Metamorphoses

When I began blogging in late 2007 it was to keep writing.

I was leaving the newspaper world of my own volition and wanted to keep my mind nimble and learn the medium that seemed to be at the heart of an increasingly fragmented media. I also wanted to stay abreast of issues that I might not otherwise come across being outside a newsroom.

The early content was a grab bag of politics, pajamas commentary, and occasional analytical pieces about changes in the practice of journalism. If a few dozen people decided to read the blog each month, all the better.

Then came the axe men.

Every few months the budget cutters came through the shrinking newsrooms and hacked away at what was left. It wasn't just about an industry in contraction that gripped me, it was that the ideals that were being trampled by mediocre businessmen addicted to the grubby impulse to make profit out of pink slips. It was a cheap and mindless time and I couldn't help but talk about it.

As axes gave way to buzz saws, and board rooms embraced bankruptcy, a choke of huckster visionaries started to form around the carnage. I felt compelled to do offer my best perspective on who was saying smart things about the future of journalism, and who was selling snake-oil remedies. It felt useful, even if most of my audience seemed more interested in using the comments section to vent than to bask in my wisdom.

Years have passed and I have moved into management at a public radio station. I don't have time to offer the frequency of updates necessary to keep the blog moving.

Instead, I'm going to take what I learned from in the last few years, including from work on this blog, to do my job better. I'll continue to write here and would appreciate hearing from my readers what they think should come next. But I won't be a reliable repository of job cut updates anymore.

Onward.

Press-Enterprise editor heads to Tennessee

Maria De Varenne will become the executive editor of The Tennessean after 10 years as editor of the Press-Enteprise in Riverside. Nels Jensen will takeover duties at the P-E.

Union-Tribune sold

Platinum Equity has turned around and sold the San Diego Union-Tribune two years after buying the newspaper. The new owner will be a real estate company MLIM, owned by Doug Manchester, reports The Wrap. Now, real estate entrepreneurs and newspapers don't always mix well (see here), but Manchester does have the advantage of being local.

Voice of San Diego had this to say in a story presaging the sale:

If Manchester bought the newspaper outright, he'd get a key piece of property that local real estate analysts have said was a valuable part of the Union-Tribune's 2009 sale to Platinum: The company's main building, which sits on 13 acres in Mission Valley, just south of the Fashion Valley mall.

Fake news written by fake people

Scandal stories about water districts in Southern California (and maybe everywhere) often involve the cloistered ways in which the boards do business - and the generosity with which they pay themselves for doing shady business.

The Central Basin Municipal Water District has found an original way to make scandal news. The public body hired a "news" outfit to write favorable articles about the district and then got them posted on Google News as though they were legitimate. Essentially, the stories were thinly disguised public relations pieces.

Now the Los Angeles Times, which broke the Google story, has discovered that the hired-gun journalists being paid to write the water district's PR weren't really journalists - and, in fact, weren't really people.

Mike Adams, the lead writer for a company calling itself News Hawks, appeared to be imaginary. From the Times:

News Hawks also presented a picture of Adams, showing a stoic man with a gray beard and a black cowboy hat. A reader notified The Times that the photo was a stock image used to demonstrate editing techniques on websites such as deviantart.com.

From there, the picture was traced to photographer Leroy Skalstad, who said he took the shot at a Milwaukee food bank last year and posted it to several photo-sharing websites. He said the subject of the picture is a man nicknamed "Cobra."

Press-Telegram journalist Larry Allison was 77

From the Press-Telegram obit:

LONG BEACH — A newsman to his core and to the end, Larry Allison spent 54 years in Long Beach journalism and worked in it until just days before he went into the hospital.
Allison died Sunday night from complications after a two-week battle with pneumonia. He was 77. 

Beginning as a reporter at the Independent, Press-Telegram in 1957 and working in virtually every department in the paper through editor. He was until his final days both a voice of the community and the official voice of the paper as Editorial Page Editor. 

Regardless of the positions he took for the newspaper, Allison was hailed by representatives from varied political and social viewpoints as invariably fair and accessible. His positions were seen by most as reasoned and journalistically sound. ...

Layoffs at the Press-Enterprise

The Press-Enterprise in Riverside on Tuesday cut several newsroom staffers Tuesday. At least one of the names I was originally given turned out to be incorrect, so I've removed the information from this post until I can confirm exactly who was laid off.

(this post was updated)

Jobs at KCRW

For those who might be interested, KCRW is hiring a promotions manager and a communications manager. Job descriptions are here.