The changes were announced in a memo early last night from chief company spokeswoman Tara Connell, whose role in ContentOne remains unclear. She told editors of the company's 85 U.S. dailies that GNS's three managing editors "will oversee the transition. They remain your primary contacts and I am always available if you have questions or would like to discuss the changes."The memo makes no reference to Vice President Kate Marymont, whose News Department oversaw GNS under her long-time predecessor, Phil Currie, until his December retirement. Only two weeks ago, Marymont wrote editors about the GNS restructuring.
Friday, Connell told Media Bistro that ContentOne had been added to her growing portfolio in the company's Communications Department, where she is vice president. The department is responsible for public relations, a function on the other side of the so-called Chinese Wall that has historically separated news gathering from business operations. In the modern era of newspapers, that wall helped ensure the integrity of news by keeping commercial interests at bay.
Next up: March Madness
The memo is the most detailed yet in a series of leaked documents and other internal communications since ContentOne first emerged three months ago as part of Gannett's broader transition to a fully digital news and information company. The service was given a trial run last month, when it anchored news coverage of President Barack Obama's inauguration -- a debut that some employees complained hurt their site traffic more than it helped.
Connell said ContentOne’s "next major project" involves the high-profile NCAA March basketball tournament.
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I still don't know what ContentOne is. For instance, can someone explain how it will impact a Gannett paper? Will staffing at papers shrink more? What will ContentOne provide to papers or what will papers provide to it? Let's take USA Today, for instance, and outline what is going to be different at the flagship with this ContentOne venture. Will USAT be more stretched or will it receive help from ContentOne? I see a lot of catchy little phrases about this thing, but no details on how it will function or what exactly it will provide to anyone.
ReplyDeleteIsn't ContentOne that national head on the local content bodies, or am I mixing up my fads?
ReplyDelete"Isn't ContentOne that national head on the local content bodies"
ReplyDeleteNawww, it was the next big thing that was gonna save the company. You know... the thing that ran out of bandwidth during election coverage. The thing that sent everyone scrambling to CNN for actual election coverage while we offered live webcasts of crowd reactions from Joe's bar.
Yeah - it was that thing.
Oooooohhhhhh Noooooooo!
ReplyDeleteBecause the inauguration crap worked so well ...
Get your NCAA coverage elsewhere, I guess.
Still don't understand why content one is under the PR division and not the NEWS division. This seems very odd to me.
ReplyDeleteGannett is getting ready to Rip One.
ReplyDeleteI, on the other hand, will go elsewhere for NCAA coverage.
"Gannett is getting ready to Rip One."
ReplyDeleteLMAO - RipOne would be most appropriate. Anyone believe we've got our technical ducks lined up this time?
Up to how many gazillion or bazillion page views was that ContentOne debut supposed to bring in for the advertisers? Did anyone ever reveal the actual numbers?
ReplyDeleteDoes anyone know who took the buyouts at GNS before the changeover to Content None?
ReplyDelete1:17,
ReplyDeleteIf the numbers were good, they'd have been trumpeting them from ever tower. So you can bet they sucked.