Out of the Picture

THAT Graeme Wood, the Global Mail’s sugar daddy, has more money than sense should by now be obvious to all, even allowing for the $1.7 million he has poured into the Greens. Somewhere north of 10 per cent of Australians believe Old Mother Milne to be sane, so it cannot be said that his political enthusiasms represent one of the rarer forms of madness. As an aspiring media proprietor, however, well he’s out there on the far borders of derangement.

Everyone – no, make that the few – who have visited his vanity press will know that, unlike the printed page or your standard web site, the Global Mail’s display moves sideways and is very annoying to read. Take for an example the work of youngster Joel Tozer, who has extruded this log of words about a chubby matron in leather trousers who enjoys sex with young men and is keen to turn a dollar on open-source porn. Why she should invest entrepreneurial effort in such a project is a mystery, given that there are many and much easier ways to line the pocket -- like calling Mr Wood, praising mung beans and asking for a spare million-or-so. He gives it away quite freely, so why should a slutty sixtysomething be denied? And if the mung beans prove an insufficient inducement, a stated preference for doing it sideways would certainly produce a cheque in the first post.

But enough of Wood’s money, for it is Tozer who is the real object of wonder. On Saturday, the intrepid cub journeyed to Sydney’s Hyde Park, where many sons of the Prophet were a’bristle with more than their usual quota of inchoate resentments. Tozer pulled out his little camera and snapped some pictures, one of which is below. Yes, that’s the one, the happy family shot of that junior jihadi and his sibling being prepared for a life of good, old fashioned, multicultural intolerance.

What a scoop, you might think. How thrilled Tozer must have been as he dialled the Global Mail office and screamed, “Hold the sideways slide, sweetheart. Do I have a picture for you!”

Except he didn’t. Tozer published the picture on Twitter and has yet to write a single word on the site of what he witnessed. There’s one of your up-and-coming quality journalists for you! Meanwhile, Tozer’s picture has gone around the world and the poor boy has been reduced to asking that more competent media organisations seek his permission to reproduce it. One gathers few have bothered.

Any other media boss would have been miffed. That picture might have been syndicated, bringing in royalties and re-print fees and boosting the Global Mail’s profile with people other than Fairfax refugees who have heard that the proprietor is a soft touch and will hire pretty much anyone with a yen for hot Green action and Old Mother Milne.

The sexygenarian in the leather trousers should look into that scenario. Now that Wood has played about with the written word, a move into non-profit movie production is quite likely the next step. What a pity Sideways has already been released.