Tuesday 3 July 2007

New Daily-Nairobi Star

As I type this, I have just perused the first copy of the latest daily to come out of our pulishers ( I understand this is done by Nation Printing). The paper -Nairobi Star- has the tag that 'Real Life stories everyday'. It will be an evening paper hoping to soothe the minds out of a long day and give some of us who love 'trans-nighting' something to chew on.
The paper is owned by Kiss FM (and Classic FM too) proprietor and frontman Patrick Quarco who said that, 'the paper will driven by the market'. Launched by the Minister of Information and Communications who said that , 'I am happy that this paper is being launched now, as it will encourage the reading culture among the young people', the paper will hope to cut its niche among other dailies more so the Daily Nation and East African Standard which have both existed for more than 40 years ( the latter more than 100).
I have some critique even before I have read all stories. Whoever gave the media the vibe of recycling reporters and article contributors I don't know. I have seen that two old hands in the industry will be making contributions to the paper. True their experience is worth having but again for how long can they contribute ? Again when a journalist is recycled for too long, they tend to loose their flavour and focus.
Of interest to me was the business and sports section. It's refreshing to have the paper commit 6 pages to sports coverage. The only problem is that it is not as incisive as promised.
Another good thing is that they have decided to focus on fringe sports like tennis, volleyball and others which may enjoy low coverage but can be enhanced. This might however overlooked once the mainstream sports return from their summer breaks in August and September in major leagues in Europe and US.
The other issue I have is that there is not enough local sports coverage. Make it interesting and captivating by having such sections as 'retro moments' or 'know your local sports hero'-(please pay if you decide to use your ideas!)
All the same, it's fair that they be given time to get their footing. I will not haze your judgement for the rest of the paper, I'll wish to reserve my comments for a later date.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Having grown up in Msa and been a swimmer, I must express my pride and joy of the achievements....recently.....of the Kenyan swimming Team in Rome;in particular, Sylvia Brunleher (NOT Brunhelmer....as 'The Star' national newspaper recently reported) who is setting records at such a young age..... I'm so happy and excited to see Kenyan-trained swimmers performing so well in the international arena. KEEP IT UP PEOPLE!