Nobody at NPR Knows How to Pronounce ‘The’ Before a Vowel

Posted on May 13, 2014 by Campaign Outsider

The hardtalking staff has railed about this before, but we’ll say it again: The Proper Pronunciation Of ‘The’ Before A Vowel Is Literally Disappearing.

Again, from thee EnglishClub.com:

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We also (should) say “thee online magazine Ozy,” as opposed to “thuh online magazine Ozy,” as NPR’s Weekend All Things Considered host Arun Rath weekly has it.

This is not to pick on Arun Rath. Virtually no one at NPR knows that it should be “thee Odyssey,” not “thuh Odyssey” as an NPR reporter recently reported.

We say all this More in Sorrow Than in Anger – we listen to NPR all the time. We just want it to hurt the ears a little less.

 

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The War of Art in NYC’s Auction Houses

Posted on May 10, 2014 by Campaign Outsider

It’s auction season for the arterati, and yesterday’s New York Times was the Antietam of tony gavel houses in the Big Town.

There was, for instance, this Christie’s ad in the A section:

 

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Which sends us to this video presented by Loic Gouzer and Gary Gardner (no idea who they are):

 

 

No idea what they’re talking about.

Next up, this ad from Bonhams:

 

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That’s “The Garden Chair” by Frederick Carl Frieske (no idea who he is – apparently you have to be a millionaire to appreciate him).

Then came the Andy Warhol portion of the auction action.

From yesterday’s Times Weekend Arts II section:

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And this:

 

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Warhol we get – although we’ll never get one.

Then Phillips checked in with this Mark Rothko piece:

 

 

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And finally, Sotheby’s had this anemic half-page ad featuring a Jeff Koons whatever:

 

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Maybe they should eat more spinach, yeah?

 

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U.S. Chamber of Commerce Jumps into Tierney-Tisei Bakeoff

Posted on May 8, 2014 by Campaign Outsider

From our Kampaign Kibitzers desk

Independent expenditure groups are the neutron bombs of the 2014 midterm elections, which could see close to $3 billion in ad spending.

An early explosion is coming from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, as this Politico piece notes.

A Chamber ad deluge

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The U.S. Chamber of Commerce is poised to unveil an onslaught of general-election advertising this week, launching TV spots in nearly a dozen of the most competitive House districts in the 2014 midterm elections . . .

The Chamber declined to share the cost of the TV campaign but called it a multimillion dollar effort, and it appears to represent the powerful business lobby’s most intensive effort so far to leave a mark on the congressional landscape.

Officials with the Chamber said the campaign will include 11 districts from California to Massachusetts . . .

That last would be the Bay State’s Sixth Congressional District, where GOP hopeful Richard Tisei is challenging incumbent John Tierney (D-Wanna Bet?) for a second time.

The Chamber spot:

 

 

So far, this is a replay of their previous race: Tisei wants to paint himself as a moderate, Tierney will try to depict him as a Tea Party radical.

Let the wild – albeit largely deceptive – rumpus begin!

 

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Chrysler Drives Stealth Marketing ’24’/7

Posted on May 7, 2014 by Campaign Outsider

Jack is back!

 

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Version 6.0 of Fox’s fabulously successful series 24 premiered on Monday, and you can count on uber-sponsor Chrysler Motors to rev its ad engine in any number of ways throughout the season.

From MediaPost . . .

Read the rest at Sneak Adtack.

 

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Tucson Magazine Publisher: We’re the Beck-and-Call Girl of Our Advertisers

Posted on May 5, 2014 by Campaign Outsider

The hardtracking staff realizes that times are hard for media outlets these days, but this seems a bit much.

From the redoubtable Jim Romenesko:

NEWSPAPER COMPANY: OUR CUSTOMER IS THE ADVERTISER, NOT THE READER

Why Mark Evans refused to work for the new owners of Inside Tucson Business

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We’re sure plenty of publishers think the exact same thing, but this is the first we know of brazen enough to put it in writing.

Then again, more and more media manipulation is coming out of the shadows these days. Consider this Dan Shaughnessy piece from yesterday’s Boston Globe . . .

Read the rest at Sneak Adtack.

 

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Ask Dr. Ads: Does Starbucks Really Fit Oprah to a Tea?

Posted on May 5, 2014 by Campaign Outsider

DrAdsforProfileWell the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

So there I was, minding my own business and reading the New York Times when I came across this full-page ad.

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A boldly spiced chai with a touch of sweetness?

Chai kidding me?

– Dr. Fill

Dear Dr. Fill,

Do we detect the green (tea)-eyed monster at play here?

Regardless, the Doc definitely detects the Oprah-industrial complex at work.

As usual, the whole Oprahprise is cloaked in altruism . . .

Read the rest at Ask Dr. Ads.

 

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Red Sox Slowly Studying Slow Baseball Games

Posted on May 4, 2014 by Campaign Outsider

The Boston Red Sox, a.k.a The Slowskys of Major League Baseball, are examining, well, themselves in a new MLB effort to speed up the national vastime.

From the Weekend Wall Street Journal.

Does Baseball Have to Be So Slow?

As MLB Games Become Even Longer and More Deliberate, The Red Sox Study Why; Too Many Strikeouts

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The Boston Red Sox spent last winter basking in the afterglow of their World Series victory. They also spent some of it pondering a couple of questions: Why do their games take so long? And what should Major League Baseball do about it?

At the request of commissioner Bud Selig, the perennially slow-paced Red Sox formed a committee of seven team executives to study the issue and recommend changes for the league as a whole. A volunteer corps of 30 front-office staffers spent over 350 hours combing through video of Boston’s 2013 regular-season games, charting every little drag on the pace of play.

The Red Sox, whose games averaged an MLB-high 3 hours 15 minutes in 2013, are only about halfway done with the project. But the fact that such a committee even exists shows how little progress MLB has made in its attempts to speed up the game.

Read the rest of this engaging piece at your own pace, yeah?

 

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Why We Love the Stanley Cup Bakeoffs (Marian Gaborik Edition)

Posted on May 4, 2014 by Campaign Outsider

From our 19:53 of the Third Period desk

 

 

And then there was overtime in the Anaheim (No Longer Mighty) Ducks v. Los Angeles Kings (of Comebacks) Western Conference semifinals Game 1.

 

 

Announcer: “And the Kings have gotta feel like they stole Game 1.”

Well yes they did.

 

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Correction o’ the Day (Joe Nocera Woodshed Edition)

Posted on May 3, 2014 by Campaign Outsider

Last Saturday the New York Times op-ed page featured this piece by columnist Joe Nocera.

Buffett Bites Back

The first Saturday in May is always a great day for Warren Buffett. That’s the day his conglomerate, Berkshire Hathaway, holds its annual meeting in Omaha.

Thousands of shareholders descend on the city — there were more than 30,000 last year — where they eat ice cream at Dairy Queen (one of Berkshire Hathaway’s holdings), shop at Borsheims (the Omaha jewelry store Berkshire has long owned) and dine at Gorat’s and Piccolo’s (Buffett’s favorite restaurants) . . .

I wonder, though, if anyone attending this year’s meeting is going to ask him about his decision to abstain from voting Berkshire Hathaway’s 400 million shares against Coca-Cola’s equity compensation plan, even though Buffett felt the plan was, in his own words, “excessive.”

In the piece Nocera claimed Buffet flopped around like a sea bass on the (non)vote in a series of media interviews (but not with the Times scribe), until finally the Mutual Man of Omaha “having had a few days to lick his wounds . . . went on the offensive with Fortune [magazine].”

Thus, the “bites back” of the headline.

But apparently Buffet bit back at the Times, because this appears at the bottom of Nocera’s column today.

 

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Who’s licking whose wounds now, eh?

 

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Does Meb = ‘Made Easy Boston’?

Posted on May 3, 2014 by Campaign Outsider

You splendid readers can believe this or not, but the morning after the 2014 Boston Marathon the hardworking staff said, “The Kenyans tanked the race yesterday.” (Ask our suite mate at BU!)

The winning time (2:08:37) was too slow, and the timing was too perfect – an American wins Boston one year after the Marathon bombings.

Now comes this Wall Street Journal piece by Kevin Helliker and Sharon Terlep:

Boston Marathon Mystery: Why Didn’t Anyone Beat Meb?

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How Meb Keflezighi ran his fastest-ever marathon only days shy of his 39th birthday is a mystery that will inspire other runners for decades.

Also certain to endure is the mystery of how Keflezighi’s less-than-spectacular time succeeded in winning last week’s Boston Marathon, amid a field of Kenyans and Ethiopians who completed that race several minutes behind their usual pace.

“It’s hard to explain why several Kenyans and Ethiopians didn’t run quite a bit faster,” said Ambrose Burfoot, an editor at Runner’s World and winner of the 1968 Boston Marathon.

Burfoot sees nothing conspiratorial about the outcome, which gave the U.S. its first male winner of the Boston Marathon since 1983.

But some others do.

Among them, the folks at LetsRun.com, where, the Journal notes, there’s a comment thread called The Boston Marathon Was Fixed.

The back-and-forth on this is really engaging.

But we’re sticking with our initial reaction.

Sorry, Meb.

 

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