Weekly Rant: 10/18/2009-Newspaper industry in trouble

[jiggyjaguar]

The topic has been talked about me on radio and in this column for years. I for some reason have hated the newspaper industry and have not been a fan. When I hospitalized this last summer for a week or so. I looked at a lot of newspaper and got all of my news on the outside world from the Wichita Eagle and a few local papers in the region. I have saw why I have hated the world of newspapers. This week we talk about the industry being in trouble. This week we talk about a recent column I saw on the industry telling itself it's failing. The Salina Journal dropping the ball on the whole Shat story. The Hutchinson and Salina papers are riddled with issues as well. McPherson paper and it;s pre news. Ads and more ads but no content boost and my view on the matter.

A recent article from the Biz Journals on this distance at the KC star. A recent comment from someone who sent me this column stated: The Kansas City Star is in trouble?!!! OMG! If they are in trouble, how in the heck does Rocking M (the piece of crap it is, stay in business). The Kansas City Star, wow, I cannot believe this. Newspapers are pretty much done at this point.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009
Kansas City Star furloughs most employees for a week through year’s end
Wichita Business Journal - by Jerry LaMartina
The Kansas City Star will implement one-week furloughs for most employees through year’s end in response to the tough economy.
A spokeswoman in Publisher Mark Zieman’s office confirmed Tuesday that the newspaper will take the action.
The Star also will offer a voluntary separation program to the majority of its regular, full-time employees, Zieman said in a Tuesday memo to employees.
“We are doing this because many employees continue to express interest in a voluntary program during this time of industry transition, and because we want to put The Star in the best financial position possible going into 2010,” Zieman said in the memo.
The Star hasn’t established a target number for the voluntary buyouts, Zieman said.
The Star’s parent company, Sacramento-based McClatchy Co. (NYSE: MNI), also owns the Wichita Eagle. McClatchy also is extending its companywide salary freeze through year’s end, McClatchy Treasurer Elaine Lintecum said. Furloughs are not being implemented companywide, she said.
McClatchy had said Feb. 5 that it would extend a salary freeze for senior executives in 2009 that it had implemented in 2007. The company earlier had frozen salaries companywide from September 2008 through September of this year, and Chairman and CEO Gary Pruitt declined any bonus for 2008 and 2009.
On July 21, McClatchy reported second-quarter earnings of $42.2 million, or 50 cents a share, more than double earnings of $19.7 million, or 24 cents a share, last year. Revenue for the quarter was $365.3 million, down 25 percent from $489.7 million last year.
McClatchy is the nation’s third-largest newspaper company, with 30 daily newspapers, about 50 nondailies, and direct-marketing and direct-mail operations.
So your telling me that this newspaper who has been a titan in the buisness is in trouble? You have got to be kidding me. If this paper is in trouble, how do places like Rocking M Radio make it? How does the world of newspaper keep going with all this but also some sloppy stuff. Which I will detail here soon.

The Salina Journal did a story recently on a band from New Jersey who came to Salina, Not once but twice. The band was known as Shat, I have talked about Shat before and when the story broke. I do not need to go over this again, what I need to do is throw the newspaper in front of the truth bus. When the story broke that the paper would be doing a story they came to Access TV to talk to the staff and talked to me. I sat down with the “reporter” on this issue and in the process promoted me and my projects. However what I got out of it, was that the Paper planned on doing a story on Access TV and it's producers and were going to “rip the lid off” the organization and the community itself. This got Access TV and people involved with it to brace for action. However once the story came out, it was not a big deal. It painted the person making the complaint a goof ball and it pretty much backed down from the story that was going to rip the lid off this tiny community based group. Basically they tossed each other under the bus for being journalists. So they dropped the ball on this one, big time!

The 2 newspapers that I grew up on, were The McPherson Sentinel and the Hutchinson News. These 2 papers were riddled with spelling and grammar errors on a daily routine. The papers had to several times retract and apologize for statements that they printed. So your telling me that as a journalist and people who saw the paper, knew that these papers are trash. I have called the Salina Paper, birdcage lining before. Your telling me that these papers had no one to proof them before being published? The journalist did not proof them before turning them in and the papers did not have anyone who saw all this and thought, 'FUCK...let's get this right for once?”

The McPherson Newspaper have had lots of issues over the years but the biggest was the Pre News cycle that these clowns are in. The paper is printed in the evening and handed out at 5pm on a daily routine Now I understand in McPherson Kansas, There is not a lot of news to break. However they are proud of one fact and one fact only. They publish and put their paper together..1 day ahead of time. Yes they pre news their daily news paper? Now I understand that if it's a slow news day and you know that the only news that could be written is Friday night football, weekend wrap up for a Monday paper. However, guess what they do this all the time?

Content, lots of places and things have come under fire to me in the past. For instance back in the day when Audiorelam.com had a SAM Unit{Streaming audio manager} for radio stations. They made a upgrade called SAM 2.0 and they began charging for the program. You know why? They made upgrades and made adds to the programming. However when Alternacast.com and the folks who made the wonderhorse software began to charge for their programming and software. They made no upgrades or added things to it. They took a cheap, crappy piece of software and went, hey now it's not free now it's 20 bucks a month? Huh....Well the Hutchinson and McPherson papers do the same thing. They added more advertisements and added more to the price to the paper. However they did not hire reporters or add more content. They still had the same content and columnists. They just added more ads and charged me more to read all those ads?

My view on all this is that the newspaper world is in huge trouble. However it's not just newspaper,. I may have picked on them this week. However all media is in trouble. The TV and Radio world is in trouble. You have tabloids and magazines going to on line only and dropping their print version. You have print versions of these publications offering print as a back up to people who can not read it on line Lots of places such as Rupert Murdock going out and saying, If you want to read the Wall street Journal on line with less ads, You had to pay a fee. I think that the media model has to change and if people can not do it. Then everything will go the way of the dinosaurs

Finally let's wrap this up this week, Newspapers like the KC star are in trouble, that means we may have issues with others in the world. Shat made for some good journalism, however it's a too bad the local newspaper did not bother to jump on the story. The 2 papers of my youth have been a comedy of errors and continue into the new world. Newspapers doing pre produced newspapers is not doing the art of the news paper. Lots more ads and not much content more? Huh? I think media needs to put it's head on str8 of they could be fucked sooner than later.

Jiggy Jaguar
http://www.jiggyjaguar.com