Know your audience

The Boston Globe stops being so high and mighty and finally listens to what it's readers want.

Four in the morning

1. It's Earth Day: Buying green won't buy you absolution. Newsweek

2. How social pressure through social media closed the gap between "Web site" and "website". Bloggasm

3. The Journalism Shop is expanding its roster beyond former Los Angeles Times reporters and editors. Journalism Shop (via LA Observed)

4. Sometimes it takes an institution (the Boston Globe) to take on an institution (the Catholic Church). Nieman Journalism Lab

Four today

1. Former LA Times reporter Bill Boyarsky lauds USC's online news site, Neon Tommy, as the future of IF Stoneian journalism (although I thought the name referred to something completely different). Truthdig

2. CNN's website expands - becomes even less relevant to me. Business Insider

3. Former Boston Globe reporter comes up with an unfortunate name to describe gripping stories. JLocal

4. Voice of San Diego wants to turn people into civic activists. Nieman Lab

No sale

The New York Times Co. has decided to keep the Boston Globe. (via Romenesko)

Four in the evening

1. Fear the shield: An attorney and former judge says a federal shield law for reporters is more trouble than it's worth. Boston Globe

2. Legislation by ballot: Californians pass legislation and even amend the state Constitution through the ballot box. So why aren't more of the campaign documents related to those ballot measures made public? Joe Mathews says they should be. Fox & Hounds

3. Good for what Ailes you: Fox News CEO Roger Ailes met with White House political boss David Axelrod to look for common ground. Politico

4. Executive-suite privilege: Freedom Communications, owner of the Orange County Register, isn't interested in sharing its business records publicly. Ironic, no? Editor and Publisher

The Platinum treatment

The Boston Globe profiles Beverly Hills-based Platinum Equity, which bought the San Diego Union-Tribune in March and has put in a bid of $35 million to buy the Globe from New York Times Co.

Tom Gores is the billionaire owner. He's 45. He's used the cash he's made from his private equity investments to produce a Lindsay Lohan slasher film.

Good taste aside, the description of what's going on at the Union-Tribune should have the Globe staff frightened. In addition to the 192 layoffs instituted shortly after Platinum Equity bought the San Diego newspaper, the company has barred employees who leave from recruiting current employees for new ventures and hired "consultants" to monitor the productivity of reporters and editors.

The private equity firm brought in Ed Moss, a veteran downsizer who's worked at both the Akron Beacon Journal and the Los Angeles Newspaper Group, to become Union-Tribune publisher.

The Globe reports that another round of layoffs is expectd at the Union-Tribune next week.

Then there's the aggressive manner in which Platinum's attorneys tried to squash a story about two sexual harassment lawsuits that, along with those productivity consultants, raises serious questions about editorial independence and ethics.

Many argue Platinum only got into the newspaper game for the real estate - and the Globe has some prime real estate of its own.

From the Globe:

“They don’t care whether it’s a newspaper or a dairy or a gas station or a small engine manufacturer,’’ said the person close to the transaction. “They’re looking at the fundamentals of the business. If they think they can make money at a certain transaction price, they’re interested in that business.’’

Platinum Equity already has a regional office in Boston.

Racism by reflex

There's plenty of conscious racism out there, but research suggests we're still biased despite our best intentions. From the Boston Globe:

The arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. sparked allegations of racism, followed by fierce denials that race played a role in the 911 call or the police response to the report of a possible break-in at his Cambridge home. But social psychology research indicates that regardless of people’s stated attitudes about race, unconscious racial biases can influence their behavior in surprisingly powerful ways.

That means that people who are not racist may unknowingly behave in ways that reflect racial stereotypes, even when they may disagree with such ideas. One study found that doctors with more unconscious bias against blacks were less likely to give African-American heart attack patients clot-busting medication than white patients. Another found that when participants in a computer simulation were told to shoot criminals but not unarmed citizens or police who appeared on the screen, more black than white men were incorrectly shot. Other work found that children perceived ambiguous, but aggressive behavior as more threatening if the perpetrator was black. ...

“I think our data, obtained from millions and millions of people, show a real disparity between who we think we are, who we say we are . . . and what actually goes on in our heads,’’ said Mahzarin R. Banaji, a Harvard psychology professor who is a leader in studying such implicit bias.

Read the full article here.

Boston Globe union, New York Times reach deal

Poynter reports that the last holdout union representing Boston Globe employees has reached a tentative deal with the paper's owner, the New York Times Co. If members agree to the contract on July 20, they'd lose six percent of their pay and some would lose their lifetime job guarantee.

Reports of Cronkite's illness might be gravely exagerrated

Legendary anchorman Walter Cronkite has taken ill, but may not be as "gravely ill" as some have reported. His executive assistant told the Boston Globe that Cronkite is "dealing with the challenges of being a 92-year-old man."

Four in the morning

1. North Korea's official news agency claims that Current TV journalists Euna Lee and Laura Ling confessed to crossing illegally into the country during their secret trial. Lee and Ling were sentenced to 12 years hard labor for the alleged transgression. NYT

2. Google offered several established artists the chance to work for free. The artists - some anyway - declined to consider "exposure" as payment. NYT (h/t fishbowlLA)

3. The federal government has raised anti-trust issues about Google's planned online book registry, with critics, including librarians, saying the company will have effectively cornered the market. Time

4. What's the Boston Globe worth (assuming the New York Times Co. decides to sell)? A buck, says Ken Doctor at Content Bridges: "A buck essentially represents a gentleman’s agreement: I take a liability, headache and a distraction off your hands, says the buyer. I give you the great potential of the Globe brand, a top 25 news web site and improved ability to re-jigger the pieces, thanks to our new contracts and cost-cutting, says the Times." Content Bridges

Will the Globe go Intercontinental?

The owners of Intercontinental Real Estate Corp. have placed a bid to buy the Boston Globe, and I'm guessing it's not because they're interested in the articles.

From the Boston Herald:

“Intercontinental is interested in any good investment that offers superior returns for our investors, as well as opportunities for job preservation, and even job growth, for our union investors,” said a top executive for Boston-based Intercontinental ... “The Globe fits our profile.”

Since very few companies - especially ones with "real estate" in their name - think newspapers are great investments right now, what's the attraction? According to the Herald, the Globe owns some "prime property" along the I-95, which makes the proposal look a little like the deal Platinum Equity made to buy the San Diego Union-Tribune. Intercontinental also manages investment funds, including union pensions.

Speaking of which, the Herald reports that the largest union at the Globe has called for an equity stake in any new company. Assuming Intercontinental emerges as the buyer, that would at least leave one entity with an interest in the newspaper that wants to keep it a newspaper - albeit a much smaller one.

Of course, the New York Times Co. has yet to confirm it's going to sell the Globe. Putting the paper on the block could be a tactic to get the unions to sign off on wage and benefit cuts; or the wage and benefit cuts could be a tactic to make the Globe more attractive to a buyer.

Globe for sale

The New York Times Co. wants to sell the Boston Globe.

(via Nieman Lab)

Globe to NYT: This is a contract we can refuse

The union at the Boston Globe voted 277-265 today to reject a wage and benefit cuts requested by the paper's owner, the New York Times Co.

The New York Times reports:

After weeks of labor tension and 12 hours of suspenseful voting, members of the Newspaper Guild at the Boston Globe narrowly rejected a proposed package of wage and compensation cuts, despite a threat from the newspaper’s owner, The New York Times Company, that such a rejection could precipitate a unilateral, 23 percent cut in pay.

The Boston Herald's lede is a little feistier:

The Boston Globe’s biggest union last night refused to bow to contract concessions demanded by its New York corporate masters in a high-risk slap that dares management to make good on threats to impose a 23-percent pay cut or even shutter the struggling broadsheet.

Globe shutdown averted, Senate hearing goes on

The unions representing workers at the Boston Globe have agreed to steep wage and benefit cuts and that should keep the New York Times Co. from shutting down the Boston newspaper anytime soon.

Meantime, Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry has scheduled a hearing for today at 11:30 a.m. PST to discuss the future of journalism in light of the turmoil at the Globe and elsewhere. As has become obligatory, the panel will include a representative from Google and Huffington Post co-founder Arianna Huffington.

Also slated to speak are David Simon, creator of "The Wire" and former Baltimore Sun reporter; Steve Coll, president of the New America Foundation and former managing editor of the Washington Post; Dallas Morning News Publisher James Moroney, and Alberto Ibargüen, president and CEO of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

Four in the morning

1. The New York Times Co. decided yesterday to withdraw its threat to shutter the Boston Globe in 60 days after the company won concessions from six of the seven unions representing Globe workers. WSJ

2. Platinum Equity of Beverly Hills has completed its purchase of the San Diego Union-Tribune and has appointed Paul Bridwell, "an experienced turnaround specialist," to restructure the newspaper. U-T

3. The Los Angeles Times also hires people. Shane Goldmacher, the 25-year-old political blogger behind the Sacramento Bee's Capitol Alert, will move to the Times Sacramento bureau in June. Capitol Alert via LA Observed

4. Even The Onion is having financial trouble. fishbowlLA

Four in the morning

National Public Radio plans to layoff 13 employees and institute furloughs for rest of its workers. In addition, NPR will eliminate three paid holidays from its calendar. WaPo

The Wall Street Journal has put together a graphic documenting the biggest cuts at the biggest daily newspapers across the country. WSJ

Journalists who don't want to actually go into the streets to find a man on the street can rent one instead from journopimp HARO. ROAN

The New York Times and the Boston Globe head to a May 1 showdown. Boston Globe

John Kerry to the rescue

Erstwhile presidential hopeful Sen. John Kerry plans to hold hearings next week on the state of the newspaper industry. (via Romenesko)

Lasting impressions

Seldom do I look to actor Ben Affleck for wisdom of any kind, but the Boston Globe recently quoted him saying something exceedingly pertinent to the news industry:

"Part of the erosion of newspapers is about new media, but part of it is newspapers' own fault ... I think the public has felt let down by The New York Times and others for not asking the tough questions, whether about the Iraq war or the subprime issue. The job of the fourth estate is to stand outside the vested interests and say, 'Wait a minute, this isn't viable.' "

Whatever one thinks of Affleck's fuzzy version of history, it's the sentiment that's important. His impression of newspapers, which I think more and more people share, especially young people, was shaped by a perception of failure - for them, the newspaper is symbolized by Judy Miller and the New York Times and their collective failure to tell the truth in the run up to a war. In this way of thinking, newspapers are dispensable and possibly dangerous.

Compare this to the popular sentiment that existed pre-weapons of mass destruction when the popular impression of newspapers was shaped by a perception of success - the Watergate investigation. In this way of thinking, newspapers are indispensable to democracy and a watchdog against the worst kinds of corruption.

Ad dollars might be drying up but a silent killer for newspaper journalism is the impression people have caused by these external events. One can argue for standards, and ethics and against layoffs and cheapjack publishers, but until public sentiment shifts away from the Affleck narrative and back toward the one at the heart of "All The President's Men," it will be difficult to gain traction outside of our own media echo chamber.

Trancontinental trouble*

Taking a page from the Hearst Corp. playbook, the New York Times Company has threatened to close the Boston Globe unless the unions there agree to $20 million worth of concessions. This is likely to mean pay cuts and an end to pension benefits.

As with Hearst's San Francisco Chronicle, the Globe is reportedly bleeding cash:

Earlier this week, the Globe newsroom completed cutting the equivalent of 50 full-time jobs. But the deteriorating economy has made the paper's financial outlook much worse. Management told union leaders Thursday that the Globe will lose $85 million in 2009, unless serious cutbacks are made, according to a Globe employee briefed on the discussions. Last year the paper lost an estimated $50 million, the employee said.

(h/t Romenesko)

*Update: News reports of the impending death of the Boston Globe (including the one in the Boston Globe) are greatly exaggerated, according to Alan Mutter.