Last year, the Chicago Tribune company made changes at its regional papers — referred to in-house as the “T6 papers” — to have certain pages and parts of pages — called “modules” — produced in Chicago. As you can imagine, this was a huge labor-saving device for the Tribune. Many designers, copy editors and other journalists lost their jobs as a result.
The papers affected: the Orlando Sentinel, the Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel, the Baltimore Sun, the Hartford Courant, the Allentown, Pa., Morning Call and the Daily Press of Newport News, Va.
Monday, the Tribune took the next step toward further consolidation, Chicago Tribune columnist Phil Rosenthal reports:
Since last spring, the Chicago Tribune has been sending edited, formatted and headlined nonlocal stories to smaller Tribune Co. newspapers, which could then drop them onto their pages. This new plan, set to begin Tuesday, involves editing, formatting and producing whole pages for the Daily Press, including, in some cases, editing and inserting local content…
“Instead of sending out individual building blocks that are assembled at the local site, we’re essentially going to build the framework into which they will fit local modules,” said Chicago Tribune Editor Gerould Kern, who has led the centralization efforts. The Daily Press, Kern said, asked for the latest “iteration on this model” to maintain local reporting yet lower costs.
Tuesday’s Daily Press front page.
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“This is a model that, particularly in smaller markets, although I can see it in larger markets as well, can change the economics of the newspaper business the same way Clear Channel changed the economics of … the radio business,” Digby Solomon, president and chief executive of the Daily Press, said by phone.
The comparison to Clear Channel isn’t surprising, given the background of Tribune managers. But the downside should be obvious, as well. The kind of homogenization brought forth by Clear Channel and its ilk is one reason I bought an iPod adapter for my car.
Make no mistake about it. This is not good news for journalism, print newspapers or for readers.
Find the story here.
Find my story about the Tribune’s module system here.
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UPDATE
My old friend Phil Walzer of the Virginian-Pilot reports today:
The Daily Press in Newport News will eliminate most of its positions for copy editors and designers and move their functions to The Chicago Tribune, the newspaper’s publisher, Digby Solomon, said today.
Read the story here.
