Big cuts in Akron

[Michael_ Gee]

What does the publisher put on the wall when the graphs all start heading straight down? In my experience, publishers' walls are covered with pictures of themselves shaking hands with other asshole big shots.

 

[Frank_Ridgeway]

Why doesn't the CEO just come out and say, "we want to make the ABJ as irrrelevant as possible as quickly as possible?" Because that's what he's really trying to do.

Well, let's understand that the new owner is the guy who saved the Honolulu Star-Bulletin when no one else wanted it. He didn't save everyone's job, but he did save the paper. Whether these kinds of drastic measures are necessary in Akron, a one-paper town, is open to debate. But I don't think we can be ultra-cynical about his motives just yet.

Frank, have you seen the Star-Bulletin since Black moved in? It's two steps shy of journalistic irrelevancy.

That may be true, but would the people working there rather have a bad paper or a dead paper?

 

[loveyabye]

In Toledo, where the workers pay $0 for health care and make 60K a year, the contract is up and the paper is aiming at busting the union. A strike might happen.

The Blade has locked out six of its eight unions, the most recent four today. The guild and the pressmen are still going.

Here's a link: stoptheblade.com

 

[Dan Hickling]

While certainly Reed and McManamon are big losses for the paper, the other two are addition by subtraction. Storm and Estwick added nothing whatsoever to that section and the size of the section, in pages, did not justify the size of the staff, in people. In fact, it still doesn't.
Storm, meanwhile, seems to have no problem finding jobs, despite underwhelming talent, and Estwick should have little trouble finding something new (I'll not elaborate there, for fear of inciting certain people, who don't believe that certain hiring practices do, in fact, exist).

My friend, I take issue with your comments about Stephanie Storm....she is an excellent minor league baseball reporter...works hard at it...puts her heart into it...and as a result is respected throughout the (admittedly small and provincial) community of EL and IL beat writers....

 

[steveu]

Last I checked, the Trentonian is above 50,000. I could be wrong, so shoot me if I am... and if Reed, McManamon and Storm are as talented as the board says they are (and I read their stuff online, so I don't doubt it), some enterprising papers will snap them up quickly.

Having said that, the ABJ was a viable mid-sized alternative to the PD and is now the little paper that couldn't. What a waste.

 

[Michael_ Gee]

The one thing Americans hate most is a quitter. Newspapers big and small can't wait to tell their American customers that the newspaper they just bought is a big-time quitter.

 

[Tom Petty]

Why doesn't the CEO just come out and say, "we want to make the ABJ as irrrelevant as possible as quickly as possible?" Because that's what he's really trying to do.

Well, let's understand that the new owner is the guy who saved the Honolulu Star-Bulletin when no one else wanted it. He didn't save everyone's job, but he did save the paper. Whether these kinds of drastic measures are necessary in Akron, a one-paper town, is open to debate. But I don't think we can be ultra-cynical about his motives just yet.

Frank, have you seen the Star-Bulletin since Black moved in? It's two steps shy of journalistic irrelevancy.

That may be true, but would the people working there rather have a bad paper or a dead paper?

thanks for stopping by Black Press CEO and president David Black.

i think the point already has been made there was a 20 percent profit margin ... most businesses would do the icky shuffle if they had a 20 percent margin and they certainly wouldn't die unless they were mismanaged into the ground.

what is your forking point mr. black? i think the point is, as far as "new-wave" newspaper owners are concerned, 20 percent is NOT enough and product be damned to get it closer to 30.

people like you who defend cocksuckers like this make me sick. it's people like you who shrug their shoulders when another daily newspaper becomes the equivalent of a shopper.

excuse me while i go forking nap at my desk and dream about earning the man his required 30-40 percent.

 

[Frank_Ridgeway]

Why doesn't the CEO just come out and say, "we want to make the ABJ as irrrelevant as possible as quickly as possible?" Because that's what he's really trying to do.

Well, let's understand that the new owner is the guy who saved the Honolulu Star-Bulletin when no one else wanted it. He didn't save everyone's job, but he did save the paper. Whether these kinds of drastic measures are necessary in Akron, a one-paper town, is open to debate. But I don't think we can be ultra-cynical about his motives just yet.

Frank, have you seen the Star-Bulletin since Black moved in? It's two steps shy of journalistic irrelevancy.

That may be true, but would the people working there rather have a bad paper or a dead paper?

thanks for stopping by Black Press CEO and president David Black.

i think the point already has been made there was a 20 percent profit margin ... most businesses would do the icky shuffle if they had a 20 percent margin and they certainly wouldn't die unless they were mismanaged into the ground.

what is your forking point mr. black? i think the point is, as far as "new-wave" newspaper owners are concerned, 20 percent is NOT enough and product be damned to get it closer to 30.

people like you who defend cocksuckers like this make me sick. it's people like you who shrug their shoulders when another daily newspaper becomes the equivalent of a shopper.

excuse me while i go forking nap at my desk and dream about earning the man his required 30-40 percent.

Blow me.

 

[Tom Petty]

Why doesn't the CEO just come out and say, "we want to make the ABJ as irrrelevant as possible as quickly as possible?" Because that's what he's really trying to do.

Well, let's understand that the new owner is the guy who saved the Honolulu Star-Bulletin when no one else wanted it. He didn't save everyone's job, but he did save the paper. Whether these kinds of drastic measures are necessary in Akron, a one-paper town, is open to debate. But I don't think we can be ultra-cynical about his motives just yet.

Frank, have you seen the Star-Bulletin since Black moved in? It's two steps shy of journalistic irrelevancy.

That may be true, but would the people working there rather have a bad paper or a dead paper?

thanks for stopping by Black Press CEO and president David Black.

i think the point already has been made there was a 20 percent profit margin ... most businesses would do the icky shuffle if they had a 20 percent margin and they certainly wouldn't die unless they were mismanaged into the ground.

what is your forking point mr. black? i think the point is, as far as "new-wave" newspaper owners are concerned, 20 percent is NOT enough and product be damned to get it closer to 30.

people like you who defend cocksuckers like this make me sick. it's people like you who shrug their shoulders when another daily newspaper becomes the equivalent of a shopper.

excuse me while i go forking nap at my desk and dream about earning the man his required 30-40 percent.

Blow me.

what's that dave, you witty fork, i was too busy taking a nap and playing around on the internet to have heard you.

i guess you just went back to counting company cash and brain storming with the rest of the non-editorial cooperate forks on how to squeeze yet another nickel out of another paper.

what's wrong with the industry? shirt, easy answer ... douche bags such as yourself.

 

[Flying Headbutt]

I'll be honest, even if I don't necessarily agree with much of what Frank says about this particular thread, he's one guy who has constantly demonstrated he knows what the heck he's talking about. He's no David Black, that's for sure.

 

[Columbo]

Petty,

I respect someone taking facts and maiming the sacred cows on this board as much as anyone, but I'm not getting you here.

I haven't seen any of the animus from Frank I would expect in preface to such wild, angry response.

Frank has all the clubs in the bag and knows how to play them all.

To me, he is the most informed poster I have encountered around here.

 

[Tom Petty]

Petty,

I respect someone taking facts and maiming the sacred cows on this board as much as anyone, but I'm not getting you here.

I haven't seen any of the animus from Frank I would expect in preface to such wild, angry response.

Frank has all the clubs in the bag and knows how to play them all.

To me, he is the most informed poster I have encountered around here.

defending the fact 20 percent is not enough and belittling a small minority of journalists painting the scope as if they were the majority is wrong.

i've seen the shirt he's attempting to defend first-hand many years ago, and to be frank (no pun intended), there's no defending it. bottom line is it's the corporate assholes who entered the industry because they saw an ROI larger than any other industry -- other than insurance -- that are killing this business.

you can talk chicken or the egg ... cooperate jackasses or declining circulation and advertising. i think you know where i weigh in, it's the chicken (the dave blacks of the world). to sit here and watch someone defend a gigantic ass such as black is insulting and his ripping a minority of journalists and painting a wide swath is sickening.