Tribune chief innovation officer Lee Abrams' memo to staff

Topic: Miscellaneous items
Date/Time: 10/6/2008 11:50:47 AM
Title: Abrams-Greising exchange on ad sections
Posted By: Jim Romenesko

THINK PIECE: DIALOGUE VS. WHINING

Just back from Dallas visiting the scrappy "Mighty Joe Young" at KDAFTV, the focused Roger Baer at KIAH in Houston and their respective andimpressive staffs. Then upon returning to Chicago, a Tribune that istextbook re-invention where the #1 complaint is why the boxes are always sold out. (It is a brilliant modern paper that is expertly balancingmainstream with intelligence...the formula for success in mass mediawars, I believe). I want to dive into those three things (and I will), but some things came to my email that I thought was even more important to share.

I wrote about re-thinking "Special Advertising Sections" and perhaps naming them something less generic. Back-to-back I received two emails late last week.

E-mail #1: From an unknown person with a mysterious Yahoo address, itwas: "You are a fu-ing idiot. Another stupid idea from the people ruining these great institutions". OK, fine, that's your opinion, but I can't really respond.

E-mail #2: From David Greising at the Chicago Tribune, who I never met. He had concerns about my comments and chose the dialogue route.

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