Just got around to reading Judy Prisk's column in today's SMH while waiting for the (very) slow cooker to do its thing.
http://www.smh.com.au/national/when-owners-feel-locked-out-20120417-1x5jl.html
It's a lovely read, about the readers' sense of ownership of their paper (it's much the same at every paper, I suspect) and their outrage when their online comments and letters to the editor are not published, or savaged by heartless subs (my words, not theirs).
Readers are equally outraged if they are not invited to comment on a story they think they should be, and some allege political and even gender bias.
But Judy rightly explains most of the glitches as having their origins in either technology, or staffing.
The bloody computer system eats things, we all know that, and there are a lot of frantic legs working away under the water to keep those ducks bobbing away on the surface. I'm not sure readers grasp that at all. It would be lovely to invite comment of every word printed in the paper, but who would moderate those comments? We don't have online fairies, only hardworking journos who often also have other jobs to do. Put on more staff, you say. Sure thing, with shrinking circulation and print advertising revenue?
Readers have become a bit bolshy, if you ask me!
But it's best you don't. I sit in close proximity to the letters editor, and a kinder man you would not meet. But I would never dare answer his phone. I'm an online moderator too, but only occasionally these days. But I still sometimes bear the brunt of a disgruntled online commenter on the phone who can't find his way to the online editor's extension. Trainspotters, the lot! They want the world, these readers.
And we do try to deliver it. Really, we do. Letters editors and online moderators are people too. Just trying to get through the day. So please don't call us names when we edit your comments in keeping with our guidelines, or choose not to publish comments that are flagrantly abusive and defamatory. It's for your own good, really it is.
If only those disgruntled online commenters were more likely to read a column like this. Some days moderating comments I feel I go home having lost a few brain cells because of the content I have had to publish. Others I even learn new swear words... and then curse when I can not use them in response to said reader about why his comment was not published. And then there are the days I have to explain to a lovely old man why I can not fill the letters to the editor page with his poetry.
ReplyDeleteWhat I find most interesting is the fact the disgruntled commenters are the ones least likely to provide any valid contact details with their comments. Says a lot really.
Yes, Tahnee, we really need to write ourselves into a TV drama series so folks can see behind the scenes. Something like Frontline meets The Slap.
ReplyDeleteLove it Aly.
DeletePerhaps we could include the day I had the mayor of Mount Isa phone to offer me marital advice... About farting in bed. Or perhaps my farewell with Bob Katter when he said he admired me for 'sacrificing my career for my husband'! Still trying to figure that one out. Obviously world travel is for men.... Not women.
Funny thing is I'm not sure anyone would believe half the story lines! But oh how fun it would be....
You must keep a list. Im sure you and Eve could collaborate on something wonderful.
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