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Don't ever forget who runs your newspaper

Discussion in 'Journalism topics only' started by Rudy Petross, Oct 7, 2010.

  1. Rudy Petross

    Rudy Petross Member

    http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_editor_demoted

    This is sadly my favorite line in the piece:
    "Drussell, who works for the paper as a reporter and page designer, said she was baffled her bosses did not support her."

     
  2. SF_Express

    SF_Express Active Member

    Sadly, every near my hometown. 20 miles from the Capitol, actually. There used to be a run from the Capitol Square to downtown Stoughton. That was one of the towns hit hard by tornadoes a few years back.
     
  3. Bubbler

    Bubbler Well-Known Member

    Weak sauce.
     
  4. OnTheRiver

    OnTheRiver Active Member

    God, the comments on Yahoo are dipping toward YouTube levels.
     
  5. TheSportsPredictor

    TheSportsPredictor Well-Known Member

    Woman's clueless if she thinks she can sue to get her job back.
     
  6. mustangj17

    mustangj17 Active Member

    I agree. She may be standing up for what is right, but she doesn't know how to play the game. She won't win that law suit.
     
  7. writingump

    writingump Member

    Yet another example of how newspapers as a whole are run by people who either are invertebrate or live by vendetta.
     
  8. albert77

    albert77 Well-Known Member

    Sure, she sounds a little whiny, and she's very naive if she thinks she's getting her editor's job back, but all of that misses the point.

    Not only was this paper gutless for not standing behind her column, but they missed a golden opportunity to educate the local business community on how to successfully compete with the Wal-Marts of the world. Hell, she did them a favor by spelling it out for them: competitive pricing and better customer service, along with advertising that plays up the strengths of hometown businesses.

    It can be done. Here in my town we have a family-owned building supply company that by all rights should have folded when Lowe's and Home Depot showed up. For one thing, their location sucks. It's right off downtown on a side street, in an old depressed area that hasn't seen better days in 40 years. The building is old and kind of ramshackle, and there's very little parking.

    But they've not only survived, they're thriving. Their location actually works for them, because it's accessible from all parts of town, they stress personal service and customer satisfaction, and they advertise relentlessly, playing up the family and local connections. It's worked for them, and other in-town businesses have taken a page from their handbook and are doing the same thing, with similar results.

    Instead of throwing the editor under the bus, the paper should have sat down with those advertisers and used her column as a starting point for convincing them that what she was saying was sound business advice. But they didn't, so now they and the businesses who helped push her out are reaping a ton of negative publicity that won't do any of them any good.
     
  9. Gator

    Gator Well-Known Member

    She had me until the I read the gender part of the story. Was she fired because she voiced her opinion, or because she's a woman. I wholeheartedly agree with A77, that it's not a bad thing to light a fire under local businesses, but when you bring gender into the equation out of the blue, it kind of shoots down the credibility of your argument.
     
  10. micropolitan guy

    micropolitan guy Well-Known Member

    She had no chance in a small, insular town like Stoughton. My former high school girlsfriend lives there, and I think I used to work with the guy who wasn't disciplined.

    Stoughton is also the home of the annual "Syttende Mai" road race, I think, on Norweigen Independence Day.
     
  11. HanSenSE

    HanSenSE Well-Known Member

    Even in these horeshit times for newspapers, is any job that you have to sue for worth keeping?
     
  12. Mark2010

    Mark2010 Active Member

    Good for her for standing up for herself and her right to write as sees fit. She'd be better off somewhere else, though.
     
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