Saturday, September 10, 2011
47 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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So, if USAT is now dismantling the vertical strategy less than one year after it launched, does anyone have any insight as to what the new strategy is for USAT?
ReplyDeleteI will try to repost what I said earlier regarding major gaffes, mistakes and errors @ Usa Today. At most papers, heads would roll or there would be demotions. Here, we have affable memos and celebratory parties for mere competence. Gosh, I miss the old style newsrooms where it really was about doing your best and scooping competitors.
ReplyDeleteNewspaper?
ReplyDeleteReports of the dismantling of the verticals have been greatly exaggerated.
ReplyDelete9:11 OK. What, then, is the more accurate story?
ReplyDeleteUSAT is still promising three more verticals in 2011. Some time ago, a poster here said the personal finance vertical got killed before launch. True? If so, how come?
And where are the other two, which were to be about diversions and personal technologies?
What's been accomplished in the 10 months since the last vertical, Your Life, was launched?
Sooooooooo.....after one week of getting our USA's printed elsewhere and vanned over to us....today we get shorted. Every carrier came up with different numbers other than what was posted on our manifests.
ReplyDeleteOh goody. This is what we have to look forward to?
You censor the posts of the very people who provide you key inside info. You can't have it both ways, jimbo
ReplyDeleteDubow needs to have Dickey and Hunke overlay maps of delivery area's where they each have circulation employees supervising deliveries, marketing and drawsetting. When is corporate going to go after this obvious low hanging fruit for position cost savings? Production has been doing its part by combining printsites and elimiinating positions. Circulation should be next on deck.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.businessinsider.com/new-yahoo-eic-pushes-out-front-page-editor-2011-9
ReplyDeleteUSAT's Vertical strategy may be the worst communicated, most convoluted in the history of newspaper publishing.
ReplyDeleteJim jumped the shark protecting Susan Weiss. Now he is seeding his own blog with posts about the much hated verticals team to drum up comments. We are on to you, jim.
ReplyDeleteAnd hm, just who else has a grudge against the verticals and Heather Frank's team? Who feels threatened by them and might be leaking word of their struggles to this blog? I think we've found a motive for deleting those comments.
ReplyDeleteI don't want to say the name because then this post will be deleted. It probably will be anyway. Let's see. Maybe some of you will read it before that happens.
It is just as conceivable that Heather and her pals are trashing Weiss on this blog to deflect on going criticism of the verticals utter failure. But who knows when Jim is pulling comments on a whim?
ReplyDeleteVerticals and ideas like that are where people need to help Jim. He tends to think, unintentionally, that if he's not interested in something, others also must not be interested in it. That's clearly apparent with Your Life, which is a good idea that builds on USAT's strengths. If USAT can't pull that off, they're in serious trouble.
ReplyDelete6:36 I'm not interested in USAT's verticals?
ReplyDeleteWhat about this post -- and this, and this, and this, and this, and this, and this and this?
Yeah, Jim is all about criticism of the verticals. He would never delete a post about them for being "repetitive."
ReplyDeleteSo obvious now who is feeding it. Great team player that one. Good thing we have her as a leader.
Perhaps taking down the comments about Susan Weiss was Jim's way of overcompensating for not taking down comments about other female managers. Maybe he's extra-sensitive to complaints that he was being insensitive.
ReplyDeleteBut implying that Susan Weiss is feeding information to Jim is potentially libelous and those comments should be removed.
Hey 12:48...I've worked 21 years in circ and I don't know of any "low hanging fruit" you refer to. Do you know how many circ employees I have seen transitioned? I personally was involved in terminating 11 employees over the past 8 years. The mantra for those 21 years was "more for less".
ReplyDelete10:53 I wrote 7:32 and did not mean to imply Susan Weiss. I agree that is stupid. I imagine some managers do complain to Jim about the Verticals given his heavy coverage of them, and was thinking I could guess one, but then it became more a crack about Jim's itchy deletion figure.
ReplyDelete6:36. Yes, keep that up and soon we will all be back in condition and fighting spirit. Go get 'em Gannett Blog. Make 'em cry for mercy.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteHey, Jim: Thanks for bringing the USA Today special comments forum back. I was wondering what ever became of the interns at USA Today this summer. Did they learn anything, or are they continuing in journalism? This reader would like to know.
ReplyDeleteI would like to see the low hanging fruit in circulation too. In what used to be our market, I know of at least 6 who have been let go in the circulation department. It's not unusual to look into another state or at least 200-300 miles away to find anyone who can cover a vacation for a DM anymore. Overlay all the maps you want, there is no boundary overlap and nobody in an office within a half days drive anymore.
ReplyDelete11:55: If you're in Gannett management and you've only transitioned 11 employees in 8 years you've still got a lot of fat in your shop. 10:44, who are you kidding? With the economy the way it is, exactly how often does that DM who is 300 miles away have to visit the vacationing district? My guess is rarely if ever. Most of those areas are covered by partnerships. If USA Today is the only paper delivering in isolated areas like that, then they need to pull out tomorrow to save costs.
ReplyDeleteI agree there's duplicated efforts. I work for a gannett newspaper that delivers USA Today. They print at our printsite and in our market there's some people who work for USA Today Circulation. We could take over everything they do tomorrow and nobody would notice they were gone.
ReplyDeleteWhat has happened at USA TODAY in the last 4-5 years sickens me. From certain unqualified managers/editors gaining clout through blatant dishonesty to sloppy hiring and gimmicks taking priority over substance/accuracy, this brand has gone from being a credible news source to a amateur production. And while titles change, things continue to worsen.
ReplyDeleteSerious journalists are leaving. Others are embarrassed to work here. If it weren't for the fancy building and the prior reputation of USAT, I often wonder why anyone would accept a job here.
A core of committed gatekeepers remains, but they are overwhelmed by a sea of dysfunction and incompetent coworkers. USAT has always been a tough place to work for people with a degree of vision and integrity. But things were moving in the right direction until a few years ago.
Now? Well, there's no job security, no help or backup, too many initiatives with idiotic titles ... and way too little of the stuff that lends itself to producing a reliable, cutting edge news product.
It's stunning to see who has moved into favor with top management while other truly talented and good people were pushed out. It's just a damn shame that people who should have gotten more appreciation didn't, while others, who possess nothing more than a nice smile and ability to kiss ass, are showered with praise by insecure higher ups with a distorted view of how a newsroom should be staffed.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteI miss Craig Moon. He had his issues but he was honest, direct, smart, experienced and did a great job with USAToday. He saw the writing on the wall with Dubow and smartly, he left the job. He wanted no part of what was ahead for USAToday.
ReplyDeleteI know you didn't like him JIm. But look what we have now. Be careful what you wish for.
"It's stunning to see who has moved into favor with top management while other truly talented and good people were pushed out. It's just a damn shame that people who should have gotten more appreciation didn't, while others, who possess nothing more than a nice smile and ability to kiss ass ..."
ReplyDeleteThis simply means USAT is now fully immersed with the total GCI culture. The company has always prided itself on promoting mediocrity. Those who can stomach the mind-bendingly pointless meetings with a big smile on their faces advance. Welcome to GCI, USAT.
USAT's online mixed martial arts sports pages make me wonder: What, exactly, is a web vertical?
ReplyDeleteI haven't found a good definition, so I'll go with USAT's, which appears in the paper's online media kit:
"USA Today has added a new dimension to its media portfolio with vertical content experiences that expand our relationship with consumers and provide new integration opportunities for advertisers."
There are now two of them: Your Life (which gets lots of attention here), and Travel (which is hardly discussed; why is that?). Meanwhile, USAT is promising three more by the end of this year: in personal finance, personal technology, and entertainment.
But it looks like there's actually already a third vertical in place: mixed martial arts. That was once the subject of a conventional blog, Fighting Stances. Click on that blog's link now, and you arrive at the USA Today UFC Group, devoted to MMA.
So, how are the MMA pages not a vertical? Or, have they simply morphed into one without anyone noticing?
7:48 Agreed.
ReplyDeleteUSA Today wouldn't be this way unless the powers that be wanted it to be this way. There's good journalism and bad journalism in it every day. That's why Jim left and started this blog, and that's why some of us come back every day to this blog. That, anyway is my hope for what the USA Today interns got out of this summer's vacation.
ReplyDeleteIt's pretty simple actually....we are almost solely focused on content distribution rather than quality content. Sure, one follows the other, but somehow we have gotten it backwards.
ReplyDeleteGo get 'em Tiger.
ReplyDeleteCraig Moon honest. That's funny.
ReplyDeleteI'm cross-posting this, whis was posted earlier today on another thread:
ReplyDeleteAnonymous has left a new comment on your post "Sept. 5-11 | Your News & Comments: Part 5":
USA Today loses another customer: http://www.tbd.com/articles/2011/09/george-washington-university-stops-giving-away-free-newspapers-that-no-one-wants-66256.html
There are good posts and bad posts, 9:28. Yours is terrible.
ReplyDeletePretty sad when moon is seen as a better publisher than Hunke. But
ReplyDeleteMoon begat hillkirk, who allows the shenanigans in the newsroom to fester? Ultimately, who had final say over the current management structure and team? Who has the power to do a redo? It can't be just about cutting. It simply doesnt work.
Speaking of the verticals, I had the opportunity to actually read the copy on wednesday while traveling. The banal writing is one thing. But in tiny type in the top banner I found something even more disturbing. A "
ReplyDeletePr newswire" credit line.
Any self respecting gannettiod should be ashamed of the blatant advertorial pandering and lack of basic journalism standards on Your Life. And what content there is ? Just awful.
ReplyDeleteThe decline of Life's once excellent and newsy health and behavior, medicine and science coverage and the rise of the deeply mediocre Your Life is nothing short of shocking.
ReplyDeleteThe reporters and any real editors who are left are trying to hold the line, but what can they do when staff-written copy is subsumed by crap that's indifferently edited, barely vetted and just thrown up there?
It's easy and popular to blame Hillkirk et al, but let's not forget that those editors were put in those positions precisely because they wouldn't kick up a fuss. It's like blaming a cat for catching a songbird. It's their nature.
The real culprit here is Dave Hunke, who cluelessly inflicted an unworkable Transformation on the newsroom and hired a bunch of AOLers to finish the job of dismantling what took 30 years to build.
It's a testament to our professionalism that we even get a newspaper out each day.
USA Today has eliminate DSM positions and has other newspapers delivering single copy and home delivery. A fine example of this process may be found at the Minneapolis and the Denver market. The market eliminated more than five DSM positions over the past three years. Home delivery has been given to the Minneapolis Star and single copy to the Pioneer paper in Saint Paul, Minnesota for delivery. Management was not reduced through this process and continues to remain top heavy through this transaction. This kind of behavior, one that favors the company will eliminate more jobs at other markets in the same fashion.
ReplyDelete6:12, you really nailed it. No one has the guts to tell anyone in power- namely Hunke - what doesn't work and what crosses the line regarding content. The AOL crew operates it's own fiefdom with its own substandard content. They don't give a shit about the rest of the paper.
ReplyDeleteHillkirk? He cares about número uno, not making waves and not getting his hands dirty. He is not a problem solver. He ignores very real problems. He allows incompetence to fester. He just doesnt care about the fractious post transformation management team. He doesn't hold anyone accountable for blatant mistakes. He wont make necessary changes.
There will be no more vertical launches until Heather Frank gets her team's act together. Which isn't going to happen any time soon. Their approach to attracting readers is wrong. So the content doesn't interest them. This is a newspaper. None of the AOL team has any actual newspaper experience. They don't understand our reader base. You can't throw poorly conceived, lousily written crap out there and expect anybody to care about it. If the concept was attracting advertisers instead of pandering to them, HUnke could justify all the high paid hires he has made. But the verticals are broken and all the management shuffling and meetings in the world wont fix them if the core concept remains.
ReplyDeleteHillkirk. That says it all about what is broken. Let's promote him to vice president of Healthworks and replace him with someone who cares about putting out a quality newspaper and website. Susie Ellwood, find someone who sees a need to replace and reposition to make it happen.
ReplyDeleteKnowing the way USA Today inbreeds management, you cannot expect change until someone from the outside is brought in, 11:07. Why can't we get someone from the NYTimes or some other big city paper?
ReplyDelete"It's pretty simple actually....we are almost solely focused on content distribution rather than quality content. Sure, one follows the other, but somehow we have gotten it backwards."
ReplyDeleteNailed it, 9:29 a.m. Absolutely nailed it.