Thursday, March 28, 2013

March 25-31 | Your News & Comments: Part 3

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53 comments:

  1. That Callaway sure knows how to throw a sucker punch. The staff is down for the count! More haymakers to come!

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  2. This guy is a clueless sleazeball. We have plenty of them on staff already.

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  3. Compare to how Gannett handled "Blue Balls."


    http://venturebeat.com/2013/03/20/playhaven-developer-fired-for-making-sexual-jokes-after-sendgrids-developer-evangelist-outs-him-on-twitter/

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  4. who remembers the last time they got a raise in pay?

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    1. I do, but I had to leave Gannett to get it.

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    2. I do, but I had to present an ultimatum to my boss.

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    3. I did even better, a 5K a year raise and a cut in hours by about 15 a week from what I worked at Gannett on top of it.

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    4. The Liars' Club has reconvened, I see.

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  5. Another "resignation" from USAT's marketing crew. Micek is cleverly pushing each one of the seniors out the door one by one.

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    1. That's the dea. No matter how cleverly legal-eagle, it's age. Not performance. Sorry, kids with the all the vile presumption. Sure, there's some dead weight but it's it is NOT determined by experience.

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    2. ...and I can't help it if a cat walks across the keyboard when I'm trying to type.

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    3. Oh No, are we going to have to deal with more fired marketing staff clogging up the cesspool of this blog?

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  6. Age. Age. Age. Thrown under the bus.

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  8. Yes. It's age, age, age everywhere. It's not just Gannett. Do something for the next generation. File a complaint. I'm on my second EEOC complaint, and this second one was so much easier since I now realize that it won't hurt my employment record. As long as the age discrimination laws are on the books, I'll do everything I can to fight that kind of discrimination. Join me, boomers. We've won bigger battles.

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    1. Grow up and move on.

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    2. 1:04 am Stated like a true know it all youngster up at 1 am and partying on.

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    3. Thanks, but I'm probably older than you.

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    4. Um, 8 a.m., some of us work nights for the mighty G. I know that's a hard concept for many day workers to grasp. Hell, I'm not even home by 1:04 a.m., let alone partying.

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    5. Considering nothing and nobody at Gannett seems to function after 10 pm, then what exactly do you think you're accomplishing. Unless you're a security guard.

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    6. 2:55 Who in the hell works nights to print GCI Rags, Pressman, nights,weekends and holiday's. Every night, all night. Jerk O

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  9. Age = experience = higher salary. You get what you pay for. Just look at any of our products now. Crap across the Gannett floors. The advertiser knows it and the user sure knows it.

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    1. Bull. Experience comes from accomplishment, not tenure. And value comes from results, not experience.

      None of which matters, because the collapse of the newspaper industry is due to factors beyond anyone's control.

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    2. Then our leadership is surely at risk.
      Experience = Accomplishment @ Gannett = ZERO
      Value = Results @ Gannett = ZERO

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    3. Spoken like a true HR flack. Looks like a standard processed line to be written on those non-existent performance appraisals on why you won't get a raise anytime soon.

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  10. Charles Everett3/28/2013 8:11 AM

    Exhibit A: USAToday.com/sports. The Miami Heat lost last night to end a 27-game winning streak. Lead story of USA Today sports at this hour? Tiger Woods. You want Tiger worship 24/7, watch The Golf Channel.

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    1. USAT sports used to be a reason to buy the paper. Now it is just crap.

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  11. Its just sad. Old managers and new reporters are equally clueless. Combine those two with the digital geniuses and Callaway's lack of oversight and you got bigger problems at this organization besides dead weight and incompetence. Cant wait for Dave's next round of pointless chair shuffling.

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  12. Anyone else hearing rumblings of furloughs or other cost-cutting measures for the next quarter -- perhaps site-specific rather than across-the-board?

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    1. No. I believe we're on solid ground with no more cuts or furloughs needed, at least for this year.

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    2. Oh Brother !
      What Daily Planet do you live on?
      How many times in the past has everyone thought,they can't cut anymore,we are to the bone?
      What do you base this theory on?
      Revenues continue to be trending down.Expenses must go down to offset.

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    3. All we here at our property is that we have to cut expenses. Last time I heard that we had lay offs. Anyone getting a layoff vibe?

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    4. Just a matter of time. May 15th is when it will happen.

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    5. I understand major firings of account reps in advertising who management deems NOT World Class! Is May 15 the magical day?

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  13. Not learning from the idiots at the Journal News, The Des Moines Register publishes a map showing which Iowa schools are adequately protected and which ones lack security.

    http://www.newsmax.com/TheWire/des-moines-register-map-iowa-schools/2013/03/28/id/496779

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  14. A word to the higher-ups at USA Today / Gannett:

    Even if you dismiss 90 percent of the comments on this blog as coming from malcontents, outsiders or sour-grapes ex-employees, you have to admit that if just 10 percent of the observations and accusations here are true, you have a problem.

    Board of Directors and stockholders, take note.
    Where there is smoke there is fire.

    I don't see how the company portrayed in this blog can ever recover from the damage it has inflicted on itself in the last five years.

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    1. 100 % of everything on this blog is from those pesky fired ex marketing people. And those numbers of exes keeps growing more and more each day.

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    2. Really? 100%? Even the stuff I'm writing?!

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    3. Obviously 6:34 pm is a current pesky marketing peep. - -

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    4. Not true, I think all of us are still working with the company. It is a way to blow off steam, our boss could give a shit as well. The company is a joke

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    5. I post here most everyday and I work for the company. Believe what you will....and don't let facts get in the way of a good story.

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    7. The crybabies on here are in denial about a dying industry.

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  15. I agree with 4:35 PM. There is one thing, though, I'd like to add that the recent generation might not grasp since it is out of their experience.

    As someone who spent a quarter of a century with Gannett, I've witnessed some missteps here and there, usually corrected through feedback, but nothing on the scale of this current mess.

    Not surprising, though, these days. Feedback is unthinkable. It's all top-down now. All of it. The only input expected in the past five years from the bottom is serial ass-kissing. That's one sign of a very sick company right there.

    And, yes, I finally accepted that the company was no longer in any form the one I could to continue to associate with. Gone was locality. Gone was feedback.

    I check Gannettblog once in a long while just to see what my former coworkers are still dealing with: a company run by guesswork and egos.

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  16. Here's link to Fox News interview with editor Rick Green. Sounds to me like the paper folded too soon on the interactive graphic, which showed which school districts in Iowa have or don't have security staff.

    At least he's dealing with questions right away, as opposed to Westchester, which responded too late and with too little.

    Would appreciate thoughts from Register staff on the story. How does Green stack up as an editor compared to Carolyn Washburn?

    http://foxnewsinsider.com/2013/03/28/fiery-interview-megyn-kelly-presses-des-moines-register-editor-rick-green-to-take-responsibility-for-school-security-map/

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    1. My favorite part of that exchange is where Green is talking to Fox News' Megyn Kelly about why they published the graphic.

      Green: “The tricky part of this whole thing Megyn is that when taxpayers and residents are calling us to inquire about how safe their kids’ schools are, we have to investigate it."

      Kelly's reply: “Tell them to call the school district!"

      Extending her thought further, newspapers should not publish crime statistics for certain neighborhoods because it might inspire more crime.

      "Tell the readers to call their police station and find out for themselves!"

      Or: Newspapers should not cover City Council meetings because reporters won't quote every exchange verbatim -- giving some councilors more time than others.

      "Tell the readers to attend the meetings for themselves!"

      Earth to Kelly: Readers pay newspapers for this coverage so they don't have to go out and do the legwork themselves. It's called journalism.

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    2. Earth to Kelly: Readers pay newspapers for this coverage so they don't have to go out and do the legwork themselves. It's called journalism.

      And the less newspapers do journalism, the less newspapers they sell!

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    3. Terrific. Let them provide a map of abortion providers and their degree of security.

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    4. Nobody "pays" for news coverage - that's why the news industry is going under.

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  17. You guys seriously don't see anything potentially problematic about posting interactive maps of which schools have lax or no security? No seeing where those few hundred apoplectic readers on the DR's reader comments are coming from? The idea for the DR story was smart -- infinitely smarter than Westchester's inane "we need to know the name and address of everybody who has a gun, because Sandy Hook." But the Register should have been handled the information more generally in my opinion. "XX of schools in Iowa have no security personnel whatsoever," without naming them all.

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    1. ..."we need to know the name and address of everybody who has a gun, because Sandy Hook." That wasn't the premise of the Westchester story. Did you even read it -- or did you just read the many mischaracterizations about it?

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  18. Charles Everett3/29/2013 7:48 AM

    The Des Moines faux pas has made it to the right-wing blog NewsBusters. All the comments are a great way to start your Friday.

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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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