Rooster teeth

[sigma7]

It's fascinating to see the outside pundits barking that we are "destroying great newspapers". Equally fascinating is how outsiders historically claimed imminent destruction of any institutions that forced change. Certainly saw it in TV as "CNN was destroying television news" or 'Jet Air Travel was destroying the inter city travel experience'. I never got the whole 'destroying' thing. If anyone destroys a product that is of value to the public, then someone should create something in its place...instead of whining about it.

Tribune "Innovation" chief Lee Abrams, everyone. Let's give him a round of applause.

Of course, CNN didn't explode affiliates and Jet Air Travel didn't start shooting down every fifth flight.

Comments

[motteditor.livejournal.com]

Ugh. I think everyone loathes Abrams in the Tribune offices. What an utter asshole.

Perhaps he should take heed of his own words and they should try creating something, since so far they're just destroying papers, careers and lives.

Assholes.

[beagle1971.livejournal.com]

Wow. I'm glad I'd never heard of this idiot before today. (Yeah, I've been avoiding reading too much about the destruction of the larger papers for fear of making my own situation in a small market seem all that more grim.)

What's sad is that I've heard this drivel before from the local "innovation/audience directors." Either they're reading from the how-to-do-things-wrong guidebook or terrible minds think alike. Meh, it's both.

This reader's responses sum it up pretty well, though: http://www.tellzell.com/2008/07/lee-abrams-confronts-actual-reader.html

[sigma7.livejournal.com]

I see Abrams as drinking from the same pot as Zell and Murdoch -- less unrepentantly stupid than the former and less pure evil than the latter, but still cut from the same cloth.

The sad thing is I fear they may actually think they're being honest when they spit drivel like this while "right-sizing" their newspapers. If that's true, then print is doomed.