It was also supposedly the first time a newspaper allowed 'civilians' into the heart of its operation and let them put together pages. Ritchie said the broadcast and the visit by VIP guests was the paper's first in a number of client outreach events.
The 702's technical team and producers worked with The Star's technicians and Telkom to install four ISDN phone and data lines in record time, while Saturday Star media and marketing editor, Brendan Seery (whose brainchild the event was) helped set up various interviews for the 702 show.
While O'Sullivan's broadcast was kicking off, the VIP guests were being immersed in the hectic experience of producing a newspaper on deadline. They were The Jupiter Drawing Room's Graham Warsop, Thebe Ikalefeng from Brand Leadership, ad guru Andy Rice, Neo Mashigo (executive creative director at Draftfcb), Gordon Patterson from Starcom, Tim Hendon from General Motors, Irvan Damon from Carbon Track, Amanda Hardy from Flight Centre and Cheryl Hunter from Chimera Communications.
After sitting in on the final news diary conference of the day with Ritchie and his reporters, the group was given a tour of the building and shown the massive printing presses, which are at the core of the operation.
Then, after a briefing by Seery on the basics of the computer system, the visitors were divided into groups of two and giving specific "copy tasting" assignments for the world news section. Warsop and Hardy trawled the news wires for light stories, Hendon and Damon compiled the briefs, Mashigo and Hunter looked to the lead story and second lead while Patterson and Rice went through the AP and Reuter's picture feeds to select images - all done to deadline.
O'Sullivan interviewed Seery and Ritchie, as well as sports editor Mark Beer and had an interesting conversation with Makhudu Sefara, the editor-designate of The Star, who will be taking the reins of the paper on 1 March 2012.
The event also tied in with the 125th anniversary celebrations of the newspaper and was aimed, said Seery "at showing people that, all the propaganda notwithstanding, newspapers are far from dead and are still a fascinating and sexy medium, as well as an effective advertising vehicle.
O'Sullivan, his team and the other guests later enjoyed supper with some of Independent Newspapers' senior executives, including CEO Tony Howard and group editorial director Moegsien Williams.
Ritchie remarked, "To be honest, in the beginning I thought that inviting an entire team of outsiders into the newsroom on deadline on a Friday night was insanity and utterly stupid. Get O'Sullivan to set up a makeshift studio three metres from the managing editor's office and broadcast his entire drive time show live - shoot me now. Actually, in the end, it was incredible.
"Putting a paper to bed is very special. It is intimate, fraught with tension, last minute micro crises and narrowly avoided mega disasters. On the Saturday Star, almost the entire team stays back almost to the very end, even though as reporters and photographers their work is long done - it is that kind of paper. This is why it is difficult to let strangers in and yet, when the group is chosen correctly, when these are people who love newspapers as much as we love producing them - it just sharpens your own excitement.
"I was one of the sceptics before Friday night, now I'm a convert. There is a place for new media, but there is no substitute for the excitement of being part of producing the printed word on what is still the world's best FMCG, the newspaper. It's great to be able to share that, to evangelise that, with others."
For more:
