The name of this column causes us some consternation, since, after all, the media is not really dying. What’s happening is more of a metamorphoses, like a caterpillar transforming into a butterfly. As the pupae sheds its flabby, graying skin and spreads its newly grown wings, so media companies are shrugging off some weight and figuring out new and innovative ways to spread content across multiple platforms and still make sure people get paid.
But, “Newspupaers” wasn’t a very good name for a column, so.
Anyway. After the jump, Intern Mike Vilensky shares his field notes from today.
The media embraced the internet again today. Website staffers got pay increases and, in another web-print reversal, start-up news sites might be selling their foreign coverage to newspapers. More signs of the times (and the Times) below:
• The bankrupt Tribune Co. might be closing its foreign bureaus in favor of paying the Washington Post for its overseas coverage. Teamwork! [WP]
• The New York Daily News might begin buying foreign coverage, as well, from start-up website GlobalPost.com. [WSJ]
• The day in layoffs: The Boston Globe is cutting 50 staffers from its newsroom.
[ Boston.com]; Travel + Leisure publisher American Express fired 33 staffers. [Folio] And even hip, happy Google has had to let around 100 staffers go. [MarketWatch]
• The Times v. Atlantic media match continued today, with the Atlantic’s Michael Hirschorn responding to the Times’ response to his “Dead by May” piece. We’re starting to feel like we’ll all be dead by the time this ends. [Mediabistro]
• New York Times web staffers got their salaries upped by an average of 12 percent, according to Gawker, according to a Bloomberg report that we can’t find anywhere. The website’s workers now have salaries on par with the paper’s (though the digital dudes continue to put in more hours than the print people, and they had to give up their bonuses). [Gawker]
•Village Voice Media has purchased LikeMe.net. The social networking site allows users to rate their likes (and, in an advertiser-friendly move, only their likes) in their city, such as favorite restos and bars. [Gawker]
• Robery Shrimsley has jumped ship as news editor of the Financial Times to become managing editor of its website, ft.com. [Mediabistro]
• Always the contrarian, Vice is hiring. The free, Brooklyn-based monthly magazine has added Chris Cechin, formerly the managing editor of RadarOnline.com, to its masthead, along with six other newbies. [Folio]
• The Chicago Reader’s Michael Miner explains why she writes for HuffPo for no pay. [Chicago Reader]
