Written Pyramids

The Washington Post needs its teenage readers. It needs its next generation of readers. If they all flee to the blogs and to Twitter. That's probably part of the reason that the paper's style section ran the story: "ONE, TWO, THREEEEEE! The Jonas Brothers Are Taking the Kiddie-Pop Market by Wailstorm." So they its a little condescending--" young and younger girls who act as a sort of early-warning radar for the trio of teen idols"--but it's a little further down that, apparently killed them.

"But the sound that has come to define Nick Jonas (15; the cute one), Joe Jonas (nearly 19; the hot one) and Kevin Jonas (20; the other one) has nothing to do with power chords and sweet vocal harmonies."

Today the Post decided to apologize, sort of.

"The in-box of The Washington Post's pop music critic, J. Freedom du Lac, was reduced to smoldering cinders yesterday, flamed by e-mails from readers angry at his characterization of Kevin Jonas, eldest of the chart-topping Jonas Brothers...

These words caused offense in the Jonas community.

The editors have decided that it's only fair to give the fans their say. Several of the dissenting e-mails are printed below, with unorthodox spelling and punctuation intact.

As for du Lac and his immediate supervisor, they have been chastised severely and ordered to spend the rest of the week reorganizing Bob Woodward's scrapbook."

And so they do. I can't do it justice in describing it, so here's a choice excerpt:

"i was very upset with thing about the jonas brothers part today!...he could be at collage or doing his own thing now! but by helping his brothers this has turned into a HUGE thing!!! i am going to stop now! becoase i am in tears already ! so i hope you get the picture! -- cass."

OK. Let's review. My guess is, that, generally, when a source makes a typo or two (or a dozen) they fix it or paraphrase, because it'd be a little unfair to imply that the source was stupid. But, a look at the intro to this set of e-mails that ran off of the front page of the Style section, says that not only did they want to leave in the typos, they wanted to make sure that everyone was reminded that the people who ran the original Jonas profile wins lots of Pulitzers. Once, they even broke the Watergate scandal. Remember that? "Oh, no, these teens that write in probably don't even know who Bob Woodward is. Ha. Ha. See we're The Washington Post . They're just teenagers. Who have an unhealthy crush on a singer, and who can't even spell 'because.' Ha Ha."

You know, I get annoyed when major papers like the Post and Times run technology and youth vote articles that feel like they are designed to rope in younger readers. I also would go ballistic if I were a news editor who was intructed what to run or not what not to run based on what the readership wants. But you thought the New Yorker came across as snobby? Just read today's Post.