Copywriting vs. Journalism

Back home in Phoenix, yes here in sunny Arizona, I’m currently writing copy at NextStudent. It’s a lot different from reporting and writing for magazines and newspapers. I needed a change after many years in journalism and turned to copywriting for the student loan funding company.

At NextStudent, I work with a team of highly qualified copywriters from different work backgrounds. Some were journalists and some did work in marketing or advertisting. Bringing us together to form the copywriting team at NextStudent was a great idea. There’s now a combined effort of different types of writing styles that blend well together. We’re all able to brainstorm and bring forth different ideas and ways of creating important copy to bring it to students and parents looking to fund a college education.

Speaking of college education, to me there’s nothing more important. In this day and age a college education helps in so many varied ways. It allows people to open their minds to new ideas, to learn new subjects, and to basically expand their horizons. It also helps people in the job market.

So my work here at NextStudent truly is different from previous writing and editing positions I had in New York. The deadlines are there, but different. The topic is different and geared toward a different audience: people looking to get to college, which is a good thing. And I get to work with others in a cool and oftentimes fun environment. I also don’t have to work until the wee hours of the morning, and that’s a huge plus.

It’s Cold and Ugly

Well, New York City is having a cold and ugly February. As I sit in my Phoenix office at NextStudent with the sun shining through the window and 70-degree temps, I don’t regret moving home. I’ve been reading and hearing from old friends about how cold it’s been in New York. It’s also gotten some snow. The temperatures are in the 20s, but the wind chill factor is bringing those temps down to the single digits. I do not miss it at all.

With the cold, snow and people, I remember what that means in New York, and it’s not good.

When it first snows anywhere, it’s a beautiful thing. Especially in New York. When it snows, it’s really the only time the city gets quiet. The sounds of the city become muffled and there’s beautiful snow falling. But it doesn’t last long.

If you put a huge city together with snow, tons of cars, buses and taxis and millions of people walking everywhere, you get a mess! And, it gets real ugly, real fast. Slush, mud, ice, wind, people bundled up so much that sometimes they barely resemble people.

People throughout the city look less happy, as they walk stiffly because they barely can move in their layers and bundled winter clothes. They also typically are rushing to get wherever, and get out of the cold.

This also is the time when people slip and fall and bad accidents happen. Ice on the sidewalks or under snow is the culprit. It’s pretty scary. So not only are people walking to get out of the cold, they are trying to walk so that they don’t have an accident.

Winters can be strange in New York City. You can have days when the weather is mild and sometimes even in the 60s or 70s one day. The next day the temperatures can drop to the 30s and snow starts falling. I could never get used to the wacky weather there.

Yeah, it gets hot here, but I don’t mind. I don’t have to worry about slipping on the ice or shoveling the snow.

Laughter, and the Strange and Bizarre

Some people told me they got a real kick out of my last blog, “Loose Slips.” That’s just one of many funny things I witnessed while living in New York. Little tidbits of laughter in the Big Apple.

Hey, not that there aren’t funny things that happen in Phoenix. There are for sure. But there’s just something about New York City and crazy, wacky things that happen. I probably could never count them all, no less remember them.

Some things weren’t necessarily funny or funny at all; they were just plain bizarre, freaky or scary. YES, scary.

While working as an editor, me and many of my co-workers sometimes would complain of how we were being worked to death. We come to find out that weeks later, one of the reporters was found dead, at his desk! That scared the crap out of us all. Most likely there were other factors that contributed to the death of that reporter. But still … that’s pretty freaky.

I also witnessed a lot of crude behavior on the subway, people getting mugged, and a person actually was shot right outside my bedroom window. That’s when I said, “I really gotta go home to Arizona.” And, at the time, I lived in one of the nicest neighborhoods in New York City.

Yeah,  yeah, I know. These things happen anywhere, even in Phoenix, especially since it’s grown so much. But I witnessed way more things in NYC, and right up close, than I would have liked. You know, too much of a good thing…

But there were lots of fun times. Times I wouldn’t want to erase from memory. I just want to keep them there where they belong.

It’s Raining Again. What is This, New York?

I’m going off on a bit of a tangent today. Nowadays, as I mentioned somewhere, I am a copywriter at NextStudent, a student loan funding company. Typically, I can look out the window at my desk and see the sun shining. One of the many reasons I moved back home from New York to the Phoenix area is because of the lack of sun in the Big Apple.

Can’t tell you how many days of sun I missed when I lived in New York. There would be periods of three weeks in a row of rain, dreary and dark days, and the depression that followed. Not to mention the biting cold that went with it. Sure, there were some sunny days, but not as many as I would have liked. Those sunny days usually came with 90 degree temps and 200 percent humidity.

So, I move home, where the weather typically is beautiful, especially during the winter months. Yes, to me even 120 degrees is beautiful, but with low humidity. We get rain in Arizona, just not much of it. And once in a blue moon, we get hit, especially during monsoon season in the summer.

But today, what’s going on today and these past few weeks? It’s raining with that biting cold. It must be the New Yorkers on vacation. They brought that weather here and it won’t leave. I can’t stand it.

Many of us Arizonans like the rain. Most people here like it because we hardly ever get it. But me, I can’t stand the rain. After living in New York for too many years and living too many days of rain and bad weather, I’ve had enough.

I want the sun, I need the sun. If it’s below 80 degrees I’m cold and have to wear a jacket. Mind you, I’m not a sun worshiper, just someone who smiles more and is more productive when the sun shines.

The ‘Real’ Thing

Days ago I wrote about computers replacing people in some of the publishing jobs back in the late ’80s. What a shame. I still think back to those days and the people let go from their jobs. For a while I kept in contact with some of them. Some of the people were able to get other jobs right away. Others received some training so they could be marketable in the “new” world of publishing. And then there were those who were unable to find anything. I truly felt bad for them.

After showing so much loyalty to a company for so many years, it’s unfortunate when people get thrown away, as if they were nothing.

That leads me to what happened to the “real” New York. Yes, things change and cities grow. Parts of cities get revitalized. “Bad” sections of a city get gentrified. This can be great in many ways. Old, dilapidated buildings receive much-needed improvements. Boarded up businesses get bought and spring to life once again. Parks are improved. Or places where there are junkyards become parks. Trees are planted, fountains erected, dog walks set down.

To improve old neighborhoods is a great idea and, oftentimes, brings money into an area that once lacked funds. There also is the downside. To the extend that gentrification happened in New York, and still is happening, you find that the lower-income and poor were pushed out and still are being pushed out.

There were many areas in downtown New York that were considered artsy. I am not talking about all the expensive art galleries existing now. There were “starving” artists who lived downtown in lofts. Many of these artists had no option but to leave after genrification. An area would be revitalized and named the “latest hot spot.” The more affluent would want to live there and then poof! It becomes the “in” place to be. There’s no room for low-income or poor in the “in” place. 

Many of the low-income and poor also have been pushed out because expensive co-ops and condos replaced their homes. New York City never has been more expensive. Yes, it’s true, this is happening throughout the country. But New York City once had a “coolness” to it that just doesn’t exist any longer. It has become a city for the rich.

Towering glass structures are going up in many downtown areas where once stood picturesque architecture. Many see these new buildings as monstrosities that do not add to the character of New York. But it doesn’t matter. Pieces of land in New York go to the highest bidder. And there are tons of high bidders out there building what they think should stand tall, no matter its ulginess.

The prices in New York City have skyrocketed so high that it has been hitting the middle class as well. If you cannot afford at least $2,000 a month for a studio apartment, then you surely can’t afford $2 million to buy a two-bedroom co-op or condo. Yep, those are the prices. And those prices include about 1,000 square feet of space. If you’re lucky maybe 1,200 square feet.

Soon the only thing left of the old New York City will be the memories of those of us who were there before all this gentrification took place.

Computers Replace The Real Thing

When old-fashioned typesetting was being fazed out in the publishing industry to make way for desktop publishing, many people wondered what would happen to their jobs. I knew of many people in the typesetting department who had been there for years. They were nervous and anxious about what was going on, if they’d be trained for the new world of publishing, or if they’d be let go.

Unfortunately, many of these typesetters were people who had been in their jobs for years. They were older, many heading toward retirement age. A lot of publishing houses did not see the need to train these people, most of whom were women. So they were fazed right out of the companies for which they worked.

It was sad and such a shame. Many of these people wanted to learn desktop publishing and stay in their jobs. Let’s be real: Who’s going to hire an older woman in her early 60s? It’s unfair, but it’s true. The answer is: hardly anyone.

With the influx of desktop publishing came the layoff of many old-school typesetters. For those of us who were old-school copy desk employees, we were the ones who would learn the new animal: desktop publishing.

New computers called “Macs” were brought in along with experts who would train us. Some of us “old-schoolers” had a difficult time, even a so-called “mental block.” There also were some of us who were angry that the last of the typesetters were let go. They had become our friends and they were loyal, good workers. So, in a way, we were stealing their jobs. There was a mix of guilt and just-plain feeling bad.

However, if we wanted to keep our jobs, we had to deal with it and learn the new system of putting out the newspaper. Not all of us liked it, but many of us had no choice. This was the beginning of a whole new world in publishing.

Sales vs. Editorial

I found out early about the differences between sales and editorial with regard to the publishing world. There sometimes were problems and sometimes not. Things sometimes even got heated.

Obviously the world of sales in publishing means selling the ads, which brings in the money. And the bottom line always is the money in just about every business. On the other hand, editorial typically is about journalists striving to report on and write the best stories they can. Pitching editorial sells ads. But when it comes down to it, sales usually wins. If the ad space isn’t sold, then there’s no magazine. If there’s no magazine, everyone on staff has a big problem.

Things actually can get held up because of advertisers. That oftentimes doesn’t sit well with editorial. Writers, reporters, copy editors, managing editors and editors work on “deadline.” With these people, and I’m one of them, deadline is “king.” Our lives revolve around deadline, and most of us hate to miss a deadline. Many of us live our entire lives, personal and professional, with the word “deadline” hanging over our heads. It’s ingrained in our souls, like a sickness.

I found out pretty early on in my career that deadlines would be missed — not due to errors on my part, but mostly due to sales. Didn’t like that at all. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know our magazine had to make money. But you can’t tell me to be “deadline-oriented,” which I accomplish, then tell me to forget the deadline! That drove me absolutely bonkers.

There were never any actual knock-down, drag-out fights. But we sometimes came close. I think there were quite a few times when I sat at my desk at 10:12 p.m. clenching my teeth in anger. The stress level certainly was high. I guess many of us in the business thrive on that type of stress.

After a lot of late nights, the editorial team closing the issue easily got “punchy.” Laughing for no reason. Typing in a headline after your fingers are on the wrong keys can bring about some funny stuff. Maybe not that funny, but when you’re going on two hours of sleep, you sometimes laugh at just about anything. Heck, you’ll even laugh with the salespeople.

In the end, after an issue closes, everyone makes friends. Then it starts all over again for the next issue.

The Early ’80s and Typesetting

Boy things really were different back then. Not that it’s so long ago in the scheme of things. But in the early ’80s there was no Quark or InDesign. Not even Pagemaker. There was old-fashioned typesetting and cutting and pasting.

When I began my career in publishing as an editorial assistant, I ran around and wore many hats. Since I desperately wanted to truly be in the editorial department, I watched, learned and did anything and everything I could and that the higher-ups would allow.

Much of what I did entailed going to the art department. At that time there were a number of artists doing everything manually. You really got to see a lot of talent at that time. Drawings done by hand and from scratch. Things like that now are rare.

The art department also was in charge of getting the magazine’s pages down on boards. Everything written and edited was done on an old computer program with a black or blue screen. Then when everything was edited and ready to go it would be “shipped” via these old computer systems to the typesetting department. What came back to us were the actual “pages” that would be put on the boards in the art department.

When the pages came in the copy desk would do final copy edits and proofreading. Any mistakes were marked up and brought down to the art department where “magic” would occur, the old-fashioned method of “cut and paste.”

It really was fascinating to watch. Sometimes full sentences had to be cut out, and letter by letter an artist would correct the sentences or words and paste them onto the board. You had to have patience and a steady hand.  Kind of like a type of surgeon.

As editorial assistant I often ran down to the art department, especially on deadline days. I would have to run and get this or that and make sure everything went out to the printer on time.

It truly was exciting at times, and exhausting. There were tons of late nights during deadline. Everyone on staff would become this close, stressed-out family all working toward the same goal. On days and nights like this, you would get a real adrenaline rush.

When New York Was ‘Cool’

At the time I arrived in New York, things were different. The city still had an “edgy” feel to it. It had not yet been turned upside down and over and into a type of “Disneyland.” Parts of the city that now are hip and chic still were no-go zones, meaning you really had to be careful, stupid, or with a crowd of people to go there. But oftentimes those zones were the best parts of the city.

Many of these areas were downtown. Where once places like the Village, that’s Greenwich Village, were still “cool,” now they are a mecca for tourists and don’t seem to have the character they had. That edginess is long gone.

When I arrived in New York before much of the gentrification, the Village was full of musicians… real, starving musicians. Many of them still on the tail end of the “punk” era, or the real rock ‘n rollers. The leather jackets they wore were not the ones everyone buys from tourist shops or Nordstrom to “look cool.” Those jackets were the real deal and they were worn and torn and had a history.

You would be walking around with friends and actually be a bit scared to be out in certain areas. But it gave it a kind of thrill; it was exciting. It was a wonderful place to be for a writer. Way too many characters to even imagine.

By day, up-and-coming writers and editors in New York who moved there from places like Arizona, Nevada, Ohio and other parts of the Midwest, would work our butts off during the day and well into overtime and late nights to make a name for ourselves or get noticed within our companies.

At night was a different story, especially on the weekends. Even during the week. New York truly was, and still is, the city that never sleeps. There was too much to miss. Always a concert, a band playing, a party, an art show, or the opening of a new club. Something always was happening. So even after a long day at work, it wasn’t unusual to either go out directly from work or run home to change and then go out again. There were way too many times we would be out into the wee hours. New York is the place of the 4 a.m. last call and the after hours clubs. And somehow we’d get home, sleep an hour or two and get up and do it all over again.

The Road to a New York Writing Job

Truthfully, the road to an entry level publishing job in New York wasn’t too tough. I hadn’t been out of college that long and received a job just weeks after graduation. I graduated with a degree in journalism and writing. Out of all the jobs for which I interviewed and the offers I received, I chose an editorial assistant position at a trade magazine.

From all my research, I concluded that trade journalism paid way more than consumer mags. And I was correct. To this day, from people I know in the biz, consumer magazines, especially fashion magazines, do not pay well at all. And it’s all about who you know, what you wear and who can kiss up to the boss the most.

I worked for a wonderful editor at a trade magazine in midtown Manhattan. She was tough, but she knew her stuff. Ms. Editor had started from the ground up and took no prisoners, but she was fair if you did your job and showed initiative.

As editorial assistant, I wore many hats. It’s kind of like part editorial helper, part secretary. I worked hard to show everyone I wanted to move up, write, edit, anything to get their attention. Through months of this job I learned a lot of company gossip due to the “secretary” side of the job. I also learned about the writers and editors who wanted to help the up-and-coming newbies.

After months of trying to prove myself worthy of actually being part of editorial, it paid off. I was promoted to assistant editor, meaning I would help write stories on the reporting side, and also learn to edit other reporters’ work. This was my big break.

I finally make it to New York, land a job, and then get promoted all in less than a year. Everything is going great workwise. Let’s not forget I’m in New York City at the time, which meant after work there’s an entirely different life waiting for me, and everyone else in the city.