Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Amid layoffs, media companies 'speak no evil'

"While news organizations demand full disclosure from everyone else," American Journalism Review says in a new story, "they often resort to euphemisms and sugarcoating when they report on their own downsizing."

Writer Paul Farhi, who also is a Washington Post reporter, includes Gannett in his examples. He writes: "Jim Hopkins, whose Gannett Blog tracks the nation's largest newspaper chain, says the newspaper industry has become rife with 'stealthy layoffs' -- cutbacks that are never reported."

3 comments:

  1. Ha. I've thought that for years. We get indignant when the local sweatshop factory owner won't tell us about layoffs, but god forbid Gannett mention their own layoff schemes.

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  2. The media company I’m employed by never ceases to amaze my colleagues and myself in the direction the company is trending, layoff employees and grant bonuses to the executives.

    Five supervisors in circulation were let go this month, eighteen pressmen scheduled to be terminated at the end of the fourth quarter, and ten to twenty in editorial to be throw under the bus within the next few weeks.

    But remember, don’t tell anyone.

    The Blogging Pressman
    Los Angeles Times

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  3. News companies as we knew them are dying. So expect execs and the journalism groups and schools that pander to them to lie or spin non-starter economic models as they quickly pull their parachutes on.

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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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