Category: Media

Even George Will is appalled by Cheney

Thought you might enjoy George Will’s response on “This Week” when George Stephanopoulos asked him about Dick Cheney’s accusation that President Obama, by taking his time before deciding on a strategy in Afghanistan, is “dithering while America’s armed forces are in danger.” Here’s how Will began:

A bit of dithering might have been in order before we went into Iraq in pursuit of nonexistent weapons of mass destruction. For a representative of the Bush administration to accuse someone of taking too much time is missing the point. We have much more to fear in this town from hasty than from slow government action.

Good stuff, although a few caveats are in order. First, though Will is a conservative, he’s not a neoconservative, and he’s been notably less enthusiastic about foreign adverturism over the years than his neobrethren. Second, he came out against the war in Afghanistan weeks ago. Third, Will has never been much taken with the Bush clan or its minions.

But still. With the war-mongering Laura Ingraham fulminating on the same set today (and when is she going to enlist?), it was heartening to hear a sane conservative call out Cheney’s posturing for what it is.

The New York Times’ non-profit partners

What should we think about a partnership the New York Times has announced with a Chicago non-profit news organization that will supply two pages of news each week for the Times’ new Chicago edition?

On the one hand, the Times, a for-profit enterprise, is using material from a non-profit in order to take business away from two other for-profit enterprises, the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times. (Earlier, a similar arrangement was announced for a San Francisco edition of the Times.)

I’m a huge fan of non-profit journalism, but this strikes me as raising the specter of unfair competition. The non-profit, after all, enjoys certain tax advantages not available to a for-profit.

On the other hand, no one objects when for-profit newspapers run material from non-profit news organizations such as the Christian Science Monitor. My gut tells me this is different, but I can’t explain why.

We’re all debating whether for-profit newspapers can or should take the non-profit route. At least in a small way, the Times is now doing exactly that through the back door.

Dancing on the newspaper business’ grave

Former Wall Street bad boy Henry Blodget takes a look at the state of the newspaper business and asks an impolite question: So what? Blodget writes:

“Journalism” is alive and well, as evidenced by the still-robust health of companies like Bloomberg and Reuters, the survival of the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and other great news organizations, the hyper-growth of online news and commentary sites, and the rise of social media.

Interestingly, Blodget’s provocation coincides with news that conditions are improving at the New York Times Co., which, despite its financial woes, is almost certain to be one of the winners in the emerging media landscape.

And I don’t think anyone would disagree with Blodget’s assessment that “society doesn’t need hundreds of White House reporters.” Back in the day, many of us used to argue that at least a few newspapers ought to have the guts to leave the White House to the AP and instead dig into the undercovered federal agencies. It never happened, and the moment has long since passed.

But I can’t be as cavalier as Blodget. If major metropolitan newspapers like the Boston Globe, the Philadelphia Inquirer and the Miami Herald can’t reinvent themselves as robust local-news operations, or somehow be replaced, then democratic self-government will suffer.

As you know, I’ve been paying a lot of attention to the New Haven Independent, a non-profit news site that stands as an interesting model of where local journalism may be headed. The local daily, the New Haven Register, is owned by the Journal Register Co., which is bankrupt. [Correction: The company emerged from bankruptcy in August.] The Register still does good work, but the Independent focuses more closely on the city, on urban issues and on community-building.

But the Independent employs just four full-timers, plus another two at an affiliate site. And it may never get much bigger than that.

I have very little nostalgia for the newspaper business, and I’m excited and energized about what’s taking place at the grassroots. But if we lose the capacity to throw bodies at certain kinds of complicated stories, especially local stories, then we’ll have lost a lot. (Via Jack Shafer’s Twitter feed.)

Calling all NU journalism majors

If You're A Journalism Major, You Have a Choice

View more documents from lisawilliams.

If you are a journalism major at a university other than Northeastern, please look the other way for a moment.

Placeblogger is looking for two interns at its office in Cambridge. Headed by Lisa Williams, the project tracks local blogs across the country and around the world. It’s cutting-edge stuff, and you’ll learn a lot about the future of journalism.

Check out the slideshow. And just do it.

Steamed Brauchli

Washington Post executive editor Marcus Brauchli emerged from the salon debacle unscathed. But now that he’s admitted he knew all along that the salons were intended as off-the-record fundraisers, it’s time to demand that he and publisher Katharine Weymouth come clean on what they knew and when they knew it.

Or so I argue in the Guardian.

Paid content, free alternatives

Boston Herald publisher Pat Purcell is the latest to argue that newspaper owners need to get together and agree to start charging for online content. And as I’ve said before, I’m not philosophically opposed. But it’s not going to work.

Let’s say every newspaper began charging for Web-site access tomorrow. By the end of the day, anyone could put together about a half-dozen bookmarks giving them at least 75 percent to 80 percent of what they were getting from newspapers, provided by news organizations that are free and will almost certainly remain so.

Here are just a few top-of-my-head alternatives. I’m leaving out a lot more than I’m including.

Consider, too, that many of these sites would beef up if newspapers were to withdraw from the free Web. Nothing remains static, especially when a business opportunity beckons.

There is no pot of paid-content gold at the end of the online rainbow.

More: Steve Buttry made similar points back in June.

Tax incentives, yes. Government subsidies, no.

Len Downie
Len Downie

Len Downie, former executive editor of the Washington Post, and Michael Schudson of Columbia University will release a report tomorrow that calls, among other things, for direct government funding of local journalism. Rick Edmonds of the Poynter Institute says such funding could amount to $500 million a year.

Despite Downie’s sterling credentials — and he’s looking better every day — I suspect this isn’t going anywhere, nor should it. True, Downie and Schudson try to draw parallels to existing models such as the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities in order to make their proposed Fund for Local Journalism seem less exotic. But it still amounts to a direct government bailout for the news business, which would severely compromise journalism’s ability to act as a watchdog on government.

Indirect government subsidies in the form of non-profit status and the tax incentives that go with that status make much more sense. Not that every news organization should go non-profit. But many non-profit news organizations are already doing good work, including public radio and television (which, alas, do receive some direct government funding) and community Web sites such as Voice of San Diego, MinnPost and the New Haven Independent.

If legislation is needed to bring non-profit news more into the mainstream, that might not be a bad idea. But when government starts writing checks, it will, inevitably, demand to have some say in what it’s paying for.

Chest-hair battle rages on

Boston Herald media reporter Jessica Heslam says Platinum Equity chairman Tom Gores does too have chest hair, and that the print version of the photo she and Boston University’s Tom Fiedler saw in the Boston Globe recently makes that clear. She writes:

Kennedy … has posted what appears to be the Internet version of the Gores photo on his blog. But if you still read a newspaper the good-old-fashioned way, like Boston University journalism honcho Tom Fiedler and I do, you’ll see that his black chest hair is very prominent.

I will have to take Heslam’s word for it. She’s right in saying I did not see the print version of the Globe. A quick survey of Google Images this morning does not settle the issue. In any case, Gores will not be the next publisher of the Boston Globe, so this hairy issue will have to remain unresolved.

Balloon dad hits the 14:59 mark

Richard_Heene_20091017Yes, we should all be skeptical about checkbook journalism, and Gawker is right up front about having paid Robert Thomas, a former friend and would-be business associate of balloon dad Richard Heene (photo).

But if Thomas can be trusted, the picture he paints of Heene is devastating. Thomas portrays Heene as an increasingly paranoid, frantic man who believes shape-shifting reptiles are running the government and who would do anything to get on television.

The two had even talked about perpetrating a hoax with the balloon, Thomas claims, though getting one of the kids involved was supposedly not part of the original plan.

This story in the Denver Post only adds to the sense that it’s all about to fall apart.

Photo of Heene is from his MySpace profile.

GateHouse reverses pay cuts

Despite having plenty of financial problems of its own, GateHouse Media New England will reverse pay cuts that had been implemented earlier this year. A little while ago Media Nation obtained a copy of an e-mail that president and CEO Rick Daniels sent to all staff members announcing the news. The full text follows.

Colleagues,

Based on the strengthened cash flows over the last several months, I am pleased to announce that the temporary pay cuts that were implemented in June and July are coming to an end, and our pay rates will be restored to full, pre-cut levels. For those whose pay was reduced as of June 1, the first workday that will be paid using the original, “pre-cut” rates will be Oct. 5th. The first paycheck that will reflect your original rates will be Oct 23rd. For those employees who received paychecks on Oct. 14th, your “retroactive pay” (from Oct. 5th onwards) will be reflected in your first post-announcement paycheck. For those colleagues who are represented by unions, the restorations will be done in accordance with the terms of the relevant agreements. These dates have been communicated to union leadership and your respective managers will communicate these dates to you under separate heading.

First and foremost: Thank you all — for your work, your dedication and your toughness. NONE of us were pleased about the need to take this step, yet the vast majority of employees did not choose to do anything BUT to put in their very best efforts to do their jobs so that we could reverse these cuts as soon as possible. We believed then, and still believe that this step allowed us to preserve the core assets and capabilities our customers value most. While the members of the senior management team had hoped we could restore these cuts prior to year’s end, at least partially, we are heartened that the time spent under the pay cuts will prove to be shorter than expected; that said, even had it been a week or a month, it would have still been an onerous sacrifice. Ending these cuts is not only a major relief for all of us, but it’s also an important affirmation of our business model, and an affirmation of the quality and effectiveness of our collective efforts, and the results we have been able to generate. We are in a position to restore the cuts because GHMNE is again generating sufficient cash flows to be clearly and safely in the black. If you remember, when we announced these cuts, I said there were two kinds of companies: Those that produced positive cash flow, and those that didn’t, and we could not allow ourselves to be among those that didn’t.

I don’t want to create any misimpressions that the economy, and its powerful effects on our advertising revenues, is improving all that much. Ask any of our sales personnel. Most of our advertisers are struggling. For the most part, most of our cash-flow improvements are being generated by very stringent spending reductions, NOT a rapid return to great revenue performance — (although there has fortunately been some strengthening in revenue comparisons vs. the year over year declines we experienced earlier in the year). NONE of these cost reductions has been “easy”, and while we’ve turned over many stones to reduce the structural costs of GHMNE by several millions of dollars, we need to continue to take all possible steps to increase our efficiencies — and we will. Going forward, we need to continue to evaluate all aspects of our operations to help ensure that we are operating in a smart and efficient manner. ALL of us hope that we will never have to cope with pay reductions again (and I’m sure we all hope we never see another “Great Recession” in our lifetimes). We have, once again, proven that highly focused and very efficient local publications (both print and digital), that are produced by a very focused, talented and dedicated group of team members are extraordinarily durable, because they provide exceptional and truly unique value to readers and advertisers. We have a GREAT, and now very much battle-tested, group of employees and publications that will allow us to get back to the business of growth, and probably in the not-too-distant future. There are a host of new business initiatives, both at local and at GateHouse-wide levels that are being put into effect, and both I and the members of the senior team will be scheduling site visits and employee meetings in just over a month to share details on some of these, as well as answer your questions and hear your thoughts and suggestions. Again, thanks very much — you’re talented, dedicated and durable and a group that’s a true privilege to work with and lead.

Richard Daniels,
President and Chief Executive Officer