NYT reportedly sells off regional partners

I think the Elkhart Truth ranks as #1.

 

The Ord Quiz sheds a tear.
http://www.ordquiz.com/

 

The Hungry Horse News weeps.

 

That's not fair. The town has the funny name, not the newspaper.

 

Long live the late, great (no, it wasn't great by any stretch) oddly name Butterfield Express in suburban Southern California:

http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn92069917/

 

This deal is done:

http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/27/times-company-sells-regional-newspaper-group/

 

For an average of $10 million per paper, no less.

 

I know someone in Wilmington, and apparently everyone finds out in 48 hours whether they're getting offered jobs or not.

 

I know a little about Halifax's purchase of the Daytona News-Journal. It was heart-wrenching before and after. The paper canned many good people before it sold. Those firings were designed to make it more profitable and more desirable to prospective buyers. They went through a series of firings and a few furloughs. I believe Halifax made the old guard swing the swords for the last round of firings. Then Halifax came in and fired some more people and cut the department budgets. Naturally, everyone is doing more work, and that's never a welcome change.

The sports editor moved to news. I'm not sure whether it was voluntary. One of the co-preps editors left a year later. He was not replaced. In fact, approximately eight sports staffers, including a few desk people, left the place before and after the purchase. Some were fired. Some found other employers. I don't think they replaced any of them. But I could be wrong about that. They did fill a few holes by shifting people around.

Some reporters worked from home before the change. I believe the new policy requires almost everyone to be in the office when not working a story. I believe they also decided that the dress code was too lenient. No more shorts. And that's a big deal for Florida. I have talked to a few people who work there. For obvious reasons, they are hesitant to knock the new owners, but they certainly haven't indicated that things are superb.

 

Heineken, I don't know if things are superb anywhere right now.

 

Well, it's certainly difficult to separate the industry trends from things specific to the Halifax purchase of the paper. I'm sure Daytona has dealt with the impact of both.

 

Late to the party, but where is the love for the Pantagraph from Bloomington, Illinois??