Down-sized columnist on the state of newspapers

[Inky_Wretch]

Scripps newspaper in San Angelo, Tex., fires a longtime editor to cut the budget. He fires back in his final column...

http://gosanangelo.com/news/2008/jan/03/columnist-caught-up-in-newspapers-changing-times/

 

[fishwrapper]

Well done, Perry. Well done.
Classy and well presented.

 

[DanOregon]

I wonder if he would have let one of his underlings write that type of column after letting them go. He speaks a lot of truth. Newspapers need to drastically reinvent themselves, but they're not going to do that without a massive investment similar to Gannett's launch of USA Today. That paper was in the red for several years before turning a profit.

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

Why didn't he write that column about all the other people who got ****canned for the bottom line? He had to wait til it was all about him?

 

[friend of a friend]

Why didn't he write that column about all the other people who got ****canned for the bottom line? He had to wait til it was all about him?

Yes

 

[forever_town]

That and these sorts of columns are boiler plate these days.

 

[slappy4428]

Scripps newspaper in San Angelo, Tex., fires a longtime editor to cut the budget. He fires back in his final column...

http://gosanangelo.com/news/2008/jan/03/columnist-caught-up-in-newspapers-changing-times/

Good column. But Scripps cut good people? Color me shocked!

 

[Ace]

That and these sorts of columns are boiler plate these days.

Sad but true.

 

[JayFarrar]

At least the paper had the stones to run the column.
I can think of a couple different places where the publisher had those kind of columns spiked.

 

[Rex Harrison]

At least the paper had the stones to run the column.
I can think of a couple different places where the publisher had those kind of columns spiked.

Publisher: "What the **** do I care as long as the sudoku puzzle is four columns wide and all the coupons are there? That's all people want anyway."

 

[SockPuppet]

A well-written farewell. Too bad the people who made the down-sizing decision don't read.

****abuncha-Wall Street-Italian-suit-wearing-investment-analysts.

 

[spnited]

The more I read these things, the happier I am at my family-owned paper.

 

[MCbamr]

Interesting that it actually ran. Also interesting are the reader comments at the bottom, particularly considering the bashing that type of forum gets on this site.

 

[Fenian_Bastard]

Terrific column.
Also the dictionary definition of "pissing in the wind."

 

[forever_town]

At least the paper had the stones to run the column.
I can think of a couple different places where the publisher had those kind of columns spiked.

Sad to say, I might spike such a column if I were the publisher. Besides being boiler plate, it's too self-serving.

 

[clutchcargo]

Forever-town says, "Sad to say, I might spike such a column if I were the publisher. Besides being boiler plate, it's too self-serving."

Self-serving???!!! The guy lost his freakin' job for pete's sake---how did he get "served" by writing this? He just became unemployed.

 

[forever_town]

"Look at me! I lost my job so now I have an ax to grind!"

That's why it's self-serving.

 

[Frank_Ridgeway]

I guess the way it's written may be unclear to those of us who don't live there. When I read the column I assumed he'd been at San Angelo for 42 years. Actually, after spending much of his career elsewhere, he was editor for three years and "editor emeritus" for the past five, so I don't know if that was a full-time position.

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/tx/5425246.html

Still sad, but not as bad as I first thought.

 

[fishwrapper]

I didn't get that. Read right through that. I figured he spent much of his career in San Angelo.
Yet, I don't understand these threads.

If the thread were titled: "San Angelo paper fired veteran journalist, columnist."
The reaction would have been: Those mother****ers. Another ******* victim in an unforgiving industry. ****in' Scripps.

Thread title: "Down-sized columnist on the state of newspapers."
He gets off a fairly well-constructed column which includes explanatory notes not only regarding his demise but what he perceives the demise of the industry. It's called "self-serving" and "boilerplate."
You know, perhaps he wasn't writing it for you. Perhaps he was writing it for his audience. His readers.

I found his summation more truth than ego:

It's hard to remember when people loved newspapers more than they loved money.

Let us speak no more of riding for the brand, a quaint notion of mutual loyalty between employer and employee. Such an ideal vanished with the Linotype.

My publisher reminded me that I am expendable.

I hope the day never comes when people of the Concho Valley regard their newspaper as expendable.

Now, take out "Concho Valley." Put in your town or city.

 

[PHINJ]

I can't imagine why his audience would give a ****.