Imitation is the highest form of flattery, they say, so we’re not all that upset that one of our esteemed competitors has appropriated an idea of ours (which we ourselves had appropriated). This kind of thing happens periodically—it is one of the conventions of publishing a periodical. Depending on your frequency, the institutional memory is wiped clean daily, weekly, or monthly. The deep desire for novelty is both fed and mitigated by an impulse to steal good ideas from your competition.
What we continue to be irritated about, though, is the morally indefensible position of doing so little with so much. We don’t normally like to mention names, but here we go. Here’s what we mean: We happened to be having a cocktail a few weeks ago over at the US Bank building when we noticed that MSP’s director of advertising sales, Pat Matthews, was being feted in honor of her retirement. Now one would think that twenty-five years of service in building the powerhouse publishing empire of MSP Communications would be worth quite a lot. Indeed, in the present issue of their flagship publication, MSP crows, “We sell more ads each year than almost any other city or regional magazine in the country.” Surely much of that success is owed to the redoubtable Ms. Matthews.
We felt a warm feeling of vicarious pride—plus we were thirsty—so we asked the bartender for a glass of the same bubbly the MSP crowd appeared to be having to toast Ms. Matthews. “Same as them!” we said with a leer. Our bartender smiled and said, “Are you sure?” We said, “Don’t make us ask twice—and damn the cost.”
He brought a glass of sparkling apple juice, and said one was the limit—if Mr. Deep Pockets was buying, anyway.
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