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Topic: Does anyone work for Gannett?
| Author | Message |
| someone | Posted – 8/12/2007 11:55:02 AM | show profile This article has some interesting comments: http://blogs.wsj.com/deals/2007/08/09/is-gannett-girding-for-a-sale/ |
| inkblot | Posted – 8/12/2007 3:26:37 PM | show profile True voices can be heard ...on the WSJ link posted by Journo19. (Thank you, J19). I am a recent former employee of a Gannett "property" and hated damn near every aspect of Gannet ownership. I endured many years -- for the sake of showing job committment on my resume and dedication to my beat -- of watching Gannett take a huge dump on everything I learned in journalism school. Right down to the insipid Information Center restructuring. The list of Gannett transgressions is endless: Unfair labor practices, poor employee training, high turnover, shoddy coverage, unrealistic expectations (financial and journalistic), bad editing, irrational pandering to certain demographics, formulaic corporate mindsets, quantity trumping quality, you get the picture. I noticed the company was desperate when reporters had to attend a mandatory meeting on how selling ads to certain niche markets. It wasn't a meeting on training us to directly sell, but it was to make us cognizant of sales. I don't think the sales department had to attend a newswriting meeting, though. Many times management confidently stated the proverbial "wall" between editorial and sales was gone forever and to embrace that notion in the new era. If Gannett were to be sold, unlike the Wall Street Journal, the only way its quality could go is up. |
| missprint | Posted – 8/12/2007 4:51:36 PM | show profile Interesting. I work at a Gannett paper (though my end is near) and we got a corporate e-mail yesterday disputing all the rumors Gannett was being sold. I didn't know what they were talking about, but I guess now I do. My only question would be, who would want the company? At such a horrible time in the newspaper business, I can't imagine someone wanting to invest lots of money in an industry that is dying, or at least, is in the process of undergoing a huge restructuring. And I, too, have been diappointed in much of my experience here. At my paper, their Web site is HORRIBLE and very unstructured (They refer you based on "key words", a la AOL circa 1994). Will be interesting to see what happens though. |
| Mr. Biggles | Posted – 8/12/2007 11:10:37 PM | show profile FWIW, a former coworker of mine took a job with one of their pubs on the West Coast and quit after less than a week, having learned that she'd be expected to work 12-plus-hour days as a matter of course. |
