Newseum Top Ten: Zero good points

[rknil]

The silliness hits a new high when Sharon Shahid picks the pages.

First, she's admiring the headlines on the New York tabloids that are slamming Tiger Woods. "LOCK UP THE WAITRESSES!" and "LOCK UP THE BIMBOS!" are hardly stellar samples.

And of course, she gets in her mandatory plug for The Virginian-Pilot, which is hardly fabulous today:



Sharon Shahid is not too sharp. Shame on Sharon Shahid.

[rknil]

Today was a little better, as we had John Maynard presenting the analysis, which included no gushing testimonials to The Virginian-Pilot today. (By the way, who won that Super Bowl again? It's the gift that keeps on giving.)

We did have one crazy selection, though:



This headline represents sensationalism at its worst. The package is far too repetitive, with numerous headline, cutline, refer, and graphic references to a plane slamming into the building.

Again, the editors need to do a better job of screening these pages.

[rknil]

Our favorite moron Sharon Shahid is back at it. Today she's praising a tight focus on Olympic photos.

She must not look at the pages very closely, though, because this mess landed in her top ten:



The cutline on the main photo says John Higdon graduated in 1988. But the article says he graduated in 2008.

This is very confusing for people who look at the cutline first. I was scanning the people at the front of the photo for someone who would have graduated from college 20 years ago.

Thanks, Sharon!

[rknil]

I haven't reviewed the Newseum picks as often as before, but they have been a little better -- less worship at the V-P altar and at least a cursory attempt to use some sense.

The drawback, though, has been the use of more themes to choose the pages. On some days, this is inevitable, while it's forced on others.

Today the theme is (once again) Tiger Woods. One choice is particularly amusing:

 

Wow, that's a lot of exclamation points!!!!! Also, the design dolt marks territory with a cutout, and that's generally an indication we'll find text problems elsewhere on the page. Surprisingly, the only one that jumps out so far is the lack of a closed quote in the liftout on the left.

And clearly this is a smaller paper trying to focus on local lore, but the crab capsule is simply more dumb than useful. Keep the outdated gimmicks off the front.