The demise of our local paper

[Plain Talker]

damo in reply to your quote i am a boss or should we say head of a departmant

 

I have frequently contacted The Star to offer my services as as proof-reader, since before the move out to Dinnington, as it's been patently obvious that the people involved in writing up the stories have no idea whatsoever about spelling, and spell-checking, neither have they any idea about the geography of Sheffield.

 

The number of times that I have seen stories "reported", where the action has taken place in XX street, in YY district, when the street and the reported district are miles apart. (For example, in recent months, something happened on XXXX Street in Woodhouse, which was reported as being XXXX Street, Attercliffe.)

 

if it's a local paper, you'd think that the Journos and the writers would at least be sticklers for local accuracy.

 

You can partially excuse a local paper here in Sheffield for reporting a story from, say, London, and the report saying it's X Street Camberwell, when it's actually in Wembley, as it's not a local interest story, but for the camberwell rag to say X Street Camberwell, when it's Wembley, would be an unforgivable gaffe.

 

When the paying public see such frequent, and glaring errors in a newspaper that is meant to have local interest, it's no wonder the circulation is dropping off. It just screams to the reader "I may have written this piece, but I don't actually give enough of a monkeys about providing any accuracy for the reader"

 

I often think, whilst looking at the Star newspaper, "Why on earth did I waste my money on this garbage?"

[Plain Talker]

No its down in the tube station.

 

"....at midnight. ohh-oh ohhh!" ?

[wardour st]

wardour st ... a silent echo and then a

 

Sorry thought it was smithers jones.

[moke]

as a relative outsider, my perspective is that the reason the star is facing problems, is because it's virtually unreadable.

 

vacuous non stories mixed up with kind of local 'news' that is usually the exclusive domain of the 'free-sheets' i delivered as a teenager in the south. mix that up with the adverts and listings, and there is no content of any substance for my tastes.

 

badly written, badly researched, and nowadays having to compete with the likes of the metro being vended for free.

 

it's a shame that it is this way - local dailies are a brilliant thing, but to an extent, the paper seems to be hastening its own demise.

[alko27]

As the paper is online that could explain part of the demise. Some national papers are considering charging for site access.

 

I do agree most of the recent stuff is pants. The price doesn't help either for such a thin paper when most people happily buy a national paper for nearly half the price or even two papers for a similar price (Express & Daily Star)

 

Maybe to boost editions they should hand the daily editing over to a competition winner/celebrity, lots of magazines do it with their coloums and though a bad example WWE have a "guest host" every week with Raw to spice the show up.

 

If the company is as disrespecful as you say then all the best with the strike

[grandadowl]

i have worked at the sheffield star now for 18 years when i started the circulation was 140 k the star (morning paper) is now down to a measly 45k daily the paper has recently gone from being a nightly paper to an early morning paper to try to boost sales(not gong to happen) this means its readers are not getting news as it happens the star employs staff on their inputting team that are not qualified to do this task hence mistakes after mistakes (re black faces of the so called swfc supporters issue 01042010) the tradition of coming home from work and reading the star at the dinner table has gone,they have tried to add new features ie schools pages and local sports pages all good for the struggling ciculation but the feed back i am getting is cancel cancel cancel my delivery or my readership so this means it will have an adverse effect wake up and take note before its to late(to late already in my opinion) the company who owns the star and other local newspapers treat their workforce with little respect and will soon become liqudated a STRIKE by some of our workforce is on the agender and so are job losses .... watch this space ps good luck to my strikeing collegues

 

It,s very sad but the sheffield star is in decline and that decline will soon become terminal.in my opinion the decline started with the end of the late edition ,so in effect turning the paper into late morning paper which is n either here nor there.Traditionally people would buy the star on the way home from work and sit and read the days news in the evening. The supplements are of only a small interest to a minority of readers ie, Business monthly( mindnumbing ) grass roots ( good but only of interest to a minority ).The paper has also in effect become a used car guide for some companies that advertise the same cars week after week when in reality some of the cars have been long sold.On the plus side the sport pages remain on the whole reasonably good whith both sheffield teams ie, owls @owls reserves getting decent coverage as well as the surrounding clubs as well. back to the down side , What about the dreadfull martin dawes and his missus chomping there way round sheffield { tab picked up by the star no doubt ) the missus must look like a beached whale the amount of snap she puts away.Give someone else a chance to do guest reviews before terminall obesity sets in !!! Only joking but something must be done ( and soon ) to rescue a once much loved sheffield paper.

[Rioja]

It,s very sad but the sheffield star is in decline and that decline will soon become terminal.in my opinion the decline started with the end of the late edition ,so in effect turning the paper into late morning paper which is n either here nor there.Traditionally people would buy the star on the way home from work and sit and read the days news in the evening. The supplements are of only a small interest to a minority of readers ie, Business monthly( mindnumbing ) grass roots ( good but only of interest to a minority ).The paper has also in effect become a used car guide for some companies that advertise the same cars week after week when in reality some of the cars have been long sold.On the plus side the sport pages remain on the whole reasonably good whith both sheffield teams ie, owls @owls reserves getting decent coverage as well as the surrounding clubs as well. back to the down side , What about the dreadfull martin dawes and his missus chomping there way round sheffield { tab picked up by the star no doubt ) the missus must look like a beached whale the amount of snap she puts away.Give someone else a chance to do guest reviews before terminall obesity sets in !!! Only joking but something must be done ( and soon ) to rescue a once much loved sheffield paper.

 

Careful, Martin is well known for reading SF and responding to his critics.

[psyko]

moke in response to your comments i totally agree but as the metro is a contract print at dinnington print centre more effort is put into the content and quality of print as not to do so would be unforgiveable the metro is a free newspaper and the journalist and editorial side are 1st class the metro is owned by the daily mail (similar outlay etc) and you see very little problems with this title the star has a very difficult job competing with a free newspaper that gets its revenue for advertisement ie front cover advertising virgin o2 etc i think the way forward is to make the star a free paper and attract the advertiserers to advertise with them and boost circulation thus advertisers will instead of paying x amount to advertise in a paper of 46k the revenue that will be produced for advertising in a 100k paper will out weigh itself

[Rioja]

moke in response to your comments i totally agree but as the metro is a contract print at dinnington print centre more effort is put into the content and quality of print as not to do so would be unforgiveable the metro is a free newspaper and the journalist and editorial side are 1st class the metro is owned by the daily mail (similar outlay etc) and you see very little problems with this title the star has a very difficult job competing with a free newspaper that gets its revenue for advertisement ie front cover advertising virgin o2 etc i think the way forward is to make the star a free paper and attract the advertiserers to advertise with them and boost circulation thus advertisers will instead of paying x amount to advertise in a paper of 46k the revenue that will be produced for advertising in a 100k paper will out weigh itself

 

Great, so we'd have a tatty free sheet full of adverts, great way forward.

[grandadowl]

Careful, Martin is well known for reading SF and responding to his critics.

 

Dont care , change is needed, martin has made himself a one man (and woman ) expert. give some guest reviewers a chance