An example of why the industry is in trouble...

Newspapers suck the bag. Can I get an amen?

 

If I'm not mistaken, this is a free rag, the kind people start in their basement.

Because I think the "real" paper in Vermillion is the Vermillion Standard.

 

I still threw up a little bit in mouth reading that.

 

I'd guess there are hundreds of 3 or 4 person shops where the editor is also an ad salesperson. Certainly not ideal, but at tiny little weekly papers, there often isn't an option other than this if they want to stay in business.

 

True that. In my neck of the woods, we have a "legit" daily rag, and a weekly rag which has a staff of maybe four or five. So yes, people will indeed double up on the duties.

 

There is a small daily in our area where the assistant sports editor also sells ads part time for extra money...

 

I did a summer internship for a weekly. Actually, it was a chain of three very small weeklies. I had to take over the operations of one of those papers for three weeks when the ME went on her first vacation in four years. She was also the sole reporter and page designer for the paper. The 'secretary' and ME were also the ad sales staff. There was no other staff.

During the four weeks I spent there, I was asked to dedicate one day per week trying to sell ads.

small community papers often have no other choice but to do this. There would be hundreds of papers dry up and go away if this ethical line weren't crossed.

Again, not ideal. But sometimes, we all do things which are not ideal in one manner or another.

 

Ides, what you're saying is representative of a struggle many journalists not at larger papers experience rather frequently. We have broad-based journalistic standards and ethics, but so often those standards and ethics are bent or even thrown out the window by necessity.

The problem is where the line should be. When can you say "enough?"

And then there's criticism from journalism circles and those who, through their own job, don't have to bend those same journalistic standards.

 

As someone who started in radio, that was my thought as well. Not out of the ordinary at all.

 

I hear you. If I'm at a 'legit' daily as you say, I wouldn't personally cross that line or allow my reporters to cross that line and start getting cozy with advertisers be being salesmen.

If I'm at a tiny weekly with less than five people on staff (including the salesmen) I think the line hardly even exists. I'm not about to advocate the death of papers where that is necessary. People can and do draw their own lines at what they'll do. Location, circulation size and staff size blur those lines and I can't fault those papers. A daily, however, should have no excuse for letting a reporter double up as a salesman.

 

I like the "not stuck to a 9-5 routine" part. That's a very nice way of saying you'll work 80 hours a week and like it!

 

But will you get paid for it? No mention of that.