More fun with the Gainesville Register

 First, it raised its print prices again, to $1.25 Tuesday and $1.75 Friday. Seriously, is anybody paying that? And, did your subscription prices go up with that?

Second, its editor is trying to get started, not an editorial board in the normal sense, but a community feedback board. It would probably start with "more local news." Of course, when you're not at all local meetings, and the Weekly News of Cooke County runs all the courthouse stuff (divorces, criminal pleas, police report, etc.) and you don't, you're sledding uphill, and the Register has been, as far as I can tell, since I started as ME at a pair of area weeklies more than three years ago.

But, that said, second part two? You've got both an editor and a staff writer, and you can't do that? And, you need the public to tell you more of what that "more" should be?

Part three. The new staff writer is a 2020 non-journalism college graduate. And, hometown person. Nothing wrong with either. 

But? Her actual degree? Education, with a teaching certificate. So, she either discovered that, mid-COVID, she didn't want to teach in today's education system, or, for whatever reason, she couldn't land a position. She was a church office manager before that. Again, nothing wrong with that. Before I landed on newspapers as the only reasonably available professional job in a place smaller than Gainesville, I did stuff that didn't pay well and was lower on the socioeconomic job scale than that. But, college was a lot less expensive decades ago.

Part the fourth, back to part 1. Your paper would be 8 pages on Tuesday, maybe 10 on Friday, without all the syndicated filler that your dumb-ass bosses at CNHI are probably still running in all your papers, even though they all stopped being daily in print long ago. So, you're charging $1.25 for an eight-page paper and $1.75 for a 10-pager? The Weekly News, as a semi-shopper, remains free. Among paid papers in this area, Wise County and Bowie are still a flat buck an issue with half again as many pages as you actually have, not what you nominally have.

If the Weekly News scraped up the money to hire your sports editor, or even a half-time sports guy, school year only, you'd be dead.

Or, if somebody started running more legals in another newspaper of general circulation ... that's all that props up the Register today.

Newspapers of NW Ohio raise my eyebrows

On LinkedIn, I saw an ad for a newspaper editorial position. ME at a 6-day daily.

It, the Daily Standard, claims to cover three counties in northwest Ohio.

Problem?

Aside from its home county, the smaller of the other two counties has an online-only newspaper whose website is better than this newspapers.

And, the bigger of the other two counties? About 10 percent larger, it has its own daily paper. And, to make it more fun, that paper, in Auglaize County, claims to cover the Mercer County of the Daily Standard. The cities are the fun-to-say Wapakoneta, in Auglaize, and Celina, in Mercer. St. Mary's, on a lake of the same name, is just east of Mercer County into Auglaize. The Daily Standard claims to cover it. Wapakoneta has a separate paper for that city.

Second? Color me skeptical that a paper in a county of less than 50K, less than 45K in fact, has 10K subscribers. (Well, the website said 10K copies.)

Third, color me skeptical that in today's newspaper world, that it's 6 days in print, rather than 6 days of e-edition. (The Ohio Newspaper Association doesn't list subscriptions for any members.)

Plus, there's a group of weeklies by a company called DNI floating around bits of NW Ohio surrounding this paper, too.

Surely, none of the three (or more) papers in the area is doing THAT well. The Daily Standard has a rate card that sounds on the highish side for a place that has a cost of living the same as most of rural Texas. They do offer not only frequency rates but a sliding scale on larger sized ads, tis true. That itself is interesting; it's generally an industry no-no to publicly post your rate card. Even more so in a still theoretically competitive area. They are cheap on class frequency rates compared to Wapakoneta.

Anyway, no, I'd be skeptical of them.

Don't apply at Hearst — process is worse than Gannett, at least in Beaumont

 And, I say that from experience with both in the last six months.

About six months ago, I applied to be managing editor of a fair sized Gannett weekly in NorCal: three staff writers. Pay, when adjusting for California cost of living, wasn't that much higher than here, but was a bit.

Anyway, Cal labor law apparently requires that jobs above base level fall into salary slots, so I knew what the pay was by default.

The interview process was long and back and forth, before the persons involved said that Gannett higher-ups had said that filling the position was officially on hold.

OK.

Last week, I applied for a Hearst job, assistant editor in Beaumont. No pay scale listed. (And, the job's now yanked off LinkedIn, so I can't get the full description.)

I was contacted by a Kyle Campbell of Local Edge, and asked a salary screening question. Said he needed to know that before going down the road of an interview.

Who is Local Edge? An entirely separate division of Hearst corporate, primarily responsible for branding and marketing. So, nobody at the local paper is involved in the start of the process, and nobody local. Mr. Campbell's area code on his phone is metro Buffalo, and I mean Buffalo, New York, not Buffalo, Texas.

(That said, even smaller chains than Hearts are doing this, having somebody non-local be at least the initial contact on hirings below the level of publisher. Old "friend" Wick is another.)

But wait, it gets better.

I could have bounced back the old "negotiable within parameters" but figured he'd reject that. 

Instead, I gave him this.

Ahh, we're at that "dance time" early. 

I could say negotiable per position parameters even while noting that, at least as listed on Indeed, there were no publicly available parameters. 

But, I'll give you a number, BUT ... 

Kind of like auction items on eBay, but with a twist, this is a "focal number." I could work off of it either way, either up or down, depending on a number of specifics about position requirements. 

Second, it's based on someone else's salaries, and my relation to similar salaries at my current location. That number? $54,102. Where did I get that exact number? Beaumont ISD.

Specifically, it's the starting salary for a first-year teacher.

He said that was more than they were offering.

So, noting my emphasis in the original, I said:

Well, what DO you offer, as in a range? As I said, I can pivot either way, and this was intended to start a discussion.

And heard back crickets at first.

There's three things that get me, and the crickets is only the second. The no local involvement at the start of the interview process is the first. The position already being yanked off LinkedIn is second. (The email exchange was on Sunday; I applied in, IIRC, the Thursday before.

But wait, it gets better.

He kept emailing me. I finally gave him a real bottom line. He said he'd forward my resume to the ME at the Enterprise. That's on a Tuesday. Kaitlin Bain emails me later that Thursday, asks what are good times to call I gave her times for the rest of the week.

No call.

BUT? Job is reposted on LinkedIn that Friday. And this time, I grabbed the link.

And, now that I have the job description? I work occasional evenings at city council meetings and school board meetings. Sometimes, grabbing a few sports photos. But, as an ME myself? My time is under my control. And, I VERY rarely work on a weekend and never on Sundays, unless I'm doing something at home.

But wait, there's more. The ad also mentions working with Hearst Community Media. Per Hearst's page on the Enterprise "group," there's two exurban (definitely, in the case of Jasper, probably in the case of Hardin County) weeklies, a biweekly real estate mag and two monthly "community" mags. It's shed three other weeklies plus a Spanish weekly since Wiki last updated its page.

And, more sadly? On the group website, the "key people" goes immediately from the prez of Hearst Community News to Bain. The only other "leadership" person is the circ director. No publisher listed, not even a general manager. That's cuz publisher Clarice Touhey fled seven months ago for balmy Williston, North Dakota, and the arms of Wick Communications, another newspaper company not high on my list. She was only there two years, having fled Craphouse to get to Hearst in Beaumont. The ad director fled for eastern Arizona a few months later. Editor Ronnie Crockett (not the ME) is not listed by teh Google as fleeing. OK, it seems that the Enterprise is "flattened" enough or shrunk enough it doesn't have a separate editor/executive editor and ME. So, the assistant editor is like a city editor, and it's still not paying enough.

And, it gets better YET. She's been in the business six years total, not counting college journalism and an internship, and was promoted from "digital producer" at that paper, and that overlapped with her being a local reporter.

Anyway, the city floods almost as much as Helltown while having an even more concentrated Cancer Alley. My bottom line will get moved back up if I get a phone call.

Which appears NOT likely.

Kaitlin Bain? You ghosted me. That's the way I see it.

(Update, May 5: Hearst is advertising this position AGAIN/YET/STILL with LinkedIn. I also consider it a semi-lie to post Hearst's total employment rather than numbers at the Enterprise.)

And, Hearst, if the Enterprise has gone that much in the crapper, or you've let it go that much in the crapper, or whatever? Hard pass. God, reporters there (the few that they have?) must make nada.

Reflecting this? I checked Texas Press Association circ numbers.

Now, most newspapers have been trickling off circulation for years, long before COVID hit. (But not all!) And, some have been bleeding, not trickling.

But, it's BAD at Beaumont. They've lost 65 percent in the last three years. 

Out of curiosity, I checked Odessa, where I was a bit over a decade ago, and as a comp, checked snootier twin city Midland, since that's also a Hearst paper. Odessa has lost about one-third its circulation. Midland? Nearly 45 percent, to the extent that its current circ is at Odessa's level if not lower.

So, some of it is the water in Beaumont. And some of it's the water at Hearst, perhaps. (From an area where I lived before, I also checked Waco. Down 40 percent over that same time.) As for the water at Hearst, the Chronic in Houston ran a Texas Trib story about the indictment of three staffers of Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo .... and were tweeting it hours later. An eternity in modern big city media.

And, of course, Hearst is privately traded, so it could be wildly profitable, or, at a minimum, at least as profitable as the newspapers Alden Global Capital owns, and steals from because its other hedge fund ventures suck.

Hey, editorial peeps: Avoid Mexico, Missouri, and probably just avoid Westplex Media

 Last week, was looking at LinkedIn, and saw the ME's position for Mexico come up.

I applied when it was open in August, 2020. Job went to somebody else.

I applied again when it opened 14 months later, after publisher and owner Tim Schmidt contacted me first. October 2021, to put it in calendar terms.

And, now, April 2022, it's open again.

After I didn't get it the second time, Schmidt then asked me if I was interested in the ME's position at Moberly, Missouri. I replied by asking him about why I didn't get Mexico the second time, since he had reached out to ME this time, and here he was reaching out again, about another newspaper he owns.

No response.

So, folks, be aware. Yeah, Schmidt may have gotten write-ups in Editor and Publisher and elsewhere. But, I'd avoid him.

A new newspaper player in Texas

 I was wondering who Cherry Road was, seeing them advertising for several openings on the Texas Press Association website.

And, this is them, by national newspaper presence.

OK, here in Tex-ass? In my area, Sherman-Denison used to be Gannett-Craphouse. Can't remember who owned Van Alstyne and Melissa-Anna. Waxahachie and Midlo used to be American Consolidated Media. So, at least some of their pickups are papers being dumped by midsize and larger players.

They appear to have some concept of "clustering," which the companies they bought from often didn't.

That said, Cherry Road Media is just one division of a much larger company. They're big IT folks, if companies like Oracle and DocuSign are listed as partners, even if there's some puffery behind that. They're big on data.

So, what will this clustering from this new owner involved? Good question. Expect a bigger push to online, and data mining and targeting as part of that, even more than a Gannett-Craphouse did, perhaps?

US media misinformation about Russia-Ukraine media censorship

This is Sunshine Month in the media world. And, in the past, at various newspapers of mine, I've had no problems running outside guest columns. Often, the Texas Press Association serves something up via its news service.

Well, this year Kelley Shannon, executive director of the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas, was in the bullpen. And, I took a pass. Here's why (couldn't find this year's column linked at FOIFT, so this is via TPA:

As Ukrainians fight and die for democracy, Russia is arresting its own citizens who are protesting the war and threatening prison for journalists who report the truth. 

The attempt to crush a democratic government and stop the flow of information comes as American news organizations and transparency advocates observe Sunshine Week from March 13-19, a time for highlighting government openness and a free press. 

Certainly, let’s commemorate the freedom of information we enjoy – and constantly strive to improve – in the United States. But it’s imperative to contrast it with what’s happening around the world and understand how devastating it is when a government allows only its own tightly controlled version of events to trickle out. 

Earlier this month, Vladimir Putin’s government changed its domestic media laws to make it a crime to distribute what it deemed to be “false news” about the war. Doing so could mean up to 15 years behind bars. Many news organizations pulled journalists out of the country or shut their operations; the government also cut off access to major social media sites, the Neiman Journalism Lab reported in its thorough rundown on the severe restrictions. 

The censorship amounts to an “information dark age,” according to the Committee to Protect Journalists, which called on journalists everywhere to stand in opposition. 

Thwarting free speech isn’t only happening in Russia. We simply need to think back to the Olympics a few weeks ago to remember the spotlight on China’s crackdowns on dissent and free expression and its control of internet content. And, of course, there are other examples.

As I tweeted to her and FOIFT, Ukraine as well as Russia has engaged in media censorship. And, Ukraine as well as Russia did it before the start of the war. Don't believe me? Here.

Beyond that, in years past, via what WAS and IS on the FOIFT website? Shannon has never mentioned Israeli censorship of Palestinian media, attacking even US media when it thinks it can get away with it, and more. 

None of this is meant to condone Putin's invasion. Nor are my other observations meant to condone Palestine's own suppression of media and many other things. Nor are these observations meant as any "moral equivalence."

Rather, it's to say Ms. Shannon should be more inclusive in her international examples or else not use any. And, that's not even to discuss misinformation by omission at the national level being part of maintaining "access" or even cheerleading.

American media cannot go around fact-checking when, by omission if not commission, it commits errors like this itself. And, given the Iraq War, it can't make mistakes like these and not have to face the music on allegations of being cheerleaders for the government.

Aggie administrators kill print version of The Battalion

Innnteresting, and per the Trib, apparently was done with ZERO forewarning to journo students, or input by them.

President M. Katherine Banks (always distrust people who go by first initial, middle name, until they prove otherwise!) made the call herself, according to A&M's dean of students. Banks claimed that, per a 2021 recommendation to bring back a journalism department there (dead since 2003), it was inline with focusing on digital journalism in general.

Problem? That journalism department ain't back yet, and who knows if it will be. A working group first discussed that as a possibility, nothing more, the day before Banks killed the print paper. Besides, Battalion staff note that most ad money for them still comes from print. Oops.

Good journalism students there are of course, and rightly, journalistically skeptical, even suspicious, about the official line on this.