good days at the santa barbara news-press

http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2006/07/media_massacre_in_santa_b.html

from romenesko:

and from la observed:

http://www.independent.com/opinion/2006/07/xdogs_the_last_stand.html

 

Relatives live here, and they get the Times rather than this name-only newspaper. To think it once was a solid NYT regional product. :-\

 

So, I guess that means there are a few job openings about to be posted ay jjobs.com??

Shameful stuff going on there and, I must say, it was cool to read the staff reaction.

 

How can you pull that sort of bush leage crap in an affluent, educated area? I mean, the Reagans lived in Santa Barbara...all sorts of rich people live out there. You've got an audience that travels and knows what good newspapers are like...it ain't Hicksville, Neb., where you can run a picture of a girl kissing a hog on A-1. Why don't you just buy everyone there a subscription to the LA Times?

 

Is this a preview for Philly?

 

Sorry, but I'm not buying the "fuck you" chants. I'd be very surprised if that really happened.

The only reason I'm not calling outright bullshit is the claim that any number of positions are vacant.

 

Supposedly there was a scene like this when the New York Post was briefly owned by Abe Hirschfeld, who fired editor Pete Hamill. The way I remember it, they didn't yell "fuck you" at him, they yelled "liar!" Then they put out an edition ripping him, including a story about the new owner with a headline that asked, "Who Is This Nut?" The front page had a drawing of Alexander Hamilton (the founder) with a tear falling from an eye.

 

I absolutely believe it. But the writer didn't say they were chanting, just shouting. Ink-stained newspaper folk can be a fearless, in-your-face bunch. I have no doubt they were hurt by what happened and let Armstrong have it with both barrels.

 

So what kind of dirty photos does this Armstrong fella have of the owner to garner such treatment? That is more interesting to me than the staff reaction.

I mean, I was told to reprint an article that had an ME's daughter's name mispelled (not a correction, but the entire article again), but holding out a news article is fricking outlandish.

By the way, it took 20 showers to feel better after re-running the article. And I felt better, but the stink remains.

 

Closer to us, one blog item says that sports editor Jerry Spratt quit as well, beyond the five senior editors in news and business.

I actually know George Foulsham from a past tour stop. Good guy who apparently had been in Santa Barbara less than a year.

 

I worked with a Spratt (young kid) at the Santa Maria Times. Wonder if they're related.

 

He did quit
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-newspress8jul08,1,5255717.story?coll=la-headlines-california