For a newspaper that brags about its movement toward the Internet, the News & Observer can't seem to get off the ground as far as its blogs are concerned. In fact, a recent look at the Editor's Blog -- a blog for four N&O editors to post -- shows the Editor's Blog has nearly gone dormant.
John in Carolina looked at the Editor's Blog and noticed there have been just 7 posts since March 17 -- and just 10 since March 3. More embarrassing: just one reader has bothered to leave a comment since March 3. (The March 3 comment was left by a reader happy with changes at the comics page. Since then, not a single reader has posted a comment.)
The four contributors are John Drescher, executive editor, and senior editors Dan Barkin, Steve Riley and Linda Williams.
Here is the productivity at the Editor's Blog: four editors, but just 10 posts and 1 comment in the past 7 weeks.
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31 comments:
Heya, I think Steve Riley was one of those laid off in the last round, so there probably won't be too many posts from him. :). Too bad, too, because he's a good guy.
Linda Williams is one of the poorest so-called journalists in NC. She is a bitter, caustic person, IMO. That she has an outlet for her racism at any newspaper, is astonishing. Affirmative action was supposed to be a hand up, but in her case, it has given a venue for venom and mediocrity. Paid to hire, impossible to fire! The N&O has fired all their real talent and kept their third-rate slackers. Who wonders why no one reads their online news? No thinking person I know.
@5:23: Riley is still at the paper.
@5:28: Breathe deeply. Exhale. Do it again until you're calm. The N&O has certainly had to lay off some good folks, but good folks also remain. Linda is not a bad egg.
Linda Williams is a racist, and that is being kind. She is on par with Rhonda Lokeman.
One down, one to go!
Yes, soon we will get all the black women! Hurray! They are threatening and scare me till I wet myself.
Can lokeman now come out of retirement? This is the perfect do nothing job, for a do nothing racist.
She could start an MNI car and driver stunt driving and AA blog.
Whoops, scratch the AA part. She's still in her denial phase of the race.
During the Duke Lacrosse scandal, Williams made the irrevocable journalistic error of siding with the black “victim,” who turned out to be a fraud and a liar. I don’t recall Williams or Sill every owning up to their biased and erroneous conclusions. Referring to the known whore as the “victim” and the lacrosse players as “playboys” should have had them removed from journalism. McClatchy is so full of corrupt journalists that only complete shutdown will cleanse the profession for that black hole. Perhaps some online news sites will return to reporting the news, and not opinion disguised as news.
“Linda is not a bad egg.”
Only another racist would say that. There are dozens of racist comments by Williams, starting with her comments about Gov. Palin. She didn’t know any real facts about Gov. Palin, she just parroted the smut of the ADN, and glorified Obama because he was black. That is journalism at its worst, and racism cuts two ways. To excuse her hatred, and her use of a news outlet as a platform of racism is as bad as any racism recorded in history. There were hundreds of voting irregularities in NC, and how about the Black Panthers guarding the voting precinct carrying a stick? The N&O didn’t see a story there? Journalistic dishonesty and corruption deserves death, a long slow death it seems, and it couldn’t happen to more deserving liberals.
“Yes, soon we will get all the black women!”
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The women in discussion are racists, that they are black doesn’t have anymore weight than if they were white. Racism is racism! No excuses for being a black racist, just as there is no excuse for being a white racist. Maybe the likes of Williams don’t really want equal rights? They want Jesse Jackson’s style of equal rights.
Yes, my heart throbs at the plight of the white people who are so terribly oppressed in this nation. Alack!
@7:01: It wasn't just Linda. No one in America liked Palin. Except Hank Williams Jr. Even McCain didn't like Palin.
@7:01: It wasn't just Linda. No one in America liked Palin. Except Hank Williams Jr. Even McCain didn't like Palin.
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You know, I've read some totally foolish nonsense out of leftists in the media before, but this really takes the cake.
The only person I can even think of that would say something this stupid and expect someone to believe it would have to be Lewis Duiguid.
Congratulations, we can call you the missing link. Proof positive that there is a segment of human society that is just too devolved to be allowed to breed.
Well, one thing the Palins are good at is breeding. We've certainly seen that. There is no more fecund family in America.
Yes. Woever wrote "Linda is not a bad egg" obviously has no intimate knowledge of how she works. And the reason she doesn't blog? Probably because she ISN'T allowed to after her monumental f@#k up when she attacked former writer Dan Gearino on his blog with a caustic rambling tirade. And just how does McClatchy treat a situation like this? (where she embarrassed the whole organization) She supposedly got put om the whole Animal House "double secret probation" and the given a promotion. You won't see her blogging too much because that would take some small amount of talent and creativity, which she has neither of.
"Probably ... supposedly."
The new fact-based Internet citizen journalism at work, ladies and gentleman!
Linda is a manager who's not afraid to tell people no, which rankles lots of folks. She is interested in race, which considering her age and background is natural. And she doesn't always take the stands one might expect. I don't always agree with her, but she is always worth listening to.
She's no monster and no caricature.
Further, if Gearino were worth keeping, the N&O would have kept him. He was pushed overboard when the paper was still able to make choices.
Williams: “She is interested in race, which considering her age and background is natural.”
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This thinking is why newspapers are dying. She gets a pass for racist writing, because of her age and background? That is the most racist comment of the day. Williams is borderline incompetent.
“she is always worth listening to.”
About three of you might agree with that. She is a joke, and the sooner the N&O gets rid of their deadwood the better. How many racist comments is she allowed? Anyone else making the statements she has, would have been fired long ago.
Hang on to Williams, when you all go down together, she looks like she might float.
"No one in America liked Palin"
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How many people voted for McCain/Palin? Millions!
The corrupt media has taken you over. The 'big' scandals about Gov. Palin were manufactured, and politically driven. Obama and his cronies was the big story. What happened to that news gathering? Believing McClatchy, and the other dishonest media is for the stupid.
I had a friend who called me up the day Palin got picked and she said the election is decided. I didn't believe her, but she was right.
If we Republicans nominate her again it will be eight years of Democrats.
Poor conservatives -- always crying about racism and discrimination and victimization.
Maybe you should try pulling yourselves up by the bootstraps like the rest of America. What do you want? Special set-asides? Affirmative action for conservatives? Just someone to listen to your complaining? Toughen up, you cupcakes.
Re: "...called me up the day Palin got picked and she said the election is decided."
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At that point, no one knew anything about Gov. Palin. On what could your friend have based HER opinion? Palin is a successful governor, which should carry some weight. If you wonder how deranged Obama voters were, re-read your own comment. Is your friend an ugly feminist?
It's a foolish man who wanders into the swamp of online debate, but here goes:
8:51, this assertion -- " ... if Gearino were worth keeping, the N&O would have kept him. He was pushed overboard when the paper was still able to make choices" -- is laughably, provably wrong. In fact, I was offered two other positions at the N&O after my column was eliminated. I accepted the second, but I'll confess to some bad faith: I'd already decided to leave the newspaper business, and figured I'd collect a few more paychecks while I set the stage for my next career.
Still, the unintended irony in your comment was highly entertaining. Here's a tip: When you begin a comment with these sarcastic words -- "The new fact-based Internet citizen journalism at work, ladies and gentleman!" -- it's a bad idea to be both factually wrong and anonymous. Cowardice and ignorance are not attractive qualities.
[Williams] “She's no monster and no caricature.”
You have supplied just the right word, she is a caricature. However, deciding a caricature of what might take awhile. Geeez she is bad news, bad, bad, news.
Redundancy defined. "Is your friend an ugly feminist?"
@10:11: She was by no means unknown in conservative circles, having the charmed the argyle socks off many pundits already. So, yes, my friend -- no ugly feminist -- had heard of her, as had I.
Gearino: Right you are.
G.D. Gearino was one of the few good columnists at the N&O. I was sad he left until I found his blog. I think some of the posters here aren’t even from NC, or they would know about Williams and the other racists taking up space in the N&O’s living dinosaur graveyard.
10:41 AM
No one outside of Alaska knew Gov. Palin, and no true conservative would say such a thing based on the little known facts at the time.
You are a liar!
Only liberals think that way. Gov. Palin had a high approval rating, 80% at the time. There was nothing else to know but that. The corrupt media set out to destroy her for Democrats to win the election. The liberal media is paying for their corruption, and I for one find it justified.
Objectively poor news judgment from the outset on the Durham farce, as some of us threw up to MNI outlets immediately, in real time:
The Meck Deck
Paging Rick Thames
Posted March 31st, 2006 at 3:26 PM by Jeff A. Taylor
Hey, Rick –
Got a question about your front page today, Friday. Anything seem a little off to you?
We have a big lotto package, lotsa art and color and I guess it goes there. Fine. ...
Then we have the screaming 22 inches of copy above the fold on the Duke lacrosse incident, with another 36 inches after the jump. That one I just do not get. That’s two days in a row of three reporters filing massive inches on this out-of-town and still murky story.
The Duke story’s play looks downright bizarre, in fact, when you look at what leads the Local section today — news that a Demo legislator has broken ranks and is calling for Speaker Jim Black to step down. This story would seem to have all kinds of immediate impact for Charlotte area readers from the purely political to the now real prospect that Black may not be in the Speaker’s chair for the short session, which in turn may impact plans for General Assembly approval of a hike in the car rental tax which is supposed to fund the $150 million Uptown arts complex. See, lotsa stuff there just to tease out briefly.
Accordingly it seems to me that the Black story merits the 50-inch A-front play and the Duke story, an important regional and continuing story to be sure, should’ve received the 25-inch B-section treatment. Now it is true that The New York Times has decided to cover the lax story, but that should not sway the decisions in your newsroom. In fact, given the Times’ track record, it is only a slight reach to say that NYT coverage of a story should be taken as prima facie evidence that the topic is not news worthy.
Further, we’ve heard an awful lot lately on the importance of good news judgment and how that can sometimes be sidetracked by other agendas, like corporate balance sheet considerations. Well, here is a case where the objective news judgment criteria seems to conclusively point toward one story yet the scarce news hole goes to another. What other agenda is at play here? It does not seem to be a matter of resources.
Thanks for any light you can shine on this matter. I am easily confused, but I really do not think I am alone on this one.
JAT
Update: Rick, the timeline on this Durham thing is now quite shaky.
Update II: Same deal on Saturday’s B front — Duke above the fold, Black at the bottom. Plus we get a background package on Durham to look forward to [Sunday]. Yippee! ...For background, TCO had protected the powerful and slimy Black for years prior and for months more after this post, until Black was caught red-handed taking sacks of cash bribes in Charlotte men's rooms.
Given that Thames just weeks ago ceded control of his features to Williams, I must conclude the man cannot think for himself.
“No one outside of Alaska knew Gov. Palin”
You are right about that,
Gov. Palin in not a insider GOP. She took on the good old boys in Alaska as a matter of fact. Now that more and more people see how corrupt the media has become, there is even a re-look at what the hostile media did to President Bush. The Democrats were so power-hungry they risked the good of the USA on their Socialist agenda. Seeing the tax cheats and recycled failed politicians in Barry-O’s cabinet ought to scare people out of the ’Change’ dream.
Palin may become President yet.
Of a Free Alaska, that is.
I am undecided on Linda Williams. On one hand, she badly fouled up the early reporting on the Duke Lacrosse hoax. Joe Neff fixed that, but he did so with no help or guidance from Linda.
For whatever reasons, Linda Williams has declined, along with the rest of the N&O to release the "police report" they relied on to verify what Crystal Gail Mangum alledgedly told them. I put "police report" in quotes because police reports are public records in North Carolina and no police report has ever been found that substantiates the story that the N&O says is substantiated by a police report. That leads me to question Linda Williams' basic honesty.
However, I have heard from people who work or worked for the N&O that Linda was not such a bad person. None though would go so far as to explain the early lacrosse coverage.
The bigger question is why has not the N&O cut any senior editors? The newsroom is roughly half the size it was three years ago. The paper is obviously producing less local content. Content is what will save the N&O if anything can. So why continue to slash away at the people who provide the product to sell and the people who sell it while still keeping lots of management overhead?
Walt-in-Durham
If you'll remember, Sen. McCain received a great bounce in the polls when Gov. Palin first was chosen. But she unravled before our very eyes when she started talking, showing her ignorance on key issues, not able to answer standard questions.
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