[Newseum opened last spring in Washington, D.C.]
Ken Paulson (left) has been the No. 1 circulation newspaper's editor since 2004, when he was hired to replace Karen Jurgensen, who resigned in the wake of the Jack Kelley scandal.Paulson, 55, is taking a coveted job as president and chief operating officer of the controversial $450 million Newseum and its developer, the non-profit Freedom Forum foundation. He will replace another former USAT editor, Peter Prichard, effective Feb. 1, according to a memo from USA Today Publisher Craig Moon.
In 2007, Prichard earned $297,791 in compensation, plus $40,124 in contributions to his benefit plan, according to the Newseum's public income tax return. He also received a $59,775 expense account, the 2007 return shows. Ka-ching: $397,690.
Paulson's move had been long-rumored. His Freedom Forum appointment follows a series I wrote about the foundation devoted to press freedom -- and a still-unexplained $425,545 paid to Al Neuharth in 2006, when Paulson was a trustee. Retired Gannett CEO Neuharth founded both Freedom Forum and USAT; Paulson was once his chief of staff. (Paulson's memo today to USAT staff.)
Earlier Freedom Forum posts
- A tortured history between Gannett and Freedom Forum
- The non-profit foundation's family values, Gannett style
- CEO Charles Overby's unlikely gig: for-profit prison director
[Photo: Newseum]
Here is what happens when editors refuse to go along with the sort of drastic cuts at USAT corporate wanted.
ReplyDeleteYou should put "retiring" in quotes. The last barrier between USAT and the bean counters just collapsed.
ReplyDeleteThis was so hastily put together that over at the foundation, Peter Prichard suddenly found out he's going to be doing special projects for the next year before his planned retirement, so room will be made for Paulson to take over. Curious development, because I thought there was supposed to be an arms-length between foundations and the organizations that fund them. Short arms, I guess.
ReplyDeleteIn good times and bad it's seems to be a five-year job. Do the math: Quinn, Prichard, Mazz, Jurgensen and Paulson.
ReplyDeleteThis opens the door for the weasels to get full traction at USAT, while the best staff continue to flee.
ReplyDeleteWill Executive Editor John Hillkirk replace Paulson -- or will Moon do something dramatic, and go outside the company to hire a digital person?
ReplyDeleteI've a question to ask all you Gannett (and any other newspaper) types. If you follow the blogs about news and newspapers (poynter, newsosaur, buzz machine, etc), you've probably seen my posts. I live in Ruston, LA and I'm in the phone book.
ReplyDeleteI've dealt with the Gannett papers in Monroe and Shreveport, so I personally know a few of you.
And I'm as conservative as they come. I served on the Louisiana Republican State Central Committee. I keep up with Louisiana and national politics. I've been a news junkie all my life.
What I want to learn is this: how smart is it for newspapers to insult and antagonize half of their customers? Almost all newspapers are written with the liberal or Democrat slant.
The country is roughly evenly divided ideologically. And I understand freedom of the press and newspapers can write whatever they please.
But from a business standpoint, it seems really dumb to attack half your customers and expect them to pay for it.
Why?
Walter Abbott
Just another example of the Feed 'Em Forum/Nauseaum/USAT Revolving-Door-and-Full-Employment-for-Executives Effect.
ReplyDeleteAnd I agree, the last barrier between the USA Today newsroom and Mama Gannett's long-knived kissers of Wall Street butt is now being removed. Stand back and watch the carnage ...
Dear Mr. Abbott,
ReplyDeleteYou are asking the exact same questions that we are. I would gather that most who post on this blog are editorial employees, but we have surprisingly strong representation from other departments as well. And we are all as perplexed by this business plan Gannett is adopting as you are.
The reason for it is a belief that newspapers are not reaching young people. This is a tired debate, but I believe young people have no vested interest in newspapers until they have families and buy a house. It is only then that they become interested in issues such as property taxes, schools, local crime and general economic issues, and want to keep abreast of those issues. Yet newspapers have advertisers who say they want to reach young people with significant disposable money to spend, and want a youthful audience. Right now, newspapers are chasing what advertisers want.
There is a sizeable opinion in newsrooms that the reason people buy newspapers is for the news they contain. This is poo-pooed by editors, who seem to believe they can get by with features and fluffy trend stories. As you are probably aware, it takes time and some political contacts to write political stories, but rather than wasting time having a reporter chase those stories, you can have two features written. So we have newspapers that are abandoning political reporting, except when it is served to them via press releases. Investigative reporting takes even more time, and so is regarded as wasteful and unproductive by this regime and also has been abandoned.
You might well ask why publishers chose to piss off half of their readers. You might think that they would be comfortable with serving people who read their newspapers, and encouraging them and others to read more by presenting good, solid news reports. But editors have been trained today to treat these people as the walking dead, because they are of the age cohort that won't be around for long. So were are told not to care about them anymore.
I wish I could find some more coherent way of presenting what is happening in this business these days. It is a shame to see these institutions dismantled. It took years to build them up, but it only takes a few foolish mistakes to dismantle them. The publishers are only looking at the bottom line, and see declining revenues, and declining stock price. This brings only more pressure to cut fixed costs more, and try to improve profit margins. It is a death spiral, and what you are seeing is another twist in it as newspapers collapse.
Ken was a great guy... but knew Al well in Brevard, and they saved him a seat at the table. I wish him well, and am glad that the blog hasn't been loaded up with all of the nonsense that followed the departures of other high-ranking personnel.
ReplyDelete4:08 p.m.
ReplyDeleteI assume you mean comments about the swine Currie......
Wait, that wsn't nonsense.
3:42 -- that was a very good synopsis of the troubles for newspapers that you sent to Mr. Abbott, but I can guarantee you that none of what you wrote was on his mind.
ReplyDeleteRead his screed again. He's all about that tired old the-news-media-are-liberals rant, 100 percent. He couldn't care less about differing demographics, etc., etc. His is a one-note song, sung quite out of tune, that is exactly NOT the same question that you and I and virtually all the rest of GannettBlog readers are asking.
Again, good post, but Mr. Abbott's not in the audience that will listen to or care about it ....
3:42 PM
ReplyDeleteGreat post. Couldn't agree with you more.
If you've been at USAT for more than 10-15 years, and are or were predominantly associated with the print product, you should be looking for another job asap. If you look at the losses of managers in the last year or two, that will tell you all you need to know. You won't be getting a severance package or buyout in the future. You will be caught off guard and probably unprepared unless you do something proactive starting now. The shell of a staff that will remain will work under some of the worst conditions imaginable. Please don't listen to any more lies about the paper not going anywhere or this editor or that editor leaving for reasons not related to the demise of print (and maybe the whole brand). Holding on will only delay a more painful departure in the not so distant future.
ReplyDeleteActually, 3:42 did partially answer my question. He said editors aren't interested in doing stories for people who won't be alive much longer. And that the papers are written like the advertisers want.
ReplyDeleteBut I still want to know why newspaper people are antagonistic towards conservatives and don't make an effort to be balanced. I'm 58 years old and can remember balanced reporting.
It may make no difference, since I see this shift as primarily technology driven. But when you're scrambling to hold every single customer, it is stupid to piss off half your customers.
It may be that the media culture just can't accommodate such a thing anymore.
Walter Abbott
Kinsey Wilson, Ken Paulson, Richard Curtis...not to mention others who have recently left or got booted. And they still expect us to believe that the sky isn't falling, even now? That they just happen to find new opportunities? Why were they even looking? C'mon, it's time to wake up and protect ourselves and get off this sinkin' ship. The cuts in 2009 are going to dwarf what has happen so far. Corporate journalism is dying rapidly.
ReplyDeleteMr. Conservative Waltor Abbott,
ReplyDeleteCan you please document for us the "liberal slant" you see in the media you're reading? Show us some specific news stories over - say a 30 day period - in a publication you read where you can clearly demonstrate a "liberal" bias.
Conduct your content analysis in a scientific way and post your findings. Please include your methodology so we know the results are not just your opinion.
We hear this all the time on blogs, in columns, on radio, on television, in focus groups, etc. But each time I've heard this and have asked people to document their perceptions with evidence and point out a specific pattern of bias one way or another, they can't do it. So, prove me wrong Mr. Abbott. Show us some examples of that perceived media bias your talking about.
Walter, are you the same Walter Abbott who was convicted of threatening to strangle the Maryland governor?
ReplyDeletehttp://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4183/is_20081021/ai_n30925050
6.53,
ReplyDeleteNot me. I was born, raised and still live in Louisiana. Even got to know pretty well one of the senior Gannettoids who retired a few years ago, John Hill. He covered the State Capitol for the state's Gannett papers.
6.49,
The liberal slant of the media is indeed my opinion. But it is shared almost universally among conservatives. Maybe we are all wrong. But we are still potential customers and deserve respect instead of the scorn we usually get. It's bad business telling half your customers they're full of shit.
Walter Abbott
Thank you for your enthusiastic participation, Walter Abbott. Would you please cite some specific, relevant examples (headlines, dates, paper names) from Gannett newspapers or TV stations? I try to keep these comment strings focused tightly on Gannett.
ReplyDeleteIf I could find it I'd post it but10 years ago or so someone did a survey of media types concerning polical leanings, life views, religious affiliation and attendence and the rsults were overwhelmingly liberal, 90% of the ones that were registered with a party were Democrats and they either believed in God or attended church at substantially reduced rates from the population. There was more in it about lifestyle preferences etc but I forget that. Someone must have this survey somewhere.
ReplyDeleteAfter 30+ years dealing with business people on one side and newsrooms on the other, trust me newsrooms are much more liberal than the population. In most newsrooms its conservatives that stay in the closet.
No one should be surprised y the Paulson news. Al Neuharth runs the Freedom Forum. Kens been attached to Als hip ever since he was on Bus Capade with Al back in the late 1980's.
ReplyDeleteFYI the Freedom Forum is not funded by Gannett. Al highjacked the Gannett foundation when he stocked the board with his cronies and they voted to sell the Gannett stock that it controled and start a new foundation with AHN as its head just after Al retired. Frank Gannett turned over in his grave. The foundation has been a personal cash cow for Neuharth ever since. Now his loyal follower and Bus Capade servant is cashing in too!
Jim,
ReplyDeleteThis morning, 12/18/08, on USAT's front page at 5am ET, there is little posted about the Blagojevich/Obama senate seat scandal. I don't know what the print edition shows.
I suggest had the political parties been reversed, this issue would dominate USAT and Gannett newsrooms across the country. It would be above-the-fold headlines until it was found out who knew what and when did they know it. Every investigative reporter in Gannett would be focused exclusively on it for the duration.
Now back to the question of how it all plays as a business practice. We conservatives are a large part of the potential customer base of Gannett. We perceive a flaw in the service (information distribution) Gannett is trying to sell. If we complain, we are told to shut up and buy the service anyway.
I suggest this is part of the problem of why the business model is broken. When you tell your customer "here's what I'm going to sell you" and he either doesn't want it or thinks the service is flawed, YOU are the one with the problem, not the customer.
And my question is, once again, why any company would pursue such a business strategy.
I may be wasting my time asking this question. But this blog has a large following of newspaper types and it seemed a good opportunity to ask for an honest answer from real, everyday journalists.
Walter Abbott
This Walter guy is a paranoid loon.
ReplyDeleteYes, Walter. It's all one big conspiracy and we take orders from Central Command every morning.
If you truly think the Illinois scandal is NOT getting covered, you're obviously not looking at the newspapers, the Web or TV.
I do agree that the journalistic world's investigative juices aren't what they used to be, but that has to do with the size of newsrooms these days, finances and the slow move toward commenting ABOUT the news rather than covering the news.
But that isn't ideological. It's cultural and a sad trend in the profession. To try to throw some liberal bias overlay on that ignores what's really going on.
That said, either start a new thread to talk about this VERY tired topic, or find another blog. We have bigger worries to talk about. And Happy Holidays!