Comments on: Metamorphosis for the Globe?

By: Could strategic bankruptcies be needed to transform newspapers? » Nieman Journalism Lab

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 16:31:19 +0000

[...] or close to it, and the market value of owner equity is zero, or close to it (as indicated by the suggested negative price to be paid by whoever is willing to take the Boston Globe off the hands of the New York Times, [...]

By: Martin Langeveld

Martin Langeveld — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 19:00:27 +0000

Anonymous: Sorry, but they look like aggregation sites to me. The Wellesley one, for example, at the moment has aggregated content from several Wellesley blogs, the town of Wellesley, the Globe, the Herald. I didn’t say dumb, I said robotic. Whether there’s someone curating it, or a machine, they really have no personality.

By: Se eu fosse dono do The Boston Globe : Ponto Media

Se eu fosse dono do The Boston Globe : Ponto Media — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 18:46:08 +0000

[...] NIEMAN Journalism Lab, um belo artigo de Marin Langeveld, com 10 conselhos para o futuro dono do The Boston [...]

By: Anonymous coward

Anonymous coward — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 18:27:54 +0000

On your second point: look at the local sites that are already found at http://www.boston.com/yourtown/. They are not the dumb aggregation that the Gatehouse lawsuit made it seem they were; and there are now 10 of them.

By: Greg Andrew

Greg Andrew — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 16:03:49 +0000

The problem is that under your scenario, I suspect that the Globe will lose a lot more money over the next few years than under the way things will be once the current round of negotiations is finished. Sure, the print edition is a dead end in the long run, but in the short run I suspect it makes a lot more in revenue than it costs to print and distribute the paper.

I think the appropriate news for most papers right now is to go a 5 day a week printing schedule, publishing on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, plus one edition on the weekend

By: New Media Hub | Blog Archive | Around the web 6/19

New Media Hub | Blog Archive | Around the web 6/19 — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 14:08:59 +0000

[...] Tribune to emerge from bankruptcy with new publisher.Congratulations, you own the Globe! Now what. A look back at the early days of online [...]

By: Dave W.

Dave W. — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 10:49:46 +0000

Please, we must speak respectfully of the dead. It was the Rocky Mountain News. Quite dead. The Post survives. You somehow blended both newspapers into one name.
— Thanks Dave, I fixed that! – ML

By: MichaelJ

MichaelJ — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 10:25:51 +0000

Sorry for two in row, but I wanted to add, that you do severance pay in the form of preferred shares. It’s not great, but it’s a hell of lot better than the email on Friday at 4:00/

By: MichaelJ

MichaelJ — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 10:21:28 +0000

Martin,
Re: the parking lot model. What if the present staff were given a choice. It will mean sacrifices, no doubt. But as the President says we all have to share the pain.

It might be something like: you can take a salary cut in return for x amount preferred shares. The greater the cut you take, the more shares you get.

The preferreds have a set dividend, say 6%. But the deal going in is that the dividend gets paid only when there are profits. If the operation is successful, the price of the preferreds rise in the secondary market. That’s the potential upside.

The silly market could decide to value the notes at 5 or 10 x.

The key thing is that all the accounting is on the web. Everybody’s salaries and all the expenses are posted on the web.

Or..

Maybe a transition program, placing journalists in K -12 education, or government agencies.

Meanwhile, health care is guaranteed during the transition.

Of course I would be remiss if I did not disagree with the Print piece not being important. But I won’t clog this thread by getting up on my little soapbox.

By: Metamorphosis for the Globe? :Newspaper Ad Rate

Metamorphosis for the Globe? :Newspaper Ad Rate — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 04:39:07 +0000

[...] Continue reading this post at Nieman Journalism Lab. [...]

By: Martin Langeveld

Martin Langeveld — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 23:53:51 +0000

Dear Faithful:
I’d like to see all of that, online first at Boston.com. If reporting of all stripes is not implicit in “the Globe’s future is digital”, consider that amended to “digital reporting and digital editing”.

David: I haven’t seen the offering memorandum either, but if the Times is not selling Boston.com as part of the package, I doubt if anyone in their right mind would be interested.

By: David

David — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 22:22:56 +0000

Digital is the future, but are you sure it’s Boston.com? It’s not part of the NE Newspaper Group of The Times Co. I haven’t seen the offering memorandum, but all a buyer might wind up with is the electronic rights to the Boston Globe content itself — not all the other parts of Boston.com.

By: A faithful reader

A faithful reader — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 22:05:03 +0000

Excuse me, I meant to write “I did not see even a passing mention of in-depth coverage of sports, politics, art, or business in the region.” I’m embarrassed by the mistake, but glad I could provide an example of why copy editors are needed even in the digital world.

By: A faithful reader

A faithful reader — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 22:02:20 +0000

Where does actual reporting fit into your plan?
Unless I read carelessly, and forgive me if I did, I not even a passing mention of in-depth coverage of sports, politics, art, or business in the region.

By: Martin Langeveld

Martin Langeveld — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 20:06:27 +0000

David, I agree it’s a big challenge and that the inertia of a legacy organization, and the required cultural changes, are enormous. On the other hand, the buyer here can get a going concern and a valuable brand for nothing. The buyer would assume no debt, might get a cash bonus, and could get cash for the real estate. Nobody is doing this as a city-scaled startup. Starting out with the existing Boston.com and networking in all the niche verticals and print niches would make the whole worth much more than a bunch of competing from-scratch niche startups.

By: David Klein

David Klein — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 19:43:09 +0000

This is a fine idea but doesn’t need the Boston Globe to do it. In face, a start-up company with VC funding could arguably set these niche networks up faster and better and without any legacy/cultural issues. Nothing in this plan leverages any strength the Globe has. It’s a new business entirely, and not a newspaper. I actually think any pure digital play for newspapers is a non-starter, because a bunch of college kids with money can always do it better and faster — it’s for their generation. And they don’t have to start by unwinding gigantic debt loads, union contracts and angry customers and employees. Also, even when newspapers CAN execute this kind of transition (MUCH harder than implied here), the cost of entry for others is so low against any of your niches that you just can’t make much money. This is a fine business model for someone, but I don’t see why you need the Globe to do it — nor would it still be anything resembling the Boston Globe even if they did execute it adequately. Lastly, these niche business make niche revenues: You’d be lucky to be able to afford 100 people all told. It’s just a very sad state of affairs for us print people right now, but it is what it is.

By: Seamus Condron

Seamus Condron — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 19:30:12 +0000

I would love to see a community-funded project become part of the Globe’s new strategy. Use one of the hyperlocal sites as the pilot. In addition to an online area where readers can see pitches and fund stories, there should be a physical space in where community managers and writers can meet with the public and pitch them. A spin-off of Spot.us and the “newsroom cafe” concept.

By: Martin Langeveld

Martin Langeveld — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 18:21:15 +0000

Joe, my point in that post was not that print is still viable (my unfortunate headline choice notwithstanding), but that newspapers have done a poor job attracting their share of the online news audience. So they have a non-viable print business model and insufficient orientation to their digital future. But there’s no question in my mind that the future of news is online and that print will be, at best, a niche product.

By: JoeN

JoeN — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 18:01:17 +0000

How do you square your call to cease publishing with your post in April, declaring:
“All generally accepted truths notwithstanding, more than 96 percent of newspaper reading is still done in the print editions, and the online share of the newspaper audience attention is only a bit more than 3 percent.”

By: Martin Langeveld

Martin Langeveld — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 17:47:29 +0000

Michael J: Yes, this is known as the Parking Lot solution. As opposed to the constant whittling of staff that’s been ongoing at most papers, you fire everybody and send them into the parking lot, and then just let back in the people you absolutely need in order to executive your new business plan. It’s difficult, and it’s more easily said than done, but it puts the business in the necessary startup mode instead of the failure mode it has been in.

By: MichaelJ

MichaelJ — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 17:43:02 +0000

I can’t see why what you suggest wouldn’t work. But the overhead – meaning full time paid journalists might – or might not – have to be lower.

I heard the new CEO of GM. He said “We can break even in a market of 9,000,000 cars.”

I don’t know how that works in the newspaper business, but I think you have to back into the staff size from pessimistic, reasonable and optimistic projections of earnings.

If the earnings grow, the staff grows. It’s ugly, but it does keep all the incentives aligned.

By: Martin Langeveld

Martin Langeveld — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 17:04:19 +0000

Josh: Without access to the books, its hard to say. Obviously this kind of change doesn’t come without major staff cuts, but it preserves some staff, as Hearst did in Seattle, as opposed to a complete shutdown such as at the Rocky Mountain News. If we assume the steps to date cut the Globe’s $85 million annual deficit in half, there’s still $40 million or more to go just to achieve breakeven. You can’t cut your way to that level and retain a viable business, and in today’s atmosphere you can’t grow advertising to close that gap. The only way forward is to fundamentally change the business model. With a complex network of online enterprises as I suggest, plus a weekly package and niche publications, you’d certainly need more than the two dozen or so journalists retained at the Seattle P-I for a one-dimensional Web site. If I had to hazard a guess, I’d say you’d keep 200 in news and site management, but that might be high.

By: Joshua Benton

Joshua Benton — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 16:51:03 +0000

Martin, I think these are really smart ideas, if a painful transition. Since you’ve thought about this: Roughly what percentage of the Globe’s current staff of journalists would you project to still have a (recognizably journalistic) job after a transition like this? Obviously it’s not 100%, but is it 60%? 40%? 20%?