Friday, December 07, 2007

Amid USA Today buyouts, the farewells begin

USA Today's loss is a loss for all of Gannett: J. Ford Huffman (above), who helped design the paper's original prototype, is one of the first of 43 newsroom employees leaving in a wave of buyouts announced Thursday. "He's been invited to Gannett newsrooms more than 50 times to lead discussions about writing and presentation and to advise on design," the Society for News Design says on its blog. Memorably, SND says, Huffman designed the front page of the top-selling Sept. 12, 2001, issue (see below) that SND magazine called "an unprecedented national statement." Thanks, J. Ford!

USA Today staffers taking buyouts: Send me your name and photo, using your company e-mail address. I want to write about you all! See Tipsters Anonymous Policy in the green sidebar, upper right. Or leave a note in the comments section, below.

2 comments:

  1. It's sad to see J. Ford, and other talented people in all departments of the paper, depart. In light of the buyouts (newsroom), layoffs (business side), hiring freezes, and tightened caps on raises in 2008, we will all be very interested to see what executive compensation looks like for 2007. It would be a nice surprise to see some top-down sacrifice and leadership, if this management team is capable.

    We won't hold our collective breath...

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  2. Thanks; good stuff. Now tell us more about those caps on 2008 raises. Your comment inspired me to write this: http://gannettblog.blogspot.com/2007/12/reader-looking-for-some-top-down.html

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