Stats LLC is buying PA SportsTicker

Saw the headline on the front right of insidehoops.com, didn't even click the link, came straight here to see what anyone thinks about the news

Is STATS actually better writing than sportsticker? I think they're fairly similar.

 

Full press release:

http://www.stats.com/pressrelease_030409.asp

 

It means a lot more good people will be out of work, adding to the disgraceful statistics of this industry and this country.

 

How much redundancy are these two services?

 

There is plenty of redundant copy. I will give a little insight because I'm close with some people who worked at PA SportsTicker (hard workers who got a raw deal).

1. Under the leadership of ESPN, SportsTicker was profitable for some time, then started losing millions for a few years before ESPN decides to cut ties in 2006.

2. Eventually sold off to the Press Association (based in UK) after ESPN failed to broker a deal with Stats in 2005.

3. Despite previous missteps under ESPN, upper management at the Press Association continues on under the same business model (makes a lot of sense, huh?) The losses just keep mounting and no one does anything about it.

4. Finally, the Press Association decides to take a closer look at the SportsTicker business and hires a managing director to do that in the summer of 2008.

5. Changes are slow and the business finally starts to grow. SportsTicker in the last year became a major player in the Canadian Newspaper market and recently had cut a deal with the New York Daily News. PA SportsTicker copy starts making it in to the Daily News and other papers in the U.S. are on the horizon. Would seem like a positive. No, no, no.

6. While cutting these deals in the U.S., the Press Association in the UK is in negotiations all along to sell off SportsTicker to Stats, which has no use for the business due to many things they do the same. So, you have employees from my knowledge at SportsTicker believing things are on the uprise when in reality, it's only a matter of time before they are shown the door.

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Other things I've gathered from people I know I've dealt with at SportsTicker.


- In the last year, their entire editorial staff was put on a new computer system implemented by the Press Association. The system was put in to service differemt headline packages. However, after the implementation, the Press Association realized they didn't have to the necessary software to make the system work. Then when negotiations started with Stats, budget constraints killed any upgrades. $300,000 down the drain. Good work guys!

- Caused constant frustration for the 15-20 editorial staffers at SportsTicker. I've been told that guys at SportsTicker would be writing stories, get logged off the computer system and lose their work on a daily basis. And the IT dept had few answers how to fix things because it was a British computer system. Haha!

- Other frustration for SportsTicker editorial members from what I understand is the awful copy they had to run from time to time from the Press Association. SportsTicker also has a problem with some of its copy, but for the most part does a decent job with the resources they have.

- I can paste a Super Bowl story which people at the Press Association were upset that SportsTicker failed to run. It very well may be the most comical piece in the history of journalism.

In closing, from what I've heard, SportsTicker went under because of awful management at the very top. Plenty of bad deals also which resulted in "dead" money.

It's sad that this has happened to a great bunch of people who worked hard.

 

Very good summary. I worked there in the Jersey City days and watched helplessly as John Skipper tried to make the move to Connecticut sound like a positive. This is another example of the disgraceful not give a shit attitude of corporate people when it comes to those in the trenches and in this case, this is the newsroom staff and the reporters at games. This is a sad day.

 

Being a Sportsticker field guy I can shed more light on this I believe. I have been told that everyone in Conn. is just about gone in 2 to 6 months. That is an approximate 125 jobs gone. Thanks for playing, drive safely. They will at least be getting some kind of compensation. Those of us in the field will be getting a big bag of dick, but of course if you play this freelance game you know how it goes. I fortunately have other accounts so the only thing I loose out on is being able to see professional sporting events. I knew trouble was brewing when they had the field people stop writing gamers and just call in updates and quotes. Stats LLC just basically wanted PA-Sportstickers accounts to add to its own business.

 

My experience with PA Sportsticker leads me to believe they are a complete joke.

 

Please do.

 

Second

 

I had that sense too when they told us to do just quotes for the decrease in pay. I also had an inkling when they dropped covering college basketball. I'm sure they want it to eliminate it and wouldn't anticipate doing anything beyond this calender year for them. It's a shame too, especially for those staffers, who uprooted their lives from New Jersey only to be betrayed three times.

 

We've had to use Sportsticker copy when we opted out of Canadian Press two years ago.
It is beyond horrible, for the most part. Seriously, barely in English. Often I've begged our sports editor to use something else – anything else – because when we run Sportsticker stuff concerning sports I'm involved with, I'm the one that gets the e-mails to complain.