Among the many maxims in publishing folklore, few harbour as foreboding a warning as that about a newspaper’s masthead.
“Meddle with your masthead at your own peril” goes the dark threat.
This is how Graeme Johnstone opened his article, Evolution of a masthead in extra, the Quarterley newsletter for readers of The Age published at the weekend. Johnstone takes us through the history of the masthead of The Age and some of the issues navigated – well worth a read by anyone interested in newspapers and newspaper mastheads.
Johnstone’s article ends with: And, as they say, muck around with things too much and suffer the consequences.
I wonder how Johnstone would feel when he sees The Age this morning. The newspaper masthead has again been covered by an advertisement – this time for ING Direct. This makes a mockery of Jonstone’s article as it shows the company itself does not value the masthead.
Perhaps the continued selling of these ads to cover the venerable masthead of The Age and other Fairfax newspapers reflects a view about the future of print newspapers held by bean counters in the company and not newspaper people.