Before the Man comes to take it down, hopefully some of you will have had the chance to see the three-story high headline on the side of the LA Times building this morning. A devoted fellow Retcher dropped a ginormous banner. It reads: Zell Hell: Take Back the Los Angeles Times.Is that cool, or what? It's big. It's bold. It's a first step toward prying the LA Times out of the tight, greedy fingers of billionaire Sam Zell.
Here's the story for first time visitors. Real estate mogul Sam Zell took over the paper in January. After promising that the path to growth was not through cuts, he immediately began cutting. So far, Zell has ousted over 200 reporters, photographers, copy editors and editors from the Los Angeles Times. Hundreds of other editorial workers have been fired from other papers in the Tribune chain. This is not business acumen. This is not saving money. This is suicide.
Here's what the Retch is proposing. We fight back with Paper Cuts. We protest, in ways big and small, in different places and different forums. We join unions. We post bumper stickers. We bake cakes. We file lawsuits. Everything we can, in as many ways as we can. Together.
Our aim is to convince Zell that he has taken the wrong path to bettering our paper—both journalistically and financially. But if we cannot do that, then our aim is to convince Zell to sell the paper to an owner who actually cares about Los Angeles, about great journalism, about kicking ass and taking names and speaking truth to power.
There is no one thing that will suddenly result in Sam Zell ceasing his rampage. But if we work together, me and you, we can do it. We were the owners of the Los Angeles Times long before Sam Zell came along. And we will be its owners long after he has gone.
Take Back The Times.
First look, via celphone, minutes after the banner drop was complete.
For those who want a vertical.
11 comments:
this destructive campaign will not change the underlying economics that have forced tribune to downscale its operations.
if anything, the campaign will further turn off readers and advertisers, worsening the economic conditions and leading to more layoffs.
it's time for labor and management to work as a team to stop the bleeding, implement productive improvements and begin to turn around the business.
Gee, did you learn any other words in business school, anon, or is that all you've got? Writing lots of sentences without actually saying anything is a great skill--maybe Zell's got a spot for you as a puppet journalist.
I can't believe you're actually challenging the right of mass amounts of people who are getting axed to make a stir. Especially when it's at the whim of a grubby little man who's not being forced to do anything--there's lots of ways for a paper to make money, and Zell just chose the sellout route, namely bringing on advertisers who pay and kicking out journalists, who he unfortunately has to pay.
So fuck yeah, make a stink! wave banners, bumper stickers, paint walls, write on bathroom stalls--people are getting canned and the paper is getting torn apart for no good reason, and it's your right--no, your duty, as someone caught up in this mess to tell the readers, tell the advertisers, and Tell Zell how you feel about it.
FYI, I'd recommend, to the folks that did this, that they prepare to be escorted from the building by LAPD. The LAT management won't let this go and I guarantee that security has video of the event happening...
as someone who's been escorted from the building by security, and threatened with the LAPD ... they will do it, and swiftly.
All this does is reinforce the negative public impression of the paper. Someone once "told" Zell to stop trashing the paper. How bout if we all stop doing it too? This was beyond dumb. Far from doing anything to free the paper from Zell, this only serves to convince anyone who might still be thinking about buying the place that they'd be making a mistake. Let's get a clue, folks.
Anon at 8:02 a.m., you haven't been paying enough attention if you think that the general acquiescence of the LAT masses over the past few years is *working*.
The banner is inspiring, and along with the full-page ad from Jack McGrath, the attention on LAO to the (very real) drops in quality, and Russ Stanton's own musings on KPCC that a community outcry seems necessary to stanch this bleeding gusher, maybe it will snowball into something that L.A. can't ignore.
I'm amazed that some staffer had the money to produce such a banner. With so much disposable income, why complain?
This is absolutely great stuff! After the banner went up, Dandy-Randy called his new VP's and his super sleuth labor yack, Howweird Weinersnitzel, and told them to post something negative here to scare the "banner hangers" with LAPD threats! You whining losers are the reason the LAT and other Tribune properties are in the mess they're in today.
Here's a question: How many people haven't died because of stories by reporters recently departed from the times? Take the U-Haul stories, the Harrier aircraft stories, the pieces on King-Drew, just for starters.
I've had my gripes with the LAT, but strong, well-staffed newspapers are essential to maintaining a democracy and keeping crime and malfeasance out of our lives.
Newspapers have to be more than one man's piggybank, and I'm all for anybody who's speaking out in that direction.
interesting, maybe we're finally getting to Zell and his idiot lieutenants when their party line is posted anonymously here. Speaking out will turn off readers or will reinforce a negative public impression of the paper? sounds like the mewling of the people in power who insist that free speech is great, but only up to a point--that they define. the only thing that is "reinforcing" any negative reader reaction is the elimination of quality news coverage. no, worse... the replacement of quality news coverage with the fluff and pap that you zellots are trying to pass off as serious news. people notice. so fuck you zell. and bravo to the folks that unfurled that banner. and to everyone who is pushing back.
#1's got it all wrong. The underlying economics are this. The paper is a product. That product must be a desirable product or nobody will buy it. So if you're suffering from lack of sales (for lack of a better term), you don't cheapen your product which will, over time, further kill your business. You recommit to producing a better product that everybody finds value in. The campaign will drive off readers, readers who are already disgusted seeing their favorite columns, writers, and sections killed off, leaving us no real reason to keep paying for something we can get elsewhere for free.
Their current strategy seems to be to drive everyone from the print to the web, when it is a well-known fact that print advertising is much more profitable than online. You want me to get the articles and columns online from now on, I will. I'm canceling my subscription this week and moving on...line that is. It's FREE!!!!
The cameras in that parking lot do not work, and the "truth" would have to be stretched far for the LAPD to make a case on the singular camera focused on Dan Neil's parking spot, the security booth and the corners of the walls on each floor.
Forget about the basement.
Post a Comment