Why I Won’t Cancel My JS Subscription
Hundreds of supportive emails, Facebook entries and comments, and blog posts and comments have come my way in the wake of my buyout at the Journal Sentinel and emergence at Third Coast.
A thousand thanks to each well-wisher.
A few of these writers, however, bashed my old paper.
For example, Mike Plaisted, in his Plaisted Writes blog, said some nice things about me (thanks, Mike!) and some not so nice things about the JS (hey, not so fast!). I felt compelled to respond at his place, and a version of that response is worth sharing here.
In his “Journal Sentinel: Death by a Thousand Cuts,” Plaisted considers whether or not to renew his subscription after four of us JS critics were “purged” and a major trial was covered by phone from a desk rather than in person.
First, no one was purged; we all likely could have stayed, if in somewhat different roles. It’s just that the buyout was too good to pass up, given our stations in life and opportunities on the outside.
The will to put out a good paper that serves the public still exists at the Journal Sentinel. Marty Kaiser (editor) and George Stanley (managing ed.) are serious guys; they want to cover the news properly. That’s tough when you’re amid the convulsions of downsizing. Something is sure to be lost in the shuffle.
In a month, George and Marty will know who they have. Then they will be able to figure out what they can do and how to do it. The paper will be still be worth reading, because even a greatly diminished Journal Sentinel will own the largest and most skilled news-gathering staff in Wisconsin by a wide margin. Once the shooting stops, I think they will find ways to, for example, get reporters physically into courtrooms for important cases.
Arts coverage won’t be what it was. (They will not replace any departed full-timer. With all due modesty, even if they wanted to replace me, they’d have a hard time doing it .) But arts coverage won’t be abandoned; they’ll do what they can.
Arts aside, the JS will remain THE source of news in its purest form and an important watchdog of government and business. All other media, bloggers included, will continue to follow the paper’s lead. The citizens of greater Milwaukee need the Journal Sentinel and would be fools to refuse to support it by paying for it, even if it’s available free online. Without the paper, public life would become secret, and that is bad for all of us.
I don’t work at the paper anymore, but as a citizen of Milwaukee County, I’m rooting for the Journal Sentinel to not only recover, but prosper.
Tom,
Great piece. I truly think the Journal is doing what it can and that should be respected. However… I’m truly glad you are now with ThirdCoast, thanks for your support.
Holy High Road, Batman
Tom-
I’m glad you’ve landed somewhere but I have to say that I canceled my subscription to the JS several 4 or 5 years ago because of their absolutely *abismal* customer service.
VERY long story short (as short as I can make it anyway) – they made a decision to stop delivering papers to apartment dwellers’ doors, leaving the papers in unlocked outer lobbies, often directly in front of the door where people coming in will walk on it.
They did so without letting us know.
One day it just stopped showing up at my door. When I phoned to complain I was, quite simply and blatantly, lied to. I was told that a sign had been put in our lobby explaining the change. No sign was ever put up in our lobby, and even if it had been that was *not* the way it should have been handled. A letter mailed to each subscriber should have been sent out letting us know.
For me it meant one of three approaches to getting my paper: 1-getting dressed before I shower to go downstairs to retrieve it (I live on the 2nd floor); 2-pick it up on my way out the door to work which meant carrying it with me (on foot, bike, or bus – I don’t drive) *and* not having it to read over my breakfast; 3- leave it there to retrieve on my way home hoping that noone had stolen it in the interim, and knowing also, that I’d probably already have read most of the news in it from looking at the NYTimes and JSOnline while at work.
When I contacted the editorial and management staff about it I got absolutely no response.
That was the end of my subscription. They continued to phone for about 6 months badgering me to resubscribe until I finally told them that it was *not* going to happen unless they assured me they would begin delivering to my door again. The calls ended.
Sorry… but the JS management did this to themselves and they are only cutting the groove deeper by making decisions such buying you out.
Have they cut any of the sports staff ?
I thought not.
Tom,
You are most gracious in you comments about and good-wishes to the remaining Journal staff. I’ll take your word about the character and good intentions of Kaiser and Stanley, but I don’t think that’s at all to the point. The JS, like many (perhaps most) other major papers around the country, is no longer in the news-gathering, news-reporting business. With nearly 19% of the Jounal’s stock now owned by investment funds led by Mario Gabelli, the company’s future will be shaped by attempts to maximize share value. Good for those of you who held on to your stock if — but only if — such attempts succeed. [See Milw. Biz Journal: http://milwaukee.bizjournals.com/milwaukee/stories/2009/07/27/daily15.html%5D
In the meantime, I would guess that management, under pressure from investors, will flail around with various “reorganization plans” as serious journalism becomes increasingly irrelevant to “mainstream” media. It’s likely arts coverage will go the way the editorial pages have gone — more and more “community voices” spouting off about subjects on which the depth of their knowledge is far surpassed by the strength of their opinions.
As for me, I decided after the previous round of buy-outs that my Journal Sentinel subscription money was better spent on an occasional double latte at Alterra. It takes far longer, I assure you, to consume the coffee than it does to consume the diminished Journal Sentinel.
Best wishes — you are certainly now in a better place from which to work in these interesting times.