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Sunday, June 19, 2011
17 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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Will the Hattiesburg American ever hire a new editor? Dan davies has been gone for at least 3 months. They have done multiple interviews, yet no announcement. Oh yeah, I forgot the Gannett way: keep positions open and save money while the product suffers and remaining staff is forced to do more w/ less.
ReplyDeleteI just learned about former Gannett NJ publisher Skip Hidlay's demise at McClatchy. I hope you and other readers find out what he has moved on to.
ReplyDeleteMy feelings are exactly in line with the poster on the May 10 blog expressing mixed feelings about him. He didn't reveal a lot about his thought processes and personal feelings as he administered Gannett manifestos, so I am deeply curious about what he left the Witchita paper to do. It may give clues to his past decisions affecting us.
Also worth remark and follow up was that Chris Erwin, who was a sports writer with serious clashes with Skip and Gannett in general, seems to have last commented identified by name on that blog post. He was arrested on May 11 and charged with some serious crimes. I like Chris OK from what little contact I had with him, but I'm curious about this: The prosecutor's allegations include claims he was using his landscaping business as a front for an illegal drug enterprise. Wasn't one of his issues in contention with Skip that he was operating the landscaping business from the APP? Did the APP tap his phone then, and could this case have been building as far back as that?
And a third bit of intrigue around these camps and their times was a VP Finance guy at the APP (I forget his name now, an East Indian) who was reassigned to the Home News and was summarily fired as one of Skip's first big acts of business when made HNT publisher. What ever happened to him, and does anyone know the outcome of criminal allegations in the grapevine in that case?
I know, all are former Gannetteers and some say, "Who cares?" Gannett New Jersey cares, Jim.
The fact that Chris Erwin was one of the very few people who felt he could post with a name speaks volumes about the credibility of this blog.
ReplyDeleteThat statement will confuse the many pea-brains here, but some should figure it out.
OK, I'm one of those pea brains, I guess, Anon 11:54 a.m. You're not talking about the points in the second comment, are you? I take it you're talking about hard feelings among some about Jim's monitoring or something? I couldn't care less about that. It's his blog, and if he doesn't like something he's free to delete it and we're free to post it elsewhere or on our own sites. If you're referring to something about what Chris posting about Gannett under his real name means about his landscaping business, please spell it out for my pea brain.
ReplyDeleteYou are a pea-brain, 12:21. I'll wait until a couple more of the empty heads come in here seeking answers. Best to keep those of ignorance in the dark for a while; they tend to rebel against the knowledge once it's offered.
ReplyDeleteKnowledgeable Anonymous 12:25 PM: Did Chris ever post a comment, in his name or anonymously, at this blog related to the facts in the arrest announcement?
ReplyDelete12:25 Translation: I don't know what I"m talking about either, but it sounded good when I heard somebody else say it.
ReplyDelete11:18am - You are wondering about Ketan Gandhi. Yeah, I am wondering where he went too. I believe he went to Philadelphia in some publishing role. There was much fan fare for him being the first Asian Indian newspaper publisher and then poof, overnight, he was gone with no explanation. I can honestly say, having worked at The Home News Tribune under him, that he wasn't missed. I worked for Skip too but I had limited dealing with him and his policies were no where near as advertorial as Ketan's.
ReplyDeleteWhere is the Chris Erwin comment posted?
ReplyDeleteYou can find out what Ketan is doing by going to his profile on LinkedIn. A company called Broad Street Publishing. Don't know about Skip. His profile on LinkedIn notes he is still executive editor at the APP.
ReplyDelete5:10 This required a bit of research.
ReplyDeleteA reader who said they were Chris Erwin posted comments in this thread, shortly before 1 a.m. ET on May 11. That was just hours before former Asbury Park Press employee Christopher Erwin was arrested in connection with a multimillion-dollar painkiller medication distribution ring. Erwin was among 16 people arrested that day, according to this U.S. Justice Department press release.
In that release, the department said: "One of those co-defendants, Christopher Erwin, 47, of Barnegat, N.J., is a purported landscaper who served as leader of the drug trafficking organization."
At the time of the arrests, the Press reported: "Chris Erwin is a former Asbury Park Press newsroom employee. He left the company in August 2007."
However, I have no way of knowing whether the Chris Erwin who posted those comments is the same Erwin who was arrested.
Also, earlier, on Jan. 22, a reader signing their comments Chris Erwin -- possibly the same one -- also posted comments in this thread.
Nice try, 4:21, but all you did was expose yourself as ignorant to the facts. In a surprise and refreshing change, Jim actually went back and got some information and posted it here.
ReplyDeleteIs there any guarantee the Chris Erwin who posted here is the same Chris Erwin who was arrested? Probably not, but I think a sensible person can conclude either they are the same, or someone went to a lot of trouble to imitate Chris.
Now, 4:21, get some facts the next time before you throw out a weak insult.
6:05 This blog wouldn't be at all interesting without all the effort and thought Jim puts into it, and it is appreciated very much by some.
ReplyDeleteJim IS 6:05, you weiner. What are you talking about?
ReplyDelete6:05 here. Stand by what I said.
ReplyDeleteUm, what are you idiots talking about? You do realize the timestamp is under the post, right? So Jim's post is at 6:05.
ReplyDeleteI have to wonder how much stress some people here created when they were still working for Gannett. The amount of hand-holding that has to be done with some is amazingly high, and even then they still don't get it.
I've now done some more digging, and have found quite a few more comments posted to Gannett Blog by someone who said they were Chris Erwin.
ReplyDeleteAll of this leads me to a question I'm only beginning to answer: How did Erwin go from sports copy editor at a mid-size N.J. daily to the accused mastermind of a multimillion-dollar oxycodone painkiller distribution ring with two doctors and nearly 20 foot soldiers -- all in less than two years?