Here’s my latest update on local media stuff:
- Even the newspaper delivery boys are getting fired! Thirteen-year-old “Connor Piquette has been delivering the Edmonton Examiner every Wednesday after school for the past year. But this Wednesday will be his last on the job.” He was one of “approximately 600 contract carriers” who received termination letters last week. In a follow-up statement, Postmedia said they have “restructured our distribution model in Edmonton aligning our FlyerForce distribution system and Edmonton Examiner distribution system” which led to the change.
- Trent Wilkie interviewed Ryan Jespersen on The Undad. “From the moment Wyatt is old enough to understand English, I’ll be telling him talk radio is the world’s most important public service.”
- The City found itself in trouble last week when it “took permission away” from CTV Edmonton reporter Breanna Karstens-Smith who was going to do an interview in Kinsmen, apparently because she wasn’t “promoting” the facility.
- The Oilers too caused a stir this week by cancelling an interview with CBC Edmonton about the community benefits agreement for Rogers Place. “An interview set up with Susan Darrington, vice president and general manager of Rogers Place, was cancelled by the organization following publication of a news story containing comments from critics of the community benefits.”
- Congratulations to Omar Mouallem on being published in The New Yorker! Here’s his contributor page.
- Historian Laureate and CJSR News Coordinator Chris Chang-Yen Phillips has launched a new podcast called Let’s Find Out which aims to answer questions about Edmonton history.
- Congratulations to Global Edmonton’s Carole Anne Devaney on the birth of her second child!
- Apps are coming to a radio near you! 91.7 The BOUNCE will feature the new local daily countdown show “The Shazam @ 7 Countdown” which is a partnership between Rogers Radio and Shazam. “Using unique, targeted data to feature different playlists in each market, the show highlights the top seven songs of the day, comprised of recently Shazam’d tracks and new and trending tracks from across the country.”
- Believe it or not, Postmedia is looking for a part-time senior copy editor for the Edmonton newsroom. The deadline to apply is September 3.
- Want to be the new Public Address Announcer for the Oilers? You can apply here. Auditions for selected candidates will take place early next month.
- Sportsnet has released details of the Edmonton Oilers broadcast schedule for the 2016-2017 regular season. The schedule features 37 national games and 45 regional games and all can be streamed online as well.
Elise Campbell, Marty Chan, Annie Dugan, and Holger Petersen, photo by Capital Ideas Edmonton
And here is some slightly less local media stuff:
- You can always count on The Onion: Media Intern Looking Forward To Moving Up At Company That Won’t Exist In 8 Months.
- Fox News will soon celebrate its 20th birthday and is currently the most-watched cable network “with a larger audience than its nominal rivals, CNN and MSNBC, combined.” But its secret sauce is demography and that may not last.
- Is John Oliver a journalist or not? He continues to state that his show is comedy, not news. “If you make jokes about animals, that does not make you a zoologist. We certainly hold ourselves to a high standard and fact-check everything, but the correct term for what we do is ‘comedy.’” He’s clearly committing acts of journalism, however!
- I did not realize that some college papers in the United States are actually owned by for-profit companies. And now they’re feeling the effects, “of course, student publications haven’t been immune to the business challenges facing the news industry as a whole.”
You can follow Edmonton media news on Twitter using the hashtag #yegmedia. For a great overview of the global media landscape, check out Mediagazer.
So, what have I missed? What’s new and interesting in the world of Edmonton media? Let me know!
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