Gannett buying North Jersey Media Group?

NJMG new digital strategy prompts restructuring - News - NorthJersey.com

North Jersey Media Group folks will be assimilated... even after being sold by the Borg (family). The saddest part might be how many current NJMG employees have been anticipating the layoffs.

I wonder if the "restructuring" will spread to the other Gannett New Jersey papers again, as employees are shifted between properties.

 

"Bold, ambitious vision ..."

You're cutting 200+ jobs. Shut the fuck up.

 

I wonder what the largest independent, suburban daily left is? I would define a single masthead suburban daily as a paper that's circulation zone is within the home delivery area of a larger metro wide daily. An operation like the LANG papers does not count because they print multiple mastheads out of essentially one newsroom.

By that definition it might be Newsday though they are basically the dominant newspaper in their own metropolitan region, Long Island. But who would be the next largest? Independent newspapers like that are becoming dinosaurs.

 

Don't know if it's No. 2 after Newsday or what its circulation is these days, but the Daily Herald in the Chicago suburbs is relatively large. It's still a single-masthead paper as far as I know, although it zones extensively. Not only is it within the circulation areas of the Chicago Tribune and Sun-Times, it's surrounded by Chicago Tribune/tronc-owned papers on the edges of the suburbs -- Lake County, Elgin and Aurora, Ill.

 

I thought about the Daily Hearld but I thought they were part of the Southtown Group which had been acquired by Tribune. Who owns the Daily Herald?

 

What horseshit. It's not even new horseshit. Just the same old horseshit they spray around like air freshener.

Fuck you, Gannett.

 

Still owned by Paddock Publications, the original owner. It's the company's only newspaper aside from a Spanish-language publication that circulates in the same area.

 

Stephen Borg is rolling over in his ... Uh, I mean rolling along in his Escalade, counting his share of the family haul on the way to the bank.

The old man, Mac Borg, had done business with Gannett before. He had to see this coming, in spite of his comments that Gannett would give the paper the best chance to succeed.

If I was one of the longtime Record people -- and there are many -- I would feel very, very betrayed by a family that, up until 10-15 years ago, may have been the most generous family in journalism ownership.

 

What were the other options to cash out?

At this point, I can't blame any family for wanting to cash out. In my hometown the property values have spiked insanely in the past few years -- probably doubled. They've tripled over the past 15. People have sold left and right. Few have pensions anymore. Some can't afford the spiraling property taxes. As much as I hate it, I kind of understand.

Newspapers remind me of white flight. Almost everyone is fleeing. Folks are trying to make a buck salvaging what they can.

There will be journalism in 10 years, but will good journalism make anyone money?

Don't get me wrong. I feel horrible for those who will lose their jobs.

 

I don't blame the Borgs for cashing out. They made a poor decision of leadership in the 1990s, hitching their wagon to a manufacturing guy whose grand plan was to get teenagers to pick up a paper. And they've been behind he eight-ball ever since.

But I would feel betrayed by these two items, pasted from the New York Times story about the sale, which was less than 10 months ago.

-- Malcolm Borg, chairman of the North Jersey Media Group, wrote in a letter to employees. He said the family chose Gannett as the company’s new owner over others because Gannett was “strategically positioning itself as the journalism and industry leader.”

-- After the staff meeting when the sale was announced, North Jersey Media Group newsroom employees were reassured about Gannett’s commitment to journalism and told they would not have to reapply for their jobs.

 

This. Totally this. It's so insulting the way the suits spin things.

 

What if they really believe they have a "Bold, ambitious vision ..."