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NEWS NOTE: Tribune Co. fears bankruptcy; NYTimes in discussion with lenders on debt payments....At Least Dead Dinosaurs Made Oil. . . .
Q: “Would you want you kid to go into the newspaper business?”
A: “No. It’s a dying business. Being a newspaper reporter is like being a cowboy on a dinosaur ranch.”
—Anonymous California reporter responding to a 1990 newsroom survey
(“‘Still the Invisible People’: Job Satisfaction of Minority Journalists at U.S. Daily Newspapers,” 1991.)
(“‘Still the Invisible People’: Job Satisfaction of Minority Journalists at U.S. Daily Newspapers,” 1991.)
Today in History
2000: U.S. Supreme Court halts Florida election recount; 1989: Leona Helmsley, the Queen of Mean, goes to jail; 1980: tycoon Armand Hammer buys Da Vinci notebook for $5.1 million; 1925: the first motel opens in San Luis Obispo; 1917: Father Flanagan founds Boys Town; 1915: Frank Sinatra’s birth day; 1901: Marconi sends first trans-Atlantic wireless message; 1787: Pennsylvania becomes 2nd state to ratify Constitution.
Ted:
ReplyDeleteI've had the dinosaur term thrown at me, and responded that I expect newspapers to be around after I'm gone.
That, admittedly, is not to say that I'd go into the business at age 16, as I did in 1950. For one thing, two of the first three papers for which I worked aren't around any more. For another, Personnel would send me packing because I didn't have a degree.
If anything, I think that papers are in trouble in part because they're too "modern", i.e., politically correct. Each time I was hired, the man running the news, sports or foreign news shop decided after an interview that he wanted to hire me and sent word to personnel that they were to start paying me XXX each week (paperwork involved Social Security and benefits, which were few).
Now, from what I hear, I would start with personnel and perhaps have my name sent to the news side with an "OK to hire" rating.
At the last U S News bureau chiefs meeting I attended, the exec ed said, "You're lucky to be here. I couldn't hire you today, because you're white and male and aren't disabled (actually. I carried a 10% disability rating with the Veterans Administration, but hadn't bothered to inform the magazine of that when David Lawrence hired me).
I wonder if there isn't at least something of a parallel between our business and the railroads. They went broke right and left, and those that came out of bankruptcy were merged (Burlington Northern Santa Fe, for instance), had shed duplicate money-losing lines and rid themselves of antiquated work rules (firemen kept on locomotives long after there was no coal to shovel, railroads having their own telegraphers long after microwave communication became available, etc). Now, the merged lines are run sensibly and make money (or have up now).
When I worked in NY, papers were allowed to set type by computer ONLY after agreeing that the same copy would continue to be set on linotypes -- and melted down immediately! No wonder there are three metropolitan daiies now, where there used to be a dozen (I'm counting two in Queens and one each in Brooklyn, Newark and Jersey City as well as the seven in Manhattan). From what I've read, even those that have survived up to now are beset by featherbedding and backward-looking management.
I wonder how many of the NY Times Co. troubles have to do with the fact that the company is run not by newspapermen but by Sulzbergers, many of whom are said to have little if any interest in anything connected with the papers other than their dividends.
Keep up the good work.
Joe