I’ve heard elsewhere and I see here that the layoffs have begun. Holding a thought for our publishing brethren across town.
25 comments
*ugh*
Yes, thinking of all the DMN staffers.
@ 11:38 am on September 6, 2011
it’s bad, once again, dude
some well-known reporters and editors are gone
@ 11:50 am on September 6, 2011
As a veteran of the 10/27/2004 mass layoff, I am upset that the paper continues to cope by killing careers. But, it will be sweet justice to see that some of those axed actually deserve it — oh, wait, what I am I? Living in a perfect world?
It’s Orwellian: Some pigs are more equal than others.
@ 12:53 pm on September 6, 2011
i know we’ve differed before, publicnewssense, but i’m with ya on this one
how anyone over 65 still has a editor/reporter job is beyond me
sure, go ahead and call me an ageist, i don’t care
why axe a competent 35 or 45 year-old reporter/editor and keep those over retirement age? who benefits from that?
and it’s what’s killing newspapers
@ 1:45 pm on September 6, 2011
I got the axe today. I wish I hadn’t. I don’t blame anyone. This isn’t about managers or executives trying to fatten their wallets at the expense of the employees. It’s about executives in a failing industry trying to hang on as long as they can. They’re just trying to slow the fall. None of these layoffs and restructurings will fix the fundamental problem that people just don’t want the newspaper anymore.
@ 1:56 pm on September 6, 2011
victim, you can come work with me, if you like
sorry you lost your job, but i disagree
people do want the newspaper
but 20somethings don’t care nor want to read what 60somethings have to say
baby boomers are destroying this country by trying to hold on to what’s been long gone
@ 3:15 pm on September 6, 2011
to the person hiding behind the initials “jrp”:
And they tell us irony is dead!
Almost took your little joke seriously, then I thought to myself, No, no. He’s just foolin’ with us, pretending he’s one of these young whippersnappers whose memory doesn’t reach back to the Vietnam war or Kent State, who thinks grammar is what his father called his own mother, whose grasp of the world is limited to what he can call up on his Googlefier.
But remember, you were young and ignorant once yourself, and you seem to have outgrown it. So be a little more gentle on these youngsters who don’t have the attention span to read anything that’s written on actual paper and don’t have the mental acuity to recognize sarcasm when they see it.
Best wishes for a looooong career in whatever it is you do.
@ 3:15 pm on September 6, 2011
circulation of 265,000 in a MSA of 6.5 Million…
@ 4:07 pm on September 6, 2011
I appreciate the offer, jrp. And I’m sorry you disagree with me, but I just don’t understand your argument. Are you saying it’s the content that’s keeping younger readers away from the newspaper? Because, if you are, I think you’re wrong.
It’s not about the content, it’s about conditioning. Younger readers were never conditioned to make the newspaper part of their daily life. I’m somewhere between the 20-somethings and 60-somethings you mentioned. I’d wager to bet that most of the people I know outside of journalism don’t subscribe to the newspaper. And these are people who are concerned with what’s happening in the world. They want to be informed, they just have other ways of getting that information.
@ 4:23 pm on September 6, 2011
I disagree, victim…the content of most papers is dreadful these days. It’s like there was an old fogies convention, and someone transcribed it. Even my dad, at age 70, has a hard time reading the DMN. It would be great if they would try to fill the actual paper with content people wanted, and quit creating toss outs that litter lawns. But, those are gone, too. I think jrp was right.
@ 5:29 pm on September 6, 2011
Newspapers had to change — but they changed poorly. They made decisions that alienated rather than embraced. Poor judgement on classified ads — could have beat monster.com to the punch. Just not acquainted with planning for the future because they were content with the fat wallet-past and blind to change in the real world. Also, when they began to think of their stock as their main product instead of dependable news and information, that’s when they went off the rails.
And age matters, but brains and experience matter more.
I don’t know what you do for a living jrp, but if you’re paying, I’ll send you my resume and be happy to help everybody get rich….I know almost the whole alphabet.
@ 5:54 pm on September 6, 2011
I’m in the 25-35 range and I never read the paper version of the DMN. I’ll go to the DMN website, but I have no use for the actual paper.
I was in London a few weeks ago and read the Times, which blows the DMN out of the water with both content and writing ability.
@ 6:46 pm on September 6, 2011
right, amanda.
Too much on the economy, that unpleasantness in Afghanistan, 2012 hopefuls, fires and storms, jobs and the lack of same, failing schools, 9/11 remembered (you DO remember 9/11?) and such like. Not enough content people under 35 want — me! me! me! more about me!
Your dad must be a stitch.
@ 6:51 pm on September 6, 2011
Few in my baby-boomer aged neighborhood has the DMN delivered. WSJ is more so.
Agree with Amanda. They have made some dreadful choices in which writers they’ve hired (cough, Leslie Brenner, cough), stories they’ve covered, and people they’ve let go (or have been unable to keep) over the last several years.
And the editorial board absolutely refuses to admit they are wrong. On anything. Ever. That gets old, unemotional and distancing to the reading public who are looking for fairness, reasonableness and a solution.
I didn’t stop reading, I just found what I considered more thorough, thoughtful and neutral on the topics somewhere else. Which is unfortunate, because I would love to love my local paper. I just can’t justify paying $350 a year for what they deliver now.
@ 7:10 pm on September 6, 2011
I heard New Yorker writer Ken Auletta not long ago remark at a panel here in Dallas that the failure of newspapers is not that they do not use capital to innovate and allow young, bright reporters to try new things — even absorbing successful startups and incorporating their new ideas into producing a better product overall. Auletta said newspapers have failed largely because they pour capital into preserve longstanding, obsolete, expensive methods, thereby precluding themselves from making investments in new ideas. In some cases, legacy publications have even funneled cash into quashing startups.
And so it is that we get the same tired news presentation — and less of it from the few staffers they can afford to keep — from papers that refuse to innovate. I’m 25 and I take the Morning News and the New York Times every day. I’m the only person I know my age who reads print copies of newspapers anymore. I have an iPad and also read news there, as well as online through various sources, including papers’ websites and even social media sites (i.e. breaking news on Twitter).
Eventually, newspapers have to recognize they can’t keep ignoring new ideas in favor of preserving tradition that thrived a half-century ago. There is so much that can be done, even to give the illusion newspapers are “with it.” But they refuse. And they struggle, ultimately hurting those who have faithfully stoked the boilers with content and kept the ancient engines running. Sorry to hear about so many losing their jobs. Best of luck.
@ 10:54 pm on September 6, 2011
Remind me — what is it the Dallas Morning News does again?
Read Jill Abramson’s memo to the New York Times staff from yesterday. On her first day as managing editor, she outlined her plans for the newsroom. And while it’s not fair to compare the NYT to the DMN, it at least sounds like they have a vision.
@ 9:20 am on September 7, 2011
Bii, in your initial position, you argue that somehow events that happened decades ago matter or give some kind of magic unicorn tears on today’s news.
Jrp’s position is thus demonstrated.
Sorry you don’t get it. The DMN is a shell of “what was.” Some of the content went awat, admittedly b/c of the cuts to people like you, Bill. I agree that your experience in life and the business allows you a perspective…but holý crap, daddy-o…the cuts yesterday were just insane. The DMN looks more like a small town weekly rag, and somehow they manage to churn it out daily and assault the subscribers.
As earlier comments mentioned…the business side of papers could have and should have responded to a new reality much, much better. Ivory towers? Yes, but the descent with stock options is much better than the victims of yesterday’s carnage.
Bill…you may hate me, and take it on yourself to send me spiteful emails…but let’s acknowledge the elephants. I’ve got lots of emails from the DMN asking me to write for them. I just wasn’t willing to do it for FREE. Others were. Free content, usually isn’t worth, well…anything. Hence the anemic nature of our hometown paper.
You can defend the decisons of manangement all you want…but they’re cutting to a point of trying to make a profit on a business model that just doesn’t work for anyone born before 1970.
@ 10:08 am on September 7, 2011
I read for many reasons, most of which have nothing to do with the front section: Sunday retail ads, Wednesday grocery ads, metro news and obits–mostly things that the WSJ doesn’t cover.
I have found it shocking that the DMN has gone after UT Southwestern and Parkland with such hatred. The misinformation and blatant distortion of facts in these stories, and others like the Trinity River Project, make me question everything I read in it.
Every time I hear about layoffs, I recall the Cue Cat. So many millions of dollars down the drain.
@ 10:30 am on September 7, 2011
I’m sorry, but amanda’s response to Bill Marvel is incomprehensible. I don’t see where he defended management decisions at all, and I seriously doubt he would.
Further, no one associated with any newsroom in America would argue against the idea that newspaper management teams — not just DMN but across the country — should have been more nimble and forward thinking in changing their news model to adapt to the time.
And no one associated with any newsroom would argue that getting freelancers to provide content free or cheap is an appropriate way to do business. Hell, we’d argue against that.
But Bill didn’t suggest those things. No one would. So all I get from what you said, amanda, is that you’re very young and no one can tell you a damn thing. Which makes you different from other people of your generation … how?
@ 2:47 pm on September 7, 2011
Drew…I get mail from AARP. Incomprehensible?
Once again…jrp’s point is validated.
@ 3:07 pm on September 7, 2011
Just so, Drew,
My beef is with the barking blogdogs who trace the newspaper problem to an aging staff or to a left/right political editorial agenda or to a plague of locusts or to the direction birds were flying on a certain Thursday morning in 2007.
Ignorance is ignorance, whether it appears on newsprint or in dancing electrons on a blogsite.
@ 4:45 pm on September 7, 2011
I believe the loudest critics of the Dallas Morning News come from their competitors, frustrated writers and former junior DMN stringers who have convinced themselves that the newspaper has “ruined” their journalism career. Maybe it’s time to move on. To the latter group, your blogging therapy here and on DMNCuts is clearly not working.
Our food critic above claims she wants to love her local newspaper. Gen X (or Y?) Amanda indicates she’d read the DMN if it appealed to her age demographic. I call bullsh*t on that.
@ 12:07 am on September 8, 2011
MarciaMarciaMarcia. I don’t review food, I’m no competitor, frustrated writer or junior DMN stringer, and I do want to love my local paper. I have a great respect for some of the writers, it’s the editorial content and the direction the editors keep sending the paper that repels me.
After I cancelled, I received a solicitation from the paper asking me to return. It was a black-on-yellow outline of a woman (wearing pearls, no less) with a huge hole cut out in her head. “It’s a no brainer!” the ad exclaimed. To which I replied, “Exactly”.
@ 6:44 am on September 8, 2011
I subscribe on Sundays solely for the coupons! Reading their content is secondary. I listen to NPR or go to NYT online for news and interest!
@ 7:05 am on September 8, 2011
Bill, if you hate blogs, then why are you here? It’s not an aging staff (sensitive much?)or bias that is the basis of my observations. Content is why people read. You won’t consider for a moment that the DMN could use some fresh content? Really?
And Marcia…I do read the DMN…and I’m underwhelmed by it on an almost daily basis. I fit in neither neat yet insulting category you’ve outlined. I just think it’s sad that the DMN adapted poorly, along with most of the others to what was happening in the market.
The DMN is going to keep cutting at what cost? Over the last several years, some excellent writers have lost their jobs. The paper already looks anemic. I never imagined Dallas would go from 2 papers to 1, and now I wonder if this one can make it without some serious overhaul.
@ 8:26 am on September 8, 2011
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FrontBurner® launched in March 2003, the first blog in Dallas run by a media organization. This is where the editors of D Magazine come to waste a tremendous amount of time.
25 comments
*ugh*
Yes, thinking of all the DMN staffers.
it’s bad, once again, dude
some well-known reporters and editors are gone
As a veteran of the 10/27/2004 mass layoff, I am upset that the paper continues to cope by killing careers. But, it will be sweet justice to see that some of those axed actually deserve it — oh, wait, what I am I? Living in a perfect world?
It’s Orwellian: Some pigs are more equal than others.
i know we’ve differed before, publicnewssense, but i’m with ya on this one
how anyone over 65 still has a editor/reporter job is beyond me
sure, go ahead and call me an ageist, i don’t care
why axe a competent 35 or 45 year-old reporter/editor and keep those over retirement age? who benefits from that?
and it’s what’s killing newspapers
I got the axe today. I wish I hadn’t. I don’t blame anyone. This isn’t about managers or executives trying to fatten their wallets at the expense of the employees. It’s about executives in a failing industry trying to hang on as long as they can. They’re just trying to slow the fall. None of these layoffs and restructurings will fix the fundamental problem that people just don’t want the newspaper anymore.
victim, you can come work with me, if you like
sorry you lost your job, but i disagree
people do want the newspaper
but 20somethings don’t care nor want to read what 60somethings have to say
baby boomers are destroying this country by trying to hold on to what’s been long gone
to the person hiding behind the initials “jrp”:
And they tell us irony is dead!
Almost took your little joke seriously, then I thought to myself, No, no. He’s just foolin’ with us, pretending he’s one of these young whippersnappers whose memory doesn’t reach back to the Vietnam war or Kent State, who thinks grammar is what his father called his own mother, whose grasp of the world is limited to what he can call up on his Googlefier.
But remember, you were young and ignorant once yourself, and you seem to have outgrown it. So be a little more gentle on these youngsters who don’t have the attention span to read anything that’s written on actual paper and don’t have the mental acuity to recognize sarcasm when they see it.
Best wishes for a looooong career in whatever it is you do.
circulation of 265,000 in a MSA of 6.5 Million…
I appreciate the offer, jrp. And I’m sorry you disagree with me, but I just don’t understand your argument. Are you saying it’s the content that’s keeping younger readers away from the newspaper? Because, if you are, I think you’re wrong.
It’s not about the content, it’s about conditioning. Younger readers were never conditioned to make the newspaper part of their daily life. I’m somewhere between the 20-somethings and 60-somethings you mentioned. I’d wager to bet that most of the people I know outside of journalism don’t subscribe to the newspaper. And these are people who are concerned with what’s happening in the world. They want to be informed, they just have other ways of getting that information.
I disagree, victim…the content of most papers is dreadful these days. It’s like there was an old fogies convention, and someone transcribed it. Even my dad, at age 70, has a hard time reading the DMN. It would be great if they would try to fill the actual paper with content people wanted, and quit creating toss outs that litter lawns. But, those are gone, too. I think jrp was right.
Newspapers had to change — but they changed poorly. They made decisions that alienated rather than embraced. Poor judgement on classified ads — could have beat monster.com to the punch. Just not acquainted with planning for the future because they were content with the fat wallet-past and blind to change in the real world. Also, when they began to think of their stock as their main product instead of dependable news and information, that’s when they went off the rails.
And age matters, but brains and experience matter more.
I don’t know what you do for a living jrp, but if you’re paying, I’ll send you my resume and be happy to help everybody get rich….I know almost the whole alphabet.
I’m in the 25-35 range and I never read the paper version of the DMN. I’ll go to the DMN website, but I have no use for the actual paper.
I was in London a few weeks ago and read the Times, which blows the DMN out of the water with both content and writing ability.
right, amanda.
Too much on the economy, that unpleasantness in Afghanistan, 2012 hopefuls, fires and storms, jobs and the lack of same, failing schools, 9/11 remembered (you DO remember 9/11?) and such like. Not enough content people under 35 want — me! me! me! more about me!
Your dad must be a stitch.
Few in my baby-boomer aged neighborhood has the DMN delivered. WSJ is more so.
Agree with Amanda. They have made some dreadful choices in which writers they’ve hired (cough, Leslie Brenner, cough), stories they’ve covered, and people they’ve let go (or have been unable to keep) over the last several years.
And the editorial board absolutely refuses to admit they are wrong. On anything. Ever. That gets old, unemotional and distancing to the reading public who are looking for fairness, reasonableness and a solution.
I didn’t stop reading, I just found what I considered more thorough, thoughtful and neutral on the topics somewhere else. Which is unfortunate, because I would love to love my local paper. I just can’t justify paying $350 a year for what they deliver now.
I heard New Yorker writer Ken Auletta not long ago remark at a panel here in Dallas that the failure of newspapers is not that they do not use capital to innovate and allow young, bright reporters to try new things — even absorbing successful startups and incorporating their new ideas into producing a better product overall. Auletta said newspapers have failed largely because they pour capital into preserve longstanding, obsolete, expensive methods, thereby precluding themselves from making investments in new ideas. In some cases, legacy publications have even funneled cash into quashing startups.
And so it is that we get the same tired news presentation — and less of it from the few staffers they can afford to keep — from papers that refuse to innovate. I’m 25 and I take the Morning News and the New York Times every day. I’m the only person I know my age who reads print copies of newspapers anymore. I have an iPad and also read news there, as well as online through various sources, including papers’ websites and even social media sites (i.e. breaking news on Twitter).
Eventually, newspapers have to recognize they can’t keep ignoring new ideas in favor of preserving tradition that thrived a half-century ago. There is so much that can be done, even to give the illusion newspapers are “with it.” But they refuse. And they struggle, ultimately hurting those who have faithfully stoked the boilers with content and kept the ancient engines running. Sorry to hear about so many losing their jobs. Best of luck.
Remind me — what is it the Dallas Morning News does again?
Read Jill Abramson’s memo to the New York Times staff from yesterday. On her first day as managing editor, she outlined her plans for the newsroom. And while it’s not fair to compare the NYT to the DMN, it at least sounds like they have a vision.
Bii, in your initial position, you argue that somehow events that happened decades ago matter or give some kind of magic unicorn tears on today’s news.
Jrp’s position is thus demonstrated.
Sorry you don’t get it. The DMN is a shell of “what was.” Some of the content went awat, admittedly b/c of the cuts to people like you, Bill. I agree that your experience in life and the business allows you a perspective…but holý crap, daddy-o…the cuts yesterday were just insane. The DMN looks more like a small town weekly rag, and somehow they manage to churn it out daily and assault the subscribers.
As earlier comments mentioned…the business side of papers could have and should have responded to a new reality much, much better. Ivory towers? Yes, but the descent with stock options is much better than the victims of yesterday’s carnage.
Bill…you may hate me, and take it on yourself to send me spiteful emails…but let’s acknowledge the elephants. I’ve got lots of emails from the DMN asking me to write for them. I just wasn’t willing to do it for FREE. Others were. Free content, usually isn’t worth, well…anything. Hence the anemic nature of our hometown paper.
You can defend the decisons of manangement all you want…but they’re cutting to a point of trying to make a profit on a business model that just doesn’t work for anyone born before 1970.
I read for many reasons, most of which have nothing to do with the front section: Sunday retail ads, Wednesday grocery ads, metro news and obits–mostly things that the WSJ doesn’t cover.
I have found it shocking that the DMN has gone after UT Southwestern and Parkland with such hatred. The misinformation and blatant distortion of facts in these stories, and others like the Trinity River Project, make me question everything I read in it.
Every time I hear about layoffs, I recall the Cue Cat. So many millions of dollars down the drain.
I’m sorry, but amanda’s response to Bill Marvel is incomprehensible. I don’t see where he defended management decisions at all, and I seriously doubt he would.
Further, no one associated with any newsroom in America would argue against the idea that newspaper management teams — not just DMN but across the country — should have been more nimble and forward thinking in changing their news model to adapt to the time.
And no one associated with any newsroom would argue that getting freelancers to provide content free or cheap is an appropriate way to do business. Hell, we’d argue against that.
But Bill didn’t suggest those things. No one would. So all I get from what you said, amanda, is that you’re very young and no one can tell you a damn thing. Which makes you different from other people of your generation … how?
Drew…I get mail from AARP. Incomprehensible?
Once again…jrp’s point is validated.
Just so, Drew,
My beef is with the barking blogdogs who trace the newspaper problem to an aging staff or to a left/right political editorial agenda or to a plague of locusts or to the direction birds were flying on a certain Thursday morning in 2007.
Ignorance is ignorance, whether it appears on newsprint or in dancing electrons on a blogsite.
I believe the loudest critics of the Dallas Morning News come from their competitors, frustrated writers and former junior DMN stringers who have convinced themselves that the newspaper has “ruined” their journalism career. Maybe it’s time to move on. To the latter group, your blogging therapy here and on DMNCuts is clearly not working.
Our food critic above claims she wants to love her local newspaper. Gen X (or Y?) Amanda indicates she’d read the DMN if it appealed to her age demographic. I call bullsh*t on that.
MarciaMarciaMarcia. I don’t review food, I’m no competitor, frustrated writer or junior DMN stringer, and I do want to love my local paper. I have a great respect for some of the writers, it’s the editorial content and the direction the editors keep sending the paper that repels me.
After I cancelled, I received a solicitation from the paper asking me to return. It was a black-on-yellow outline of a woman (wearing pearls, no less) with a huge hole cut out in her head. “It’s a no brainer!” the ad exclaimed. To which I replied, “Exactly”.
I subscribe on Sundays solely for the coupons! Reading their content is secondary. I listen to NPR or go to NYT online for news and interest!
Bill, if you hate blogs, then why are you here? It’s not an aging staff (sensitive much?)or bias that is the basis of my observations. Content is why people read. You won’t consider for a moment that the DMN could use some fresh content? Really?
And Marcia…I do read the DMN…and I’m underwhelmed by it on an almost daily basis. I fit in neither neat yet insulting category you’ve outlined. I just think it’s sad that the DMN adapted poorly, along with most of the others to what was happening in the market.
The DMN is going to keep cutting at what cost? Over the last several years, some excellent writers have lost their jobs. The paper already looks anemic. I never imagined Dallas would go from 2 papers to 1, and now I wonder if this one can make it without some serious overhaul.