Facing massive cutbacks and "unconscionable" slashes in compensation, Reuters reporters took to the streets at noon March 5 in downtown Washington, DC, determined to win their fight for a fair contract. As a giant inflatable union rat drew attention from lunchtime commuters, the workers blasted, "They say cutback, we say fight back" through their bullhorns and waved signs reading, "Reuters pay cuts equal quality cuts" while they circled the sidewalk.
Tribune Co.’s Virginia newspaper plans to outsource the editing and designing of much of its content to the newsroom of its corporate flagship, the Chicago Tribune, in a bid to reduce costs and focus resources on local coverage. "I’m sure they can produce something plausible in Chicago to run in those papers, but it’ll be just ever so much more out of touch with readers," said Alan Mutter, a former Chicago Sun-Times city editor who’s now a Silicon Valley-based consultant.
Steven Waldman, senior advisor to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, believes there is no harm in the decline and fall of broadcast outlets and newspapers — so long as there is something immediately set to replace their useful function of delivering news and civic information. Waldman is charged with coming up with a report to the commission on the state and fate of the media in the midst of radical change.
The Akron unit of the Northeast Ohio Chapter of The Newspaper Guild has avoided a possible union strike by ratifying a three-year agreement with the Akron Beacon Journal. The agreement includes a 2.11% decrease to base pay, a reduction in the work week to 37.5 hours from 40 and a week of unpaid vacation in 2010. The contract also has layoff protection for the next 18 months, with wages and hours reverting back to previous levels if a notice is given.
From a glitzy new office in downtown Washington, the ideological war over the media is fully engaged. Six years after its founding to counter what it said was “conservative misinformation,” Media Matters for America employs a staff of 70 that spends 19 hours a day monitoring newspapers, magazines, broadcast and cable television, talk radio, and the Internet to counter reporting or commentary it deems to be inaccurate or biased.
