Winning Ways
TechNews Best Practices Awards Winners Set Examples
"Sounds
like my job just got a little easier," says one recipient of the
2001 TechNews Best Practices Awards, and from patent-pending products
to how-to-guides, each winning entry helped do just that.
By innovation or by example, this year’s honorees also offer food for thought for the industry as a whole.
- Rather than handle World Wide Web production with a generic content-management system, Dallas-based Belo Interactive built one of its own. VelocIT, as it’s called, pulls feeds from proprietary front-ends and converts them into a variety of multimedia formats. It soon will be in place at all 22 of the company’s Web sites.
- The Times of Shreveport, La., consolidated a host of reports produced by different production departments into a single Microsoft Access database, making it easy to slice and dice a wide range of business and production data in ways never before imagined.
- As it shifted production to a remote facility and boosted the number of electronically produced pages, The Dallas Morning News looked for ways to keep production on track. A home-grown, intranet-based solution known as PageTracker offers up-to-the-minute details from any computer.
- Like many papers, the Austin American Statesman struggled through what its staffers jokingly call the "dark ages" of receiving digital ads. Rather than rest on its laurels, it developed a series of guides that help its advertisers follow ad-submission procedures and backs them up with a wide range of support.
- At The Intelligencer Record in Doylestown, Pa., Tom Newman designed a device to hold a press folder-knife assembly stationary. This seemingly simple gadget, now patent pending, allows more precise alignment, shaves setup time and allows up to 60 million cuts per blade.
- Striving to improve a range of circulation activities, staffers at the Atlanta Journal and Constitution found the solution right in their Palm. Now handheld devices drive a variety of circulation innovations, ranging from more efficient door-to-door sales and special-market coverage delivery to single-copy management and, perhaps someday, address-specific delivery.
- When The Miami Herald decided to get serious about recycling and reducing waste, little did anyone know the project would net nearly $1 million in savings a year. Having found ways to recover much of the plant’s paper waste, team members Alicia L. Beceña and Harry G. Phelps now are focusing on wood pallets, oil filters and chemicals. They even won the Herald a tax break by switching refrigerants.
This marks the fifth time the TechNews Best Practices Awards have been presented. Some 29 teams of operations staffers have now received the award, which is bestowed by TechNews’ board of contributing editors from NAA’s technology group.
This year’s winning teams each will receive $1,000 and a plaque at NAA’s Newspaper Operations SuperConference in Orlando–and, in return, hopefully give others in the industry innovative ideas of their own.
New Media Award
Editorial Award
Business Award
Pre-Press Award
Press & Materials Award
Packaging & Distribution Award
Environmental, Health & Safety Award
Sources
- Ed Baer, Atlanta Journal and Constitution, 72 Marietta St. NW, Atlanta, Ga. 30303. E-mail, ebaer@ajc.com; phone, (404) 526-5104; fax, (404) 526-7050.
- Alicia L. Beceña, The Miami Herald, 1 Herald Plaza, Miami, Fla. 33132. E-mail, abecena@herald.com; phone, (305) 376-2879; fax, (305) 376-2094.
- Gary Brockman, Atlanta Journal and Constitution, 72 Marietta St. NW, Atlanta, Ga. 30303, phone, (404) 526-7654; fax, (404) 526-7050.
- Olivia Casey, Belo Interactive, 14 Jackson St., Suite 1025, Dallas, Texas 75202. E-mail, olivia.casey@belointeractive.com; phone, (214) 977-7987; fax, (214) 977-4074.
- Sheryl Cole, The Times, 222 Lake St., Shreveport, La. 71130. E-mail, scole@shrevepo.gannett.com; phone, (318) 459-3394; fax, (318) 459-3301.
- Rox Anne Lee, Austin American-Statesman, 305 S. Congress Ave., Austin, Texas 78704. E-mail, rlee@statesman.com; phone, (512) 912-2994; fax, (512) 445-3557.
- Daniel Meyer, The Dallas Morning News, Communications Center, Box 655237, Dallas, Texas 75265, (214) 977-2958; fax, (214) 977-8168.
- Tom Newman, The Intelligencer Record, 333 N. Broad St., Doylestown, Pa. 18901. E-mail, tnewman@calkinsnewspapers.com; phone, (215) 345-3043; fax, (215) 345-3150.