Sunday, January 10, 2010
Week Jan. 4-10 | Your News & Comments
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37 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."
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Yay, Jim!! Welcome back. You were missed.
ReplyDeleteFrom Ruth's Blog [if you've already addressed this, I missed it and wanted to share]:
ReplyDeleteA friend asked yesterday if I'd gotten 'any whif of shit' regarding Indianapolis Star exec editor Dennis Ryerson.
That's a hard question to answer, so I deferred back to my friend, who explained: The Star received a package yesterday addressed to Ryerson.
When it was opened -- it is uncertain by whom, but someone in the newsroom tore off the wrappings, etc., possibly even himself -- it turned out to be a package full of shit. Quite literally.
The only "evidence" so far points to Cicero; it was mailed from that community. In characteristic over-reaction, the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department was contacted. I am sure that decision required much soul-searching and several meetings with top sycophants.
No word yet on the source of the shit: animal, human, whatever.
Can someone please get a copy of that police report?
What a crappy thing to do.
And one can only speculate on what particular issue Ryerson went on about that caused such a response. Perhaps his wishy-washy condemnation of global warming critics? Perhaps just attitude of the paper in general?
Ah, well. The sender's message is clear. Ryerson is full of it. And the Star newsroom stinks.
Too bad Editor and Publsiher is no longer around to take this one on....
Jim--It is so good to see you back. You should read up on the Journal News in Westchester, NY. It has been a huge amount of news. Very, very sad as they are using a non-gannet site as of March, 2010 to print the paper. Same old nitwits running the place !!!
ReplyDeleteJim, glad to have you back!
ReplyDeleteOMG Jim! Hurrah that you're back!!
ReplyDeleteJim: Wished you'd have told everyone to put their entire 401K in GCI stock last March. It's up something like 550% since then!
ReplyDelete4:09 p.m.: As they say, hindsight is 20/20. Just ask CEO Craig Dubow; he and other top executives took all-cash bonuses in the last round, rather than the traditional payout that included company stock.
ReplyDeleteTwo years ago, I believe, I urged readers to consider selling shares in their 401(k) accounts. As I recall, Gannett was trading in the mid-30s -- twice where it is now.
Well a year before that I sold at 60, twice where it was then.
ReplyDeleteGood to see you back here, Jim. I was part of TJN's massacred staff and am really happy to not be there now. What a joke and how sad to see that flagstaff paper of Westchester slip down the drain.
ReplyDeleteJim
ReplyDeleteGlad to have you back up and running
Does anyone have the list of recently named newsroom mvps?
ReplyDeleteWhat is going on today with all these close door meetings with managers?? Something seems very odd around here...does anyone know.
ReplyDelete19 New Jersey advertising positions open. Managers have to re-apply for their jobs.
ReplyDeleteWhat site are you at, 1:31 p.m.?
ReplyDeleteAnd where in New Jersey are you, 1:49 p.m.? Also, when you say these positions are open -- do you mean everyone's been told to reapply, or just those 19 people? Finally, are these ad-sales positions, or something else?
In New Jersey,so far I heard 2 papers were doing this.
ReplyDeleteIf there is something going on where advertising folks have to reapply for jobs, is it possible that FINALLY some of useless long-term losers will go away? Doubtful. Some things never change in NJ.
ReplyDeleteAny new news about the ad consolidation?
ReplyDeleteAnyone know about AzRep shifts, Scottsdale editor going to Metro (replacing whom?) Other moves afoot?
ReplyDeleteI don't know where the current Scottsdale editor is going, but Chris Coppola from the EV Tribune is joining the AzRep to edit in Scottsdale.
ReplyDeletehttp://navigator.cision.com/media/general.aspx?pg=1&F_All=yes
A very competent gal from the Asbury Park Press was recently named "Regional Advertising Director" and all of the "Advertising Directors" at the individual sites essentially lost their jobs. But instead of putting those high paid individuals on the unemployment line, I guess the powers that be decided to throw them back into the mix as sales reps. Now everybody has to reapply for their jobs and waste all kinds of time instead of selling ads.
ReplyDeleteDoes this mean that the new guy who came in as Ad Director at the Courier-Post in Cherry Hill, NJ is no longer going to be the AD, rather a sales rep? He just got here a few months ago along with a new publisher. Who is this "super" ad director in Asbury for all of NJ and what is her background?
ReplyDeleteGlad to see you again, Jim. Hope this is a more positive experience for you this time around. Thankfully, I'm no longer with Gannett, but I'll be watching in the interest of those friends I left behind.
ReplyDeleteThe Asbury AD is a brick
ReplyDeleteThanks for keeping it clean, Jim. The blog is a much better resource with you making sure that the comments are constructive.
ReplyDeleteThat said, I'm still trying to figure out Dickey's comment about a 24% reduction in head count. Maybe a stock analyst that uses this blog as a resource will ask the question during the next earnings call.
As Bob knows, the street hates when executives mislead investors.
@1:131 p.m. - I bet they'll post the jobs on CareerBuilder.com just like they did with TJN jobs when Fisch said no, only TJN employees will have access to them. Did they give you more than two days to decide? At TJN they told us on August 14, and we had to pick two jobs, and apply to them, by August 16.
ReplyDeleteWelcome back, Jim. We missed you and this important source of information. Glad to hear your break helped you put it all in perspective. We appreciate the time and effort you put into this.
ReplyDeleteWhat? 24% reduction in head count? How many more people can Gannett lose and still be efficient and have a quality product? Oh wait...this is rumor, and quality is no longer important to gannett.
ReplyDeleteFirst time I visit in over a year and the blog's both closed and re-opened during my absence.
ReplyDeleteGlad you're back. Yay! \o/
Small Dead Animals has a series called "Not Waiting for the Asteroid."
ReplyDeletehttp://www.smalldeadanimals.com/archives/012732.html
The site's not well organized. But some work with a search engine can find them all.
That's a one or two-person site doing a better job, part-time, of covering the decline of the newspaper industry than Editor & Publisher did.
Here's the article related to a prior hed re: Denise Richter in Lafayette.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.theind.com/content/view/5462/95/
I thought the AD in Asbury was a guy? Where did the gal come from?
ReplyDeleteJim,
ReplyDeleteJust figured it out - Gannett swirls around the drain, Gannett Blog thrives. Stock prices stabilize and grow, hiatus for Gannett Blog.
2010 begins, and Gannett Blog rises from the ashes. Uh, oh...but this time, I'm watching from the outside. Working, but not for Gannett.
For those that remain, I hope I'm wrong. But Jim IS a reporter with connections - so, better bookmark the site again, all.
My Boss: a belated Happy New Year, to you and yours!
ReplyDeleteJim, we're so glad you came back! I can see why you took a break, because of some of the comments you had to put up with, and some of that was downright abusive, if you ask me. Everyone is glad you're back, or at least, all of the very best people are glad you are back, although I guess there would have to be a few exceptions which are none too thrilled that you are back, people who are not the right sort of people at all and will probably write mean comments to you again. I think you shouldn't publish the mean comments, if you don't want to. Life without GannettBlog was rough. We didn't know the scuttlebutt, of what was going on. A great void is filled, with GannettBlog back in our lives again.
ReplyDeleteYou have a blog on Gannett, NYT and News Corp. Why not a fourth blog on the Washington Post?
ReplyDeleteRmichem: The Washington Post Co. is now largely an educational testing business, as its Kaplan subsidiary dominates the company's operations.
ReplyDeleteYou didn't ask about the other newspaper publishers -- McClatchy, Tribune, Lee, etc. I can't cover all of them in detail, so I chose News Corp., the New York Times Co., and Gannett Co. because I think they have better chances of surviving. In the end, however, News Corp. may well be the last one standing.
Glad that you're keeping it clean and straight forward, Jim. If someone tries to put crap in the posts, and you don't publish it, it's like a tree falling in the woods, and no one hearing it.
ReplyDeleteSo glad that this once again can become a constructive forum for information that we can't get from the people we work for.