Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Our far-flung correspondents: A letter from Oz

There's something a little, well, queer about a newspaper industry blog being edited by a 51-year-old gay man with a boyfriend named Sparky. Then again, maybe that explains a mysterious letter from a new subscriber who said they're "a friend of Dorothy's." More in today's Gannett Blog TV.

16 comments:

  1. More fun facts: Today's Gannett Blog TV episode closes with Donna Summer's 1970s gay disco anthem, "I Feel Love." Sparky, it so happens, was friends with Summer when he was a college student in Munich, the German city where the singer lived with her then-husband at the time.

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  2. Thanks for the shoutout Jim!

    -friend of Dorothy in the South

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  3. Glad to see I'm not the only Gannett gay reading the blog.

    .

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  4. DITTO! Maybe we should have pushed for a gay employee's group.
    Where I work there many of us, and my "gaydar" has sometimes been faulty. On the positive side, I never have experienced any discrimination, unless things were said behind my back! I do enjoy those very secretive phone calls from people who ask to meet for lunch because they want to talk about a relative they suspect!

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  5. Sounds as if there are a bunch of us out here.

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  6. Jim,
    You often make a point of your homosexuality on this blog.

    Big deal!

    I am not sure we really care about you being an unemployed, homosexual, journalist-turned-blogger living in San Francisco. There must be a million of you out there.

    So why do you make such a big deal of it? Are you uncomfortable with yourself?

    Is it even relevant to Gannett?

    I am sure there are many people on this blog with different sexual persuasions, but many people do not choose to expose them.

    Why do you stick with the issue at hand and report on Gannett. I paid good money to you to support your efforts, and I am disappointed with the negative tone of you so-called reporting.

    Please Jim, clean it up and earn the reputation you deserve.

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  7. Chill out. There's one posting about this. You act like it's all Jim talks about. I've never seen such an ungrateful bunch of co-workers that piss and moan about everything.

    I'll bet you have the little family bumper sticker where it includes only a man and a woman.

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  8. To 9:34 p.m. Thankfully, I'm glad I'm not spending the holiday with you. You sound like you have no joy in your life and seem bitter about so many things.

    I find Jim's efforts to inject some diversity and lightheartness into the blog refreshing.

    Afterall, isn't this what America is all about: tolerance and freedom.

    Finally, if you think Jim's reporting on Gannett is inadequate, get off your sanctimonious ass and put the effort forth yourself on your own blog. I wonder how many readers you would get reporting strictly on Gannett's sad state of affairs. The human mind can tolerate only so much misery.

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  9. thanks to Jim
    a cousin, and a sister of the friends of Dorothy and a lifelong fan of the Wizard of Oz. we live and love.

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  10. When I came towork for Gannett, one of the publicized selling points of the job was DIVERSITY. That was always what gave me a pride in working there.

    JIM HAS NOT PUSHED THE TICKET ON THIS! IT'S ONE OF THE FEW FAIR POLICIES WHICH EVER SEEMED TO STAY IN PLACE!

    I SERIOSULY DOUBT THAT WE HAVE HAD A GAY/LESBIAN QUOTA AT OUR NEWSPAPERS, SO WE NEVER CAUSED THE KIND OF DISASTERS GENERATED BY AFFIRMATIVE ACTION! ENOUGH SAID!

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  11. 9:34 lighten up and don't be so uptight.

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  12. some of the people who post here are very mean-spirited, and it reminds me of the times I went to the journalism site in the very early days of the Internet -- newsmait.com --- and was a bit taken aback at how journalists can be fairly vicious in their criticism of each other.

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  13. I have been reading for months. I never realized Sparky was a man, or that you were a homosexual. I have to tell ya now that I know I am gonna have to give you a big yeah whatever. Keep up the good work.

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  14. I think eventually a lot of our differences will be met with a "big yeah whatever.'

    There's only two things I hate in this world. People who are intolerant of other people's cultures... and the Dutch.

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  15. Hey 9:34. I have been looking at this blog daily and I had no idea Jim is Gay.
    A Gay Gannett Employee.

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  16. I was very young when I started working at 'my' newspaper. I stayed there for over half my lifetime. My boss for most of these years was a very intelligent and wonderful man.
    He pushed me to keep learning new things and also taught me how to hold myself accountable.
    It took years for me to figure out why he was so fascinated with The Wizard of Oz or why my feminine wiles never seemed to work on him!
    During the past few years, we have both moved on from GCI.
    Anyway-not sure why this pertains to this tread--just got me remembering "the good ol' days".
    "Q"-if you are reading this, I would like to offer a belated "Thank you" for all you did for me and wish you (and all) a very Happy Thanksgiving.

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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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