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Paper Cuts tracks newspaper job cuts

Paper Cuts tracks newspaper job cuts

If there was ever any evidence that the ongoing rise of the blogosphere was having an impact on newspapers as a whole – one needs to look no further than the graphical mashups and information being shared on the blog Paper Cuts:

For the new folks, a little history on this blog: In May 2007, Editor & Publisher ran a story about job cuts. (The story is no longer online, which is why I now copy stories into posts.) I talked about that story with other journalists. With nonjournalists. I blogged about it. But it seemed there was more — or should have been more. So I started a list of buyouts and layoffs at U.S. newspapers. (See the 2007 list.) All numbers come from people within the organization (Secret squirrel sources are always welcome!) or published reports. In December, I used Paper Cuts as an opportunity to learn how to create the map mashup — written using JavaScript and XML.

Paper Cuts notes that in 2007, newspapers cut more than 2,000 jobs in the last seven months alone – while in 2008 so far more than 3,020 newspaper jobs have been cut.

I know I see this in my local Minneapolis Star-Tribune where we’ve seen a significant number of job cuts and staff buyouts/reductions over the last three years – and more are expected.

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In fact, if I’m a typical consumer of media – then newspapers are indeed in trouble – because I read several of them online, but only receive a single print paper – the Wall Street Journal.

View Comment (1)
  • I know advertising is down, but you could save readership if the media would once again become a watchdog for all corruption no matter what or who, not create the news and make it up or overexaggerate, cover elections fairly, (remember the whole paper is not a letter to the editor,only the editorial page are personal opinions), and give a rest to”if it bleeds it leads”. These have all turned me off to the newspaper that used to be a place to get the full story not sound bites as on TV or radio.
    I know journalism schools are even discussing this and the professors are disgusted at the lack of professionalism in the media these days. So how bad do your business numbers have to be before you actually listen to your readership. You abandoned your readers, they did not abandon you.

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