The Globe, Metro West Daily and all the rest.
Warren Buffet today in the WSJ said newspapers are in trouble and may not survive. The Globe is trying to keep afloat with employee concessions and if it's true, the Globe is losing 85 million, I can't see how employee concessions would ever make up that difference.
The MWDN has been shrinking in size for a while now and you know things are bad when a company that buys old gold jewelry takes out two full page adds in the front section. Their monopoly on the news in this Town and surrounding towns is infamous and while their attitudes towards anyone who is different than them is still the same, the editors are clearly worried as are the bean counters. I wonder why the Tab is still being printed. I wonder why the papers don't slash advertising rates for businesses to increase revenues. Why not offer free employment adds to companies who are hiring, to compete with Craig's List. I also wonder if employee concessions are being asked of MWDN group and why they continue to run stories about grading beers around town is a mystery? Useless and pointless information should be done away with and honest, factual timely reporting should be the priority.
For all the incomplete and biased reporting done at the papers, for all the politically correct slanted reporting done, and for a host of many other deficiencies the papers have, we need them. Because without them, what little information we do get would go away and that will lead to a more dumping of our communities, even lower voter turnouts in more uncontested elections. Newspaper web sites are great, but someone has to pay or we will loose them also.
I'm not sure at all what will happen with these papers in the coming months when readership falls and the economy idles under intense pressure, but I'm very sure nothing good will come of the papers demise.
posted by Jim Pillsbury @ 11:11 AM
5 Comments
5 Comments:
Without the MWDN, I would have to come to this blog for any idea of what is happening. Oh, wait a minute, that is what I am doing now! I know what you are saying is right about the newspaper being a necessary piece of the information highway, but I must say that if the MWDN did a better job of reporting all the news, then they would have more people subscribing to the paper. For the Globe, sounds to me like the Unions are the reason they are in such big trouble. Job for life? Who the hell thinks that is reasonable other than the Globe employees who have that perc?
No one reads a paper today like they use to. Everything in the paper is old news byt the time you get it. In this age of instant news updates round the clock on CNN, MSNBC and New England News, the paper is an out of date means of dispensing information. News papers on line are better, but they still have to change their mindset to get the news out there sooner, or to change their format to be the means for more in depth information on stories that the fast news channels just give you the bullet points on. You need someone savy in the web based publication arena to bring these papers into the 21st century, and I don't see the MWDN bringing on anyone with that kind of background, and I don't see them posting stories on their web site other than what is going to be in tomorrow's paper, which may have already happened today, and will be "new" on the 6pm news shows today, will be old news on the 11pm news shows tonight, and will be all that much older when it appears in the paper tomorrow.
Oh I agree.. that job for life stuff... man what a gig that is. Agreed on the need for doing a better job at the MWDN.... they have had it their way for decades now.
It will change the face of news if they go and we will have to dig deep to get some of the news from the State House. The Towns served by the paper may run into trouble meeting legal requirements about posting legal notices. But I guess that will have to be worked out for the future.
Is the MWDN really such a loss if they stop printing? What do they ever have to say that is of any value? Now the Globe, losing the Globe, that would be a loss we would notice. But those Unions need a wake up call. What are they thinking, not be willing to make those consesions. They won't have jobs at all if the paper has to shut down. Time to face the music for those guys, not that I am defending the Times.
Seems like the Globe Union and the NY Times are playing chicken, waiting to see who blinks first. But those union guys are going to stare themselves right out of a job if they don't smarten up. Hey, you either find a middle ground and work with the managment, or you will be out of work. Seems that in these economic times, when jobs are so scarce, you would want to hold on to the ones that do exist, even if you have to lose some benefits or maybe take a cut in pay. Those newspaper Guild people seem to be of the same mindset as the MA state legislators, the rest of the world may be in an economic downturn, but that should not effect me, I deserve a raise. Hey, whatever they negotiate, it is the person buying the paper who will be paying for those benefits, and personally, I am not going to continue to buy the Globe if these lifetime job guarantees and automatic wage increases don't go away. I will find my news from a source where the working man gets that fact that the economic downturn applies to them also!
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