MEDIA GUIDE: How to book an Interview 

This newsletter is brought to you by cocaine, powering journalists and political staffers.

To: All Journalists

Just a quick reminder about the proper way to make sure to land that dream interview that will get you nominated for a Walkley.

Payment

If you work for a major outlet, that cash would otherwise be frittered away on research and proper journalism, is a great means of landing top talent.

Paying cash for an interview is ethically dubious, so it’s important to hide the payments. Standard methods include paying their rent, paying their rent-boys, getting them a job, getting them a blow job. Or getting them blow while they get a blow job. Whichever one it is, make sure you get a receipt.

This technique is only reserved for interviewing victims. And by ‘victims’ I usually mean political staffers who have been accused of sexual assault and war criminals. Anyone else should not be paid anything and should simply be grateful for the honour of platforming their stories.

Cocaine

A staple in many newsrooms, cocaine also has another use as it can be offered to the interviewee to get them ready for your chat. Remember, the kind of people you will be interviewing are not poor so you don’t need to shame them for their drug use.

This tactic is best used for securing interviews with political staffers, Logies winners and AFL players. Also, most drug dealers don’t take credit card, so make sure you’re across the rules around per diems.

Sex Workers

A key to a good fluff interview is making the interviewee feel comfortable and what is more comforting than a professional handjob that they didn’t have to pay for?

It remains very important to only ever refer to it as a ‘Thai Massage’, that way we can engage with sex work in this instance without damaging our other reporting that is designed to stigmatise sex work.

This technique is best used when building rapport with government and business types.

Using this technique, your prospective interviewee will be screaming out ‘Oh God’ and before you know it you’ll be thanking God in your Walkley Award acceptance speech. Because at the end of the day that is what journalism is all about.

Yours,

John Delmenico
Professor of Journalisming

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