11 September 2012

Sincere flattery from the Canberra Times

| johnboy
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In recent months it’s been intriguing to see the Canberra Times try to re-invent ageing warhorse Ian Warden as a sort of low-rent Johnboy.

But this morning’s excited piece of forced whimsy really brought on the deja vu.

A pity really that our piece from last year is rather better looking in my humble opinion.

We have been talking to an Octocopter crew and should have something rather special for you if the Floriade people will reply to recent correspondence.

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poetix said :

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

My thought was ‘tautology’.

So that’s what it feels like to choke on pork noodles.

Are you in fact Charlie Sheen? Because I have absolutely no idea what you are on about half the time.

I think that was WMC’s way of paying you a compliment. You made him laugh while eating pork noodles. Of course I could be as wrong as gay dwarves in school uniforms.

drfelonious said :

Ian Warden is beloved by baby boomers – the sort of people who still have the Canberra Times delivered to their front yard and go out and pick it up in their dressing gown. Of course many of these people probably don’t read the riotact and therefore he won’t be replaced because papers aren’t bought by young people any more.

BTW Johnboy I have always understood it to be very poor form to talk yourself up to the extent of suggesting another writer is a low rent version of yourself – regardless of how strongly you may hold that opinion. Just wait til Warden hears about this – the dressing gowns will be taking to the streets.

Well, this Boomer thinks Warden is a pretentious prick, and I much prefer RA to Warden’s prejudiced, vainglorious, meaningless rambling.

Woody Mann-Caruso said :

My thought was ‘tautology’.

So that’s what it feels like to choke on pork noodles.

Are you in fact Charlie Sheen? Because I have absolutely no idea what you are on about half the time.

Ian Warden is beloved by baby boomers – the sort of people who still have the Canberra Times delivered to their front yard and go out and pick it up in their dressing gown. Of course many of these people probably don’t read the riotact and therefore he won’t be replaced because papers aren’t bought by young people any more.

BTW Johnboy I have always understood it to be very poor form to talk yourself up to the extent of suggesting another writer is a low rent version of yourself – regardless of how strongly you may hold that opinion. Just wait til Warden hears about this – the dressing gowns will be taking to the streets.

Way to violate the basic CASAR, Canberra Times photographer Jay Cronan…
Do you have your operator’s certificate and UAV controllers certification handy?

If you’re getting paid to do it, or it’s ‘work’,
CASA would like a word.

Hobby is one thing, drone-for-hire is another entirely.

Well, regardless of who the progenitor is, I know which local media outlet I less fear operating drones in Canberra’s sky.

Irrespective of whether CT got its idea from RiotAct or not, I respectfully suggest that neither is the progenitor of the growing global phenomena of micro-copter aerial photography.

And FWIW I too enjoy some of Warden’s musings.

Woody Mann-Caruso6:06 pm 11 Sep 12

My thought was ‘tautology’.

So that’s what it feels like to choke on pork noodles.

Myles Peterson said :

Ironic that Crimes should sack their literary and science writers and keep Mr Fluffy on.

Gia Metherell was a union rep, successfully raised Alliance representation dramatically and won a wages battle. Rossyln Beeby was one of the hardest working journos who always stuck to her guns and took no s*** from management. Held enormous respect for both of them.

I’m told Warden is mates with the Editor. Dunno, left before he arrived.

Link your own dots.

Errm…Ian Warden was writing for the CT as a freelancer when I arrived in Canberra as a child in 1976. He was on the staff fulltime for many years and was apparently laid off sometime around 2000. I assume he now writes for them on some sort of contract basis.

And FWIW, I really like his prose. I’ve always assumed that his pseudo-epic style was gently ironic, and there have been few of his pieces in the last 36 years that I haven’t enjoyed.

poetix said :

CrocodileGandhi said :

“low-rent Johnboy” sounds like some kind of awful euphemism.

My thought was ‘tautology’.

Ohhh…that’s harsh. lease keep it up. 🙂

Myles Peterson said :

Ironic that Crimes should sack their literary and science writers and keep Mr Fluffy on.

Gia Metherell was a union rep, successfully raised Alliance representation dramatically and won a wages battle. Rossyln Beeby was one of the hardest working journos who always stuck to her guns and took no s*** from management. Held enormous respect for both of them.

I’m told Warden is mates with the Editor. Dunno, left before he arrived.

Link your own dots.

The slab-faced, raven haired Rosslyn Beeby – who wrote endless drivel about climate change and was given an entire page in the Sunday edition in the leadup to the last federal election to campaign for The Greens – has been sacked?

Glory hallelujah! There is a God after all.

Myles Peterson said :

Ironic that Crimes should sack their literary and science writers and keep Mr Fluffy on.

Gia Metherell was a union rep, successfully raised Alliance representation dramatically and won a wages battle. Rossyln Beeby was one of the hardest working journos who always stuck to her guns and took no s*** from management. Held enormous respect for both of them.

I’m told Warden is mates with the Editor. Dunno, left before he arrived.

Link your own dots.

Yep, that sounds about right.

What makes it ironic is that the literature journalist’s job is to write about and explore great writing.
And the science writer’s job is to bring sometimes huge and difficult to understand subjects to people in an approachable and concise way.

What Warden does is present poor writing, and makes the simplest of topics verbose and unapproachable, yet he has a job.

Just goes to show, it’s not how good you are but who you know.

Conan of Cooma4:54 pm 11 Sep 12

Low-rent Johnboy… There’s a high rent one?

Myles Peterson4:15 pm 11 Sep 12

Ironic that Crimes should sack their literary and science writers and keep Mr Fluffy on.

Gia Metherell was a union rep, successfully raised Alliance representation dramatically and won a wages battle. Rossyln Beeby was one of the hardest working journos who always stuck to her guns and took no s*** from management. Held enormous respect for both of them.

I’m told Warden is mates with the Editor. Dunno, left before he arrived.

Link your own dots.

martyo said :

“Like a sleeping giant, one wearing very brightly coloured pyjamas, Floriade lay slumbering yesterday” – Pulitzer material right there!

t’is a pity mssr warden isn’t resident in the good ol’ you ess of eh? [which is where pulitzer journalism winners must write] where we might be spared his verbosity and awful faux poetry…

Truthiness said :

Given the readership they’re hemorrhaging to the net, What is there left for the papers left to do except imitate forums and blogs?

Well, they could start by copying the main thing that the blags have – a usable website.

Given the readership they’re hemorrhaging to the net, What is there left for the papers left to do except imitate forums and blogs?

CrocodileGandhi said :

“low-rent Johnboy” sounds like some kind of awful euphemism.

My thought was ‘tautology’.

Ian Warden’s writing is woeful. Which isn’t to say he can’t write, only that he doesn’t seem to have any comprehension for clarity and succinctness which undermines every piece he does. Every article is written with lashings of over descriptive padding and wannabe epic imagery that makes me think he’d be happier writing official war history in Helmand than covering the local issues.

Ironic that Crimes should sack their literary and science writers and keep Mr Fluffy on.

It might have been amusing if the Crimes had Ian Warden and the old RSL warhorse, Bruce Ruxton, as competing columnists. Now that Ruxton has joined the Eternal Flame in the sky, it’s a bit like sweet and sour with only one half of the equation. Unpalatable.

I assume he doesn’t cost much, but his Facebook-like ramblings are just another symptom of the steady decline of what was once a newspaper that every important organisation in the country had a subscription to.

CrocodileGandhi2:07 pm 11 Sep 12

“low-rent Johnboy” sounds like some kind of awful euphemism.

Affirmative Action Man1:44 pm 11 Sep 12

You wonder why they let Warden keep writing. Why doesn’t he go & get a job at Bunnings & stop annoying CT readers.

“Like a sleeping giant, one wearing very brightly coloured pyjamas, Floriade lay slumbering yesterday” – Pulitzer material right there!

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