April 25, 2024
In five languages (English, Mandarin, Korean, Spanish, Portuguese and Russian) and two U.S. printing, “Newsonomics: Twelve Trends That Will Shape the News You Get” is the first Ken Doctor book. Sign up here for notice of the new Newsonomics Readers.
Is it the apocalypse, or just an unreasonable facsimile? In a week of newspaper industry drama — GateHouse’s expected takeover of Gannett and McClatchy’s unexpected move in the direction of bankruptcy — who could write a better next act than that old newspaper vaudeville duo of Michael ...
Read MoreCall it megaclustering. If a GateHouse/Gannett merger — rumored for weeks, today reported as a deal in some stage of progress by The Wall Street Journal — becomes reality, about 1 of every 6 daily newspapers in the United States would be owned by a single company. Totaled up, 267 dailies would ...
Read MoreIt seems like a return to status quo ante. But the ante may have changed. No surprises: Today, Gannett shareholders officially rejected Alden Global Capital’s amateurish efforts to win board seats and push the country’s biggest newspaper chain by revenue to sell itself. RELATED ARTICLE ...
Read More“People think nothing is happening, but that’s the farthest thing from the truth. Everybody is talking to everybody.” That’s the best quick summation I can offer of the first few months of what I called 2019 Consolidation Games back in January. That line, offered last week by one newspaper ...
Read MoreOn Thursday, Michael Ferro solidified his control of Tronc, the company he seized a more tentative kind of control of just 13 months ago, deposing then-Tribune Publishing CEO Jack Griffin in a quick coup de press. This week’s move looked financial, but too, speaks deeply to power and control. ...
Read MoreTronc (TRNC) , the third-largest U.S. newspaper company, is closing in on a deal to buy Us Weekly from Jann Wenner’s Wenner Media. The purchase price likely would be in the $85 million to $95 million range, sources said, with Tronc chairman Michael Ferro believing the acquisition will ...
Read MoreEarly in the month, I reported an “imminent” sale of Tronc, publisher of a trove of newspapers including big-city broadsheets like The Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune and Baltimore Sun, to Gannett, publisher of USA Today as well as a vast array of regional newspapers around the ...
Read MoreIt’s been a remarkable year for the nation, and its press. Transfixed by the Trump phenomenon, election anxiety has all but consumed us. But soon, what has felt like a national colonoscopy will soon be over, and the press will march (or at least step) forward. As we consider the most ...
Read MoreWhen officials at Tronc (formerly known as Tribune Publishing) canceled a September roadshow highlighting to investors in a half-dozen cities the bright future of the company just a day after announcing it, speculation began in earnest among Tronc’s close watchers. Was it as mundane as trouble ...
Read MoreIt’s apparently no longer a question of whether to sell or not, but for how much. For four months, Tronc – the company formerly known as Tribune Publishing, parent of The Los Angeles Times and The Chicago Tribune among other similarly august titles in smaller markets – has steadfastly and ...
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