The Times-Picayune: Blog of New Orleans, Gambit

James Gill jumps from The Times-Picayune to The Advocate

Kevin Allman — Mon, 13 May 2013 22:01:05 -0500

James Gill, whose acerbic wit and incisive columns about Louisiana politics and peccadillos have appeared in The Times-Picayune since 1986, is the latest T-P name to jump ship to The Advocate.

"It's very hard to make out a quote, because quotes are all bullshit," Gill told Gambit tonight.…

Kneecapped: The Advocate hires away four Times-Picayune journalists

Kevin Allman — Wed, 08 May 2013 12:26:00 -0500

Since New Orleans businessman John Georges bought The Advocate just a week ago, things have been moving quickly. Georges installed former T-P managing editors Peter Kovacs and Dan Shea as editor and general manager, and there was word that The Advocate's Baronne Street offices were adding several additional parking spaces immediately.…

Gambit TV: Talking local media on Informed Sources

Gambit TV — Sat, 04 May 2013 10:59:00 -0500

Gambit editor Kevin Allman appeared on last night's Informed Sources on WYES-TV to discuss this week's tumult and realignment in the local media world with The Times-Picayune and The Advocate. The panel included host Larry Lorenz, producer Errol Laborde, reporter Dawn Ostrom and WWL-TV investigative reporter David Hammer.…

John Georges talks about his purchase of The Advocate

Kevin Allman — Wed, 01 May 2013 00:04:00 -0500

The Advocate, which moved into the New Orleans market from Baton Rouge earlier this year in response to The Times-Picayune going to a three-day-per-week production schedule, has been sold to New Orleans businessman and sometime-political candidate John Georges. The announcement of the "Georges Media Group" and its buy will be announced officially on Wednesday at a 10 a.m. press conference at The Advocate's Bluebonnet Road offices, which will be attended by Gov. Bobby Jindal and various politicos and dignitaries.…

Social media reaction to the Times-Picayune news

Kevin Allman — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 16:41:00 -0500

In the spirit of Lauren LaBorde and her weekly Y@Speak column, I attempted to summarize some local and national reaction to the news that the NOLA Media Group, aka The Times-Picayune | NOLA.com, would soon be publishing a new street paper (but not a Picayune) on the days it doesn't print a Picayune.

Publisher RIcky Mathews clarified things for The Wall Street Journal this afternoon:

Ricky Mathews, president of NOLA, said TPStreet wasn't an attempt to backtrack on last year's cutback.…
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Times-Picayune to begin printing on days it doesn't print in order to provide "front-to-back newspaper reading experience"

Kevin Allman — Tue, 30 Apr 2013 12:53:00 -0500

The digitally-focused NOLA Media Group, which cut back print publication of The Times-Picayune to three days a week last year, continued to innovate today by announcing a new plan to print on the days it doesn't produce a print product, bringing the company up to 7-day-a-week publication, according to an announcement by NOLA Media Group Vice President of Content Jim Amoss.

The report, which is not from The Onion, says the new product, to be called "TPStreet," will launch this summer in newsboxes around the city and cost 75 cents, just like the daily paper, which it will not be, because it is more innovative than that:

“Our success in delivering more news, sports and entertainment to our readers enables us to create this innovative publication, the latest milestone in our evolution as a multimedia news organization,” said President and Publisher Ricky Mathews.…
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NOLA Media Group's Baton Rouge bureau head out after six months on the job

Kevin Allman — Tue, 26 Mar 2013 15:28:00 -0500

Carlos Sanchez, the managing editor of NOLA Media Group's new Baton Rouge bureau, has resigned after less than six months on the job, multiple sources within the company have told Gambit.

A memo co-signed by editor Jim Amoss and the director of state news and sports, James O'Byrne, went out to NOLA Media Group staffers in the last two hours, saying Sanchez was resigning for family reasons and returning to Texas, where he wrote about politics for the Austin American-Statesman and served as editor of the Waco Tribune-Herald for several years before being let go in a Trib-Herald companywide layoff in 2011.…

NOLA Media Group to "content employees": "Discuss how your performance can positively impact your pay."

Kevin Allman — Mon, 11 Mar 2013 10:12:00 -0500

A letter went out late Friday to NOLA Media Group's "content employees" (aka reporters), inviting them to a training session (a mandatory "invite"), where they will begin to learn what the company is calling a Performance Management Process (PMP):

"Our organization’s current and future business objectives require an increased focus on improved performance and talent development."

"Discuss how your performance can positively impact your pay."

Gambit, Dec. 21, 2012:

Meanwhile, the newsroom staff, which had written an open letter in June to Cunningham and Amoss, asking, “Will there be quotas for online entries?” (no formal answer was ever forthcoming), ended the year nervous about their role in drawing traffic, or “clicks,” to NOLA.com. A “Staff Performance Measurement & Development Specialist” position has been created; the job description included monitoring reporters’ and editors’ “amount of content created each day” and “[setting] standards for measuring performance aimed at achieving content and business goals.” (“I don’t know how to get more clicks without doing more stories every day,” one longtime reporter told Gambit.)

None dare call it quotas — but few in the newsroom doubt that quotas, or something like them, is coming in 2013.…
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Columbia Journalism Review on the changes at The Times-Picayune

Kevin Allman — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 17:07:05 -0600

The Columbia Journalism Review's Ryan Chittum was in New Orleans in December to conduct interviews for a wide-ranging story about the changes at the NOLA Media Group/Times-Picayune, and Chittum's story landed last night — becoming the talk of T-P employees both past and present.

Chittum paints a picture of a newsroom where "coverage looks thin at times," "incomplete versions of stories have ended up in the paper" and "some staffers say, the quality of the report is deteriorating." Much of this is attributed to unnamed sources at the T-P, as well as those who have left.…

Advance Publications wants to optimize customer experiences across platforms to strengthen our brands

Kevin Allman — Fri, 08 Feb 2013 13:48:12 -0600

... not to mention Engage Employees in Transforming the Company to Meet Our Changing Digital and Print Future.

No, it's not the latest indignity ladled upon the heads of the long-suffering NOLA Media Group (unofficial slogan: We're Miserable — But What a View!™) — it's a new "Strategic Initiative" laid down at The Oregonian, the Newhouse/Advance paper in Portland, Ore.

Newsroom employees got this directive laid out on a laminated card this week, according to media reporter Jim Romenesko.…

NOLA.com asks: when is Super Bowl 2013?

Lauren LaBorde — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 15:06:04 -0600

As New Orleans prepares to host the event know as the "Super Bowl," there are many questions on locals' minds. Which major roads will be closed?…

Times-Picayune: HANO draft policy supposedly loosening criminal background checks would actually do the opposite of that

Charles Maldonado — Tue, 22 Jan 2013 12:36:15 -0600

The Housing Authority of New Orleans (HANO) is currently in the process of revising its policy on criminal background checks for housing and job applicants. HANO has some lofty goals in mind here, reports Richard Webster:

"Their criminal history is likely a bar to admission to most affordable housing opportunities, making post-incarceration reunification of families a near impossible dream," HANO says in the preamble to its proposed policy statement.…
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Y@ Speak gets dirty

Lauren LaBorde — Mon, 21 Jan 2013 11:54:00 -0600

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." MLK Jr.
— CRayNagin (@RayNagin) January 19, 2013

My favorite throw caught/gifted to me last night at Krewe du Vieux!…
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Times-Picayune wins award for prison series produced by many laid-off journalists

Kevin Allman — Fri, 18 Jan 2013 17:03:23 -0600

The Times-Picayune’s eight-part 2012 series about Louisiana’s prison culture, “Louisiana Incarcerated,” received the John Jay/HF Guggenheim Prize for Excellence in Criminal Justice Reporting this week and will be honored at a Feb. 4 banquet in New York City.

It’s a bittersweet laurel for the T-P, which laid off nine of the 20 people involved with the story during its cutbacks last year — including managing editors Dan Shea and Peter Kovacs, graphics artist Ryan Smith, photographer Scott Threlkeld and reporter Jonathan Tilove (who is now at the Austin American-Statesman).…

Y@ Speak: It's Carnival time

Lauren LaBorde — Mon, 07 Jan 2013 10:24:00 -0600

Phunny Phorty Phellows on their annual streetcar ride Uptown. #mardigras #nola yfrog.com/oc4xxkbzj
— Scott Satchfield (@Satchfield) January 7, 2013

Last night was the Epiphany, meaning Carnival is officially here — and as you start your morning over your daily breakfast of cafe au lait and beignets, it might be tempting to contemplate your fleeting New Year's resolutions as they give way to the endless parade of office kitchen king cakes, daydrinking and other Carnival vices.…

VIDEO: 60 Minutes on cutbacks at The Times-Picayune

Kevin Allman — Sun, 06 Jan 2013 18:50:25 -0600

If The Times-Picayune was anticipating a negative piece about the paper's cutbacks on tonight's 60 Minutes — and it seemed like it was — it really had nothing to fear. Morley Safer's report — most of which was taped months ago — was a breezy, evenhanded look at the "digital transition" at the new NOLA Media Group.…

60 Minutes to air story about The Times-Picayune this Sunday

Kevin Allman — Thu, 03 Jan 2013 12:11:29 -0600

Last summer, during the protests over The Times-Picayune becoming a thrice-weekly newspaper, 60 Minutes man Morley Safer visited New Orleans to do a report on the paper. Jim Romenesko confirms this morning that the segment will air this Sunday, though so far there's nothing up on the CBS News site about it.…

UPDATE: Life at The Times-Picayune

Kevin Allman — Fri, 21 Dec 2012 17:14:00 -0600

As the year wraps up, we will be updating several stories from 2012. In Parts I and II: Alex Woodward reported on the arson fire at the offices of Women With a Vision, as well as developments on Freret Street.…

Roundtabling and logrolling

Kevin Allman — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 14:41:00 -0600

Corporate Realty newsletter, Sept. 6, "NOLA Media Group Leases Top Floors of One Canal Place":

Mike Siegel represented NOLA Media Group in its office space search and lease negotiations in One Canal Place, which is managed by Corporate Realty. “This is a significant lease that will establish a major presence for one of the leading businesses in our region in the Central Business District,” Siegel said.…
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Y@ Speak: The naughty list

Lauren LaBorde — Mon, 03 Dec 2012 13:04:00 -0600

Eggs...that's cute. Lol.
— Courtney Roby (@robyslyfe) November 29, 2012

While many — even dive bars — begin to get in the holiday spirit, it seems others are asking to get coal in their stockings this year.…

"Lagniappe," meet "Beaucoup"

Kevin Allman — Sun, 02 Dec 2012 23:21:00 -0600

Another salvo in the newspaper wars: The Advocate's New Orleans edition will launch a new entertainment tabloid, "Beaucoup," this Thursday, along with a community-news broadsheet.

Both will be edited by Annette Sisco, one of the many former Times-Picayune employees who were hired by The Advocate for its new New Orleans bureau earlier this fall.…

News of the day: Zoe Sullivan on Pretrial Services; The Lens on deliberative process; T-P tours Grand Isle Shipyard bunkhouse

Charles Maldonado — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 11:36:18 -0600

A few interesting news items:

Last week I wrote a little bit about the Vera Pretrial Services budget controversy, specifically critics' comparison of the program to the Philadelphia Pretrial Services Division. Independent journalist Zoe Sullivan has since done an interview with Orleans Parish First Assistant District Attorney Graymond Martin, who speaks at length about pretrial services.…

A Tale of Two Headlines (and one tweet)

Kevin Allman — Tue, 30 Oct 2012 17:24:17 -0500

Five minutes later ...

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Y@ Speak: Bye, Times-Picayune

Lauren LaBorde — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 10:23:00 -0500

Yes, I was nude; as bare as a loon. The sun was shining and so was the moon.…
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The Advocate kicks off New Orleans edition with reception at Rock 'n' Bowl

Kevin Allman — Mon, 24 Sep 2012 13:54:00 -0500

With the Lagniappe Brass Band blaring a welcome, The Advocate made its New Orleans debut today with a dash of local style at a morning reception at Rock 'n' Bowl. This morning's Advocate New Orleans edition was stacked on tables, each front page bearing a sticker that said "Enjoy today's paper on us!" and offering subscription information for the paper's official rollout Oct. 1.…