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Pretty Graph Chart Shows Print Journalism's Ugly Downfall
Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
Congressional Repubs Win Media War
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MisterHippity
09/27/09

In reply to Pretty Graph Chart Shows Print Journalism's Ugly Downfall
This isn't showing the "death" of the newspaper industry. It's showing the "decline" of the newspaper industry. It will stabilize in a year or two, and some those numbers will start trending up again.

Will it regain the heights of previous decades? No, probably not. So what? It will still become a successful industry again. Just a smaller one than it used to be.

This cheerleading and hyping the troubles of newspapers from so-called "new media" types is tiresome and irritating. Give it a rest. The Web doesn't "win" if newspapers "die," so stop trying so hard to convince everyone that's gonna happen.

Instead, recognize that most of the creative professionals in that industry are similar to those in your industry - writers, editors and artists. You all rise and fall together. Stop sniping at your "old media' brethren and working together to make life better for creative professionals across all media for a change.
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Pete Gaines
09/27/09

@MisterHippity: Someone should tell that to the "old media" guys - they're the ones who do most of the sniping, despite the fact they're sitting on a sinking ship.
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btipling
09/27/09

@MisterHippity: The presupposition is that ink on paper is not the legacy of a bygone era. Newspapers aren't just démodé, they're useless and ineffective.
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wholenuther
09/27/09

@MisterHippity: Agreed. "New Media" obviously has an interest in promoting itself and putting down "Old Media," but there's something to be said about biting the hand that feeds you content. Would anyone at Gawker turn down a job at the New York Times? Didn't think so.
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MisterHippity
09/27/09

@btipling: Now see, this is just what I'm talking about.

"Ink on paper" is not their business. Their business is producing and selling news. The news product the produces is distributed through more than one channel. "Ink on paper" is just one channel (declining). The web is another one (growing).

I read the New York Times and the Washington Post regularly, and have not touched any "ink on paper" associated with those two "papers" in years. I read them both on the Web.

The key, of course, is how they can make more money through the Web channel. They'll figure something out.
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MisterHippity
09/27/09

@Pete Gaines: I agree that the "Web is killing us and stealing our stuff" complaints from old-media types are tiresome too.

Put most of your stuff behind a paywall and charge for it, then. Then it won't matter how many other sites link to it -- people who click the links will still have to pay to read it.

If you can't sell the stuff behind a paywall, too bad. dump it. Stick to the stuff people are willing to pay for. Simple.
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flavorflav
09/26/09

In reply to Pretty Graph Chart Shows Print Journalism's Ugly Downfall
If print were so dead, it wouldn't be making profit margins of 20 percent a year. Circulation is not a measure of profitability or viability. Not even close. The Des Moines Register makes more money than Twitter.

Also, mint.com -- taking a cue from Gawker's recent inattention to detail -- refers to the company that owns USA TODAY as "Gannet." I guess there was no room on the chart for Night-Rider.
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NicoletteLark
09/26/09

In reply to Pretty Graph Chart Shows Print Journalism's Ugly Downfall
Why is Rupert Murdoch's NewsCorp missing from that stock price graph? His NY Post up above there has the biggest, longest circulatory plunge of all; I'd expect that NewsCorp's worth would have expressed a similar decline.
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ninety_nine
09/26/09

@NicoletteLark: Because News Corp outperformed the S&P 500 over the past ten years, and who wants to ruin a pretty argument with ugly facts?
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Foster Kamer
09/27/09

How many newspaper-owning corporations are there that aren't failing? All of those companies' primary holdings are newspapers. Not the case with News Corp. I'd guess that'd be why, other than the fact that, yes, it would look ugly, and would dilute the point.
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ninety_nine
09/27/09

@Foster Kamer: Foster, did you look at the chart? The Times spike in the late 90s (dot-com bubble) at an ahistorical rate, so their drop looks pretty extreme. And most of these companies are messy conglomerates that are family run with odd stock structures (remember how people piled on the Bancrofts for not getting true value -- boy they look cagey now, don't they?) that may have as much to do with long-term performance.
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flavorflav
09/27/09

@Foster Kamer: Don't confuse "failing company" with "low-priced stock." Plenty of newspaper companies -- Landmark, Advance, Gannett (or Gannet, as mint.com calls it) -- have little debt, have cut expenses and makes a ton of money. Gannett stock is a great buy right now.

Tribune is in trouble because Sam Zell paid way too much and borrowed 99 percent of the purchase price. McClatchy is in trouble because it paid way too much money for Knight Ridder and borrowed 99 percent of the purchase price. The Times is in trouble because it paid way too much money for its new Midtown building and borrowed 99 percent of the purchase price.

Do you detect a trend here?

Solvent publishers are reluctant to broadcast the fact that they are making scandalous amounts of money, so they sit quietly while everyone cries that the sky is falling.
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Pizza!Pizza!Pizza!
03/25/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
Let's just say an editor was getting all sorts of angry calls and emails from unpaid freelancers - what sort of power does she or he have, anyway? Most eds I know have never even spoken to accounting, and everything goes through at least three higher ups. Yet they usually field the calls.
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naboo
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
Fangoria employs WRITERS???? I always thought it was cobbled together by Joe Dante in his basement out of lobby cards, gum arabic, and sheer fandom.
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Cam/ron
03/24/09

@naboo: The dude does need the $$$.
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Phyllis Nefler
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
When Radar got bitten by a chump or whatever the parlance is for "becoming Zombie" (my paranormal knowledge comes solely from Facebook apps) I thought they actually paid all their freelancers in one fell swoop - including kill fees. Of course that may have been the last time they opened their coffers, so who knows. To be honest, I visit Radar the same amount now as I did when it was critically acclaimed. I always forgot about it then, ya know?
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gershkuntzman
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
As the Gersh Kuntzman cited above, I can tell you that Gawker needs to do a little legwork before posting stories. No one called my office from Gawker to ask about the alleged "excuses" I made, so it's difficult for me to understand how this site can report, as fact, that I made "excuses."

In fact, I have made no excuses. I give all our writers a full understanding of the billing procedure here - a procedure, you would certainly know if you called me, that never involves the editor of a publication.

Billing is handled out of the front office at every single paper I have ever worked at - but, then, you'd know that if you had called me for a comment. Alas, you didn't care to bother.

Please feel free to call me in the future. I'm probably the most accessible editor in the business.

GERSH KUNTZMAN

Editor

The Brooklyn Paper
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mmstk101
03/24/09

@gershkuntzman: So, do you still owe that writer $40?
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PandoraSpocks
03/24/09

@gershkuntzman: Krucoff? Is that you?
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kitkatsplash
03/24/09

@gershkuntzman: So, what I seem to be hearing from you, Gersh, is that it's not your problem? Right?

See, as the "editor" you are responsible for the actions of many of your paper's employees (in spirit, at the very least!).
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Fishnets and Cigarettes
03/24/09

@gershkuntzman: I suppose it's not Rupert Murdoch's problem either, now that he owns the BP.

and can we talk about that horrid "obituary" you wrote about Robert Guskind? You should be ashamed.
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lobstr
03/25/09

@gershkuntzman: I may be the minority here in giving Gersh the benefit of the doubt --

The editor has a billion things on their plate, and paying off the invoice (probably one of thousand submitted) is not their job...

Time and time again you have some hotshot primadonna freelancer who doesn't follow protocol and "wants their damn money"...

It's the same thing as me sending my 1040 directly to Obama's office in the White House and getting pissed at Obama for the delay in my IRS tax refund
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Pizza!Pizza!Pizza!
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
Never written for them, but Fangoria's editor is an odd and hilarious man.
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SultanaEleusis
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
Does the money I am owed by The Brooklyn Paper count as a Toxic Asset?
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everfade
03/24/09

@SultanaEleusis: You need a bailout.
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StonedAndDethroned
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
Whenever I call Cosmopolitan en Espanol and ask for my scrilla they're all, "No speak-a Ingles!" and hang up. Bitches.
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belltolls
03/24/09

@StonedAndDethroned: One would have thought they would just say: "Manana." (Just imagine the tilde)
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misslinda
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
Oh you poor dears, please cc me on your next late payment letter and I'll see what I can do.

xoxo,
misslinda, esq.
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Perhaps Not
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
I remember waiting for MONTHS for Back Stage to pay me when I wrote for them. No more, fuckers!
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everfade
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
Chili Pepper Magazine?! I need a subscription to that.
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friend_of_a_friend
03/24/09

@everfade: I used to have a subscription! Maybe their revenue numbers are hurting since I didn't renew.
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everfade
03/24/09

@friend_of_a_friend: You were their only customer.
Seriously though, is it exactly what it sounds like?
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Aaron Altman
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
Oh, Gersh. You can't go Gnome again.
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Baroness
03/24/09

In reply to Print's Ten Worst Late Payment Offenders
"Gersh Kuntzman" has to be a pseudonym. Which is useful for avoiding angry unpaid writers, perhaps.
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