So yesterday I finally got around to directly comparing the two new tabloid newspapers aimed at, ostensibly, me. The Tribune spent a lot of time and money on research and strategy for their Red Eye, while the Sun-Times, once they learned of the Trib's efforts, threw together Red Streak. Both are aimed at the 18-34 demographic, which is one that apparently doesn't care much for newspapers in general.

The verdict? For all their effort, Red Eye completely misses the mark. Their idea of how to appeal to younger readers is all style and no substance, with "attitude" being reflected in wire service stories topped with wise-cracking headlines. It's the same poor packaging that hurts their daily e-mails as well. There's startlingly little in the way of original content in the paper, which is counterintuitive when you consider that they're trying to market a younger "voice." The paper has no voice, really. There is some editorial direction, however, in the choice of news, which is pretty revealing as a point of differentiation between the two.

With one of the objectives of both papers being to distill the day's news into smaller, more easily digestible nuggets, choosing what to include and what to feature becomes paramount. Red Eye comes across as much more heavy-handed, in that it seems to be saying "this is what you should be interested in." No surprise, given the amount of research they did trying to figure that out. However, it feels like an overzealous parent trying to connect to their kid, which isn't really a surprise, either. Case in point is yesterday's front page, an alarmist take on unemployment in Chicago, something any Baby Boomer parent with grown kids in Chicago is no doubt alarmed by. Much more so than the kids themselves. Red Streak, on the other hand, led with the same story that fronted the Sun-Times, which illustrates a point that I don't think Red Eye gets. It's my experience that people my age don't want to be pandered to, or explicitly marketed to. What Red Streak seems much better at doing is just laying out the news without overtly marketing the news to this audience, which makes it a much easier, and much more pleasant, read. The other important thing is that they've incorporated some columnists that actually give the paper the kind of irreverant voice that Red Eye is arbitrarily trying to ascribe to theirs. I've already mentioned to a Trib staffer that I'd be happy to take a crack at being the cranky page 2 columnist that is able to deliver that attitude, but we'll have to wait and see how that pans out.

In other news, the excessive blurriness and squinting I've been experiencing lately with my contact lenses is apparently due to some mild inflammation of my corneas. For the life of me, I can't figure out what might be causing it. My optometrist said stress could be a factor, but while I've felt pretty blasé about mostly everything for the last week or two, I haven't felt stressed out or anything. I've ascribed some problems to the dryness in the air, as mentioned previously in this space, but that doesn't solve the issue entirely, either. The only other thing I can think of is that I started using an allegedly non-allergenic artificial sweetener (Splenda) in my coffee in the mornings. It wouldn't surprise me if the FDA completely missed the boat on something, but that's a pretty big accusation to make. The good news is that it's not serious, and with some anti-inflammatory eye drops and a break from wearing contacts, should go away. At least I desperatly hope it goes away, otherwise there will be an obvious source of stress in my life.