Eugene Weekly : Coverstory : 10.25.07


BEST OF EUGENE 2007: Tightrope Walkers and Trapeze Artists | Sex, Drugs and Rock n Roll |Eat Freaks | The Incredible Shrinking Wallet | Sights, Sounds, Scribbles Everything Else Under the Big Top | Trap Door | We’re So Vain | Staff Picks | Best of the Ballots

 

We’re So Vain

BEST THING ABOUT EUGENE WEEKLY

1. Calendar/listings
2. It’s free
3. Savage Love

 

WORST THING ABOUT EUGENE WEEKLY

1. Too biased/liberal
2. Nothing
3. Letters to the editor

Did Pandora have a box of chocolates? That would be EW. You never know what sweet and bitter morsels you will get when you open our tasty pages. Our readers both cherish and despise us, sometimes in the same breath, and for unfathomable reasons they keep picking us up. Below, we’ve compiled some of the best responses to these two questions – paired together to illustrate the apparent love/hate relationship readers have with the same aspects of the paper.

BEST   WORST
DELIGHTFUL, INSIGHTFUL IRREVERANCE.   The way you guys try to pretend Eugene is an interesting place to live.
Movie reviews.   Movie review is shnobby.
Free and covers everything. WE LOVE YOU!!!   It doesn’t come with a cup of coffee.
Sticking to your guns and keeping the Savage Love column.   Savage Love is horrible … but worth reading.
They let us decide stuff like this.   Non-scientific Best of Eugene surveys.
You tell it like it is with no bullshit added for extra flavor.   Unnecessary foul language.
It lends an alternative voice to the community.   It doesn’t practice an alternative commitment.
When it has lots of hippie related things that you can’t find in the mainstream, and that it covers local issues.   Panders to the psychedelic hippie baby boomers too much.
People’s opinions. It’s hilarious.   Whiny, uptight readers who can’t handle that humans are sexual creatures (and that some humans are a little bit strange).
I Saw You (“I Stalk You”s).   No one ever sees me in the “I Saw You”s.
Unbiased opinion.   It’s so liberal it’s sickening. Can’t you have some sort of balance?
YOU ROCK COCK!!!!!   Not good for soaking up spilled beer.
You’re starting to loosen up a little, but still are avoiding sounding like The Portland Mercury — that’s good!   Too PC (get a hint from The Portland Mercury). 
Review of films and gallery installations.   The writing, especially the reviews.
Snark.   Snark.
Nothing. Worst weekly paper I have ever seen. It’s like you follow a liberal mold for how to write a boring, left-wing window cleaner. Oh, the best thing is using it to light my fireplace.   None, you guys rock!  
EW is in touch with Eugeneans.   It’s a vehicle for Eugene’s insular self-satisfaction.
The hot editors.   Not enough hot editors.
The cover graphics have improved.   Pictures of hippies.
Green Scare coverage.   Country Fair coverage.
The staff cares and it shows.   Self-righteous mean-spirited hippie folk, not super cool friendly hippie folk.
Black and white journalism.   Yellow journalism.
Angry liberals.   Angry illogical liberals.
Most everything is good — good local coverage, political and arts … it’s all good.   It’s kind of clichéd and dumb.
Voice for many different kinds of people (not just super-trendy, hipster types).   Sometimes seems exclusively written by aging hippies.
Attitude.   Smug nature.
Often authentically original voice for difference and intelligence.   Oh-so-cutsey weekly columnists.
Coverage of city government.   Alan Pittman aka “the Oracle of Doom.”
Way better than The Register Guard!   It’s not as cool as it was back in the What’s Happening days…
Open mindedness.   Folkie imperialism.
You guys are so hip and fun!!   Thinks it’s trendier than it is.
Covers what the Guard won’t.   Right-wing propaganda.
Special features — writing and background are outstanding.   It serves a city that’s stupid enough to try to create a downtown with a population of three.
Original thought.   Lack of intellectual rigor.
Heavily supports local music.   Needs to feature more local music.
Everything is best.   Not enough smut!