Ethics Roasting on an Open Fire…
The Sun-Times’s ardor toward a faithful advertiser knows no bounds. This month it teamed up with Marshall Field’s in a “Find the Jingle Elf Hat” contest, the idea being for readers to scan the paper each day and spot the page on which the jolly cap appears, with a “dream vacation” going to the winner. One of the first places the Jingle Elf Hat showed up was on the head of Paige Smoron at the top of her Camera Obscura column. This Tuesday the caparisoned cranium of celebrity maven Bill Zwecker beamed at us from the front page of the Showcase section.
Meanwhile, Virgin was opening Chicago’s biggest record store on Michigan Avenue, bringing in glamorous figures such as Cher to lure the paparazzi. But Virgin declined to purchase Sun-Times space to trumpet its wares, and the spurned newspaper was unforgiving.
What about dressing your columnists in a Jingle Elf Hat?
Best of Chicago voting is live now. Vote for your favorites »
A seasoned professional shedding his wisdom on the young, Nigel Wade told an audience of high-schoolers to get hopping. “You don’t have a lot of time,” Wade said in October during Communication Day at Loyola University. “If you’re not a star somewhere by age 30, you’re probably not going to be one.”
“I simply don’t trust the Sun-Times’ ownership with my family’s future,” his letter explained. “The company’s proposal to kill the pension plan, the lack of professional development opportunities, the editor-in-chief’s recent comments concerning the potential of us over-30 journalists–these and other actions suggest to me a barely concealed hostility to the legitimate aspirations of employees here. I’ve had enough.”
“He called me into his office around 2, told me to sit, looked at me and said, ‘You’re a coward.’ He told me he wanted me out of the building. ‘Now?’ I asked. He indicated yes.
Back in the newsroom Baldwin underwent the usual debriefing by the inquisitive hoi polloi. Before walking out the door forever, he decided to make a grand gesture. “I was going to write a conciliatory message–‘Nigel, whatever our differences, I wish you luck.’” But he couldn’t log on to his computer. His password already had been revoked. His wife called the office about that time and discovered his voice mail was no longer working.
