Belgian 3D newspaper, Europe’s first?

According to a BBC report, “a belgian french-language daily has issued what is thought to be Europe’s first 3D newspaper – complete with cardboard viewing glasses.”

Following 3D movie, 3D game, 3D TV, now comes 3D newspaper. How cool is it?

Take a minute or 2 to read through the BBC short article and then come back.

Now let’s talk about something interesting.

THOUGHT TO BE, THE FIRST?

Nothing wrong with this piece except for that “thought to be Europe’s first 3D newspaper”.

Can you use “though to be” in news reporting? Isn’t it your job to check facts in your piece? What do you expect me to get reading your “thought to be”?

Well, I’m sorry, but your “thought-to-be” is wrong.

3Dvison-blog.com says that Polish newspaper Dziennik Baltycki (The Baltic Daily) has done this on 19 May 2005, long before this Belgian newspaper La Dernier Heure did the same thing.

Draftclound put up a lot of photocopies of the Polish newspaper published in 2005. Below is one of them.

Courtesy: Henryk Jursz from DraftClound

The bigger, the better, or the worse?

Another media organization who made the same mistake as BBC is ABC News. They are even bolder than BBC.

A Belgian media group has published Europe’s first 3D newspaper, complete with flip-out cardboard viewing glasses.

Not even BBC’s “thought to be”.

Is everybody wrong on this?

Not newvine.com, for god’s sake. They didn’t say it’s Europe’s first 3D newspaper, or thought to be the first. And their article source is Central Queensland News.

Are media giants like BBC and ABC too big to notice minor aspects in their reporting of minor stuff?

Now I understand why newspaper targeting niched readers can still survive in spite of the austere industry environment.