Letters to the Editor
Tona Aspsusa
Published Letters: 53 Editor's Choice: 14
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You don't have to be "new" anymore
[Read the article: Welcome to the next 10 years of Salon]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]At the very mature age of a decade Salon doesn't NEED to be "new media" anymore. You are a part of the established web-landscape, and one of the very few established parts that haven't been yahoo-ified or AOL-ized. Be proud of that and and turn all your energy to the stories and the writing.
The really old media, as in newspapers 20+ years ago did have something that is almost totally lost today: Stringent quality requirements and a clear divide between news that is relevant to society and news that is reflective of society or news that is "merely" entertaining (quotes because I do consider "fluff" to be important in itself).
This is a divide that Salon used to follow rather well, though bucking it intentionally sometimes and sometimes probably by mistake. Do not change that! I feel that much of the anguish over Broadsheet and the re-design in general comes from an unease over what for many of us is the last hope starting to fudge on that line. It may be seem so hip and rebellious to publish articles about Rosa Parks and "Kate Moss' snappy comeback" in the same space - but it isn't. Everyone is doing it and we who want our newssources to help us understand the world don't like feeling like we are subject to a never ending quiz on journalistic relevance - that is YOUR job!
And when you say you are still covering stories "other media can't or won't" the "can't" is a bit disingenous: Every one of the stories you mention should have had a place in a serious news-paper/magazine in the days of the "really old" media. Think about it.
And as to "suspended animation", I for one feel it was mostly good for Salon. I know it is fun to reinvent yourself all the time and try out new things just for the sake of it. Anything gets rather boring when you devote the bulk of your time to it day out and day in.
The problem is that we, the readers, do not do that. Our time and energy is limited, and we'd much rather devote all the brainpower set aside for Salon on the Stories. Not on navigating a cool new design or thinking provocative thoughts about how "Vaginal Face-lifting" and the new president of Liberia are meta-post-industrial reflections on the semiotic nature of the "new media landscape". Or something.
Yes, consumers are lazy - especially when the product is good in its essence. The new design was compared to "New Coke" on TableTalk, and it is a good comparison. Really succesfull brands stick to their core recognizability and don't let the quality slip on their core product.
The necessity of "suspended animation" helped create a big part of Salon's brand - the core product and the design stayed virtually the same over a long time, which made us readers FEEL that this was OUR web-zine, the one where we easily found our way around and the one that we could recommend to our friends without anxiety that it would have turned into something unrecognizable over night.
Again, that stability is a feature of the "really old media". With the rest of the media landscape, and especially the web always chasing newness of packaging my hope is that Salon will focus on the NEWs and not on NEWness.
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Split-second decisions
[Read the article: The war on terror: Miami]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]... sometimes go wrong.
What I find missing from all the "yeah, the air marshalls did the right thing" -posts here is a mention of the fact that this plane hadn't even de-coupled from the terminal, much less taken off.
One could argue that this made the threat even worse - blowing up a wing of an airport could result in far worse carnage than a blown up plane.
OTOH the scenario of a would-be suicide airline bomber rushing OFF a plane just about to take off does require some mental gymnastics to make it a likely-threat scenario. Pathological fear of flying making the bomber not able to go through with it?
If I have understood the scenario correctly Alpizar was shot either in the tube leading to/from the plane, or immediately outside it. Not in any densely populated space. IE, one of the few scenarios where there actually would be possible to exercise restraint.
But then I'm from the part of the world where even totally justified shootings by the police are seen as a failure, because the primary aim is always not to have any casualties.
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New?
[Read the article: CSI vs. CGI]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Isn't this actually an old episode? Because I remember seeing this, and I gave up on CSI:miami a few months ago.