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Combined FYI Weekend/Preview section brings lots of comment
By DEREK DONOVANThe Kansas City Star
“Why would you change something that was so perfect?” asked one caller. “Change it back.”
“I spent way too much time looking for ‘Dear Abby’ and the comics,” said another. “You say this new thing is easy to use, but not for me.”
Almost every reader I spoke to felt the comics are too small. It’s true that most of them are now smaller than they were in the broadsheet-size FYI.
A modest proposal of my own: I think editors should at least try running the strips sideways at their old size.
Several readers liked the tabloid format, which they find convenient.
“This is so much easier for me to transport and unfold,” e-mailed one. “I think you should do the whole paper this way.”
An all-tabloid Star was one possibility in the early planning stages of the recent redesign. That obviously didn’t come to fruition.
I also heard two questions many times:
Did you drop any comics?
Definitely not. They’re in a different arrangement, but every single strip from the rest of the week is still there.
Is this going to be the new format every day?
No, and the story on Page A-1 and inside the new section should have made that clear. The combo will run only on Thursdays.
As with any business, nothing stays the same forever in a newspaper. Readers’ feedback is vital to let editors know what works and what doesn’t with changes like these.
•••
Alert reader Scott McNair spotted some wording in a story by two Star staffers that seemed very close to an Associated Press story he read elsewhere.
In Wednesday’s story about “American Idol” contestants David Cook and David Archuleta, The Star’s story described Archuleta’s “overly involved stage dad,” and said Cook has “a post-grunge edginess that the angelic Archuleta lacks.”
The AP version described the father the same way, though Cook had “an emo edge.”
Plagiarism, asked McNair? No, but I understand the question.
An editor added (and slightly altered) that paragraph from the AP story — a common practice.
The Star’s Code of Ethics says journalists “should not disguise the presence of wire material in stories,” and gives guidelines about when crediting a wire service is necessary.
In this case, we’re talking about 32 words of description out of 521 in the whole story. The actual reporting was all uniquely from the Star staffers, so I’m not bothered by the uncredited insert.