Goren is NC Sportscaster of the Year

Take THAT, 'XII...former NBC-12 WXII sports director Dave Goren was just named North Carolina's sportscaster of the year, this from GreensboroSports.com. TMW understands the veteran sportscaster Goren is still looking for a job after being dumped from the local NBC affiliate last month.

E.C. :)

More layoffs at the Enterprise

Thanks to this tipster who wrote in yesterday and said:

You may have gotten the word already -- but earlier this week Paxton Media Group informed employees that the printing of the paper and related operations will be done at the Durham Herald Sun, effective March 2. A friend I have who works over there said that will result in the elimination of approximately 40 jobs at HPE [High Point Enterprise]. In all, he estimates over 70 layoffs have occurred since Paxton took over the operation fully some five years or so ago.

Pathetic -- and downright sad for those who have lived in the area and given HPE so much for so long. "Your Community, Your Newspaper" my arse!
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I'm saddened, but I'm not surprised.

E.C. :)

FOX-8 reporter leaves, WFMY gets a new weatherman

Thanks to the Greensboro Telegram for this scoop...we learn that FOX-8 reporter Leah Beno has left WGHP to go to work for KMSP-FOX 9 in Minneapolis/St. Paul. Beno's last day was January 29. Beno was at Channel 8 for two years.
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TMW also learns of a new addition to CBS-2 WFMY's weather team this week. Grant Gilmore comes to the Triad by way of Macon, Ga., where he reported the weather for a Gannett-owned station there.

E.C. :)

Area college radio stations stream signals

Guilford College's radio station, WQFS-90.9FM, will soon stream live via the Internet by summer, according to today's News & Record. 'QFS is regularly included on lists of the nation's best college stations, the article says.

Meanwhile, High Point University has launched a new Web-only radio station.

The new station, http://hpuradio.com, will broadcast round-the-clock online during the academic year, with live DJs from 4 p.m. to midnight.

Best of luck to both stations.

E.C. :)

Signature is no more, Our State lays off

Another publication in our area goes dark as Signature Magazine calls it quits. The two-year old publication only produced 10 issues, but could not sustain the advertising support, according to publisher Bernard Mann, in yesterday's News & Record.

Signature is produced by Mann's flagship, Our State Magazine. The irony is that some of the editorial staff who worked on Signature will move to Our State, but five won't, including Signature's editor Vicky Jarrett.

Mann says Elizabeth Hudson, former senior editor of Our State, will be the new editor of Our State, which will now include elements of Signature.

E.C. :)

Newspapers on Life Support

More on the survivability rate of newspapers...this one from Jon Lowder of Winston-Salem, who has some choice words on the possible pre-imminent downfall of the Winston-Salem Journal:

Sadly the newspaper industry is making the same mistake that the music industry made, only 10 years late. They aren't recognizing the market for what it is. They aren't realizing that whether or not there's a printed form of journalism is irrelevant. Paper is a delivery vehicle, same as the airwaves and the internet. They also need to understand that if they pursue the whole watermark thing all they are going to do is minimize their own exposure and tick off their customers. What's important for them to understand is that instead of building walls around their news gardens they need to learn how to take their expertise and their (diminishingly) unique place in society and use every tool available to reach their audience.

I wholeheartedly agree, Jon.

You folks may want to scribble in your calendars tonight's episode of the Charlie Rose Show, in which he'll discuss the future of newspapers. Guests include Walter Isaacson, Mort Zuckerman and Robert Thomson (thanks to The Logistician for passing that on).

E.C. :)

Veteran W-S Journal reporter shown the door

What's neither classy is how this individual was laid-off, nor how it was announced. In a "Brief" in last week's Winston-Salem Journal, they report long-time music critic and features writer Ed Bumgardner was laid off, along with a newspaper designer.

Sad.

W-S Journal:

Winston-Salem Journal cuts two workers in newsroom

Two journalists in the Winston-Salem Journal's newsroom were let go yesterday as part of the newspaper's cost-cutting moves. One was on the newspaper's design team, whose members create graphics and lay out and design pages. The other was Ed Bumgardner, a longtime music critic and features writer.

Like many newspapers and companies in other industries, the Journal has been trying to reduce costs as revenues drop during an extremely difficult business environment.
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More coverage from YES! Weekly, Life in Forsyth blog.

This is EXACTLY what we continue to talk about and focus on here at TMW...the localism is disappearing among our local media.

Ed, we wish you the best.

E.C. :)

Kernersville News...hiring?

...or at least...hired, a new reporter; this from this week's YES! Weekly.

Excerpt:

The Kernersville News, a tri-weekly community paper right here in the heart of the Triad, is hiring! According to the classified ad published in local newspapers, publisher John Owensby is looking for a reporter.

Or at least he was. “We got quite a bit of a response,” Owensby says. “More of those were younger folks, but we typically get that in our industry. It tends to gravitate towards the younger grads. But we looked at everyone and anyone, and we feel we got a responsible person to fill that spot.” Owensby says he is not naive about current economic conditions, but “Kernersville has always been, relatively speaking, a stable market and we have always been rather entrepreneurial in the way we pursue business. Scrounging is nothing new for us — that’s the way we work.” So count one journalism job against the hundreds our state has lost in the last year. And chalk one up for the Kernersville News.
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It's something that hasn't happened around here in a long time...a local publication hiring. And yes, I'll admit...I applied for the job.

Oh well...

Good for Owensby in bucking the trend. Obviously the K-N has a niche and is surviving. Good for them.

E.C. :)

Two Triad stations make digital switch next week

At least two Triad-area television stations will make the switch to digital on Feb. 17, the Winston-Salem Journal reports today.

Sinclair-owned ABC45 (WXLV) and My48 (WMYV) appealed to the FCC and will switch over from their analog signals to all-digital. Remaining area stations, per an act by Congress only days ago, will make the switch over in June.

E.C. :)

Stick the fork in local TV

Thanks to Ed Cone for providing links to this dynamite story...local television stations nationwide are financially hurting. Ad revenues are down, viewership is down, layoffs are growing among small, mid and large media companies. Stations that are surviving are getting creative, attempting to integrate their stations to their full significance on the Internet.

It is immensely troubling, especially for an industry that I went to school for some years ago, and for an industry that is very public and has a duty to its viewers/readers/listeners.

Journalism should not be allowed to die like this.

E.C. :)