With the recent furloughs and layoffs, newspaper advertising dropping an unprecedented 29% in the first quarter ($2.6 billion in lost revenue), an attempt to sell Daily Progress HQ, and a website redesign that the majority of you thought was “worse than before,” things aren’t looking good for Charlottesville’s only daily paper. But who are they looking good for?

Janis Jaquith, in an opinion piece published in the Hook, thinks its the local weeklies.  She also names daily newspapers like the Daily Progress lumbering dinosaurs and cockroaches.  BURN. Take this passage:

Unlike the lumbering Daily Progress– which is owned by somebody in a galaxy far, far away, and is now mostly a printer of those press releases and wire service reports, not to mention editorials that are devoid of any connection to the community– these newsweeklies are small and locally-owned, which allows them the flexibility to adapt to a changing landscape.

It’s all the same, right?  Janis forgets that publishing a weekly paper that’s free is a whole lot easier than publishing a daily paper and making people pay for it.  It’s easy to fill a paper with only local stuff when you fill 75% of it with ads and wait a week for local news to happen.  The Daily Progress has a harder, more expensive job than the weeklies because the DP has already dug its own grave without realizing it.  Getting out of AP-filled, daily publishing is basically impossible. Also, anyone ever look how much it costs to advertise in the DP? Holy Moly.  How do you change a sinking ship?

We’re also obviously jealous that Janis has her eye on the “locally-owned independent newspapers– these shapers of local opinion, keepers of the flame of investigative journalism.“  She forgot things like cvillenews, COUGH COUGH cVillain, the Charlottesville twitter community, and the multitude of opinionated independent publishing sites (e.g. realcentralvirginia, velvut rut) which drive more opinion than any “newspaper” can or will.

I hate to tell this to the Daily Progress and the “independents,” but the truth is that PEOPLE shape the opinion and keep the check on investigative journalism.  People comment on blogs, discuss things with their friends and they are the ones who ultimately shape opinion, which is, after all, all news is. The Daily Progress and newspapers are dying. Whether it’s driven by an old news model and the internet, corporate culture and/or people resistant to change, who cares.  It’s an uprising, by the people, for the people and of the people.  Things will look way different in 3 years and not everyone will be alive (For the record, cVillain has the lowest life expectancy due to its drug-filled rockstar blogstyle).

Colbert interviews the newspaper lobby after the break…

»Read More

Yes, another one bites the dust.  DP reports it will sell its main office building and property on West Rio Road.  The DP reports:

The Progress building, a former hardware store located at the corner of West Rio Road and Berkmar Drive in Albemarle County, and its land have a combined assessed value of about $4 million, according to county records.

Daily Progress Publisher Lawrence McConnell said the newspaper looks forward to finding an appropriate space for the news, advertising, circulation and business functions of the paper, which could result in staying in the current facility. The Progress has been in the Rio Road building since moving there from Market Street in downtown Charlottesville in 1983.

The sale of the building became more of an option after Media General decided to shut down the press on Rio Road and shift printing of The Daily Progress to a company plant in Hanover County and printing of the Waynesboro News Virginian to the company’s Lynchburg newspaper plant. Each had been printed in Charlottesville until July.

Can’t see we didn’t see that coming. Does this mean DP will start to give us exciting news? Its too early to tell. They really have nothing to lose at this point though.

[pic from herval on flickr]

Sometimes I wonder about our small town.  Uncus reports:

The Washington Post is selling its local distribution rights to the Daily Progress, leaving dozens of newspaper carriers out of a job and serving as another signal of dailies in a downturn.“It’s a cost-cutting measure,” says Charles Leathers, who’s distributed the Post since 1992, as did his father, who started distributing the Post in 1967.

He employs about a dozen people to stuff inserts and deliver the Post seven days a week in southeastern Charlottesville and Albemarle County, and Lake Monticello.

Now, if the Washington PostNew York Times has inserts of the C-Ville Weekly every now and then, does that mean DP and the NYT are now the oligopoly on home delivery?[pic]

We just got big news from a little birdie…

25 People Have Been Laid Off at The Daily Progress.  

Media General, the Daily Progress’ parent company decided to move printing operations to Richmond to save on printing costs.  The employees who used to work for the printing press no longer have jobs, but they will get severance packages.

[via Daily Progress] [pic]

Will they ask you what you think? Who knows.

The DailyProgress launched a new website design sometime last night and I was going through it. I’m not a big fan of flash boxes in the middle of the page, designs that don’t get you to where you want to get quickly. I think the menu items are slightly clearer than before, but the page design forces you to stay on and click through a lot more things. Can anyone say annoying? My favorite newspaper site is WashingtonPost.com which is easy to use and doesn’t annoy you with a bunch of flash.

I’m curious what you think:

Screenshot after the break.. »Read More

It’s never pleasant waking up to depressing news, but last night an SUV hit two pedestrians attempting to cross Rio Road.

This is the third incident of pedestrians getting hit on that same road.

Note to pedestrians:  DON’T CROSS RIO ROAD ON FOOT.  IT’S DANGEROUS AND EVEN MORE SO AT NIGHT.

[via DP]

The Daily Progress reports that a four day search for a missing Charlottesville native cost Illinois taxpayers $250,000.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME? »Read More