Saturday, May 30, 2009
Saturday | May 30 | Your News & Comments
Can't find the right spot for your comment? Post it here, in this open forum. Real Time Comments: parked here, 24/7. (Earlier editions.)
17 comments:
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."
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Going to miss this blog simply for the fact that employees and former employees were finally empowered to speak back to power.
ReplyDeleteThe economy has show the true lack of talent on the upper management level. For too long the money was easy so upper management thought they should be highly rewarded simply for being on top. The economic model was a no brainer. Today is different. We are in a paradigm shift that upper management is ill prepared to handle.
There solution: shed the talent pool that actually makes produces. Management has live under the illusion that the brand is the product regardless of content.
What has worked on the internet is content - wide diversity of content. But instead of packaging the ever wide, diverse talents of Gannett's journalists and artists, management has gotten rid of the very people that create content.
Wouldn't it have been wiser for Gannett to tap into Jim's love of Ibiza, and turn that into a money making product? What if Gannett did this with all the writers and photographers they have let go? The specialty advertisers would have flocked to Gannett's web content.
Instead, Gannett wants to roll a very limited content into ContentOne and sell it to the traditional advertisers. The internet works on ContentInfinity instead.
But what the hell do I know, Gannett drove me away a long time ago. Too many idiot middle managers trying to shoehorn me into their limited, little box of ideas, instead of turning a profit on my ideas.
Whoops, I should have charged Gannett a consulting fee for this info. Now upper management will use it to prove why they are so damn smart.
Here's a little something to brighten everyone's day!
ReplyDeletehttp://tinyurl.com/mc94zj
My limited exposure to ContentOne has been some stories forwarded to me for articles I was working on.
ReplyDeleteThey were so local in content that I think I ended up using only a paragraph from each.
If I'm in the southwest, I don't think I'm going to seek out experts and human voice in Cincinnati when I have my own local experts.
ContentOne is a far cry from AP.
"Whoops, I should have charged Gannett a consulting fee for this info. Now upper management will use it to prove why they are so damn smart."
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't worry about that. The post has so much garble, typo, and bad writing in it that its credibility is almost zero.
..someone needs editing...
ReplyDelete"I wouldn't worry about that. The post has so much garble, typo, and bad writing in it that its credibility is almost zero."
"I wouldn't worry about that. The post has so much garble, typo, and bad writing in it that its credibility is almost zero."
ReplyDeleteI had no problem understanding the points being made.
I particularly enjoyed this point:
"Too many idiot middle managers trying to shoehorn me into their limited, little box of ideas, instead of turning a profit on my ideas."
It's true in many departments.
Managers with fear of the unknown, and an even bigger fear of their corporate bosses.
All we see now is managers turning tiny minded ideas, into giant projects. Things that could be implemented in the blink of an eye, turned into self serving, "hey look at me, I'm managing" wastes of time.
Then we watch these managers get the credit. Later, the implementers, those that did the ACTUAL WORK get a ding on their reviews for something ridiculous. It happens over and over.
we all nede cpyo editurs
ReplyDeleteThis thing is shot.
ReplyDeleteYesterday somebody wrote ...
ReplyDelete"In Detroit (the Partnership)is so overstaffed with top management. Too many VP's and directors that are useless. But they are playing 'king of the hill' and will make sure that they are employed until the bitter end."
The same could be said for Reno. In editorial, the buyouts and the last few rounds of layoffs resulted in the closing of bureaus and smaller publications, so the reporting ranks have thinned considerably. But we still have plenty of upper-level editors who do nothing but go to meetings, plan ever-shrinking sections and line edit.
The line editing would be a good thing except that both Web and printed copy is still littered with errors.
I'm told that corporate recently sent out a report to all the newspapers stating that -- and you're not going to believe this, but -- the quality and quantity of news content has been suffering Gannett-wide in recent months.
ReplyDeleteI know, it's mystifying.
At my particular paper the executive editor recently took all of the mid-level editors out to lunch to thank them, because he was told his paper is sucking less than some of the others.
If you only had any idea how terrifying that thought is, given what's going on here.
3:08 Sounds like a Gannett newspaper.
ReplyDelete6:02 -- That is mystifying. Could it be that somebody has woken up to the fact that -- if we do figure out a way to make money on the Web -- Gannett won't have anything to sell on the Web in five years.
ReplyDeleteI stopped my subscription, partially in protest, and figured I would just read what I wanted on the Web. Oddly enough, I rarely go to our Web site unless I'm working on it. These days we provide so little of value that I'm just not motivated. There are other sites, however, that I visit daily.
What I can only guess was ContentOne feed...
ReplyDeleteJust this week, there was a report with the same "by line" but the facts were stated differently in each report.
Swine flu confirmation of thesame pwerson but one report stated the victim was a UWSP student and other reports sated she was a Marquette Student.
Who is on the copy desk, and who let the coflicting facts hit the web?
And to think THIS is the content they want people to pay for?
Gannett can't put out consistant and accurate information for free. How ddo they exprct to charge a fee?
"I wouldn't worry about that. The post has so much garble, typo, and bad writing in it that its credibility is almost zero."
ReplyDeleteSounds like a statement from a few copy editors I have known. They worry about the "Their" verses "There", one or two missed past tense, but these same few cannot see the content of the ideas held within the written piece.
So for those so upset, here's a correction for 9:26 AM's words.
The economy has shown the true lack of talent on the upper management level. For too long the money was easy, so upper management thought they should be highly rewarded simply for being on top. The economic model was a no brainer. Today is different. We are in a paradigm shift that upper management is ill prepared to handle.
Their solution: shed the talent pool that actually makes produces. Management has lived under the illusion that the brand is the product regardless of content.
***
I see no credibility lost in these ideas.
Hunke has brought much needed energy, insight and ideas to USA Today. I hear he's having strategy meetings with top managers. About time.
ReplyDeleteI like how the bad writers here do what they always do -- blame the desk.
ReplyDeleteHere's a hint, failures -- If you don't know the difference between "their" and "there" well enough to type it correctly without thinking about it, then you are a moron who should have been fired a long time ago.
The moron at the start of this day not only fails to realize his mistakes, but also thinks he is some sort of genius. These are the types of people who have been allowed to run amok for far too long. They won't be missed.
Man 4:56 PM, perhaps 9:26 AM should also be put in a gas chamber and then cremated for his or her crime of a few typos?
ReplyDeleteYou're awfully quick to condemn. I don't know a newspaper published that doesn't have errors or typos. I guess with your logic these newspapers are all published by morons.
What I don't see is 9:26 AM declaring that he or she is a genius. And since when do you decide who can or can't run amok?
Perhaps if all journalist learned to spell everything perfectly, with perfect grammar, Gannett can get rid of all the copy desks to save a ton of money?
Time to take your chill pill.