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July 2006 Archives

July 31, 2006

Dear diary...

As this blog is supposed to be about life inside the Daily Post, here is a look at my diary for tomorrow...
Tuesday
11 - conference
11.30 meeting to discuss activity plan for "back to school week"
1.30 - weekly forward planning meeting
4 - conference
8 - dinner with Mrs Editor as guests of "Fourteen" - a new restaurant in Llandudno
Sounds like a lot of meetings - now for some explanations. The first conference is a 10-minute get together with deputy ed Gregg Fray, senior assistant editor Mark Brittain, picture editor Richard Williams and news editor Maria Breslin to start roughing out the next day's paper - confirming the number of pages, the main features of the day plus what is shaping up as the "splash" and for other key news pages.
The "back to school" meeting is a one-off with Gregg, newspaper sales guru Olwen and marketing supremo Sian - always an important week for newspapers as people get back into regular habits after the school hols. It's vital that we do all we can to make sure we are on top form so that people who have been away get back their Daily Post habit.
The 1.30 forward planning is a weekly meeting with department heads to see what is shaping up over the next seven days.
4pm conference is when we run through all the news, feature and sport content for the next day and make sure our sales colleagues are up to speed on the big stories.
And 8pm dinner should be very nice indeed.
In between there is correspondence to deal with, pages to design, draft articles to read and phone calls to make. What I need to make more time for is to escape the office and get out and about meeting people across North Wales. But Mark Brittain and I have a cunning idea for that - details to follow.
Wela i chi 'fory.


 

July 25, 2006

Home working - it's the new garlic bread

Garlic bread, it's the future, says Peter Kay. Not any more. It's sitting in your front room on a laptop designing the front page of the Daily Post. Our super dooper new computer system means that, with the appropriate access codes, I can now read, design and generally fiddle with the paper from the comfort of my own home. Which is very handy when we are a bit short-handed in the office late in the evening but makes it very tricky to do proper justice to a pork szechuan with fried rice (courtesy of the excellent Llandudno Junction takeaway). I don't think Mrs Editor will be too keen on me making this a habit either - but it was a chance to put the new technology through its paces. And don't be thinking you can crack the code - it makes the Nazi enigma machine look about as complex as a question on the Weakest Link. Good grief I hate that show, but now I'm digressing.
Tomorrow's edition brings you news of a public servant under investigation - something that could have serious repercussions (we have finally confirmed this story, first hinted at last week). There are two pages fom the Royal Welsh Show where Andrew Forgrave is getting some great stories - it was very alarming what he wrote about today as regards the crisis in the North Wales dairy industry. The supermarkets have driven milk prices down to a ridiculous level - can't they see this is killing dairy farms?
We also have many, many moving tributes to the poor lad from Coedpoeth who lost his life yesterday afternoon when playing in the sea at Barmouth. Young Callum's family have very kindly given us a statement and his headteacher has said some lovely things as well.
That'a all for now. Take it easy in the heat tomorrow - it's going to be pushing 90 again in North Wales. Just summon up enough energy to nip to the newsagents for a lolly...and, of course, a Daily Post.


 

July 24, 2006

Eat, drink and be merry

We are just putting the finishing touches to a new section in the paper. Tomorrow sees the first of what will become a regular spread in Tuesday's paper about food and drink.
No, this isn't the Daily Post guide to binge drinking - no need to panic, officers! This is more a celebration of what a wonderful place North Wales is to visit new places - and enjoy some good nourishment along the way. Our esteemed writer Ian Parri is bringing all his expertise into use as he runs the rule over the finest pubs of North Wales. And Ian and other colleagues will be writing each week about great places to visit - and to have a bite to eat. Tomorrow's spread features articles from the intriguing Ty Coch Inn at Porthdinllaen plus a bite to eat at the Corris Craft Centre. There is also a diner's directory plus great competitions. Hope you enjoy this new content - and we will continue to run our restaurant reviews and recipes in Saturday's paper.
Let me know what you think.
One other important change is that Over to You is taking a break for the summer. We are going to give it a major new lease of life online later this year on our whizzbang new website - more details will follow.
Talking of websites I hope you have had a chance to see our new video features at icnorthwales.co.uk. There is an excellent news report by Andrew Forgrave about dry stone walling in Snowdonia, plus some fantastic close-up footage of dolphins swimming off Anglesey. We can also receive your videos - see the website for details.


 

July 19, 2006

Weather watching

Newspapers share our national obsession with the weather - and with good reason. One of the best selling editions of the Daily Post this year was back in March when the biggest snowfall in decades brought North Wales to a grinding halt.
Now it's record-breaking temperatures that are forcing their way onto the front page. We have a full regional round-up of the situation - with the headline grabbing figures that North Wales has had its hottest July day on record and its hottest day since August of 1990. Phew, it's a scorcher as they used to say in Fleet Street.
Yesterday I had the misfortune to be on the London Underground heading to a meeting at our HQ in Canary Wharf. The Evening Standard headline screamed that the Tube had hit temperatures of 47 Celsius. I can vouch for that. I've sat in saunas cooler than yesterday's services on the Northern Line.
Tomorrow's front page will have the latest from Toulouse, France, where a motorist is in court over the death of an Airbus worker from Hawarden in a hit-and-run incident.
We will also reveal how North Wales police are performing, acording to the latest Home Office figures - can't say what the results are as they are embargoed, so get your Daily Post tomorrow to find out.
We will also be telling how chief constable Richard Brunstrom has decided to launch his own blog.
Wonder where he got a bright idea like that from?


 

July 17, 2006

The elusive splash

It's been a tricky day so far. Our best bet for the front page tomorrow has a few problems. The chief character in the story is proving elusive - the main problem is that we haven't been able to confront him with a series of allegations about his work (and we want his photo). So that's off to the back burner for now. Can't say who he is - let's just leave it at this...an important public servant with a key role to play in the legal process.
One story we are giving more and more space to is the weather. And that's because the weather men are scouring record books to see if this is going to be one of the hottest weeks on record in North Wales. The news desk has told me that it is heading to 34c (93 degrees in old money) which makes Llandudno hotter than the Congo. I have asked to see how we compare with more popular tourist resorts like Benidorm.
I'll tell you what isn't hot. The Irish Sea. As promised in my last blog, I headed to Anglesey this weekend and charged into the water near Rhosneigr. A few seconds later I was charging out again, screaming for coffee and a hot water bottle.
I also fulfilled my pledge to get out on my bike. What I hadn't realised when I purchased my lovely new racer was that it came with a magic cloak of invisibility. Cycling along the front at Colwyn Bay was like wandering through a minefield. For goodness sake, I am 14 stone and ride in a bright blue shirt and shorts, a red helmet and silver cycling shoes - how can you NOT see me!
That's all for now - drink plenty of water, keep an eye on elderly neighbours and don't leave dogs in the car.


 

July 14, 2006

Good News Three

No I haven't abandoned the blog - I've been away. A fantastic weekend in London with Mrs I followed by week locked in a training room learning how to operate our new production system.
It's a fabulous piece of kit that will enable us to design a great looking Daily Post every day. It's called GN3 - short for Good News 3, the third version of a system designed by an Italian software company called Tera. GN3 also allows us to automatically upload content onto the web - and it gives us an easily searchable archive of words, images, full pages plus (eventually) audio and video.
But all new systems take a bit of getting used to so if the occasional odd thing pops up in the paper, put it down to a steep learning curve.
I had a real treat on Tuesday when those nice people from Scottish Power invited me to Venue Cymru to see the Welsh National Opera's production of Tosca. What a fabulous night!. It's great that this Cardiff-based opera company are such regular visitors. We met some of the cast afterwards who said that coming to Llandudno is always one of the highlights of their season.
A glorious weekend beckons so I will be dragging my fat ass onto my bike for a ride around the Conwy Valley - and if Sunday is sunny I am determined to have a swim in the sea off Anglesey.
Isn't North Wales a superb place to live?


 

July 3, 2006

If you can't stand the heat...

Today is a first.
Never before have I edited a newspaper wearing sandals (I do have to point out of course that, being British, I am wearing socks as well).
For those of you who log in from further afield, let me tell you that North Wales feels more like Malaysia today. Absolutely sweltering! We had a huge electrical storm last night which our dog Max was not very impressed with. I woke up at 4am with the distinct feeling that a collie cross trembling with fear was sitting on my head - another first.
I had a visit today from the delightful Sarah Kearsley-Wooller from Hope House/Ty Gobaith. We are very keen to run some events with the children's hospices in September, tapping into our new capacity to carry video on our websites. And we also discussed our plans for the 1,000 voices concert in December (a BIG name star will be announced in due course). We are so pleased to continue our association with this tremendously worthy cause.
But there was disappointment today too because a youth cricket event we support at Colwyn Bay cricket club was cancelled because of the storms. A real shame for the youngsters.
Design editor Brian Howes and some of the subs will start their training on our new computer system tomorrow. It's a great leap forward from our current technology but there are a few scary weeks ahead as we re-train and move across.
We will end up with a much better system that can be accessed remotely via the web, meaning in theory that I could design tomorrow's front page while lying in bed. Although I'm not sure if the wife would be impressed (or Max).


 

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Hello, I'm Rob Irvine, editor of the best -selling newspaper in North Wales - the Daily Post. I reckon mine is one of the best jobs in newspapers - editing a paper with an incredible history, with fantastically loyal readers. And I get to live in one of the most beautiful places on earth with wife Julie and our dog Max. I'll tell you in this blog about life at the Daily Post office in Llandudno Junction together with some s

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