There's the Door...

[Fuh Real]

A long time ago, journalism was a profitable business. Ad reps were selling ads by the buckets and ink flew off the printers in droves.

Today, however, those days are long gone as many newspapers are having buyouts and layoffs. In taking the job that you have, you knew the pay wasn't going to be good unless you were a high-level columnist or top editor.

I read this board with a careful eye and see numerous views on the state of the business. I read a solid amount of threads about people wanting leave the business and people who have already left. To those people who want to leave the business, great, get the **** out.

If you have been this disillusioned by the product that you put out or the industry as a whole, then it's not for you. Walk out the door and do not return. Stop complaining and act on your words.

Believe it or not, there are thousands of students in journalism schools around the United States ready to take your job when you leave. Those students have a drive to excel in the industry and will do whatever it takes to get a job. They will send out 50 resumes and get 49 “no's,” just to get that one “maybe.” Then they'll send out 25 more to get that one "yes."

Hell, there are plenty of people already in the business who are ready to snatch your job the minute you leave. There are people within your company or your paper that have their eyes on your job and are salivating with the talk of you leaving. Next time you go in the office, look around. One of those people is dying to take your spot. His/her resume is ready-to-go the minute you give your two weeks.

Hell, if your job is good enough and a step up from my current one, I will gladly take your position.

Journalism as an industry is not dead. Print journalism is far from dead.

What did Mike Gundy hold up during his press conference? A newspaper. What do people still have in their possession from 9/11 or other recent disasters? Newspaper clippings. Mom and Dad are making little Junior a scrapbook from all his high school games and from where are they getting the clips? The newspaper.

You know that running back you talked to after the game? The one that never really had reason to celebrate until today? You just got him more ass than he knows what to do with after you pulled him away for an interview. His family and friends were taking pictures of you interviewing him. You know that cross-country runner that had a hell of a race? You interviewing him made his short life. **** that trip to Disney World. He now has something he can hold on to the rest of his life. These people will point to that article and say, “see kids, Dad used to be this good.”

People are still getting their news from the print media, if they weren't the industry would've collapsed yesterday. The machine is still working its way back from the recent set-backs, but it's coming back. Once those in charge figure out how to focus their energy in a way to rejuvenate the product, it'll be back stronger than before.

The machine is not dead. It just has a few rusty parts. Those of you who complain about the state of the industry and want to get out of the business are just those creaky widgets. There are other shiny ones ready to take your place.

Quit talking. Take action. If you're upset with the industry and don't feel like being a part of solution, pack your bags and leave. Just don't beg to get back in.

 

[Fenian_Bastard]

Re: Excuse Me While I Rant

We don' need no STEEENKING resumes!

 

[jgmacg]

Re: Excuse Me While I Rant

No bingo?

 

[Cadet]

Re: Excuse Me While I Rant

Yawn.


(Not paging the poster, just expressing that we've heard this all before.)

 

[dooley_womack1]

I admire the guy's passion. Why, precisely, are we dissing him?

 

[Pulitzer Wannabe]

I know that's why I got into this - to get a 17-year-old hometown hero "more ass than he knows what to do with."

 

[TheSportsPredictor]

I already left.

 

[Fenian_Bastard]

No bingo?

B-I-N, I think.
Not quite there yet.

 

[Joe Williams]

My great-grandpappy says that an up-and-coming buggy whip maker wrote something pretty similar to the disgruntled of his profession early in the 20th century.

 

[WaylonJennings]

OP, your rant encapsulates everything wrong with this business today.

It should be competing to retain the best and brightest. That's what medicine and law and business do.

Instead, you're telling people that if they don't like minimal pay, few opportunities for advancement, ****ty hours and dwindling creative freedom due to budgetary slicing, that it's on them, not the industry, and they ought not let the door hit them in the ass on the way out.

Nice.

 

[Fuh Real]

OP, your rant encapsulates everything wrong with this business today.

It should be competing to retain the best and brightest. That's what medicine and law and business do.

Instead, you're telling people that if they don't like minimal pay, few opportunities for advancement, ****ty hours and dwindling creative freedom due to budgetary slicing, that it's on them, not the industry, and they ought not let the door hit them in the ass on the way out.

Nice.

This industry should be competing to retain its best and brightest, as you said that's how the medicine, law, and business industries do. If people in this industry are complaining about certain things, and say how bad they want to get out of the business, then go ahead. That would open the door for the other best and brightest to take their spot.

You mean to tell me that Harvard doesn't have a waiting list of people who are begging for someone to drop out of the school so they can prove that they have what it takes?

This business has room for the best writers who tell the most compelling stories. I do not doubt that.

People just need to look in the mirror to know why they got into this business in the first place. The first thing one of my J-school professors told the class was to "walk out the door if you are expecting to get rich in this business." For every person that walked out of the door, there was one person to walk in who wanted to add the class to their schedule. When I graduated a while ago, those are the same people who are still in this business.

 

[WaylonJennings]

Straw man alert!

I don't think people leave because they expect to "get rich."

Fairly compensated? Secure? Yep.

Your guilt trip here is part of the solution, not the problem. This is one of my biggest issues with the profession - this idea that personal fulfillment and personal security for some reason have to be mutually exclusive.

You should be demanding more of the industry. Instead, you're perpetuating a thread taking out its foot soldiers.

 

[thegrifter]

OP, your rant encapsulates everything wrong with this business today.

It should be competing to retain the best and brightest. That's what medicine and law and business do.

Instead, you're telling people that if they don't like minimal pay, few opportunities for advancement, ****ty hours and dwindling creative freedom due to budgetary slicing, that it's on them, not the industry, and they ought not let the door hit them in the ass on the way out.

Nice.

This industry should be competing to retain its best and brightest, as you said that's how the medicine, law, and business industries do. If people in this industry are complaining about certain things, and say how bad they want to get out of the business, then go ahead. That would open the door for the other best and brightest to take their spot.

That reads like horse****. The door shouldn't be opened because things are so bad that it makes people want to quit.

 

[DanOregon]

It think the main source of disillusionment in the industry is due to executives pulling the same kind of crap that reporters write about when they go on in other industries. The problem isn't people not caring, not being willing to suck it up. We've seen newspapers willing to bring in scab workers, bust unions and exhibit other behavior that newspapers have rallied against for years. Excuse the huddled masses if they are a bit confused. Being "good soldiers" is what has helped the mucky-mucks drive newspapers into a steep decline.

 

[captzulu]

If you have been this disillusioned by the product that you put out or the industry as a whole, then it's not for you. Walk out the door and do not return. Stop complaining and act on your words.

I'm glad you have no problem with continuing to put out an inferior product. I left the biz not because of the pay, and I would've put up with the crappy hours if I felt like I was still put in situations where I would be able to at least have a chance of putting out something that meets my standards. Whereas it used to be that I worked OT (sometimes unpaid) to put out a product that I was proud of, I felt like I was increasingly having to work OT (always unpaid) just to put out a product that I won't be embarrassed by. I still was passionate about doing good journalism, but I could see that management wasn't. If I thought that would change, I won't have left. And looking back, I have absolutely no regret about leaving when I did. I miss what I got into the business to do, but I don't miss what I was doing by the end of my time in the biz. What I did at work was no longer what I got into this business to do: good journalism. It was just churning out content to fill the daily paper. That was good enough for management, but it wasn't good enough for me. What I did was no longer my passion, it was just another job. And if newspapers become just another job, then there are plenty of other jobs that are much better. If you're in a situation where this is not the case, then good for you, and consider yourself lucky. But also understand that such situations are rapidly declining, and show a little better etiquette than coming on here with an asinine rant.

You're right that there are plenty of J-school kids waiting to take a job. But just wait a few years, and how many of them will have become disillusioned by the way the industry treats its employees and its product? No problem, you say. There will be plenty more kids to take their jobs. Keep it up, and you'll wind up with an industry that's more newbies than veterans. What you lose in experience cannot be made up for by pure talent. How's that good for journalism? But then again, perhaps journalism is evolving into an industry where product quality doesn't matter as much as squeezing a few pennies out of

 

[jlee]

So ... complaining about compaints about the industry. I'm going to lie down now.

 

[Dan Rydell]

I read this board with a careful eye and see numerous views on the state of the business. I read a solid amount of threads about people wanting leave the business and people who have already left. To those people who want to leave the business, great, get the **** out.

Get off the cross, Einstein. I could tell you stories that would have you sucking your thumb in five minutes.

 

[Fuh Real]

If you have been this disillusioned by the product that you put out or the industry as a whole, then it's not for you. Walk out the door and do not return. Stop complaining and act on your words.

I'm glad you have no problem with continuing to put out an inferior product. I left the biz not because of the pay, and I would've put up with the crappy hours if I felt like I was still put in situations where I would be able to at least have a chance of putting out something that meets my standards. Whereas it used to be that I worked OT (sometimes unpaid) to put out a product that I was proud of, I felt like I was increasingly having to work OT (always unpaid) just to put out a product that I won't be embarrassed by. I still was passionate about doing good journalism, but I could see that management wasn't. If I thought that would change, I won't have left. And looking back, I have absolutely no regret about leaving when I did. I miss what I got into the business to do, but I don't miss what I was doing by the end of my time in the biz. What I did at work was no longer what I got into this business to do: good journalism. It was just churning out content to fill the daily paper. That was good enough for management, but it wasn't good enough for me. What I did was no longer my passion, it was just another job. And if newspapers become just another job, then there are plenty of other jobs that are much better. If you're in a situation where this is not the case, then good for you, and consider yourself lucky. But also understand that such situations are rapidly declining, and show a little better etiquette than coming on here with an asinine rant.

You're right that there are plenty of J-school kids waiting to take a job. But just wait a few years, and how many of them will have become disillusioned by the way the industry treats its employees and its product? No problem, you say. There will be plenty more kids to take their jobs. Keep it up, and you'll wind up with an industry that's more newbies than veterans. What you lose in experience cannot be made up for by pure talent. How's that good for journalism? But then again, perhaps journalism is evolving into an industry where product quality doesn't matter as much as squeezing a few pennies out of

I agree with most of what you say. If you say that you had to "work OT (always unpaid) just to put out a product that I won't be embarrassed by," then why not change your product? If you were an editor, were you pigeon-holed into scrapping your front page by management right before it went to print? If you were a writer, did management dictate what you wrote and how you wrote it? If those answers are "no," then maybe you need to think about why you were embarrassed by what you were putting out. More often than not, it's on you to write the stories and design the pages.

 

[Claws for Concern]

Sometimes, those of us getting out of the business are smart enough to know when to get out before we're told to leave. And that's not to say we're bad journalists. Good journalists have good instincts and they question things that aren't right.

 

[Fuh Real]

OP, your rant encapsulates everything wrong with this business today.

It should be competing to retain the best and brightest. That's what medicine and law and business do.

Instead, you're telling people that if they don't like minimal pay, few opportunities for advancement, ****ty hours and dwindling creative freedom due to budgetary slicing, that it's on them, not the industry, and they ought not let the door hit them in the ass on the way out.

Nice.

This industry should be competing to retain its best and brightest, as you said that's how the medicine, law, and business industries do. If people in this industry are complaining about certain things, and say how bad they want to get out of the business, then go ahead. That would open the door for the other best and brightest to take their spot.

That reads like horse****. The door shouldn't be opened because things are so bad that it makes people want to quit.

If those people are so intent on complaining about the industry and they want to quit, what is keeping them from becoming part of the solution and creating new outlets or presenting new ideas to the powers that be?