Unbelievable happenings at the Star Ledger

The answer to your question is no. But it is work that, given a choice, management would not want to do. That's the "value" in it, within the company, at least...sort of a better-them-than-me approach, at least for as long as there are any choices between jobs/types of work.

On some level, the two reassigned journalists knew that they could end up in lesser jobs, and yet, they decided not to take the buyouts. This is the kind of thing that happens all the time when companies and industries contract. For some, our choice is either a lesser job, or no job.

It stinks, but perhaps these guys -- being in their 50's and figuring how tough it would be to get hired elsewhere in the business at that age, or not wanting to or feeling like they were unable to, start completely over in an entirely new career for which they may need to be entirely re-educated -- decided that just having a job, any job, in the company would be easier than either of those options.

It can happen, as long as you resign yourself to what you're doing, and I could see that occurring in these circumstances.

If their journalism careers are really what they put their hearts, souls and lives into for all those years, if that's really all they cared about, and they're no longer going to be able to do what they really want to do, at this point in their lives, perhaps their thinking was this:

"You know what? My career's over. What the hell difference does it make what I do now?"

I could see that happening, to a lot of us, very easily.

 

It's kind of sad. I remember when newspapers would go out of their way to call out another business that treated people as shabbily as the news biz is treating people. And you really can't say it is about money at this point. Stuff like this is just being douchy for the sake of being douchy.
The sad part is, if someone sued a newspaper for unfair treatment/harassment, A) newspapers aren't making as much money as they used to and b) how much "harm" against possible future earnings in the industry could a paper be liable for given that even for those in good stead, future earnings look bleak.

 

But even though its sad that they're in the mail room, they ae still working. I don't think they took a pay cut but even if they did, something is better than nothing when it comes to income.

 

"But even though it's sad that they're in the mail room, they are still working. I don't think they took a pay cut but even if they did, something is better than nothing when it comes to income."

-- One newspaper CEO to another, talking about their reassigned ink-stained laborers, overheard at Masa (a.k.a., most expensive restaurant in NYC and U.S.).

 

LOL but there is a lot of truth to what I am saying.

 

Maybe.
It's remarkable how it used to be almost impossible to get a writing job on the sports pages of a major newspaper and now they've eliminated most of those jobs and any new hires in the future will simply be kids on the cheap.
I truly believe most management fxxxs do believe writers and editors are nothing special at all and a job in the mailroom is about equal.

 

bingo!!

as i've written before, several years back when my shop fired me due to a physical condition which made it dangerous for me to travel anymore, i asked our editor-in-chief: "imagine if i discovered one of the teams we cover tried pulling this b.s. on one of its employees -- how do you think we'd report on it?"

his response after a pause: "point taken."

the newspaper biz is a shell of what it once was. or tried to be. it once represented something to be proud of, something to stand for.

as others have so eloquently put it already, now it's just a job. you have no idea how much it pains me to type that, coming up on 30 years in the biz.

emphasis now on "biz."

my three boys have been lucky enough to have a dad who truly loves what he does. a job their friends -- heck, even my friends -- can understand and say, "wow. how cool!" what are the chances they will be as blessed as i have been?

richer? sure. happier? doubtful.

 

Anyone know what's left of the Trenton Times sports department after the buyouts?

 

After Dec. 26 only the Trenton Times sports department stringers (and potentially some non-staff columnists - outdoors (fishing/hunting), tennis, golf) will be left. All of the full timers (2 writers, 6 deskers/editors) took the buyout and will be gone.

No word yet on who the new sports editor will be, but in the entire newsroom only three people didn't take the buyout: a metro editor, the photo editor, and a photographer who does the ski column in the winter. No word yet if one of those three will be the new sports editor.

 

Merry fuckin Christmas.

How are they even going to put out a paper?

 

Just a wild guess, but have whomever the new sports editor is tell the stringers which events to cover, have Dorf continue to provide the rest of the schools coverage and have the Star Ledger in addition to editing wire copy and paginating, also edit the local copy.
Did I mention that sometime in the next month the daily section is being cut from 7 pages to 4 or 5?

 

Unreal. Not so long ago, that was an outstanding sports department.