.
Find the Newseum’s own Top Ten page choices here. Go here to see Read-a-Paper’s analysis of the day’s fronts.