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Saturday, May 28, 2011
54 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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The markets that Deal Chicken was supposed to start in were told to add sales staff to focus on the product. New hires are either frozen or we're told that any hires have to go through the division president's office.
ReplyDeleteFrankly, if I'm a publisher and I have to fight the battle to replace a territory rep or bring in a new Deal Chicken rep, I'll go with the real revenue first.
In addition, there has been talk of building local email databases and such. Without some sort of a base, launching Deal Chicken early will be yelling into an empty box.
Remember, Deal Chicken really hasn't been launched, just announced. Even having a template from Phoenix, there will be months of work adjusting that template to our reality - or our reality to that template.
OmG, save the virgins. Here we have a chance to save a life, and we are just sitting in this theater eating buttered poporn and just watching this movie. Not even the secretaries can save the virgins from Heather and her heavy breathers. They are going all Jack Nicholson and breaking through doors with axes, and we are sitting there munching on our popcorn impassively. We have to get involved. Save a life and a promising career.
ReplyDeleteSecretaries? That's old school. Do they really still call them secretaries at USAT? In modern America they're mostly known as Admins (administrative assistants).
ReplyDeleteI think that, out of everything I've read about USAT on this blog is the most precient.
Secretaries? Really?
Is the plan to purchase e-mail databases from an outside source and spam people, or is it to launch the Chicken (let's say that out loud - "launch the Chicken") and hope that people sign up, a la Groupon?
ReplyDeleteUnless Deal Cock can offer people something they can't get through daily deal services that are already well-established, why are they assuming that anyone is going to sign up?
It always amazes me how much smarter the Lemming Trolls are than every manager, director, vp in Gannett. With all your great ideas why haven't other companies snapped you up to lead their companies to success? Really how on earth aren't you making the big bucks you so hate?
ReplyDelete9:13 I have a $1 million portfolio. How much do you have?
ReplyDelete9:13 is a smug and arogant fool with nothing better to do than criticize others on a holiday
ReplyDeleteweekend.
I am a former Gannett 12 year employ with my own
business which is now prospering and well into year 2. I still have this site on my favorites bar just to keep up on what is happening in Gannettland.
Yes,I still work weekends.Although now it is for my own bottom line and not the greedy Gannett.
Best of luck to all,I know it must be hell
still working in the stress of Gannettland.
@Jim: What's with the deleted "My Boss" post in the previous thread?
ReplyDelete10:08, probably one of the imposters spewing crap.
ReplyDeleteFor the record, the USAT interns are sitting together not to be part of the verticals but because there was available space created for them.
ReplyDeleteProbably interspersing them with the staff was a better way to go.
I noticed the blocked reference from "my boss" too and hope Jim can tell us why.
ReplyDeleteTo 9:02am, I love dry wit and that clever play on words was simply hilarious, "launch the Chicken and Deal Cock". Maybe some of us are just too twisted but this made me laugh out loud and serves as an example of how much fun people are going to have with this moniker. Then again maybe the comic relief buzz will be enough to get people interested and buying.
And to bitter-betty 9:13am, go somewhere else. We know you're afraid of this forum so I'm sure you'd feel much better by not exposing yourself to its sometimes brutal, gut-wrenching and unvarnished truths. Look away and if you can brave it, into a mirror. Will you like what's there, will others?
8:28: They aren't called secretaries. They're called office coordinators. At least they were last I checked. They may have transformed into something else.
ReplyDelete@10:08: Yep, it was a bogus, rambling post from a My Boss imposter.
@9:13: You know, "Lemming Troll" is kind of growing on me. It's nonsensical yet whimsical. I just hope you weren't going for insulting, because it doesn't really work.
9:13, maybe you should ask yourself why this company's management doesnt do a better job of soliciting ideas from its own rank and file employees. Instead, it operates in a void, and half baked ideas get hatched with little results. And if this is such a great company that holds such promise, why has wall street dumped it? Tell me what other company rewards leadership with fat bonuses when the stock has lost 80% of its value from its peak? Oh, but WE are the problem. Go back to sucking up to your bosses. This blog doesn't need your criticism.
ReplyDelete10:08 and 10:44 I removed a comment that was non-sensical, and practically gibberish.
ReplyDeleteNote: Various people post under the My Boss name.
Getting back to the interns. I hope whomever decided to lump them together in junior cubicles off by themselves will reconsider. These kids deserve a taste of a newsroom. Usat may not be everyone's vision of a newspaper. But mingling interns among reporters and editors makes more sense than wedging them between two dysfunctional teams led by Heather Frank and her managers. Most of Frank's manager have no newspaper or hard journalism experience. And most have avoided the daily operation since they arrived. What can these kids possibly learn in this kind of setting? Shouldn't some thought be given to what this organization can do to make these internships a worthwhile, rewarding experience?
ReplyDelete11:02 Gannett...thought ?????
ReplyDeleteMaybe it's better the interns are sitting where they are, at least then they will know when they graduate not to apply at Gannett. That's if Gannett is still around!!
ReplyDelete9:19: what 9:13 doesn't seem to get is that the execs are as disgruntled with corporate as the rest of the employees in this company. I don't hold out much hope for innovative ideas coming from this bunch.
ReplyDeleteDon't you think "lemming trolls" would better suit the Gannett corporate faithful, those willing to blindly follow the brainless trust at the top over the cliff and into nothingness?
ReplyDelete12:58 ou are absolutley correct. The psychological term for what that poster is doing is called "projection reaction". This is when your project traits that you don't like about yourself onto others. This is to empower your ego and help your self esteem. Repubicans do this often. You can add Homophobes and "lemming-trollers" to that list as well.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteA savvy intern would spend a few minutes on the web trolling for the personal insights, whims and philosophy of heather frank. They'd find some interesting tidbits. Same for her "director of content" Matt Greenberg, a guy who says he went to j school because he wanted to work for that esteemed journalistic publication TV Guide. Hunke, next time, check out your job candidates a bit more closely. And I don't mean Rudd Davis spring break photos on Facebook.
ReplyDelete6:33 Thanks for the explanation. I thought Gracia was premature in disclosing this. I guess she needed to show the stock analysts corporate was doing something.
ReplyDeleteHeather's vision for USA TODAY is simple, turn it into a hodgepodge of women's oriented features, signed off in advance by advertisers. She wont need any of the current editors, because she thinks we are worthless. Since she hasn't bothered to get to know the work of any reporters beyond the crew she inherited for Your Life, they're goners, too. Hunke will be pleased, because the morale problem he refuses to take responsibility for will simply evaporate.
ReplyDeleteHeather's job is such a newsroom innovation, I would think corporate would welcome spreading the word that other news organizations should come over and see what she's doing. I do think there's a good news story there.
ReplyDelete3:22 Yes, that's close to what Tina Brown is doing over at Newsweek, and she gets great write-ups.
ReplyDeleteBut if I read the demographics clearly, we already have a sizeable female readership.
ReplyDeleteAll Heather has to do is get Chuck G. to call his buddies at Walmart and see if they want to buy some news stories. I can see the money rolling in right now.
ReplyDeleteI can see Heather is in the wrong position to make any substative changes to the operation. She needs to talk it over with Hunke and see if he has any objections to making her Grand Poobah of the USA Today operating center. That is a very important office, combining under its dynamic umbrella itself the offices of First Lord of finance, Lord Chief Justice of Human Relations, Commander-in-Chief of reporters, Lord High Admiral of the ships carrying Gannett's newsprint throughout the globe, and Archbishop of Titipu. The latter title is left undefined, deliberately, so as not to offend anyone's religion.
ReplyDeleteWhen life deals you lemming trolls, guess you should make lemming aid.
ReplyDeleteTina actually is a dynamic, powerful woman. Heather is not.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteHeh 9:19 everyone is rich and beautiful online.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDelete10:46 it's simple, you and your pals spew Lemming Troll hate, pontificate endlessly, and yet no other company is interested in putting you in a leadership position. My question is why not?
ReplyDeleteAnd I've let my Newsweek subscription expire.
ReplyDeleteBy the way, happy Memorial Day weekend.
Lemming trolls at this site always have been the people who defend Jim and what he represents: gossip; anonymous attacks; endless griping; factless claims.
ReplyDeleteThey are the people who respond to every criticism with "intelligent" bits like: "Gannett is evil! We don't need facts." And on and on. Some of the lemming trolls have been out of Gannett for two and a half years. You'd think they would have tired of this pattern by now. But they haven't.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteLemming Troll Hate is a great name for heavy metal band.
ReplyDelete@8:33 p.m. It was awful to watch Newsweek's decline. I subscribed for years and let mine go a few months ago. I started missing it even before I stopped subscribing. People were so quick to say that the weekly print news magazine was a doomed medium, but I never saw it that way. As a news junkie, I loved Newsweek's "broad perspective" approaches and in-depth reporting.
ReplyDeleteAll this lemming business is just meant to distract us from what's already happened and what's about to happen. It's all so predictable now. Management decides on more layoffs and then on que, the comments meant to denigrate Jim and the blog increase.
ReplyDeleteBut one thing is a fact, these "plants" are FAR outnumbered by the bevy of lucid opinion and pertinent information often found in this forum. And better still it's all going to exist in cyberspace for a long time and they're helpless to stop it.
Question - wonder how many Gannett board members read the blog?
Answer - apparently not enough.
I believe we've found the King of the Lemming Trolls. All hail 9:58! You can delete the post now Jim
ReplyDeleteI don't give a rat's ass who is troll and who isn't. We are here to share out issues with Gannett and that is all. I don't want to have issues with other people — I want to know what is happening, that Gannett corporate is keeping from us. I am ready to roll with the punches, so it be. If they lay me off, i will survive. So, shall we all. it is not the end, but the beginning for most of us. How could things be worse that being told to lie on our time sheets, doing five sometimes six people's jobs and never receiving credit for the hard work we do. i am done and ready for Gannett to sail.
ReplyDeletePointroll now advertises on Pogo.com (a free game website). Not sure of the demographics of the site or Pointroll's intended audience but my relaxation tonight was sorely interrupted.......
ReplyDeleteToo bad Deal Chicken didn't take off, because look at how Groupon is using journalism techniques to retain its dominance of the coupon market on the Web. I wondered what was going on and the attached article explains it. Couldn't USA Today use these techniques?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/29/business/29groupon.html?hp
The interns are so scrubbed, clean, eager, polite and nice. What a truly horrible fate awaits them.
ReplyDeleteI think 'Lemming Troll' is a better name than 'Deal Chicken.' It captures the company leadership and directors' true opinion of its staff, newsrooms, customers and investors.
ReplyDeleteBut whoever it is that keeps throwing out the 'lemming troll' insults should get more fiber in their diet. Really. You need to empty out.
And you entrepreneur-types here -- one of you should go buy the Lemming Troll domain. So many ways you can make that work.
Whatever you do with that Deal Chicken thing, though, be sure you read the terms of service thoroughly. There are almost no boundaries for the company. No way I'd jump into that agreement with this bunch. They've shown their true colors plainly enough.
Are any sites replacing page designers that leave in advance of work shifting to the design hubs? Surely people are looking for -- and in some cases finding -- new jobs. When this happens, are those jobs frozen? Eliminated? Filled? What's the story?
ReplyDelete11:17 good point. But let me tell you this I started the LTs because I was tired iof anyone having s divergent opinion being attacked by readers. Being called a Troll was the nicest title cast about. Jim continued to allow it so I took matters into my own hands. Call an attractive leader a MILF you are a LT. Call someone an asshole you are a LT. As long as Jim allows personal attacks or outright lies, Lemming Troll!
ReplyDeleteLemming trolls are delicious after a bucket o Deal Chicken.
ReplyDeleteThe Deal chicken plan, is still in the midst of hatching. So the new sites will come online, as Mail lists are built. As advertisers sign-on.
There have to be both deals, and customers.
And it appears a sales force of CHICKEN PEOPLE will be plopped into each site (not out of WKRP helicopters.) They'll be working on nothing but laying the eggs.
Then getting customers to hatch them.
I think that's the gist of it.
So where is this money coming from to hire all this sales force to push Deal Chicken deals? I would remind you there is a hiring freeze.
ReplyDeleteI find the Economist is a good replacement for Newsweek. I can't figure out what Newsweek is doing, but I do know it's not singing my tune. The Economist has some crazy in-depth features, but I generally find it satisfying.
ReplyDelete9:58, I think you're absolutely wrong. I think they all read this which is why you see the increase in the lemming troll comments. Like you said, they're trying to distract but they're way outnumbered. It is very apparent that when a publication outside of Gannett wants to report the goings on at Gannett, they always reference this blog.
ReplyDeletewhat? Other places won,t reference this one unless they want inaccuracies.
ReplyDelete