Tip of the Week #38

Setting Sun and Voice Mail Hell

Once again I feel the need to write a few word about the passing of a dear personal friend.

However this time my old compadre is not a mortal. There's no flesh, no blood, no wake, no viewing, no funeral - just steel, brick, mortar and my personal memories.

Right now, they're all lying in a dusty pile of rubble at 302 S. Myrtle Avenue in Clearwater, Florida waiting for a funeral procession of 18-wheelers to unceremoniously hall the debris to the dump.

This collective rubble of which I speak represents all that is left of a once-vibrant, once thriving, family owned community newspaper -- The Clearwater Sun.

The history for the Sun's decline is a picture perfect representation of what happened to Journalism in this country during the list half or the 20th Century. I know this is true - I bore personal witness.

I was lucky enough to have worked at the Clearwater Sun twice in the course of my 40-year career as a journalist. The first time was 1969-70. At that time I was just 21 years old and the Clearwater Sun became the second employer in my capacity as a Photojournalist.

At that time, the Sun was family owned, aggressive and the kind of journalistic watchdog the community needed, demanded and strangely took for granted. Subscribers affectionately referred the Clearwater Sun back then as "the Mullet Wrapper."

When I first joined the Sun's photo staff, their photographers had yet to convert to 35mm SLR's. We were required to use 2 ¼ Rolleiflex DLRs on assignment.

I remember one time when I got in serious trouble for using my personal 35mm Nikon and telephoto lens to shoot a Sun sports assignment. Try covering a high school football game with a Rolleiflex.

In mid 1970, I moved on to a better job that offered more opportunity at a bigger paper. But memories of those formative days at the beginning of my professional career and the friendships I had developed with members of the Sun's staff remain with me even today.

When I came back to the Clearwater Sun in 1980, I immediately noticed that a lot had changed at the Sun since I left their employ in 1970 and those changes were not all good.

· Family ownership -- gone

· Employer/employee loyalty -- gone

· Friendly, upbeat and fun atmospheres - gone

These changes were the direct result of the cold hard S.O.P.'s of Corporate America.

The year was 1980 and the Jefferson Pilot Insurance Company was the Sun's owner by the time I showed up for work for the second time in my Journalism career. Their Board of Directors decided to diversify and profitable family-owned newspapers all around the country like the Clearwater Sun were quickly gobbled up in the 80's corporate diversification feeding frenzy.

I left the Sun in disgust in '87 after surviving another change of ownership from JP to The Hearst Corporation. From 1980 -- 87 I witnessed and personally experienced the unabashed greed and abhorrent malfeasance of Corporate America.

To them, Journalism was a business and the goal changed from covering the news to maximizing the bottom line for the investor. I saw with my own eyes that making money for the corporate stockholder is contrary to proper and aggressive newsgathering. It's hard to cover the news right and make a profit

Conflicts of interest, cost for coverage, political affiliations, the lack of transparency -- things like these had rarely been contributing factors in editorial decision making until the 80's. But they were now.

WaterGate and Nixon's resignation was the beginning of the end for real journalism. And the Reagan Republican Administration only exacerbated the trend towards loading the deck in favor of Corporate America.

While the demise of the Clearwater Sun pains me on a personal level, what worries me most is the effect of a weakened free press is having on our Democracy. I can tell you right now that if the Press was as strong and aggressive as it had been in the 60's and 70's, we probably would have witnessed more Presidential impeachment attempts. And those impeachments would have been for subjects far more substantive than sex in the Oval Office.

So, although its extremely sad for me to think that the Clearwater Sun has now been reduced to a pile of rubble, the fact of the matter is, the newspaper has actually been dead for quite some time now. The Hearst Corporation ceased its publication in 1990 after a 76-year run.

Since then, the rotting hulk of 31,000 Sq ft building has remained empty and abandoned with no buyers coming forward to purchase the property from Hearst.

Once the debris is hauled away, mixed use condos and shops will most likely rise on the footprint of the once proud home of one of Florida's great family newspapers.

And my fond memories of the Clearwater Sun can finally R.I.P.

So, I'll try to leave you this week with some upbeat information

that you might find helpful the next time your find yourself

trapped in Corporate Voicemail Hell.

Are you fed up with those annoying "dial 1 if you want service"

phone trees? Then why don't you check out these toll-free customer

service number listings at www.gethuman.com.

Gethuman.com is a website that compiles and archives lists of phone

codes insiders use to circumvent phone trees and get directly to a

real person.

And, now you can use them too!

Try to remember to check out this website out the next time you

have to deal with Corporate America. You might get lucky an find a

listing for the company your trying to contact. And if you do, it

could save you loads of time and aggravation.

That's it for this week.

Please have a happy and safe Memorial weekend!