Following up with his report on the DC Nation panel, Tucker Stone reports on the Harvey Awards and offers a more rounded view of the Baltimore Con itself, focusing at one point on this particular incident:
Sitting in the hallway was Mr. Brady, preparing what is probably the most inclusive report on the 90 minute panel, when Dan Didio walked by him, turned, and asked if Mr. Brady was interested in getting lunch. The request was turned down, as Mr. Brady wanted to finish typing up his panel report. I was pretty taken aback—make no mistake, I was standing between the two when they had the back and forth, so it’s not like I was sneakily eavesdropping—but wouldn’t the readers of Newsarama, a vocal group of super-hero comics fans, prefer for the head of the website to take any and every opportunity to sit down with the Senior Vice President of DC Comics, even if it’s for an informal conversation? Wouldn’t that be something far more interesting, rifer with quotable moments, than anything that came out of what the DC Nation panel had provided? I’ve got nothing against Newsarama, and I happen to quite like some of what the Blog portion of the site provides—but I couldn’t help but see this little random moment, a random moment I literally walked into solely because my wife was in the bathroom, as a terrible error in judgment, and one that I still find markedly absurd.
In Brady’s defense, and as someone who works in a newsroom, when you’re on deadline, you’re ON DEADLINE and everything else has to take a back seat. I’m sure a lot of Newsarama readers wanted to know about the DC Nation panel there and then, and he was no doubt feeling the pressure. And it’s very doubtful that, had he accepted the lunch offer, DiDio would have offered anything revealing that could have been on the record. Still, Tucker’s larger point — that in covering cons and comic-related events journalists need to not lose sight of the potentially better story when covering the more familiar one — is I think well worth bearing in mind.
October 2nd, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Psst! I’m Dan Didio.
October 2nd, 2008 at 2:38 pm
Good lord.
October 2nd, 2008 at 2:44 pm
I think there’s a really good conversation to be had in how comics news sites encourage this kind of “up to the MINUTE!” reporting that comics as an industry really doesn’t need at all.
I mean, when you have two (or six, or eight) sites all scrambling to report on how Green Lantern is going to have new magical white lanterns in an issue that comes out in eight months… you have to kinda wonder what the point is. Why does that need Headline News reporting? Why not get the info, do some legwork, and then give us a whole piece on it?
Personal pet peeve, I guess. Congrats on Tucker writing some of the most interesting con reports I’ve read in ages, if only because they are different from 99% of con reports. Good show.
October 2nd, 2008 at 2:54 pm
I say thee, Nay!
Fast, up to the minute reporting on books and movies next year is most imperative!
All bitching and moaning time must be maximized and for this, Matt Brady, I do thank thee.
October 2nd, 2008 at 3:07 pm
Nuthin’ wrong with NEWSARAMA except the nonks who hang around the message boards.
October 2nd, 2008 at 3:23 pm
Sounds like someone is jealous.
October 2nd, 2008 at 3:25 pm
How did you know I was jealous of Tucker Stone?
October 2nd, 2008 at 3:26 pm
NO, I would rather have my panel updates AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, preferably BEFORE THE PANEL STARTS.
October 2nd, 2008 at 3:49 pm
I believe Brady turned DiDio down because he has had lunch with him before and knows from personal experience that DiDio only eats live kittens, puppies and ducklings, and who wants to sit through that?
October 2nd, 2008 at 3:59 pm
Maybe Matt just ate.
Maybe he was in fact really busy.
Maybe Dan was wearing cologne that made his head swimmy.
Maybe Matt doesn’t like eating with people he’s not friends with.
Maybe Tucker should’ve pounced on the opportunity to ask Dan to lunch. Why not let his website get the scoop?
Maybe Matt doesn’t spend enough time at home making sure that Newsarama is doing the best job it can. Maybe there should be an in-depth study of his habits at home to make sure he’s not depriving the Newsarama faithful of up to the minute coverage and “scoops.” I mean, how often is Matt emailing Dan? Is it enough times? What about Joe Quesdada? Has he broken bread with him recently? Did he call Joe on his birthday?
I demand a senate oversight committee to make sure that our Nedwsarama tax dollars are being spent effectively. How many more lives and dollars are we going to spend on the quagmire that is “panel reports?” Sure, we had intelligence that stated that there were going to be exclusives announced at that panel, but there weren’t any! Who is responsible for this?
I think this Newsarama administration has a duty to its constituents to explain this shocking, *shocking* turn of events.
October 2nd, 2008 at 4:10 pm
There’s a vast difference between “Do you want to have lunch?” and “Do you want to have lunch, where I will tell you many secrets about DC Comics!” This is much ado about nothing — a casual observation from someone who doesn’t really understand how access/release of information works in comics, or in online comics journalism. There was no “terrible error in judgment,” nor any missed opportunity. Move along, nothing to see here…
October 2nd, 2008 at 4:45 pm
I think Didio got Brady confused with someone else.
October 2nd, 2008 at 5:29 pm
Do we really need that kind of garbage blog articles on a great site like this ? Wow.
October 2nd, 2008 at 5:41 pm
Terrible, terrible error in judgment. Brady had a chance to poison DiDio’s soup, which would have made Brady the most popular guy on the internet.
October 2nd, 2008 at 5:49 pm
@Eric:
Agreed, God Chris why don’t you just SLEEP with Tucker Stone? You’re currently obsessing about him.
October 2nd, 2008 at 6:57 pm
I’m telling their respective wives!
October 2nd, 2008 at 7:03 pm
I think it makes him less bias in his reporting if he’s not chatty-casual lunching it with the big wigs, right? I actually see him turning down lunch as a positive. Plus, Imaginova owns Newsarama, Brady has to keep them happy, deadlines and competition with other sites on panel reporting speed means more now, I’d assume.
October 2nd, 2008 at 7:38 pm
REMftw: You’re probably not going to like this Sunday’s Critic column then …
October 2nd, 2008 at 7:52 pm
There was no error in judgment; it was a fair use of judgment. I might have gone the other way, but then again, I’m not Matt Brady. DC comes and worships at his altar, the same way they did for Wizard in the 1990s, and so it’s not like he was going to lose a story from saying no. If DC wanted to say something to Newsarama, there’s plenty of opportunity to do so, and DiDio isn’t the kind of guy to take a “no” personally, I don’t think. A less well-known reporter might have needed the off-the-record stuff to keep abreast, or wanted to develop a relationship with DiDio, but Matt’s stature is pretty well established and he needed neither.
October 2nd, 2008 at 8:22 pm
Chris, if Sunday’s column is Chris/Tucker slash fiction, I will paypal you an entire dollar.
October 3rd, 2008 at 2:15 am
What an absolutely ridiculous post.
I shared a hotel room with Matt in San Diego for Comic Con this past July–and I never saw the guy! He was in his room–working at the absolute crack of 430AM–a mere 5.5 hours before the floor opened up…or he was dead asleep from overdosing on 6 Hour Energy supplements to keep up with the breakneck pace of his whip-cracking on the rest of the crew covering the panels.
Matt Brady works hard–like his life depends on it. I think he can be forgiven for not going to lunch with Dan Didio one time.
Sensationalist garbage.
October 3rd, 2008 at 4:12 am
I don’t think I want to read Chris Tucker slashfic
October 3rd, 2008 at 4:35 am
What would have been reported that Dan would have slipped that Matt could have reported?
“HEADLINE!
Dan Didio likes soup sans crackers!
Occasionally partakes in desserts, but only during dinner! None had today!
Dan Didio has horrible table manners and places elbows on the table!”
October 3rd, 2008 at 9:10 am
I bet Dan was going to reveal that DC and Marvel were merging, and that Amazing Spider-Man would now be published 7 times a month, and that the “big bad” behind Final Crisis is going to turn out to be Mephisto. Dissed by Brady, now the world will never know.
October 3rd, 2008 at 1:04 pm
Speaking of ridiculous posts—
anything by Steve Ekstrom.