What did you think of the new ‘compact’ editions of The Age and the Sydney Morning Herald.
Here’s 20 questions to which we don’t expect answers. Not right now, anyway.
1 What’s so precious about the SMH masthead? It’s not the original, and is a weak anachronism in a modern newspaper. even the version used for last year’s Budget special – with the ‘The’ tucked up above the rest – had a bit more impact.
2 Why the different headline faces? Subtly different, but not sufficiently so to justify the page changes that result.
3 Who let that awful Commonwealth Bank ad through? It looks like a mistake.
4 Why’s the SMH page rate so much higher that that of The Age… and are things really that tough in Melbourne?
5 What’s the obsession with lists? And why do readers in Melbourne apparently have to wait until Thursday’s Green Guide to find out who “the 50 most influential people in TV” are?
6 Can the SMH have more of those neat caption stories which appear in the top half of one of The Age’s news pages?
7 And the top-of-page infographics, too?
8 Why does BusinessDay – in both papers – look so much like the Australian Financial Review?
9 Wouldn’t it have been nice to stitch the Pulse health supplement, like The Guide in the SMH?
10 So Warren Buffett has bought 28 daily newspapers in 15 months. What are you trying to tell us?
11 Aren’t the cinema ads part of the Arts sections as well?
12 How handsome are those columnist bylines and reversed breakout quotes? We love them.
13 What do you do when advertising sells a space in the middle of a spread? The layout subs don’t seem to know either.
14 Features have always been a strong point for the Fairfax design team. Can they have a go at a few news pages, too?
15 Frustrated by not being able to buy a News Limited tabloid on Sunday – with its spoiler Style supplement – I took a fresh look at the good-looking Sun-Herald. Can you give these guys a guernsey too?
16 Why are the Saturday papers staying broadsheet? Because you need a wrapper to stick all the bits in?
17 Can we have a SMH or something like it “powered by brisbanetimes.com.au” as Queensland editions of the Sun-Herald are?
18 Why does The Age (which cost me $3.90 in Noosa) drift into regional newsagents there sometime during the day, when the SMH ($2.20) is there first thing? It appeared they had been printed on different presses.
19 We know it’s been asked before, but ‘what kept you so long?’
20 What’s a compact anyway? The Australian (in Cut-and-paste) suggests a small American car or something to keep a powder puff in, although we understand it can be an adjective too.
Peter Coleman
• Andrew Holden replies: Peter, I can answer a few of your questions but not all on a Friday afternoon!
I'll use your numbering:
2. The Age's headline font is the same as it was in the broadsheet - and I just wanted some variation with the SMH. Guilty as charged! But it's no extra work, the formatters have written a very clever script that recognises which paper it is, and converts from one font to the other with no need for a re-write or extra HnJ.
3. The ad designer was being clever. Come on, some people loved it.
5. Green Guide is always Thursday, and no editor is brave (foolish) enough to change the colour.
8. You think so? Looks more like our old Business pages to me, which were already compact size.
13. These things are sent to test us. I thought the subs did pretty well. The advertiser must love the impact.
16. The weekend papers will go compact, later this year. We're just taking a few deep breaths.
19. Don't know, we're just glad we got to have the fun.
20. Never mention the T word. Well, you can, it stands for a style of journalism. The irony is Murdoch invented it for The Times of London to distance it from the Sun and Screw of the World. Very prescient.
Regards, have enjoyed your magazine for many years.