Sunday, April 19, 2009

Sunday | April 19 | Your News & Comments

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37 comments:

  1. Have to echo yesterday's comment.

    Despite the fad, Twitter is a complete waste of time.

    I saw one leading editor at a GCI major property posting about ravioli.

    Aw c'mon. I'd rather be doing ANYTHING else than watching for that crap.

    By the way, I appear to be first.

    What an accomplishment.

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  2. If nothing more, this blog is great for a laugh. (And I do NOT agree with the naysayers...I think this blog has great value) But I LOVE how certain people take the time to READ it, and then post to it, deriding it. And this "fucktard" character is hilarious. I get the sense, from his syntax, that he's also the local, NJ rep for the CDC..."BUILDING CONDITIONS, PEOPLE!!!" Look, I hate mold and dirt too. But if I had a JOB, I doubt I'd be too picky right now about heating ducts!
    Someone posted this whole situation yesterday in extremely eloquent terms. At the end of this, SOME newspapers will survive. SOME car manufacturers will survive. SOME retailers will survive. The whole country was/is oversaturated with false wealth. Ridiculous housing prices trickled down into a false economy that must now level itself out. We got screwed by a Fed and an SEC that weren't minding the store and Greenspan...who is 2 steps from Alzhiemers. Now...we slog through it in poverty until correction occurs.
    As I've said before, we are NOT alone. Large corps are laying off left and right with NO retraining, NO services to the displaced and NO federal compliances for mass layoffs. Basically, we're on our own and it's survival of the fittest. I am not fit, not young and very sick. I know my fate is sealed. Maybe it's just natural selection kicking in. But for chrissake, don't even expect Gannett to help us misplaced baby boomers. They have their Twitter generation to save whatever is left when this is over. Plain and simple.

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  3. Twitter? The best it can do is alert people who are following and interested that a new web post has been made, that there is something new to see on your site. Otherwise, I agree, it's a waste of time.

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  4. I think Twitter will go down as a quintessential demonstration of the egocentrism/narcissism that dooms modern culture. See: Roman empire.

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  5. (Cross-posting)

    ChuckinJersey raises a good point about the deterioration of the news judgment. I've seen it eroding for years at the APP too, some days more than others.

    Gannett has a pattern of not valuing institutional knowledge and professional mentoring.

    In the best days of newspapers, when there was news competition in the market, it was the best-and-the-brightest in the newsroom that got promoted to the news and copy desks. These jobs weren't treated as nothing but mechanical assembly lines a monkey can perform.

    The buyout and the layoffs that took mostly senior journalists has a big impact. Gannett sees only the $$$$, but, as they say, "You get what you pay for."

    Stupid way to run this business.

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  6. to 12:20pm yesterday "where you been"? My paper is slow to get rumors, and I don't work inside anyway.

    Seems 10:40 is one of those tech geeks, and was outgunned yesterday. Ever go looking for a job on either Craigs or Career, or Monster for that matter, just for kicks? Dare you to find anything worth anything on them.

    I say with business still down, LOWER THE COSTS of the ads....or is that too simple a solution? isn't 3 20 dollar ads better than 1 at 40 for the same size?

    And also with ours anyway, one would find ads throughout the paper, not just in classifieds. Whose brainstorm was that? Some in Life/People/Local, some in sports. What? people need to know where to find what they want to find.

    It does sound like there are still some real knowledgeable newspaper people left in the business. That's good to know. When the "online", "digital", etc. fad runs it's course, newspapers will need the good people to pick themselves off the ground once more.

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  7. Nothing is going to change until the publisher's at each individual paper(especially the profitable ones) stands up to corporate and say's enough already.This also includes dept heads standing up for there dept's that need the resources in order to get the job done

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  8. 9:51 - HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

    Thanks for the laugh!

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  9. This "supplemental pension" that Dubow, other corporate execs and, I think, publishers and maybe others get seems to end up giving those relatively few employees (not monarchs) 150% of their already outrageous salaries, judging by Dubow's hand in the pie.

    Do employees who are not already thrown to the curb realize that their pension is only 50% of salary?

    Is there any more blatant evidence of class warfare? Something needs to be said about this. How is this legal?

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  10. 10:35 How is this legal?
    They make the laws, and so are we surprised that they have carved out new pension benefits for themselves while carving away at the salaries of the worker bees?

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  11. Lots of fucktards posting on this thread today -- many people who cannot spell or write.

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  12. 9:24 AM Asked:
    "Seems 10:40 is one of those tech geeks, and was outgunned yesterday. Ever go looking for a job on either Craigs or Career, or Monster for that matter, just for kicks? Dare you to find anything worth anything on them."

    Answer, "First, I am 10:40 from yesturday. You say that I was "outgunned" yesturday. I have no idea what you mean by that. I assume that you mean that everyone agreed that technology sucks. I dont care either way. To answer your question yes I have tried to find jobs off Monster and Dice. I was at gannett for 14 years and saw that it was time to go. I found several jobs off both monster and dice. I got several offers in the middle of the worst economy in my lifetime. I waited for just the right offer and left Gannet on my own terms. Now I have better hours, more money (about 20 percent more), year end bonuses, respect from my managers and co workers (people working in newsrooms can be huge dicks at times. Many, many have no respect for anyone working outside a newsroom. I understand that you all were on deadline and stressed but there were some ego shit too. I am sure in the current sitution much of the ego crap is probably gone from all but the most delusional of newsroom employees.). Granted its about 1 million times easier to find a job right now with a computer background then with a news background, but those sites work great for me.

    Disclamer: I can not write worth a shit. I can not spell worth a crap either. Feel free to point that out and say that I am stupid. Just remember, my dumb ass got out of gannett without having to take a single furlough. My only regret is that I didnt get any of that severance pay.

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  13. Twitter:

    What I am doing right now? - Typing this.

    Now what am I doing? - Typing this.

    NOW what am I doing? - Typing this.

    NOW what am I doing? ... and on and on...

    Look, there is nothing really wrong with Twitter, just like there really isn't anything wrong with a Twinkie. It is just empty and basically worthless.

    But it does distract the brainless and bored and may get a few people to the Website....

    As long as no one really thinks of it as JOURNALISM.

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  14. Online and digital are a "fad" huh?

    I can't wait until MP3 players run their course as well and record players come back.

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  15. I heard USA Today is taking over Single copy sales at some gannett sites. Is this true?

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  16. No one is saying online and digital are fads, far from it.

    But like in any developing medium, there are absurdities that fail.

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  17. MP3's might not have run their course, but evidently there still is a use for vinyl.....

    http://tinyurl.com/dn36ks

    "On a surprising note, vinyl saw an increase this year. In fact, more vinyl albums were purchased in 2008 than in any other year since Nielsen SoundScan started paying attention back in 1991. Consumers purchased 1.88 million LP’s in 2008, a whopping 89 percent increase over 2007."Luddites, Unite! (look it up, fucktard.)

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  18. Clearly, digital is not a fad. But I agree that the Web is overrated.

    Most people use the Web to check e-mail, do some online banking and visit their favorite sites.

    There are a million blogs out there that never see any traffic to speak of, yet Gannett seems to want everyone in the newsroom running a blog.

    Bottom line. To really make it with the Web you have to create something very special and maintain it with only a handful of people.

    GCI still doesn't understand this. The only thing that makes any of the Gannett sites special is the wealth of content that it steals from the local papers. Once they have made the newspapers staffs small enough to be profitable with a Web model, their sites will be garbage. Too bad, but true.

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  19. 12:49 pm: Twitter is no different than any other software used to publish journalism: The content coming out is only as good as what users put in.

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  20. 12:49 pm: Twitter is no different than any other software used to publish journalism: The content coming out is only as good as what users put in.

    In database reporting, we call this: "junk in, junk out."

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  21. When ever you post something such as, "When the "online", "digital", etc. fad runs it's course, newspapers will need the good people to pick themselves off the ground once more", please state your age and occupation just for kicks.

    Also, I went to monster just to see if you were correct. I found several jobs listed such as the one below. Over 110,000 a year for just 2 years of experiance programming things such as what you call fads. This shows another problem with Gannett. They recently tried to hire a programmer in Florida for the Floridatoday website for 30 grand a year and wanted 4 years experance (Then they probably have to give up 4 weeks a year on furloughs). This job is for only 2 years and pays well over 100 grand. Hey Gannett, "Good luck in the rest of the 21 century with minimum wage programmers!"

    Location Washington, DC;
    Fort Meade, MD
    Salary $110,000 - $130,000
    Education Bachelor of Science
    Category Information Technology
    Experience Required At least 2 Years
    Short Description Sr. Microsoft/C# Application Developer - TS/SCI Clearance - Ft. Meade
    Required Skills Microsoft Application Developer, TS/SCI Clearance, Microsoft .NET Framework, SQLServer Development, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server (MOSS), Microsoft BizTalk Server, Microsoft Team Foundation Server, C# Development
    Recruiter David Wright
    Date Updated 4/17/2009

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  22. Interesting comment moderation advisory posted at The Courier-Journal on a controversial story. Never seen this before. They are deleting comments.



    http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20090419/SPORTS03/904190423

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  23. 2:48 That job posting you found looks like it isn't just an ordinary run-of-the-mill company looking for a computer engineer, but rather some government-connected agency. Given that it is Ft. Meade, Md., and involves someone who will need a security clearance, I would suspect it is the National Security Agency, the government's front-line eavesdropping agency, which uses some of the most advanced computers in the world.

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  24. Re that Courier-Journal advisory:

    "Editor's note: Comments have been delete in the chat forum..."

    Comments have been delete?

    Oy.

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  25. Dumb techno question: Isn't Twitter basically e-mail you get on your phone?

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  26. 11:57...never said you were stupid, although for a programmer your spelling is as good as a copy writer (of which I am not).

    I am also not saying digital and online will ever go away. It has it's niche and will forever be, but to say newspapers are, for lack of better words, not needed or should die...yea...that's what radio and TV people said when they came along. Worked good for them didn't it?

    As stated here a while ago now, you can't and won't get the in depth coverage online that newspapers used to, and still should, do. Newspapers could have used the I-net to sell more papers by putting a couple of sentences or a paragraph online, saying to get the full story...BUY THE PAPER! But NOoooo...they did it the other way around. More people stop buying the paper for that reason alone. Who wants to read a story in the paper only to get to the end to see "for more info go to xxxx.com"? I don't, and I know many who also don't.

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  27. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  28. 9:51 AM -- I agree 100% with you. However, it will never happen.

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  29. i dont give a shit how peeps spell here. seriously.

    Remember, we're not all wordsmiths here, any more than we're all press operators. (And put me in front of a press without any training, and he'll see someone who looks REALLY stoopid!)

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  30. This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.

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  31. Fucktard is now totally overused -- and insulting to mentally disabled people. So, I've now added the phrase to my "auto-delete" list.

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  32. Hey jIm I am a press operator and let me tell you that I do spell incorrectly alot and my fellow pressman are not all the brightest bunch but, are good at what "WE" do!

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  33. 2:48 All the requirments are in that post. There is no req for security clearance. It is simply how much a progammer makes. (if you are good). The only side note is that people make more money in Mclean, VA then they do in florida space coast but not 4 times. Gannett has got to pay more for programmers if they want to compete. Its that simple!

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  34. 8:33 -- I know good programmers who don't make that much money.

    Granted, the Florida Today salary was ridiculously low, but $110,000 is a good salary these days.

    Many tech jobs are being shipped overseas, so programming jobs don't pay what they used to. My brother is an experienced programmer in California (cheaper area than the Silicone Valley) and he makes about $55,000.

    He would make more in the Silicone Valley, L.A. or D.C. to be sure, but his money wouldn't go as far.

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  35. jim im a ceo'er and i might not be the smartest guy in the bunch, but i see my name and picture on your website thing....and i try to be good, i gets lots of money and hit the little white ball thrugh the woods...can you please be nice to me mr. jim ok bye

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Jim says: "Proceed with caution; this is a free-for-all comment zone. I try to correct or clarify incorrect information. But I can't catch everything. Please keep your posts focused on Gannett and media-related subjects. Note that I occasionally review comments in advance, to reject inappropriate ones. And I ignore hostile posters, and recommend you do, too."

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