Category: Journalism

As credentialed media for the 2026 Detroit Auto Show (formerly known as the North America International Auto Show), I received a pitch from The Ford Motor Company to cover a number of its presentations planned for preview days. Among these was its “Mobile Service Unit” offering.

With that, I approached Editor Emeritus Rosemary Otzman about my writing a feature article with a tie to local dealership Atchinson Ford. This ran as a cover feature with photograph in the January 22, 2026 print edition of The Belleville – Area Independent.

• “Detroit Auto Show shows how to back drivers wherever they go“

It largely ran as submitted. The most notable exception was a context reference viz floor space concurrently occupied by General Motors in Cobo Center — today known as Huntington Place. (I happily confess an inclination to reference any among myriad connections to Willow Run wherever arguably relevant in hyperlocal media.)

I also proposed the headline, “Detroit Auto Show reflects need to back drivers wherever they may go” for this. As every shoe-leather reporter knows well, writers don’t write their own headlines.

via Internet Archive—

When I started out pitching articles for print publication in the 1980s, there were commonly at least three contending types serving any given demographic.

The clear leader. The second on its heals. Then some periodical running clean-up. My first run was always at the top book. Readership didn’t anoint this position easily, editors guarded the brand that kept ’em there jealously. But the payoff was a peerless credential. Someone reads you there, and they know you’ve been vetted, edited, and confirmed ten-ways-to-Tuesday.

Twenty-some years later now, I still prefer hardcopy periodicals to electronic format for my most important communications. The former is in trouble of course; many going dorsal-fin down, others transitioning to online. I guess they couldn’t leverage their differential advantage of credibility — if, in fact, they even realized they held that key at all. Me-too managers and committed bean-counters seldom look for such things.

Be that as it may, now that those who’ve fled to the Internet are here, translating the trust of ink-on-paper is their challenge. Cut-and-pasters chip away at intellectual property protection. Expectations of “dialogue” portend message re-direction concerns (admittedly salted on occasion with nuggets of serendipitous good). Publishers long for the days when a part-time ombudsman fielded complaints and letters to the editor were handled space-permitting. A “get it posted,” if not “get it first” mentality has largely replaced “get it right” here. Material and mailing cost savings are eaten up by increased speed and quality control demands.

Still, it’s my contention that true thought-leaders will emerge here, too. They may not be print veterans. But they will have distinguished themselves by clarity of purpose, consistency of output, and reliable output schedules. Oh, yeah: And largely bullet-proof credibility (coupled with a rapid-response system for admitting and correcting the inevitable faux pas or outright screw-up).

In a word, it’s still “branding” as we in marketing have always known it.

It simply remains to be seen who will emerge as the web equivalent of our favorite obsoleting media. But the criteria by which that position will be objectively understood is not in doubt.

via Internet Archive—

This was quite an event in 1985 when I captured the image below on film at the Ann Arbor Municipal Airport.

• Linked image: “Goodyear and Fuji Tape Blimps” [2834 x 2244 (8×10 aspect ratio)] at 2.27mb, black and white (Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1985)

It’s not likely you’ve ever seen a Goodyear Blimp moored at any airport with a competitor’s airship.

According to what I was told on site at the time of this photograph, it’s not their policy. They spend a great deal of money to keep this fleet in the air for promotions, and they feel that setting down with other lighter-than-air vessels dilutes that investment.

In this case, however, Airship Industries, which licensed graphics on the blimp in this photograph to Fuji Tape, experienced one or more mechanical problems that necessitated an unscheduled landing here at the Ann Arbor Municipal Airport.

Pre-9/11, residents were freely permitted onto the field with the ground crews, 24/7. So I’d head out there late at night and ask questions among the few people similarly braving the dark in candor. The Airship Industries crew was a bit more vocal than the Goodyear technicians, talking expansively about their “superior technology.”

Internal engines driving external propellers via drive shafts; that’s how they did it. As opposed to the Goodyear use of two completely external drive engines.

So I took that information over to one of the Goodyear crew and challenged him with the “superior technology” claims. He shrugged his shoulders and responded with only two words.

“We’re flying.”

Emphasis on the “we.” And fly they did. While I can’t speak to motives, you’ll note from my photograph that the Goodyear Blimp seems to be buzzing the Fuji Tape airship, tauntingly.

On the day I made this image, I was on the field with a Speed Graphic press camera, loaded with 120 Tri-X (black and white) film. My intent was to capture some higher-resolution shots of the Goodyear Blimp in-flight, at a distance, with good options for making enlargements. I was just setting up when this opportunity came upon me, so to speak.

Yeah, I heard some yelling. But as you can see from the ground crew headed for the mooring lines, there were a lot of folks running around.

So it was a complete surprise when some of Ann Arbor’s finest knocked me to the ground — for reasons that still escape me.

PS: I didn’t drop the camera.