Jenn hands me a kid’s plate of spaghetti from Pizza Factory to give to James. To get his attention away from the toys and onto mealtime, she signs “eat” (clasped fingers going into the mouth) and says it to him.
James responds by doing the same, both signing and speaking as he heads toward the table.
As our eyes go wide, he erases all doubt by doing it again.
James now uses the “more” sign (touching the fingertips of both hands together) all the time and then points to what he wants. He seems to think it means “want,” but “more” is probably a bit esoteric. He’s also super-interested in flash cards and picture books, anything that can build vocabulary, really. He’ll often drag me to point at stuff, either at home or at the park, and point at things in rapid succession, so I’ll say their names. He’s not saying any of it back yet (most of the alphabet is “E!” in his vocabulary, for instance), other than “CAT!” but he’s clearly prepping for it.
And yes, his site is down. When I updated this blog to the latest version of WordPress, I did the same for his site, and got the White Screen of Death as a result. I’m transitioning between two computers, and once that’s complete, I’ll spend an afternoon reinstalling his site from scratch, which should hopefully resolve the issue.
As the drumbeat of bad news beats on, with the very real possibility that San Francisco will be without a major daily metro to call its own soon, Time Magazine asks the musical question What Happens When a Town Loses Its Newspaper? (Spoiler alert: It’s bad news.)
The study is very small in scope, since the Post had a total of only 27,000 subscribers in Cincinnati and northern Kentucky. And it measures only the outcomes in northern Kentucky, since Ohio has not had municipal elections since the Post’s closure. But even with those limitations, a few trends seemed to emerge: in towns the Post regularly covered, voter turnout dropped, fewer people ran for office and more incumbents were reelected. That is, when there were fewer stories about a given town, its inhabitants seemed to care less about how they’re being governed.
It’s not a particularly big study, to put it mildly, but there will likely be ample opportunity to get more data later this year.
The study’s conclusions match up with my personal observations of what happens when local politics aren’t covered extensively.
Ever since the Rocky Mountain News went under, everyone I talk to is nervous about my job. Even when I’m talking to someone at the Hesperia Unified School District who’s gotten a pink slip, they still want to ask how the Star is doing. For the record, it’s doing better than most papers in the country. Lean and mean is a virtue in times like these.
1. The Philadelphia Daily News. The smaller of the two papers owned by The Philadelphia Newspapers LLC, which recently filed for bankruptcy. The parent company says it will make money this year, but with newspaper advertising still falling sharply, the city cannot support two papers and the Daily News has a daily circulation of only about 100,000. The tabloid has a small staff, most of whom could probably stay on at Philly.com, the web operation for both of the city dailies.
2. The Minneapolis Star Tribune has filed for Chapter 11. The paper may not make money this year even without the costs of debt coverage. The company said it made $26 million last year, about half of what it made in 2007. The odds are that the Star Tribune will lose money this year if its ad revenue drops another 20%. There is no point for creditors to keep the paper open if it cannot generate cash. It could become an all-digital property, but supporting a daily circulation of over 300,000 is too much of a burden. It could survive if its rival the St. Paul Pioneer Press folds. A grim race.
3. The Miami Herald, which has a daily circulation of about 220,000. It is owned by McClatchy, a publicly traded company which could be the next chain to go into Chapter 11. The Herald has been on the market since December, and but no serious bidders have emerged. Newspaper advertising has been especially hard hit in Florida because of the tremendous loss in real estate advertising. The online version of the paper is already well-read in the Miami area and Latin America and the Caribbean. The Herald has strong competition north of it in Fort Lauderdale. There is a very small chance it could merge with the Sun-Sentinel, but it is more likely that the Herald will go online-only with two editions, one for English-speaking readers and one for Spanish.
4. The Detroit News is one of two daily papers in the big American city badly hit by the economic downturn. It is unlikely that it can merge with the larger Detroit Free Press which is owned by Gannett. It is hard to see what would be in it for Gannett. With the fortunes of Detroit getting worse each day, cutting back the number of days that the paper is delivered will not save enough money to keep the paper open.
5. The Boston Globe is, based on several accounts, losing $1 million a week. One investment bank recently said that the paper is only worth $20 million. The paper is the flagship of what the Globe’s parent, The New York Times, calls the New England Media Group. NYT has substantial financial problems of its own. Last year, ad revenue for the New England properties was down 18%. That is likely to continue or get worse this year. Supporting larger losses at the Globe will become nearly impossible. Boston.com, the online site that includes the digital aspects of the Globe, will probably be all that will be left of the operation.
6. The San Francisco Chronicle. Parent company Hearst has already set a deadline for shutting the paper if it cannot make tremendous cost cuts. The Chronicle lost as much as $70 million last year. Even if the company could lower its costs, the northern California economy is in bad shape. The online version of the paper could be the only version by the middle of the 2009.
7. The Chicago Sun Times is the smaller of two newspapers in the city. Its parent company, Sun-Times Media Group trades for $.03 a share. Davidson Kempner, a large shareholder in the firm, has dumped the CEO and most of the board. The paper has no chance of competing with The Chicago Tribune.
8. NY Daily News is one of several large papers fighting for circulation and advertising in the New York City area. Unlike The New York Times, New York Post, Newsday, and Newark Star Ledger, the Daily News is not owned by a larger organization. Real estate billionaire Mort Zuckerman owns the paper. Based on figures from other big dailies it could easily lose $60 million or $70 million and has no chance of recovering from that level
9. The Fort Worth Star Telegram is another one of the big dailies that competes with a larger paper in a neighboring market – Dallas. The parent of The Dallas Morning News, Belo, is arguably a stronger company that the Star Telegram’s parent, McClatchy. The Morning News has a circulation of about 350,000 and the Star Telegram has just over 200,000. The Star Telegram will have to shut down or become an edition of its rival. Putting them together would save tens of millions of dollars a year.
10. The Cleveland Plain Dealer is in one of the economically weakest markets in the country. Its parent, Advance Publications, has already threatened to close its paper in Newark. Employees gave up enough in terms of concessions to keep the paper open. Advance, owned by the Newhouse family, is carrying the burden of its paper plus Conde Nast, its magazine group which is losing advertising revenue. The Plain Dealer will be shut or go digital by the end of next year.
This will be heresy to some, but I’m not particularly wedded to the idea of news-on-paper, so if any of these papers can deliver comparable news and become healthy, profitable concerns by eliminating paper, it’s not a big deal to me (although I hope said companies spin off their printing press into a separate enterprise that then flourishes on its own, once it can set whatever rates it needs to). I’m skeptical that many papers can make this transition in any sort of timely fashion, however.
