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|| SportsShooter.com: Member Message Board
"Lean Dean" Lives Up To Nickname...
Robert Hanashiro, Photographer
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Los Angeles | CA | | Posted: 12:43 AM on 08.24.11 |
->> http://reporter-g.blogspot.com/
"Tuesday, August 23, 2011
BANG goes boom
MediaNews Group announced today that its Bay Area News Group will undergo a major consolidation that will merge 12 newspapers into three and eliminate 120 jobs - 48 of the positions are in the newsroom, KQED reports. When all is finished, BANG will consist of the Mercury News, The Times and East Bay Tribune." |
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Brad Mangin, Photographer
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Pleasanton | CA | USA | Posted: 1:06 AM on 08.24.11 |
->> These clowns are ruining so many lives. They will also be shutting down the Contra Costa Times building on Shadelands Avenue in Walnut Creek where I first interned in 1987.
The scary thing is they still aint done!
To quote Bruce Jenkins: "Awful" |
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Robert Hanashiro, Photographer
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Los Angeles | CA | | Posted: 1:23 AM on 08.24.11 |
->> I wonder what they have in store for their So Cal papers?
(And plans for the Orange County Register which seems to be one of the reasons for rounding up $$$ for that purchase?) |
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Robert Hanashiro, Photographer
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Los Angeles | CA | | Posted: 1:23 AM on 08.24.11 |
| ->> "Awful" is a understatement. |
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Sam Morris, Photographer
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Henderson (Las Vegas) | NV | USA | Posted: 3:42 AM on 08.24.11 |
->> F*******ck.
And we just lost our photo editor today. I'll post to this thread the requirements of her replacement. If any of you want to take it on. |
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Chuck Liddy, Photographer
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Durham | NC | USA | Posted: 7:12 AM on 08.24.11 |
| ->> This seems to be "Plan A" for all these corporations. Destroying the infrastructure until there's nothing left. Someone in our newsroom asked a VP who visited the paper about a month ago what "Plan B" was since obviously laying off all the people who actually worked and produced content didn't seem to be working...I was told he shrugged his shoulders and went on to the next question. corporate malfeasance is going to get us all. |
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Michael Fischer, Photographer
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Spencer | Ia | USA | Posted: 8:52 AM on 08.24.11 |
->> A friend of mine who worked as a regional did something a year or so ago that I posted about - he bought the two papers that were his originally before he sold them.
He bought them cheap enough that the break even point financially was wayyyyyyyyy doable.
The original thread is here: http://www.sportsshooter.com/message_display.html?tid=33591
Don't sit there and say no way you can do it.
Yes, these were small town Iowa properties, but look at it the way he did. Who else will make offers on these newspapers? The corporations are in such a weak position that a low ball offer gets the property off of their books - which accomplishes the same thing as cutting staff. Aren't too many folks lining up to buy them. Buy it cheap enough, and you'll make money at even lower revenues (this is why taking chapter 11 works - you wipe out the debt and lower the break even point).
Newspapers never should have gone to Wall Street. It's that simple. But they did. The opportunity is there - right in front of everyone. It involves risk - that's what capitalism is about. But if a group of people financed it - with someone with good newspaper and business skills leading it - it is doable. |
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Mark Peters, Photographer
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Robert Seale, Photographer
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Houston | TX | USA | Posted: 10:49 AM on 08.24.11 |
->> Dean Singleton is a vulture who has been making his money by picking at the bones of our industry for his entire career. He uses highly leveraged loans to buy properties that are ailing, hires henchmen editors to squeeze every last drop of revenue out of them, and sells or shuts them down. He's been doing this for years. Google him and read some of the kind words by his former colleagues and employees.
How does our ailing industry treat a man who has done so much to destroy the business? Well, of course - they name him Chairman of the Associated Press.
He's a waste of skin, and with each breath is using up valuable oxygen on our planet that could be better utilized by a much higher life form - like a a mosquito, perhaps. |
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David A. Cantor, Photographer, Photo Editor
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Toledo | OH | USA | Posted: 12:20 PM on 08.24.11 |
| ->> This Freudian typo in the Politico story is sadly apt, ..."The shake-up announced Tuesday at the company built by Dean Singleton will affect ewspapers located across the bay from San Francisco." |
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Louis Feldman, Photographer
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Los Angeles | CA | USA | Posted: 6:25 PM on 08.25.11 |
| ->> hey robert tell me what you really think. |
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Mark Loundy, Photo Editor
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San Jose | CA | USA | Posted: 6:48 PM on 08.25.11 |
->> Louis, Robert's description is apt. Singleton's been sucking the blood out of newspapers and tossing aside their empty carcasses for decades.
--Mark |
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Grover Sanschagrin, Photographer, Photo Editor
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San Francisco | CA | USA | Posted: 12:26 AM on 08.26.11 |
->> This isn't something unique to newspapers - the same formula that Singleton is using is at play in every industry in the United States. Cut costs, make the most money possible, quality doesn't matter if the public doesn't know any better.
Any guess what? The public doesn't know any better.
When the public finally starts figuring it out, the cycle will reverse, and Singleton's formula will no longer work. But we have a long way to go before the USA wakes up. |
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Richard Uhlhorn, Photographer
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Chelan Falls | WA | USA | Posted: 12:18 PM on 08.26.11 |
->> And yet "It's possible that the current shakeout in the newspaper business will be good for journalism in the long term because it will create opportunities for independent entrepreneurial jouranlists who are willing to compete for the public's attention and who don't have to get the boss's approval to write about touchy topics," said a respected travel journalist who used to work in the industry.
He went on to say that in his metropolitan area of 2.5 million, some of the best journalism is in the small, independent newspapers and on independently owned web sites.
"Like it or not, times change, and lamenting evolution is a waste of breath," he wrote several years ago.
I find it interesting because I have watched the erosion of our newspaper industry and realized long ago that we are all in for a tough time.
Saving the newspaper means localizing the news. Readers want to know what is happening in their neighborhoods. There are a bunch of great stories out there that need to be told. National and International news can be had almost instantly on the web. I know what's happening in the world at any given moment because I'm on the Internet. So why should I and do I watch the National News on television each night when I already know what has happened. Good question.
As Chase Jarvis said in a talk in New York. "Turn that frown upside down." Get innovative and move forward. The corporations are not journalists' saviours unfortunately.
This is an interesting thread. I'm curious to where it will lead. |
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