Newsdesigner.com | Green India Ink*

Green India Ink*

1:30 PM, January 27, 2005

Apparently, in India, not only can you buy an ad on the front page, you can frame the front page. Including the nameplate!

Shhh! Don't tell Gannett!

*Update: For the curious, at the bottom of the ad it says "To find out, please see back page." On the back page is an ad for the state-run Oil and Natural Gas Corporation, which you can see here.

Comments

Heads up: After you hit "post" things may be slow and you may get an error. Most likely, your comment did post. Apologies. I'm looking for a fix.

what does the fine print read?

Posted by: nicole at January 27, 2005 3:34 PM

I'm squinting pretty hard to see it, but I think it says: "To find out, please see back page."

Posted by: Nicole at January 27, 2005 3:45 PM

Nicoles, it does say to see the back page, where there's an ad for the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation. I shall update the post.

Posted by: newsdesigner at January 27, 2005 4:05 PM

That's disgusting.

Posted by: Rich at January 27, 2005 6:45 PM

Why doesn't the Times of India still use that little coat of arms they used to have in their nameplate? I believe the Hindu still uses theirs.

Posted by: Andrew Cusack at January 27, 2005 9:57 PM

Sweet Jesus, that's bad.

Posted by: Steve at January 28, 2005 9:12 AM

What's going on? I usually read the Times of India on their free e-paper service (http://epaper.timesofindia.com) and I have not seen anything like this yet -- perhaps this is the New Delhi edition, which I never read. It looks disgusting (but all Indian newspapers are doing odd stuff to increase circulation and revenue -- even sell editorial space.

About the coat of arms, I think The Hindu still uses theirs but the Times of India dumped it about a year ago because they shifted from The New York Times-looking paper to a USA Today-looking newspaper. (My guess more people in India like color and photos than style and content.)

Posted by: F.D.S at January 29, 2005 8:21 AM

Found it: TOI's Jan. 26 Mumbai edition. For the curious people, I have posted files of the front page and the back page at http://sunone.h4web.com/PDF. As you can see they still have a small version of the coat of arms (which used to be on the masthead, much like I.H.T.) in the middle-left above the Quote of the Day.

P.S.: Has anyone heard about The Financial Times's new design? I haven't found an image of PDF but I have a paper copy. Their size has been cut-down to something like the USA Today (it used to be like The N.Y. Times) and they have also cut-down their font-size.

Posted by: F.D.S. at January 29, 2005 8:35 AM

Newspaper business in India is tricky. These papers are practically sold for free. A monthly subscription will cost you around Rs50/mo and since you can 'sell' old newspapers to the local paper recycler, you get almost all the money back at the end of month.

Cant expect much from the owners though, they do crazy things to make money out of the newspaper. I remember they once had a sort of proxy frontpage, carrying one huge ad and the mast head.

Others like The Pioneer have stood out, since they have very limited ad space, and specific content sections.

Posted by: Harsh at January 30, 2005 7:35 PM

Wow, at first glimpse, I thought that was a template. I didn't realize that it was an actual, terrible-looking ad.

Posted by: Ernie Smith at January 31, 2005 9:41 AM

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