JRC axes 3 at Pontiac, Mich.

But 21st century wasnt around long either. When the guy who bought them all came in, he had to hack and slash to make ends meet. Then JRC came in and bought and cut when there was nothing to cut.
Where 21st century had the advantage was advertising. With the Oakland Press to the north and Heritage to the south, they had the O&E by the balls and it showed in their ad partnership to counter the DNA.
But when JRC bought 21st century, the ad partnership was off. Then when Gannett bought the O&E that put the screws to JRC...

 

That they were. They couldn't even get their shit together to share stories among themselves.

Their legacy will be pissing away a golden opportunity.

 

You think maybe JRC might be pulling numbers flat out of its ass? You really think they would do that?

 

Most likely, this is an effort to clear the whole joint out by means of sheer panic. Rather than fire people or lay people off, they'll turn the place into such a horrifying hellhole, staffers will bee-line it for night-shift jobs at Wal-Mart. The 'scorched earth' method of personnel management.

The sports department is also being put through a shredder. They're taking a borderline major-league section and turning it into a junior-high scrapbook.

Langlois has been busted down to preps. Their Tigers beat writer has also been busted down to preps (in midseason, probably sparking a discrimination suit). Another writer, in the course of about 10 months, has been busted down from Red Wings, to Michigan football, to preps. Undoubtedly, the kindergarten kickball beat is next.

The Lions beat writer (who couldn't be any farther up Matt Millen's ass if he had been implanted as a permanent suppository) is now writing columns.

Tits and ass, blood and guts, right-wing hysteria and acres and acres of junior high soccer scores -- the JRC recipe for editorial success.

Lessenberry is your prototypical ivory-tower J-school/alt-weekly foghorn -- somebody who hasn't actually worked (that is, as in your primary means of material support) in actual journalism in decades, spewing out endless waves of pompous, sanctimonious bullshit, telling everyone who is actually working in the profession what they should do and how they should do it, and why.

That said, in this case, the proverbial blind pig has found the acorn. Of course, as he notes, it isn't exactly tough to shoot a walrus in your bathtub.

 

Bravo, lapdog.
I think Pasche is still on Michigan football, but you've nailed it otherwise.

 

Lapdog especially nailed it on the ivory-tower types. I have no problem with people offering ideas on the business, it's when they tell us how they -- the ones who haven't been in a newsroom since Lennon was assassinated -- KNOW we're effing up.

 

Speaking of ivory-tower types, I see where Garry Gilbert, after years of ignoring problems in his newsroom, has fled to teach at Michigan State.

Of course, he blames that on having to stare at a spreadsheet for eight years. Couldn't possibly have anything to do with the underperformers in the office, you know.

 

Yo Slappy,

Leave my second cousin, the 'fatass clown,' alone, will ya?

Thanks,
MGB

 

Damn, genetics DOES explain everything...

 

I think more likely Garry Gilbert's move has to do with the fact that any JRC executive editor not personally installed by Jelenic (and attached mouth-first to his groin) has an average career life expectancy measured in weeks, if not days (if not hours). Not that Gilbert was any shining beacon of journalistic excellence, but he wasn't one of Jelenic's boys, and he knew the next time Bloodsucking Bobby got hungry for a fresh jugular, he'd be right near the top of the list.

Glenn Gilbert, his replacement (no relation), is your typical JRC stooge/hatchet man-for-hire. Before moving up to Oakland, he spent a month at the Macomb Daily, the next-biggest paper in their Detroit-area cluster. He fired half the people on the masthead there, too.

 

everyone fired from Newhouse were fired for a reason, and they all know what their reasons were.

 

yeah . . . being too old/making too much money . . . old story.