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Boston Globe at a crossroads

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by Walter_Sobchak, May 3, 2009.

  1. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    I admit I'm not savvy enough to factor in things like tax write-downs and real estate sell-offs, on the chance that the Globe really is worth more dead than alive.

    I suppose there's always the gloomy prospect it could be salvaged as a "brand" like a company such as Bell & Howell -- a camera/optics manufacturer that once was among the elite but since has sold off its name to be slapped on all sorts of infomercial-quality junk.

    The part of me that says, there always will be a Boston Globe, forgets that what we end up with eventually could be the "Boston Globe." With the emphasis on the quotes. Somebody buys the "brand," keeps a few of the journalists, pays them a cut rate, moves them to some warehouse to free up the valuable real estate and tries to bleed whatever they can for as long as they can as a Web-only facsimile and a shell of what the newspaper was. Or even is.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 1, 2015
  2. Armchair_QB

    Armchair_QB Well-Known Member

    My first thought is that the Globe subscriber base would all but disappear. I cannot see Boston residents subscribing to what would essentially be a New York paper. And no matter how the Times tries to spin it, that's exactly what it will be.

    In that scenario the only newspaper that benefits is the Herald.
     
  3. MileHigh

    MileHigh Moderator Staff Member

    This move of filing the WARN Act is what happened in Seattle. Hearst filed it and kept the paper going, seeking a buyer. When it didn't happen, it shuttered the place and reporters/editors/photographers were put on the street.

    In Denver, the WARN Act was not filed until the day Scripps announced it was shutting the Rocky, on Feb. 26. Employees actually stayed on the payroll for two more months and received pay. The last check (not counting the severance) comes this Friday.

    Basically, Rocky people got paid to not work/look for jobs during the two-month period. P-I folks worked/put out a paper during that time. That would happen here in Boston, if NYT files the claim.

    But, the WARN Act can be pulled, so it can give the sides two months to negotiate an agreement.
     
  4. JayFarrar

    JayFarrar Well-Known Member

    Doesn't matter anyway, Globe isn't closing...
    poynter.org/medianews

    Seems the sticking point with the Guild is that around 175 newsroom employees have lifetime job guarantees. Paper wants that to end.
     
  5. RickStain

    RickStain Well-Known Member

    I can't think of a single good reason why the guild would give those up. The moment they do, all heck breaks loose.
     
  6. slappy4428

    slappy4428 Active Member

    Yeah. The paper closing would be a poor reason for that.
     
  7. GuessWho

    GuessWho Active Member

    Like to think nothing surprises me anymore, either, but I don't know. THAT would surprise me.
     
  8. suburbia

    suburbia Active Member

    Think about it from those workers' perspectives, though. If they have lifetime job guarantees (if there really is such a thing), then they probably make the most money. So wouldn't it be logical to presume that, if those guarantees were cancelled, they'd probably lose their jobs pretty quickly?
     
  9. sox forever

    sox forever New Member

    175 people have lifetime job guarantees? Does that mean they stay no matter how much they screw up?
     
  10. Joe Williams

    Joe Williams Well-Known Member

    Like tenured professors?

    Has the Globe tried to go forward utilizing those 175 people, or is it just presuming that some or all of them must be snuffed if there is to be a future? It would seem that the Globe of the near-future would require at least 175 people, so why not work around the job guarantees? That's sort of what the concept means, right? When other jobs go, you still will have yours. Whatever the duties in your typical workday.

    Something tells me that NYT management just doesn't like the snug fit of having 175 people with that status and wants to go after them now when the industry and the economy are ripe for such a move. Until they try to make it work around those job guarantees, given in good faith by previous administrations, they can't be taken at their word that those 175 slots are the difference between surviving and folding.
     
  11. Michael_ Gee

    Michael_ Gee Well-Known Member

    Joe, I'm just speculating here, but my guess is the Times is demanding language that doesn't just end the lifetime tenure clause (whatever it means), but ends seniority in all forms-allowing management to ashcan the employees making the most when the inevitable 50 percent staff reductions are deemed essential to the Sulzberger family's well-being in about six months.
    My guess is the union is asking for reasonably generous severance terms as a tradeoff and the Times is balking.
    There may have been a newspaper owner once who wasn't a scumbag. Benjamin Frankling maybe.
     
  12. This may explain in part why Borges plagiarized, then went off to do freelance work in Las Vegas while under suspension, then it was announced he was "retiring."
     
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