Tuesday, March 13, 2007

The Globe's advertising out

The Herald's Jesse Noyes has the backstory on the Globe-union ad the paper refused to run today, but can't get Globe spokesman Al Larkin to say which part(s) of the ad were deemed "not factual."

I'll hazard some guesses--but first, take a look at the ad in question.

Now, here's what jumps out at me.

--"The New York Times Co....has made the egregious mistake of choosing to outsource the work of Globe advertising and circulation employees to Bangalore, India." The Times Co. obviously doesn't think the decision to outsource is an "egregious mistake."

--"By outsourcing our work, The Boston Globe & New York Times Co. are sending a message that they no longer care enough to retain the very best people to handle customer accounts and client relationships." Again, the Globe and Times Co. brass would probably argue that that's not the message that they're sending.

--"Further, billing and account information will now be shipped overseas to Bangalore, India, putting customers’ most vital information at risk." The equation here is simple: India=dangerous. (OK, it could also be Bangalore=dangerous.) While you can make an ethical argument against outsourcing in general and the Globe's outsourcing in particular, the India=dangerous claim ignores the fact that everyone is outsourcing to India these days.

I'm not unsympathetic to the Boston Newspaper Guild's fight here, but I'd say the Globe was well within its rights to reject the ad in question.

3/13/2007 4:16:13 PM by Adam Reilly | Comments [1] |

Saturday, March 17, 2007 10:36:40 AM (Eastern Standard Time, UTC-05:00)

Excellent position by The Globe management. Advertisements, presumably including those involving public issues, proxy fights, political campaigns and the alleged excitement of the Boston Celtics will be subject to review and rejection for not being factual!! This is a wonderful convenience to the readers who won't have to actually think about what they read, and one more giant step toward an information world of bloggers and random comments which, repeated often enough, take on an air of truth.

As for not allowing the union a non-profit price, if other unions have gotten the price, it looks from here like an unfair labor practice.

Amusedbutinformedobserver

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