Results matching “in new orleans”

Hurricane Gustav in the US may have prevented some newspapers from publishing their print edition for two days, but not from having 24-hour online coverage on their websites.

New Orleans' The Times-Picayune and Louisiana papers The Courier and the Daily Comet all continued to report on their respective sites, reports The Guardian's Roy
Greenslade.


Source: The Guardian

Yesterday, the New York Times published an article about buyouts at the New Jersey Star-Ledger, but really, a story about nearly every American newspaper today.

"...The bald fact is this newspaper can't stand on its own two feet now and something has to change," said Jim Willse, the paper's editor. "I told the staff yesterday that the problem we are suffering is like the plague. It is sweeping through our business and you can't expect beneficent ownership to ignore what is going on."

An article in the Star-Ledger on Friday announced the owners will sell the newspaper if they cannot win union concessions and persuade 200 of the 756 nonunion, full-time employees to take a buyout by October 1. The Star-Ledger, along with its sister paper, The Times of Trenton, is losing $30 million to $40 million a year.

The news is particularly disheartening, because, as Nick Carr, of NYT reports, the Star-Ledger is an excellent paper, and its owners - the Newshouse chain - are excellent owners.

"Under the sure hand of its editor, Jim Willse, The Star-Ledger is both modern -- big and pretty with strong photos, navigation and graphics -- and a throwback to the days when the most important story was the one just down the block. In short, it's the kind of newspaper that can get the laziest reader out of bed," writes Carr of his local paper.

In the article, Carr acknowledges the cliché that should be coming. "This is the place... where the knowing... point the finger at the evil, greedy owners and talk about their relentless pursuit of profits above all else. That's some other column. The Newhouse newspaper chain... owns 27 newspapers and has managed to maneuver through the past few years of downturns without brutal cuts... It has also invested in papers to the point where many of them are regional standouts, including The Oregonian in Portland, and The Times-Picayune in New Orleans, where it financed and supported the paper even as many businesses -- much of the advertising base -- deserted the place."


"It's a sad story not just for my friends who work at the paper," said Tom Moran, the paper's political columnist. "But for the state of New Jersey." A state which has been riddled with political corruption. "If this continues, the bad guys will have a lot less to worry about."

Source: The New York Times

It has been said that journalism schools have been lagging behind in their adaptation to new media and the rapid evolution of journalism (flashback: in 1995, a publication by the Society of Professional Journalists contended journalists’ new media skills were “nice, but not necessary.”). This is starting to change though – or is it? What should tomorrow’s journalists be learning? Jeff Jarvis, Roy Greenslade, and Keith Woods from the Poynter Institute describe their own experiences for the Weblog.

Mark Glaser of MediaShift says that serious, even investigative, journalism doesn’t have to die as news moves online; instead, he says, newspapers should look at what is rising - online readership and advertising revenue – and consider how to make their websites work in the new economy.

Los Angeles Times Editor Dean Baquet is leaving the paper due to recent pressure from the Tribune Co. after he refused to cut more jobs at the paper. The final straw apparently came from Baquet’s speech given at the recent APME conference in New Orleans where he publicly urged editors to stop job cuts. Though Tribune Co. might be happy with the resignations, it doesn’t seem executives weren’t thinking about staff morale when making this decision.

As the Internet sends the business models of traditional media organizations into turmoil simultaneously placing the power of publishing at the fingertips of the masses, much concern has been raised about how the journalism that sustains our democracies is being affected. Panelists and delegates at the Media Giraffe Summit came together to try to find a “new definition of journalism.”

The London-based international news agency Reuters is at the forefront of new media innovation. Global Managing Editor for Customer Services Dean Wright talked of his company’s experiences, the changing media landscape and “Creating a Community of the Informed,” at the 13th World Editors Forum in Moscow.

An upcoming conference focusing on the uncertain and ever-changing future of journalism will feature American Press Institute managing editor Stephen Gray, the head of API’s $2-million ¨Newspaper Next¨ research initiative.

Gray will address topics including a new definition of journalism, press quality and the relationship between free media and democracy at the ¨Democracy and Independence: Sharing News and Politics in a Connected World¨ conference to be held June 29-July 1 at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, Yahoo.com reported.

Pulitzer Prize-winning New Orleans Web editor Jon Donley and columnist Helen Thomas will also speak at the conference, the first in a series sponsored by the UMass Media Giraffe Project.

Source: Yahoo.com

From time to time here at the Editors Weblog, we like to give you an idea of how journalism on the medium most affecting newspapers is shaping up and how it is going to look down the road. Here's the latest in what's going on in Internet journalism:

Making good on its word, the Pulitzer Prize committee included online journalism in several categories in its recent selection of the year's best American journalism. About 10% of entries had an "online component" and Editor and Publisher counted at least one that used blog journalism.

As new media platforms and newspapers become ever more integrated, so is this years NAA conference. The annual Nexpo conference, which exhibits new technology and operations products and services, has for the first time opened with the NAA annual convention of publishers and senior newspaper executives.

Jay Rosen, journalism professor at New York University, has launched a blog with his students called Blue Plate Special. Rosen's team has conducted a survey to find the US's best blogging newspapers amongst the country's top 100 papers by circulation. Their clear winner is The Houston Chronicle, "By a mile."

The Sun Herald of Biloxi, Mississipi, a coastal town devastated by Hurricane Katrina, has published an editorial criticising the lack of media coverage of the effects of the disaster on the area, stating its plight has fallen "into a black hole of media obscurity."

The New Orleans paper The Times-Picayune last Sunday published a scathing editorial entitled 'Its Time for A Nation to Return The Favour'. The article directly attacks the federal government for its failure to react effectively to the destrution caused by hurricane Katrina.

Last month in Moscow, the Russian Guild of Press Publishers held the First Russian Publishers Conference.  During the Press Freedom Seminar, President of the World Editors Forum and Saturday Editor of The Times (London), George Brock, gave a talk discussing the freedom of the press in Russia, whose text is posted below. 

Les Hinton, chairman of News International, accused citizen journalists and bloggers of "amateurism, misrepresentation and failing to emulate the standards of traditional news organisations", reports The Guardian. Hinton, "Murdoch's chief lieutenant in London", spoke at the Society of Editors conference in Windermere, UK.

The New Orleans Times-Picayune will return to its own presses today, reports The Oregonian. The paper has been publishing online or as a guest at other newspaper plants for six weeks (see also former posting). The Oregonian, which belongs to the same owner as the Picayune, states, "As the press thunders to life, it will be a joyous and symbolic moment, not simply for the newspaper, but for the community. For if ever the importance of a newspaper was apparent, it was in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina ... And only the newspaper will be able to fully and publicly address the daunting issues ahead for the city."

The experience of the Times-Picayune is also a lesson for the newspaper industry: "If journalists passionately care about their communities, if they truly look out for the interests of readers, and if they deliver a public service to their community, they indeed will be essential. They will be read."

Source: The Oregonian

The New Orleans Times-Picayune will return to its own presses today, reports The Oregonian. The paper has been publishing online or as a guest at other newspaper plants for six weeks (see also former posting). The Oregonian, which belongs to the same owner as the Picayune, states, "As the press thunders to life, it will be a joyous and symbolic moment, not simply for the newspaper, but for the community. For if ever the importance of a newspaper was apparent, it was in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina ... And only the newspaper will be able to fully and publicly address the daunting issues ahead for the city."

The experience of the Times-Picayune is also a lesson for the newspaper industry: "If journalists passionately care about their communities, if they truly look out for the interests of readers, and if they deliver a public service to their community, they indeed will be essential. They will be read."

Source: The Oregonian