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L.A. Times drops Jazz Coverage


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No, no - I've been WAITING for this offer to come my way. I've been here far too long. Despite the financial meltdown, this is more of a philosophical and health question: If I don't leave, being in such an evil workplace will more than likely kill me.

More relevant, more immediate, more participatory ... maybe even more democratic.

My glass is half full.

As a journalist who has one week left to work on the newspaper for which I have toiled for about 15 years - and the company for which I have worked for 19 years - I, too, am a half-full thinker on these issues.

I'll need to get employed before the golden handshake runs out, but I fully expect that my future will be online, and more than likely with a whole bunch of employers and publications/whatever, rather than a single boss/paycheck.

Bummer. Sorry to hear about the job. Good things can come out of seemingly bad situations sometimes, right? Fifteen / nineteen years is a pretty good run. I'll have completed 20 years next Aug. 1. ... Hired in 1989. Whew. :blink:

Edited by kenny weir
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Yes, I attended a presentation sponsored by Northwestern University's alumni association on the digital newsroom and they pointed to a handfull of small mid-west newspapers that created a hybrid of print and on-line desks, often with an on-line staff the fraction of the size of the print staff (maybe 8 people, the same size as our radio station staff). The interactivity of the on-line experience was knocking people out. For instance a story on heavy metal levels in fish had as a sidebar a little calculator where you could enter your weight, how much salmon and tuna you eat a year and they'd assess your risk level, or some such thing. There were many journalists from the Grand Rapids Press in attendance, but were bemoaning their inability to institute these kinds of innovations. The MI-Live situation, where several papers owned by the same company share a web presence, doesn't make room for each paper to have a dedicated web site on that level. Or that's where they were then.....

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I think the loss is more profound than that, especially as regards Democracy.

Newspapers are being replaced by something better, more relevant.

Us. Here. Now.

That's good for democracy, I think!

Yeah, nothing builds a more perfect union like being the center of your own universe.

Maybe you missed it. By "Us. Here. Now." I mean the immediacy and interaction of the internet. Instant news. Instant fact check. Real-time dialog (even among people with whom you may disagree ... gasp!). Many more points of view than can be represented in a single newspaper. You might be less informed now than you were from reading your afternoon daily 10 years ago. You'd be in the minority, I'm guessing.

Me, I have access to every latest poll out there, can watch a story break in the morning and be debunked by noon. Engage in discussion in forums like this one. Seems to have a little more depth and immediacy than a newspaper page with 8-hour old stuff in it.

That said, I love newspapers. I work for one. I just don't think they're economically feasible anymore. Advertisers will determine the tipping point.

Significantly more heat, to be sure.

But more light? I am not yet convinced. In fact, I remain skeptical, and am not so sure but that the consistent fluidity of the only/digital news/information experience is not eliminating the "gel" time needed for an environment of considered & reasoned action instead one of perpetual reaction and not too much else.

Right now, the maturity of the processing is lagging behind that of the dissemination. Hopefully it will catch up as we evolve into a more mature understanding of what it is we're dealing with. Until then, there's a lot of "doing it because we can" on all parts, and only some of that translates to "doing it because we should". For one (very big) thing, I'm not at all sure that structuring/framing political & governing issues in terms of "winning" a news cycle is good for anybody except for those who provide those mechanisms by which those cycles exist. Digital/online only accelerates this entire concept of always being "in" and never "away". As part of a well-balanced reality, away is good.

That said, I used to love newspapers, but pretty much gave them up about five years ago. Things are how they are and it makes no sense to pretend otherwise. But by the same token, things aren't how they once were, and it makes no sense to pretend otherwise about that either.

Marshall McLuhan lives.

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Significantly more heat, to be sure.

But more light? I am not yet convinced. In fact, I remain skeptical, and am not so sure but that the consistent fluidity of the only/digital news/information experience is not eliminating the "gel" time needed for an environment of considered & reasoned action instead one of perpetual reaction and not too much else.

Right now, the maturity of the processing is lagging behind that of the dissemination. Hopefully it will catch up as we evolve into a more mature understanding of what it is we're dealing with. Until then, there's a lot of "doing it because we can" on all parts, and only some of that translates to "doing it because we should". For one (very big) thing, I'm not at all sure that structuring/framing political & governing issues in terms of "winning" a news cycle is good for anybody except for those who provide those mechanisms by which those cycles exist. Digital/online only accelerates this entire concept of always being "in" and never "away". As part of a well-balanced reality, away is good.

That said, I used to love newspapers, but pretty much gave them up about five years ago. Things are how they are and it makes no sense to pretend otherwise. But by the same token, things aren't how they once were, and it makes no sense to pretend otherwise about that either.

Marshall McLuhan lives.

Fair enough. Balance. (Eww ... that sounds perilously close to a marketing slogan. :blink: )

And something is definitely lost when we stare into a computer screen and pour over links to crosscheck the avalanche of "facts," versus sharing the familiar sections of a newspaper and discussing daily events with our loved ones over breakfast. In the end, I, too, prefer the latter ... and still do. No sense to pretend otherwise. ;)

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I started turning to newspaper web sites in 2001, after somebody tipped me off to the existence of thepaperboy.com (An aggregator site that has links to newspaper websites from all over the world.) And immediately after 9/11, I mostly read UK-based news sources, like The Guardian and The Independent. (No subscription necessary, and far cheaper than trying to find - and buy - hard copies.)

I love the fact that the New York Times is online (especially now that it's *free*), but... I really miss reading the actual paper. Still, when push comes to shove, it's far easier - and cheaper - to read it online. But: if I'm going to NYC for a weekend, I buy the paper ahead of time and make plans from there (for music, art galleries, etc.).

As for what's been said about the sheer cost of paper, printing, etc. - I have no trouble believing that it's becoming more expensive by the day. But I vividly remember visiting my grandfather's office at the local paper here, and watching the Linotype operators, pressmen, etc. etc. It was exciting to be there, and my impression was that those folks took a great deal of pride in their work. All gone now...

Edited by seeline
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Re: the L.A. Times, the loss of a jazz critic means almost nothing to them. From an industry blog, "Josh Friedman, who wrote the "Movie Projector" column covering the weekly box office, has been laid off... the Los Angeles Times is now looking for a low-cost freelancer to do it." This is fairly huge news (no pun intended) in a town that survives on movie & TV coverage. Welcome to the future of print journalism...

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