Orange County Register – Page 4

The appeal of Kushner’s print-centric approach

The media’s fascination with Aaron Kushner’s print-centric approach to reviving the newspaper business continues.

Kushner, a former Boston greeting-card executive who bought the Orange County Register a year ago, is the subject this week of flattering pieces by Rory Carroll in The Guardian and Rem Rieder in USA Today. Rieder’s piece, significantly, focuses on Kushner’s plans to launch a paper in Long Beach, Calif., that would compete with one run by John Paton, whose “Digital First” orientation puts him at the opposite end of the spectrum from Kushner in any discussion about the future of news.

Kushner, who once wanted to buy The Boston Globe, has a big idea: that newspapers have a lot of life left in them, and that the way to save them is to bolster shrunken news staffs and ask readers to pay. Print and online readers of the Register are charged the same price — $1 a day.

There’s a lot to like about the Kushner approach. It’s hard to argue with more journalism and an end to a generation’s worth of endless newsroom cuts. Even more enticing is that he holds out the hope that the last 15 years have all been a mirage — that we never should have responded to the disruptive changes brought by the Internet, and that, even at this late date, we can somehow click our heels three times and it will all go away.

It’s too early to rule out the possibility that Kushner might succeed. But classified ads, which comprised about 40 percent of a typical daily newspaper’s revenues as recently as a dozen years ago, are gone and are not coming back. The Kushner approach is an open invitation for an enterprising television or radio station to bolster its website and offer a free, comprehensive source of local news. It’s also a little disconcerting to see a large, important paper like the Register cut itself off from the sharing culture of the Internet.

Still, it’s hard not to wish Kushner well. Even if you’re not a print nostalgist (I’m certainly not), his experience may offer some lessons from which we could all learn.

McNamara rips would-be Globe owner on political ads

Former Boston Globe legend Eileen McNamara has posted some disturbing news about Aaron Kushner, who tried to buy the Globe a few years ago and who may make another run at the paper now that the New York Times Co. has put it up for sale.

Writing for the Cognoscenti site at WBUR.org, McNamara reports that Kushner — a Boston-area native who bought the Orange County Register in 2012 — did exactly the wrong thing when two city councilors complained about an ad placed by a citizens group called Save Anaheim. The ad accused them of violating California’s open meeting law — accurately, according to McNamara. But Kushner’s response was to tell his advertising department to stop taking ads that criticize politicians by name.

(The story was first reported by Voice of Orange County, which McNamara credits.)

McNamara writes:

It is hard enough for grassroots organizations to be heard in politics in the wake of the 2010 U.S. Supreme Court decision in Citizens United, which allows corporations to dump unlimited amounts of cash into the electoral process. A free and independent press is all we have to level the playing field. Save Anaheim’s protests online are little match for the bullhorn wielded by City Hall, especially if the city’s largest newspaper refuses to carry its dissenting views to a wider audience.

McNamara, a Brandeis professor who won a Pulitzer Prize back when she was a Globe columnist, says that when she reached out to Kushner for comment, he declined the opportunity. [But see update below.] So can we call that strike two? To be fair, Kushner did talk with Voice of Orange County, saying he acted not to curry favor with the councilors but because “we don’t like negative political advertisements.”

As McNamara notes, Kushner has been winning plaudits for investing in the Register rather than cutting its budget, although it remains to be seen whether his print-centric approach will pay off in the long run.

For Globe-watchers, it’s been easy to fantasize about Kushner — possibly allied with the members of the Taylor family, who used to own the paper — returning it to its status as a locally owned institution.

Well, maybe not so fast.

Update: Kushner has now posted a comment to McNamara’s item. Among other things, he says was concerned that the Save Anaheim ad could have resulted in a libel suit against the Register. Not sure that I agree, but his response is detailed, thoughtful and civil.

New York Times Co. puts the Globe up for sale — again

As some of you no doubt already know, the New York Times Co. announced earlier today that it is seeking to sell The Boston Globe and its affiliated media properties, principally Boston.com and the Telegram & Gazette of Worcester.

When the Times Co. bought the Globe 20 years ago it paid $1.1 billion, a whopping half the company’s stock-market valuation at the time. When it tried and failed to sell in 2009, the only potential buyers interested in the Globe were reportedly offering pennies on those 1993 dollars.

We’ve been down this road before, and it’s hard to know whether the Times Co. has already lined up a buyer or if this is another fishing expedition. One name to keep an eye on, though: Aaron Kushner, a local guy who was spurned in his efforts to buy the Globe a couple of years ago and wound up with the Orange County Register instead.

Kushner is winning good marks for investing in the Register and for taking a counterintuitive print-centric approach. I can’t imagine him owning both the Register and the Globe, but might he engineer some sort of trade?

And don’t rule out another bid by the Globe’s former owners, the Taylor family — either separately or in collaboration with Kushner.

No sense delving in too deeply today. There will be much, much more to come in the days and weeks ahead.

Would-be Boston Globe owner goes all in on print

Here’s an interesting Associated Press story on Aaron Kushner, who made a run at buying The Boston Globe a few years ago and ended up with the Orange County Register instead. Kushner is betting the ranch on a print-centric approach, adding pages, improving color and — get this — pumping up the paper’s investigative-reporting capabilities.

People who wish to subscribe online will pay the same as print subscribers, Kushner says, because “the value of the journalism isn’t any less. The reporter isn’t paid any less. The photographer isn’t paid any less.” Well, OK, but the production and distribution costs are a lot less, aren’t they?

At a time when the newspaper business can’t find a way to fix itself, there’s no sense in mocking Kushner’s backward-looking approach. My suspicion is that he may enjoy some short-term success, though this is clearly no way to build for the future. But let’s see what happens. I doubt that he’s given up his hopes of buying the Globe some day, so this could be a rehearsal.