{"id":81686,"date":"2015-10-15T08:33:53","date_gmt":"2015-10-15T08:33:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/?p=81686"},"modified":"2015-10-15T08:33:53","modified_gmt":"2015-10-15T08:33:53","slug":"journalist-spotlight-marc-walker-daily-star-sunday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/blog\/journalist-spotlight-marc-walker-daily-star-sunday\/","title":{"rendered":"Journalist Spotlight: Marc Walker, Daily Star Sunday"},"content":{"rendered":"

Marc Walker<\/a> has been appointed\u00a0deputy news editor at the Daily Star Sunday. Marc gives us an insight into life working on a Sunday newspaper, the buzz of a scandal, the pressure to deliver exclusives and passing the \u2018pub test\u2019 with news stories.<\/strong><\/p>\n

How are you settling into your role as deputy news editor at the Daily Star\u00a0Sunday? What does a typical working day mean for you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I have been in the job a few weeks now and feel right at home!<\/p>\n

On a typical day, if I\u2019m in the office, I provide support on the news desk, helping to put copy into the system and monitoring the news wires. We have a relatively small team so I also quite often work as a reporter out on the road, following up leads and self-generating stories.<\/p>\n

But when the news editor is off, I\u2019m thrust into the hot seat, overseeing the reporters and liaising with all our freelancers in the UK and overseas. My duties include putting together the news list, holding conference, sticking all the copy into the system and working with our lawyers should there be any legal concerns about stories. It\u2019s a challenge as I don\u2019t have a deputy when I\u2019m news editing.<\/p>\n

What do you enjoy the most about your job? What type of stories do you most enjoy covering?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I enjoy news editing, especially on Saturdays when there\u2019s a real buzz in the office, but I\u2019m most at home out on stories. My favourite stories are probably anything that involves a bit of scandal!<\/p>\n

What are some of the more difficult or challenging aspects of your job?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The frustrating aspect of working on a\u00a0Sunday\u00a0newspaper is the risk of your stories appearing in the daily papers before\u00a0Sunday. It\u2019s galling when you have put an awful lot of work into a story, only to be beaten to it by a daily paper.<\/p>\n

As print journalists, we also face the challenge of ever-tightening budgets due to the tough market conditions we work against these days.<\/p>\n

How do you make sure you stay on top of breaking news? How do you make sure to engage your audience?<\/strong><\/p>\n

We rely on our strong contacts and great team of reporters. Because we\u2019re a weekly paper, we have to offer something different to what everyone has read during the week and in the Saturday\u00a0papers. That means exclusives but also staying current and finding new angles and moving on the big stories of that week.<\/p>\n

How big a role does social media have to play in your work? What trends are you noticing?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Social media has obviously made a huge impact on all forms of journalism, including print. For me it\u2019s a gateway to getting in touch with all sorts of people and new contacts that one would never have been able to reach before social media.<\/p>\n

I think it\u2019s become the first port of call for information. Police forces, for example, are tweeting about incidents before putting out press releases or holding press conferences.<\/p>\n

Do you have a good relationship with PRs? What advice would you give to PR professionals?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I work closely with PR people and have great relationships with some of them. Good PR professionals tailor their marketing to the publication and read the papers! It sounds simple but a significant minority just don\u2019t do it. It\u2019s frustrating to be bombarded with releases that are totally inappropriate for the paper. Worse still is to be contacted about something that\u2019s already appeared in your paper. Most PRs are spot on but some get it very wrong.<\/p>\n

What type of press material are you interested in receiving?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Daily Star\u00a0Sunday\u00a0is interested in a wide variety of material but it\u2019s got to be exciting, shocking, funny, wacky or scandalous, or better still, all of those things! I believe in what I call the \u2018pub test\u2019. The best stories are those that transcend people\u2019s gender, class, social standing and so on; those that elicit reactions like: \u2018You\u2019re joking!\u2019 \u2018Did he really do that?\u2019 \u2018That\u2019s absolutely outrageous!\u2019
\n<\/u><\/p>\n

\n

Take 5:<\/u><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

What are your hobbies outside of work?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I enjoy playing snooker and off-road mountain biking but being a dad with a young family I don\u2019t get much of a chance to do either these days! I\u2019m very into real ale and craft beer and when I can I enjoy seeking out new ales in pubs and at beer festivals.<\/p>\n

If you could have dinner with 3 celebrities, alive or dead, who would make up your ideal guest list?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Jack Nicholson, Nelson Mandela and Penelope Cruz<\/p>\n

Who would you like to play you in a film?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Ewan McGregor (I was clutching at straws here!)<\/p>\n

Can you tell us a surprising fact about yourself?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not a surprise to people who know me well but I speak passable Swedish.<\/p>\n

What would you name the autobiography of your life?<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you can dream it, you can do it<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Editorial information on Marc Walker, Daily Star Sunday and thousands of other media contacts, can be found in the\u00a0Vuelio Database<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Marc Walker has been appointed\u00a0deputy news editor at the Daily Star Sunday. Marc gives us an insight into life working on a Sunday newspaper, the buzz of a scandal, the pressure to deliver exclusives and …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":323,"featured_media":81691,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1449],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81686"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/323"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81686"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81686\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/81691"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vuelio.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}