Newsletter: The story you’ve always dreamed of telling

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Today is World Press Freedom Day, and this year’s theme, “Information as a Public Good,” couldn’t be more appropriate. It reflects the severity of the crisis facing journalism and the need to reshape our industry. We cannot let hedge funds and profit-hungry chains run journalism into the ground. News and information are essential to empowering the people to participate in civic life.

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NY Daily News Union wins in a blowout

The journalists of the New York Daily News won union recognition in a blowout on Friday, voting 55-3 to form the Daily News Union, a unit of the NewsGuild of New York.

After a year of organizing, they’re eager to get to the bargaining table. And as the newest unionized paper of the Tribune Publishing chain, they will immediately be drawn into the fight against a takeover by Alden Global Capital.

Follow them on Twitter @NYDNUnion or visit their website, NYDNUnion.com.

Tribune could take on massive debt to finance its own takeover

Cash-strapped and banished from its luxury offices, Alden Global Capital has crafted a Faustian bargain to buy the publisher

This article first appeared on DFM.workers.org on April 28, 2021.

Alden Global Capital says it can buy Tribune Publishing with surplus cash on hand, but the former New York hedge fund’s merger agreement with Tribune appears to contradict the claim.

Doubts about Alden’s ability to purchase Tribune with cash are reinforced by a costly U.S. Department of Labor investigation, mounting lawsuits over broken lease agreements, and a stealthy exit from the top floor of Manhattan’s glamorous Lipstick Building to an unmarked virtual office in South Florida.

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Newsletter: Strike votes, the fight for pro-journalism owners and more organizing!

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NewsGuild members at The New Yorker, Pitchfork, and Ars Technica voted — with 98 percent support — to approve a strike if negotiations with management of their publications and their parent company, Condé Nast, break down further. The vote came on March 26 after years of contentious negotiations for first contracts at each outlet.

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Alden is undermining a Baltimore philanthropist’s higher bid for Tribune Publishing

Tribune CEO Terry Jimenez was lone voice voting against Alden takeover

This article first appeared on the website of DFMworkers.org.

Alden Global Capital is aggressively undermining an effort by a Maryland hotel magnate to buy Tribune Publishing and possibly make its papers nonprofit charities, a new government filing reveals.

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Connecticut legislature hears testimony on the value of the Hartford Courant

A committee of the Connecticut state legislature heard compelling testimony Thursday about the value of The Hartford Courant to the local community and the threat that Alden Global Capital poses to it.

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Congress addresses the local news crisis

In a hearing on saving “the free and diverse press,” NewsGuild president urges lawmakers to protect local news and jobs

Summing up the nation’s local news crisis as a combination of unfair siphoning of advertising revenue by online platforms and “predatory financial actors” who strip newsrooms of jobs and resources, NewsGuild President Jon Schleuss testified Friday at a congressional hearing to address the nation’s local news crisis.

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Good news for Maryland, bad news for everyone else

Yesterday, Marylanders got some great news: a local investor wants to buy The Baltimore Sun and other Maryland newspapers owned by Tribune Publishing. Other communities with Tribune papers got bad news: the vampire hedge fund Alden Global Capital wants to take over the rest of the company.

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Tribune board agrees to sell company to Alden; union vows to continue to fight for quality journalism

Deal includes selling The Baltimore Sun and several other papers to a nonprofit foundation;
Sale must be approved by two-thirds of remaining shareholders.

Alden Global Capital, the New York hedge fund known for draconian cost-cutting at newspapers in its MNG Enterprises chain, has reached a deal with board members at Tribune Publishing to acquire the publicly traded company and take it private.

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The New York Daily News is unionizing

Employees seek to safeguard the News’ future by advocating for job security, equity, and a more inclusive and diverse newsroom. 

New York City’s hometown paper is forming a union. The editorial staffers of the New York Daily News announced Friday that they are organizing with NewsGuild of New York. More than 80% of eligible staff are standing together to request voluntary recognition from Tribune Publishing, the News’ parent company. 

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