Posted on 06/22/2008 6:20:44 PM PDT by abb
The Orlando Sentinel landed on newsstands Sunday with a new layout featuring more graphics, quick-read digests of top news, blog summaries and other changes aimed at making the newspaper more appealing to harried readers.
Orlando is a proving ground for Sam Zell's effort to reinvent floundering Tribune Co., owner of a string of television stations and newspapers, including the Sentinel, the Chicago Tribune and the Los Angeles Times. Between now and the end of September, Tribune plans to roll out redesigns at its papers. Accompanying the makeovers will be scaled-back page counts and further paring of employees.
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It remains unclear whether thinner, jazzier newspapers can bolster Tribune's precarious financial health. Ad sales are in free-fall across the industry, and Tribune is faring even worse. Newspaper advertising dropped 13% in the first quarter, according to the Newspaper Association of America, while Tribune's ad revenue fell 15%. By virtue of its $13 billion debt load, largely stemming from Mr. Zell's buyout, Tribune has little room to maneuver. Already the company's $1 billion in annual cash flow barely meets its bank obligations.
snip
The Sentinel, whose Sunday circulation has fallen 2.6% over two years to 332,000, set up a phone line and email address to handle feedback on the redesign. Early reader response appeared to be light, but Ms. Hall said the impact of a redesign would take months to pin down. "We will be listening to our readers carefully," she said.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
ping
journalists have no idea what’s going on.
they create these ideas for themselves.
Ha ha ha ha. What a pantload.
I used to live in Central Florida, read the Sentinel for years because it was all there was. It was crap then, and it's worse now. Pretty much any criticism I could make would be valid. Except, of course, if I claimed they were conservatively biased.
It’s going on everywhere,even in my little town,local news is frontpage,ap,rueters getting pushed back to page 3.
DBM: “Re-arranging the deck chairs, on the Titanic, as it sinks.”
Net, net: no difference. It still sinks.
The trend is being hyperlocal, but it only helps so much. There are larger issues here that make it not something that will fix the issue.
Well,my FRiend,how do you fix people that just don’t care?
How about we try to take a more conservative approach to our reporting?
what are you, nuts?
Over my dead body
I'd rather we went out of business
I'd slice my wrists first
You're fired
Our local rag has just rolled out it's new format:
11 inches wide. LOL! That not even big enough to wrap fish in, but the local liberal trash are all gushing over the perception that this was done to help the environment.
I laugh right at them, but they aren't amused.
Seems that they don't like being laughed at right now...
Come to think of it, its fine that the rag is too small for its best use.
I can never get that smell out of the fish, anyway
Not gonna work.
No one will be reading news on paper in ten years (or less).
good question, and I don’t know.
Newspaper tinkering like this isn’t going to bring readers back, at least I don’t think so.
I like the changes, especially the one page of really concise news that some newspapers are starting to do. Really user-friendly.
But, that isn’t going to change the fact people don’t like newspapers because people want choice in news as opposed to having gatekeepers make the choices for them. They resent the fact that the media has an agenda, which of course is normally liberal and elitist.
The only way to fix that is really open up the format to readers to contribute. I am not sure how you do that.
They need more g r a p h s.
Seems to lack the seriousness and depth of MAD Magazine.
It wasn’t done for the environment, but to save money. Thinner papers are cheaper.
Europe’s newspapers are not struggling near as much as ours. They are in a bit of a pickle, but much better than here. The reasons are many, but among them is the fact they have not operated with huge profit margins before anyway so the changes are not killing them. The massive drop in ad revenue here has caused a big problem because newspapers even up until 2004 or so were operating often with 30 percent profit margins and now are struggling to get 15 percent or even less.
The new media is really changing things I think that newspapers are very important, but I hate the liberal bias.
Maybe the new media can effect real change and put the worst offenders out of business.
Does it include instructions on how to properly wrap fish?
I’d suggest sending that to Cheney but considering his heart condition a spell of laughing might be too much. He’d probably get a kick out of it though.
July 29, 2001
That is the last date that the Orlando Sentinel was worth reading.
That is the date of the final byline column written by Charlie Reese.
The Sentinel is now so poorly run that the Real Estate section, all 3/4 of a page of it, blatantly rips off local real estate blogs for content word for word, repeatedly.
I live in South East Florida.
I drive through Orlando quite often going north.
If the wife drives I like to read but I can’t get an Orlando Sentinel and read it as it is that bad a paper.
Better to get a penny saver as it probably is more informative.
......blog summaries ......
Now that is really trendsetting. Blog summaries in a newspaper. All the news that’s ahead of the newspapers will be filtered and edited to improve the content and put out for sale.
Freep mail the censored comment to the ping list please.
The world wants to know.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/columnists/chi-mon_phil_23jun23,0,957000.column
Tribune delivers ‘jolt’ in Orlando
http://www.brasstacksdesign.com/orlando_sentinel_redesign.htm
Why Orlando will fail
Raoul to Tribune: Get out of the way of evolution. Die already.
http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2008/06/abrams_memos_again.php
« Morning Buzz: Monday 6.23.08 • Today’s Blog
Abrams memos again
Kevin Roderick • Bio • Email
This time the Tribune innovation guru explains why the Orlando redesign will work. Again, nothing about higher quality or better, deeper, smarter stories. It’s all about the presentation and marketing. From Lee Abrams’ internal blog:
THINK PIECE: WELCOME TO THE FUTURE OF NEWSPAPERS
The Orlando Sentinel has launched their re-designed newspaper. I think it is a bold, expertly coordinated move that signals a new era in newspapers that clearly reflects the personality of Central Florida and the vision of their staff. Here’s why I am confident it will succeed:
The attitude of the people involved is one of WINNING. Not tweaking...not “hoping they can turn it around”...not all consumed in the unfortunate but realistic economic realities. They are looking at it with a realistic eye and an attitude that is 180 degrees from the protective, ‘we’ll never succeed because of the economy’ defeatism.
The graphics and overall layout will bring readers INTO the content, but the real story is in the content itself. It’s smart but unconventional. For example, on the front page, they not only LOOK like modern Orlando, but the content itself, right down to the details necessary to compete in today’s CNN/FOX/ESPN world are there. For example:
Timely front page editorial Cartoons. A forgotten art. They can electrify a story. Maybe it’s just me. I remember the day after JFK was shot, the Chicago Sun Times had a classic Mauldin cartoon that was an entire page. That cartoon had more impact than any headline. Rare example, but symbolic of the power of the pen.
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They can put in all the pretty pictures they want-but they can’t help printing left wing boilerplate.
Case in point, the left story on that brand new page-global warming hysteria.
Snore. Die.
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