Anniversaries are times when people generally say nice things about others. An anniversary in the media is a time when we say nice things about ourselves.
The Silver Jubilee of the new SUNDAY TIMES (the old Times Group was begun in 1864 but folded up in 1978) is celebrated following a rather tumultuous period in every aspect. Technology has changed radically.
The Internet even hadn’t arrived in our newsrooms back in 1987. Personal computers and mobile phones made their entries during this period. Fax machines and typewriters became museum pieces. Online editions came into the scene as the old hot metal rotary printing machines and paste-up artists went into oblivion.
Through it all, the newspaper has won, and retained, a substantial share of the market. Circulation and readership figures – and credibility, the ultimate tests of a good newspaper have remained healthy and steady over a very long period of time. For this, one must also thank those who worked with us over the years in building up the Sunday Times; some of them have passed away, others moved on but they worked with dedication to help this newspaper rise, and we remember them all.
To use a fashionable term in modern days, ‘Team Sunday Times’, has prioritised professionalism as the key element in their work. Many have been the slips; to err is human, but strenuous is the effort to remain steadfastly committed to a free press amidst the threats, covert and overt. We have had our share of trials and tribulations, about which you will read inside.
Coinciding with the occasion, Team Sunday Times is launching a ‘Style Book’ on Journalism which is an essential guide for journalists and professional writers.
With the keen eye of a benign publisher watching over, this newspaper will endeavour to be what it has always promised to be – a family paper – the Sunday paper of our times.
My own task at the helm of editorial Team Sunday Times has been made so much easier thanks to the efficiency and commitment to duty of my desk heads. I could always sleep easy in the comfort that the pages were in safe, dedicated hands.
Sinha Ratnatunga
Editor
June 3, 2012 |
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