Thursday, December 3, 2009

Laid off USA Today editor to managers: "Good luck steering the Titanic"

Laid off Travel Editor Chris Faust blogs about her last day at USA Today. Click here for the story.
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11 comments:

Anonymous said...

Titanic? Now why would he make a remark like that about a paper that is in better financial shape than McClatchy?

What prey tell could he know that we don’t know?


If the media were serious about achieving business success, they would hop on juicy stories like the corruption and incompetence of the Obama administration, and they would hop on the crime against humanity which is Climategate.

But the media isn't doing that, which tells me that they are not really business enterprises anymore.

They are money-losing propaganda arms of powerful forces about which we know too little.

Anonymous said...

Your comments mean nothing to me since you don't have the ability to discern that the author of that missive is a woman. The correct pronoun would be "she." See how accuracy works? Of course, if you read this blog then accuracy really isn't all that important to you.

Anonymous said...

The problem with gender specific pronouns is that, well they are gender specific. In today's world of political correctness even noticing a persons gender is considered regressive and reactionary. For the metrosexual person in today's newsroom there can be no gender distinctions.

Manhole covers become sewer viewers and committees are led by chairpersons. Companies hire spokespersons and are staffed by personagers instead of managers.

No, gender neutrality is far more important than Climatequiddick or ACORN in the mind of the sensitive and mauve flavored metrosexuals in the lavender newsrooms of today.

Anonymous said...

Marks of our news media...obsessive focus on "accuracy" while they ignore truth. We get the pronouns right but won't cover Acorn, climategate, Obama's spending, racist czars. No wonder no one buys the fish wrappers any longer.

Anonymous said...

4:34: Now that's hilarious and very true!

Anonymous said...

3:17 -- You sound like one of the worthless aging McCraptchy newspaper editors that's somehow held onto his/her job, despite having no urge whatsoever to learn something new. Retirement's right around the corner, eh?

Shhhhh, did you hear that? That was the internet that blew by you about 20 years ago. Obviously you didn't hear it because you're still stuck on pronoun corrections. Good job!

Anonymous said...

3:17: Gary, why don't you go back to doing nothing?

Is the rumor true that you have two middle names ... Incompetent and Moron or is it Heartless and Arrogant?

What's that you say? Oh, all four are your middle names. Super.

F'ing dolt.

Anonymous said...

"It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes short again and again, who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, and spends himself in a worthy cause, who at best knows achievement and who at the worst if he fails at least fails while daring greatly so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat."

Anonymous said...

Of course, if you read this blog then accuracy really isn't all that important to you.




Are you surprised? We're largely McClatchy employees.

As for whether or not it is he/she. Have you looked at what is left in the newsrooms today? You have a choice. He/She/ or What Species and you have a one in three chance no matter which way you go. I have never seen such ugly remnants as what is left.

Anonymous said...

Sigh ...

3:17 is right. If you don't have the attention-span to catch whether the writer is male or female (the link had a PICTURE of her, for godsake), what makes you think you have any sort of knowledge worth sharing with others about the topic?

It's not a matter of "pronoun correction." (9:18 is an idiot.) It's a matter of GETTING STUFF RIGHT.

Newspapers are slipping badly, in that regard, thanks to layoffs. But they still have a long way to sink before they don't care what gender their sources are.

(Facts? BAH! Nothing but "truth." Laughable)

(I'd point out that 4:34, 5:29 and 9:19 are also idiots, but in accordance with the logic usually exhibited on this site, they MUST ALSO be 9:18. Because they agree with each other, they must be the same person, right?)

Is there a blog you people contribute to that you actually know something about? Perhaps mycousinsdnaisjustlikemine.org?

Anonymous said...

3:13, the fact that you type out the word "sigh" tells me that you're some out-of-touch ancient fossil waiting for your retirement.

I guess they made an internet connection for your typewriter.

But I'm an idiot? Why? Because I "get it" when it comes to online and know it and embrace it and am happily drowning in it professionally and personally?

I landed on my feet quite quickly after getting tossed to the curb (or how you'd probably prefer the term "separated") from the company and now I get to come on here and watch what's left of McCraptchy get flushed down the toilet. It's karma at it's finest.

I got it then, I get it now, McCraptchy didn't get it then and still doesn't get it now. The people in the company wanted to hold on to its old school ways. Look how that's worked for them as they accelerate their nosedive into an outhouse sump hole.

Please, ask 10 of your coworkers how happy they are at their job and then ask them if they see a longterm future for them at the company. Okay, fine you don't have time to ask 10. How about 5 of them. Just ask 5. The results may be quite startling to you, but that's because you're one of the people that is still in some kind of "newspapers rule the world so I'll thumb my nose at you" frame of mind.

It's really a shame for McClatchy, because there's been a huge amount of younger talent that's been let go that actually knows the online world and they've all been cut just to save the asses of the fearful old vets like yourself that really don't bring a thing to the company in this day and age, which has clearly held your company back tremendously.