Boston.comedy: Boehnheaded Post Is Double Trouble for Globe Media Website

January 15, 2015

Boston Globe Media Partners should launch a new vertical – maybe Clux.com? – to house all their apologies for the Globe’s kissing’ cousin, Boston.com.

You’d think – after the t-shirt hit the fan the other week – there’d be some kind of moratorium on Boston.commentary down at Morrissey Boulevard. No such luck. Yesterday one of the Boston.comics posted a piece with the headline “Would Anyone Have Noticed if Bartender Succeeded in Poisoning John Boehner?”

It included this piece of sparkling wit (via Politico’s Hadas Gold):

The question is: Would anyone have noticed? Stories about Boehner’s drinking have circulated for years. His drinking inspired a blog called DrunkBoehner, and in 2010 he brought booze back to Washington. Had he been poisoned as planned, perhaps his pickled liver could have filtered out the toxins.

 

That led to this media culpa at Boston.com:

Last night, an opinion piece was published on Boston.com that has since been adjusted to what you’ll see below. The original column made references to Speaker Boehner that were off-color and completely inappropriate. It reflected the opinions of one of our writers; what it did not reflect, by any standards, were the site’s collective values. Rather than remove any reference to it or pretend it didn’t happen, we are handling with transparency and self-awareness. We are sorry, and we will do better. –Corey Gottlieb, General Manager, Boston.com

 

Right – “adjusted.” There’s also this: “Editor’s note: A previous version of this article made an unsubstantiated reference to the health of Speaker Boehner.”

Geez – any way they could have been a little vaguer?

Regardless, it was mother’s milk to the frisky local tabloid, which piled on with this high-priced spread (special bonus Inexplicable Green Numbers!):

 

Screen Shot 2015-01-15 at 12.36.35 PM

 

The Globe, for its part, featured this blandish piece in today’s Metro section.

Look for Boston GlobeSox owner John Henry to lob a neutron bomb at Boston.com. When the dust settles, he might want to consider these recommendations from the redoubtable Dan Kennedy. Just for starters.

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Boston Herald ALS WTF (II)

August 23, 2014

As the headscractching staff noted earlier, the Boston Herald only got half the story when it zealously reported yesterday about the boycott of the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge triggered by Jim Rigg, the superintendent of Catholic schools for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati.

What the feisty local tabloid missed was the new Anti-ALS Association Ice Bucket Challenge that directs donations to the John Paul II Medical Research Institute in Iowa City, which does not use embryonic stem cells in its research (the ALS Association does).

So now to today’s Herald,  which devotes a full page to the ALS rumpus – a news report by Lindsay Kalter and a column by Joe Fitzgerald – and still no mention of the competing challenge.

 

Screen Shot 2014-08-23 at 6.16.01 PM

 

Hey, Heraldniks – do we need to come over there and write it for you? If so, you’ve really hit rock bottom.

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Boston Herald ALS WTF

August 23, 2014

The headscratching staff spent most of Friday trying to figure out this Boston Herald piece.

Dad: Focus on ALS cure, not dogma

Catholic leader raises concerns

The Beverly father of former BC baseball player Peter Frates — responding to a Cincinnati church leader who threw cold water on the DSC_2315.JPGfamily’s wildly successful ice bucket challenge because it funds ALS embryonic stem cell research — said he’s a good Catholic who just wants to find a cure for his son.

“I understand the Catholic dogma. I’m also conflicted with the teachings, I struggle with it, too. I just want my son cured,” John Frates told the Herald yesterday.

 

Religious nut graf:

But the late-summer viral sensation — that has lured former presidents, celebrities and athletes — suffered a setback this week when Jim Rigg, the superintendent of Catholic schools for the Cincinnati Archdiocese, told students to stop any plans to donate to the ALS group because it supports research using embryonic stem cells, which violates the teachings of the church.

 

Okay, but why then does the Herald piece include this photo of Jim Rigg?

 

Ice Bucket Challenge-Diocese

 

Caption:

‘SOCIAL MEDIA MIRACLE’: Jim Rigg, at right in the top photo, superintendent of schools for the Cincinnati Archdiocese, has counseled students not to donate to the ALS Association because of the church’s stem cell stance.

 

Nowhere does the Herald explain why Rigg is getting a bucket of ice water dumped on him if he opposes the ALS campaign.

Turns out there’s a competing ice bucket challenge, as reported by Boston Globe kissing’ cousin boston.com yesterday.

The anti-ALS Association ‘cause’ was recently taken up by the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, which encouraged area Catholic schools to tell students to donate money to the John Paul II Medical Research Institute. The Institute does not use embryonic stem cells. Cincinnati Catholic schools superintendent Jim Rigg did just that when he took part in the ice bucket challenge on Thursday:

 

 

That’s why – say it with us – it’s good to live in a two-daily town.

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Boston.comment: KidVid Says Site Redesign Is ‘Crap’

May 25, 2014

From our Late to the House Party desk

The new! improved? boston.com has met with decidedly mixed reviews, some of which the site itself is showcasing, as the redoubtable Jim Romenesko reports.

CUTE KIDS COMPLAIN ABOUT BOSTON.COM’S REDESIGN (‘WAS THIS JOHN HENRY’S IDEA?’)

globekids

The kids in this video are reading actual complaints that Boston.com got after its recent redesign. Here are some of the “child actors’” lines:

* “I can’t find anything I’m looking for.”
* “I feel like I’m looking at a children’s picture book.”
* “My wife and I hate your website.”
* “I think my grandmother might like this site.”
* “Is this an April Fool’s joke?”

 

And etc.

(Romenesko: “That’s the son of Boston.com news and homepage editor Hilary Sargent on the right; the other two belong to Boston Globe CEO Mike Sheehan.”)

And the whole thing belongs to boston.com, which “owns” the redesign in its YouTube video.

 

 

The hardreading staff’s favorite: “Boston.com is like the squirrelly uncle you put up with on holidays.”

Squirrel on, DotComniks.

 

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Jeez: Only Boston Globe Reports Quincy Creche Crashers Returned Stolen Statues

December 8, 2013

If it’s Advent, it’s open season on nativity scenes everywhere.

But pity especially poor Quincy, MA, which suffered yet another creching loss on Wednesday.

From boston.com:

Statues stolen from Quincy Center nativity scene; third theft in nine years

tlumacki_jesusisstolen_metro028

Statues of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph and a lamb were stolen from a nativity scene in Quincy Square early Thursday morning and a shepherd left behind on a sidewalk in the third such incident at the creche scene in the past nine years, Quincy police said . . .

A street sweeper discovered the crime when he found the shepherd statue on a nearby sidewalk at around 2:24 a.m., police said.

“The shepherd was out on the sidewalk and the Jesus, Mary, Joseph, and a lamb were missing,” said Captain John Dougan, Quincy police spokesman.

 

Happily, the Boston Globe reported yesterday, at least some of the lost are found.

Statues from nativity scene are recovered

Lamb taken from Quincy creche is still missing

Three statues plundered from a nativity scene in Quincy Center sometime overnight Wednesday were discovered undamaged early Friday by a construction crew and were returned to the manger Friday afternoon, officials said.

“They found Jesus, Mary, and Joseph at the end of Furnace Avenue,” said Captain John Dougan, Quincy police spokesman. “They found all of them except for the lamb. That is still on the lam.”

 

Bada-boom.

Yesterday’s Boston Herald print edition, which was thinner than the gold on a week-end wedding ring (tip o’ the pixel to the great Raymond Chandler), had nothing about the recovery.

Regardless, here’s our question for the good folks of Quincy:

What’s the Baby Jeez doing out there on December 4th?

Is this some kind of Preemie Jesus protest in the War on the War on Christmas?

Or what?

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Globe Herald Hostage (Lowball Edition)

July 13, 2013

Once again the Boston Herald is a day late, but it’s the dollar short that’s interesting.

Yesterday’s Boston Globe featured this update on the sale of the paper:

Field of bidders for Globe reportedly narrows

Groups with local ties – Taylor family Henry, equity group – remain in contention

At least three investor groups with local ties apparently remain in contention to buy The Boston Globe and its related businesses, according to people briefed on the matter.

The narrowed field of bidders includes members of the Taylor family that formerly owned the Globe; Boston Red Sox owner John Henry; and Robert Loring, a Massachusetts native who owns the Tampa Tribune, said people briefed on the process.

The owner of the U-T San Diego newspaper is a possible fourth finalist, but the status of the bid could not be confirmed Thursday.

 

And then the money quote: “The competing bids range from $65 million to $80 million, according to the people briefed on the matter.”

Here’s how that translates into Heraldese:

Boston GlobeBids in for Globe – and they’re low

With bids reportedly at a disappointing $65 million to 
$80 million, The Boston Globe’s impending sale is shaping up as more of a real estate deal than a newspaper buy, experts said yesterday, even as one of the four purported finalists told the Herald they’ve lost interest in the broadsheet.

“The implication is kind of obvious that the Globe as a straight business venture is not very highly valued on the market right now because clearly that amount is probably — at least the majority of it, maybe more — is valued land and the building,” said Rick Edmonds, a media business analyst for the Poynter Institute.

 

Ouch. It’s true that estimates of the New York Times Co.’s local media group – the Globe, its websites boston.com and bostonglobe.com, and the Worcester Telegram & Gazette – were running between $70 million and $120 million, so the current bids aren’t good news. It just hurts twice as much coming from the Globe’s crosstown rival.

And the feisty local tabloid had even more bad news for the Globeniks: “U-T San Diego CEO John Lynch told the Herald they’re out of the running.”

And then there were three.

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Brown Out at the Boston Globe

January 27, 2013

One little word was big enough to make page 3 of today’s Boston Herald:

012613-scott brown tweets‘Bqhatevwr’ he said

Scott Brown’s Twitter troubles light up Web with jokes

Former U.S. Sen. Scott Brown set off an Internet sensation early yesterday after a string of odd messages were posted on his Twitter account, including one that appeared to be a misspelling of “whatever,” that turned into a popular online trend.

The tweets of “whatever” to critics began appearing on Brown’s official account after midnight yesterday, including one post that said “Bqhatevwr.”

Twitter users soon used the nonsensical word in famous quotes and pop culture references as the term became a Twitter trend . . .

 

Compounding the problem: Brown later deleted the tweets. But that didn’t stop the waves of ridicule that subsequently washed over Brown.

Funny thing, boston.com had the story (via the Huffington Post) yesterday morning, but it didn’t make today’s print edition.

Your punchline about respective editorial judgment goes here.

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