November 1st, 2010 
joel We’re doing a little tweaking here on Press and Tower, as we attempt to keep generating interesting content in a sustainable manner.
This Deep Background post will for now be a monthly post. Place all of your comments about Erie and the national media not related to a particular post in this free-wheeling conversation. Remember civility and good cheer are a must.
If you wish, you can also connect via email or by tweeting us here @pressandtower.
Embrace the chaos!
October 17th, 2010 joel The line dividing national and local media has gotten fuzzy in recent days, with local personalities and events getting national media attention. We’ll talk about that later in the week, but meanwhile you can talk about what you want to on this open forum. And here is a challenge: try not to be contrary for contrarian’s sake. If you have criticism, voice it in a constructive and civil manner.
Leave a comment below, send out an e-mail, or tweet @pressandtower.
Embrace the chaos!
October 3rd, 2010 joel If you think nobody watches local TV, you could have fooled me!
By the chatter on the P&T comments on the whereabouts of 12 News Today’s Kara Coleman and Mark Soliday, you would have sworn that the PSP had an all-points bulletin out for the anchors. Instead Kara and Mark were on a pre-November sweeps junket to 30 Rock for a promo shoot with the TODAY show stars. Glad we found them!
Share news about other lost and found items or people in Erie media on this open forum through your comments below, dropping me an e-mail, or by tweeting @pressandtower.
Embrace the chaos!
Posted in Deep Background 
Tags: Erie, Kara Coleman, Mark Soliday, media, NBC, Today Show, Twitter, WICU 
38 Comments » September 26th, 2010 joel The RockErie Music Awards are tonight (Sunday).
Our local version of the VMA’s has the Bayfront Convention Center rocking as bands and individual musicians are recognized for their excellence and ability to generate a loyal following. It’s a cool night, sponsored by a medium that most think is uncool…an ink on newsprint newspaper, the Erie Times-News.
No it’s not a rock blog, or even Rocket 101 who puts on the RMA’s but it’s the paper, which arguably is the single most effective promoter of local music in Erie. Hat’s off to Dr. Rock and the crew who puts this glitzy event together in our town.
And hats off to you our loyal reader and contributor for keeping the conversations going. Your opinions are appreciated in this open forum, so leave a comment below, send an e-mail, or tweet @pressandtower.
Embrace the chaos!
Posted in Deep Background Tags: Dr. Rock, Erie, Erie Times-News, RockErie Music Awards, Twitter 9 Comments » September 19th, 2010 joel Sometimes in media, it’s the little things.
Yes, often it’s the big things, like the multi-page investigative report or the big fundraising remote. But for a moment let me celebrate the little things, those nuanced benefits media folks give us to enhance our reading, viewing or listening experience and that show they went to the extra effort 0n your behalf.
This week, WICU-TV added a ticker to the bottom graphic box on the Today Show. I had seen this in Dallas when I was there recently and thought it would be nice to have the local time and temp and local news headlines on the Erie version of the show. I didn’t think they could do it since there is no local HDTV origination out the Erie studios. But whether they have an HD graphics generator downstream from the network HD passthrough, or however they are doing it, WICU now has the Today Show ticker…and it is nice to have.
It’s always nice to hear from the users of this blog community. Please leave a comment below on all things media, or you can e-mail me, or tweet @pressandtower.
Embrace the chaos!
September 12th, 2010 joel Why do people love to hate their newspapers?
I mean seriously…give some thought to what is contained in even the thinnest Monday edition of the Erie Times-News: local breaking news from the last 24 hours, couple dozen comic strips, listings of lost and founds and homes and cars for sale, opinion pieces from some of the greatest minds on the planet (George Will for one), updates from around the world, promotion of upcoming local events, well-designed advertising from local and national businesses.
There is still no other comprehensive place for everything about our community than the ink on paper Erie Times-News. Now I’m a big advocate for new media, and exciting ways to access information, but even with 15 years of the World Wide Web under our belt, no one has gotten close to the total coverage that’s found in the paper.
The newspaper is written and directed by flawed humans for sure, and being human they have biases and blind spots. But to say that the paper, as one commenter on P&T tried to say, “is not fit to line the bottom of my bird cage” shows a total lack of understanding what what’s inside each edition, and it’s not constructive or civil.
And that’s what we are all about in this open forum; constructive feedback for our media producers in a context of civility. So push back with your comments below, through e-mail or Twitter.
Embrace the chaos!
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Deep Background for December 2010
Wow…it’s December already?!?
That means we made it through sweeps, through “Bristol-gate” on Dancing With The Stars, while the networks are hoping for a royal wedding smack dab in the middle of May 2011 Nielsens. The overloaded Thanksgiving newspaper is already in the recycling bin, and Classy 100 and WCTL are “bells-to-the-walls” all Christmas.
If you want to talk about what’s under the tree in Erie media, leave a comment below, send along an e-mail, or shout out on Twitter @pressandtower.
Embrace the ho-ho-ho chaos!