Some Toronto Sun Family followers are having difficulty reading the most recent Christmas 2012 layoff casualties forum postings. Perhaps, there is a limit to the number of postings. There are 207 comments to date.
Have your say with this fresh start.
Monday, 22 April 2013
Sun Media Open Forum 2013
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CRTC hearings for mandatory coverage including Sun News Network are supposed to start today. If anyone hears of any news, please post it here. As I understand it, the hearing and any decisions from it may not happen for several days or weeks so we shouldn't expect news any time soon. If Sun News wins mandatory coverage I'm sure it will end up being front page news across the Suns (288 pt. "VICTORY!" is my guess)
ReplyDeleteHere's the Globe and Mail story on the hearings, specifically Sun News' presentation:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/sun-news-warns-regulator-its-survival-at-stake/article11506891/comments/
According to JeffGaulin.com, three Sun Media newspapers are actually looking at ADDING staff.
ReplyDeleteA reporter is being sought at the Melfort Journal and the Nipiwin Journal, both papers being in Saskatchewan. They appear to be linked, as resumes are being requested in both ads by the same editor. Salary is a whole $1,000/bi-weekly.
A "multimedia journalist" is also being advertised for at the Pincher Creek Echo in Pincher Creek, Alberta.
It appears those in the west haven't been as badly impacted by Sun Media's cutbacks as those of us in Ontario.
Wow. I started at the Toronto Sun overnight at $250 a week, a year after I worked in Thunder Bay for the same amount. That was 1982 and 1983. I image Melfort and Nipiwin are caught in a Twilight Zone kind of time warp, say 1987, maybe 1988.
DeleteThe Sun was caught n a time warp then, too. Starting salary for a copy editor at the Star was around $450 with night differential.
ReplyDeletePostmedia follows Sun Media's lead and starts to eliminate publishers:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.steveladurantaye.ca/postmedia-management-shuffle/
Lysiane Gagnon on Peladeau's conflict of interest, influence over elected officials, and possible intention to lead the PQ:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.theglobeandmail.com/commentary/pladeau-chairs-hydro-qubec-raises-conflict-of-interest-concerns/article11643979/#dashboard/follows/Companies
Was he asked to leave? Look how he helped Quebecor World, took it from a leader to bankrupt. Please PKP stay in Quebec, lead your province to dispair like you have your company. Poor Quebec, they will have to find the light switch in the dark. Will he take all of his yes men with him?
ReplyDeletePKP out, he's left nothing but heartache and despair...oh and a company that has seriously poor revenue. Could it be due to the fact that everything is centralized and works so poorly that to make money would be more than a miracle, or the lack of staff members to even try to sell ads or newspapers? What a mess he's left. Last one out turn out the lights.
ReplyDeleteDid everyone read the financial report from Quebecor? WOW what a shocker, who didn't see this coming? Now everyone get ready, with such a shortfall, what will be next? I've heard already that they may look at more closures, reduced publishing days, additional centralization. Would seem the top guys are in panic mode. Won't be a restful summer.
ReplyDeleteReduced publishing days WILL be announced in 2013. We can take that one to the bank ........ along with our severance cheques for those of us who will be shown the door this year
ReplyDeleteAs my father used to say, you can't get blood from a stone...he never met anyone from Sun Media
ReplyDeleteanyone hear any recent news closures etc.
ReplyDeleteOther than Monday publications possibly being cancelled, no nothing. A couple more people gone, a couple more soon to be gone.
ReplyDelete90 jobs within the TVA group getting whacked:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.marketwire.com/press-release/to-preserve-its-leadership-maintain-its-investments-tva-group-announces-rationalization-tsx-tva.b-1798362.htm
Anyone wondering why there's not more "news" on this site should know that most of the people who used to post here are already gone. It's also commonly known that anyone caught posting here will be marked for termination.
ReplyDeleteBut it's anonymous! But you're right theres no one left to report anything, we've already been let go.
DeleteHaha we're ALL already marked for termination. Not sure who will be left to be "the last one to turn out the lights"
DeleteSounds like a bluff to me. Who exactly has been terminated for posting here? How would mgmt know? The first part of your premise I accept as highly possible. The second is just trolling.
ReplyDeleteI worked in that environment, and know that managers have a pretty good idea who might be commenting. There's certainly been a lot of speculating, and once management begins speculating about you you're done anyway.
DeleteAnd yet here I am, apparently (by your account, anyway) sowing paranoia in the Sun management ranks with the ease of any half-witted troll.
DeleteNo one has been terminated for posting on here where I work. I know they suspect certain people, but they have no proof.
ReplyDeleteI think people are not posting as much here because what else can be said about working for a company where morale is so low that has not already been posted here? People don't have the energy anymore. I can tell you there is not a person in our building who does not believe the sky will fall on our operation at some point in 2013
ReplyDeletewhat buiding?
ReplyDeleteheard about a new publication in southwest ontario in Chatham. Anyone have any info? Metroland expanding again?
ReplyDeletePerhaps this building?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.thepost.ca/2013/06/13/lindsay-post-closing
Lindsay Post gone..13/6/13
ReplyDeleteclosed this morning
hang on probably more to come
Sad news about the Lindsay closure. Six more people bite the dust as does a 152-year-old paper. Of course, the class acts at Sun Media put the blame on the marketplace.
ReplyDeleteThe Lindsay Post publishes it's last edition today. Six jobs gone and 152 years of history. Sun Media kills another long term newspaper which not that long ago published daily.
ReplyDeleteThey also closed the Trentontian in Trenton and Stirling's Community Press by merging it with the Belleville Intelligencer.
ReplyDeletePoor Ontario, seems the only papers affected.
ReplyDeletehow long before they merge London and Woodstock, St. Thomas,Sarnia and Chatham all into one huge worthless newspaper?
ReplyDeleteHere's the spin they put on it in Trenton:
ReplyDelete“By bringing all our editors under one roof we free our reporters to tell more stories. And now instead of having a couple reporters covering Trenton or Trent Hills or Stirling or Tweed we have eight reporters, any one of whom — or even all of whom — can be on the scene covering the news,” said (managing editor Bill) Glisky.
The day-to-day reality, of course, will be different. Instead of a couple of people at close range who are ready to react to breakig news, there will be eight people viewing it at a distance, not really caring if it gets covered or not because after all, it's not the core geographical readership area any more.
Sun Media markets in Ontario most likely to be restructured in terms of publication frequency before Sept-Oct: Peterborough & Lindsay (done deal), Barrie & Orillia, Sarnia & Chatham, Brantford & Simcoe, London & Woodstock, Niagara
ReplyDeleteAny word on Eastern Ontario? Been awfully quiet lately, which is worrisome.
DeleteI wouldn't be the least bit surprised if they did that. Many may have the same editors anyway. I know that Chatham Daily News and Sarnia Observer have the same managing editor.
Delete17:56, I am thinking that the southwestern Ontario area is a priority before eastern Ontario. There are a couple of pockets in southwestern Ontario that have an unusually high concentration of dailies and weeklies that have still not been touched by closures
DeleteMidland paper done.
ReplyDeleteMidland Free Press closed this morning after 160 years or so in the community. 5 jobs lost. Whose next?
ReplyDeleteWikipedia has it at 117 years; established 1896.
DeleteIt's sad to see yet another long-time Ontario paper bite the dust. I wonder how much the folks in big city Ontario care about the damage being done in small town Ontario and whether those in Quebec could care about Ontario period.
ReplyDeleteCommunity papers should belong to the community - owners come and go - real shame someone has lost sight of this. QMI you have lost (or never had) the vision!
ReplyDeleteDid Midland even get a farewell in their print edition? I looked online and I don't see anything. I'm also not seeing anything on their website. If not, that's just horrible.
ReplyDeleteI don't see anything either. I do see a bunch of out-of-market stories though, which is typical for Sun Media.
DeleteStill nothing on their website as of Friday morning (8:45 a.m. EST). Upper management probably didn't want to bump the incredibly vital and informative "Is there a benefit to eating placenta?" story.
DeleteActually, I'm quite surprised the website was even still up and running. A lot of papers that were closed had their websites banished from the internet only to have readers re-routed to another newspaper within a day or two of being gassed.
it was in the print edition, on thursday not online. Only a couple of paragraphs on the front page with the usual sun media spin. The website has been changed over to the orilia packet.
DeleteSome pointed comment here....
ReplyDeletehttp://www.aware-simcoe.ca/component/content/article/3737-media.html
The line about an absentee editor sounds like many of our papers
DeleteSome more details here: http://www.simcoe.com/news-story/3846046-sun-media-shuts-down-free-press/
DeleteOnce again, a Metroland competitor benefits from Sun Media mismanagement.
DeleteWell, their masthead does feature a sunset...
ReplyDeleteMidland Free Press site is officially offline and readers are now re-routed to the Orillia Packet & Times.
DeleteI wonder if Stun Media gave Midland a B.S. message about having their town serviced by another "nearby" paper or did the corporate pinheads simply cut and run on yet another community?
I find it funny that we all take so much sincere pleasure in the Sun Media demise. So many poorly thought out plans and then they sit and wonder where all the money went...wow if I could put this story to paper, it would win an Oscar. Boy starts company, gives company to son, who can't manage it, son leaves company, companies dies a slow and painful death, little kid down the block starts paper, takes all the big boys toys and lives happily ever after.
ReplyDeleteI don't know how others feel, but for me it's a matter of pride. I worked my way up through the decades, becoming quite good in my field, only to lose my job due to the incompetence of others.
DeleteMany, many other excellent journalists have also lost their positions because of these bad decisions, leading to a situation where the job market is absolutely flooded. I've sent out 200 applications, gotten five interviews and no offers. Many of these applications are for jobs I could do in my sleep... and I don't even get a call. Too many people applying, thanks largely to Sun Media's contribution to the unemployment rolls.
Call it schaudenfreude, or whatever... I wish nothing but ill for PKP and his band of corporate thugs.
I have not heard our publisher use the quote "I believe in the future of newspapers" in the past three weeks. Maybe corporate has ordered that quote not to be used any more
ReplyDeleteyou mean sales manager, not publisher
ReplyDeletePillars, that's what they are calling them now. Take a team and break it into smaller parts, leave it to higher managers in other cities...sounds like success to me? No communication, no team work equals poor results. If this is what they want at head office, they are getting fantastic results.
ReplyDeleteThe corporate rat bastards strike again - the Meadow Lake Progress closes its doors after 82 years.
ReplyDeleteAt least they got to say goodbye.
http://eedition.meadowlakeprogress.com/doc/Meadow-Lake-Progress/mlpr_062713/2013062701/#2
Like every other newspaper that has been closed up and abandoned, the 82-year-old Meadow Lake Progress has already been removed from the Internet. I'm not sure how far apart these towns are, but when one types in the address for the paper in Meadow Lake, Saskatchewan, they are immediately rerouted to a paper in Cold Lake, Alberta.
ReplyDeleteInteresting tidbit on the Cold Lake Sun website as well:
Under the headline "The Sun is free," readers are advised "Effective immediately, there will be no charge for the Sun newspaper. The only cost will be for shipping, for subscribers outside of Cold Lake and area." Hopefully this isn't a sign that this paper isn't in trouble as well.
Or should I say, I hope the conversion to free distribution in Cold Lake is not a sign the paper is in trouble. I hope my haphazard edit in the above paragraph doesn't make it seem I hope the Cold Lake Sun is in jeopardy (obviously, I don't want to see newspaper people lose their jobs.)
Deletehttp://bigcitylib.blogspot.ca/2013/06/sun-media-shuts-down-three-more.html
ReplyDeleteI see the Stun Media plague is spreading westward.
ReplyDeleteI question how many newspaper jobs in Quebec have been cut or are in jeopardy?
Chatham has a new weekly newspaper starting in July. The Voice will begin publishing and will be hyper-local. Former Chatham Daily News employees have taken up the task of challenging Sun Media. Bravo!
ReplyDeleteYou know, I actually tried to subscribe to my local paper. I got the call centre in God-knows-where, told them I wanted a subscription, waited a good five minutes, then was told there wasn't anyone serving that route in my area. Bam. No route equals no access to paper. I'm not buying it in the store. It's the carelessness, centralizing that is tanking our business. Well, that, along with he-who-cannot-be-named. . .
ReplyDeleteLook for announcements about Sun Media cutting frequency of papers in southwestern Ontario this week and next week
ReplyDeleteif/when this happens expect closures within 1 year readers and now advertisers are fed up with having a product that shows NO COMMUNITY shoved down their throats...guess what they don't like it and they will not buy it. What a sad end to a wonderful communication vehicle.
ReplyDeleteHope this doesn't happen. It will be the end of another community paper, we barely are holding on as is.
Deleteheard a rumour of press room layoffs in London, anyone hear more?
ReplyDeleteHeard they were the group of press men that moved from Sarnia when they closed down. 4 maybe 5 more people that stun media has pushed through the door.
DeleteHow bad did the floods in Toronto impact those who get printed there? Rumour has it papers were delayed for hours but I'm curious to hear from those actually impacted?
ReplyDeleteLong live centralization!
Paper got out in the east but a few hour late but still okay for the most part for our readers and advertisers
Deletemany papers were sent to Mirabel some to London. Papers were up to 16 hours late
ReplyDeleteI heard, what is left of the three Niagara dailies are all being moved into one building.
ReplyDeleteAnd so it starts. Will it be be forerunner to more centralization and more closings?
DeleteSoon it will be one newspaper for the region, read it if you like, but I imagine many will not and the project will end up with closures. Sarnia, Chatham, Woodstock and St.Thomas all could become one...sooner than later. Long live Stun Media. Can any advertisers see what is happening? The readers sure have.
Give your head a shake, 1945. The Standard just moved into a building that is sufficient for its needs, but can't fit more people. What, that paper is going to break its lease after being in the new place for less than a month? The Review and Tribune buildings are just going to sit empty and Sun Media is going to continue paying taxes and utilities on shit holes in undesirable locations?
ReplyDelete10:41 it would not be the first time Sun Media has gone in one direction and suddenly decided to charge course soon after. That just one thing that makes working for this company so frustrating --- the decision-making that is so often followed by "decision-making update Plan B" that usually happens within a short time frame after the original decision
ReplyDeleteAll three Niagara papers are not moving into one building. The Standard building was sold, so they moved. The Review and Tribune buildings are still for sale with no takers so far.
ReplyDeleteAll three papers, contrary to the decade old rumour, are not merging into one paper. As long as all three are still profitable on their own, they'll stay on their own.
big day for sun media again
ReplyDelete'Distribution' at The Standard and The Tribune has been 'out-sourced'. What was left of those employees are gone. Most of the Welland building is unused now. Take it form someone who knows. It's only a matter of time...
ReplyDeleteHeads up... start a new topic now. Here come the mid-year layoffs. Announcements coming soon. This is not a joke.
ReplyDeleteMore layoffs in Niagara apparently.
ReplyDeleteRumour has it the page hub has been closed and pages are to be done in London
More cuts in Niagara. Editors on editing hub in St. Catharines and lone layout/copy editor in Niagara Falls being pink-slipped and told their jobs are now going to be done in London.
ReplyDelete360 jobs cut and 8 papers closing, including 24 H in Ottawa, Calgary and Edmonton. Only one urban paper per market, except Toronto and Montreal. That's 8% of the workforce.
ReplyDeleteDoes anyone have a list of the 11 papers Sun Media is shutting down?
ReplyDeletedo u think It will get to the point where sun media shuts down weeklies that have competition, due to one paper per market?
ReplyDeleteDo you think it will get to the point where Sun Media shuts down to maybe one paper? Or none? Period? Because PKP's beloved SNN pet project didn't get mandatory coverage like he begged for? Or his beloved revival of the Quebec Nordiques falters thanks to the Phoenix Coyotes staying put? Hope that won't ever be the case, but given recent developments ...
ReplyDeleteonly at sun media can you cut 350 people from your staff and the blog got very little traffic.
ReplyDeletea sign of the passing of sun media as it inevitable sails into the sunset by the end of the decade
As a previous anonymous TSF poster said, this blog is only as good as its sources. It appears the majority of the reliable sources it counted on have been laid off, or have taken buyouts, since the blog was launched in 2006. The blog is more in Sun Media death mode in 2013 as we revive it to honour vets who are dying, newspapers that are being shuttered and longtime employees who are being pink-slipped. We will be here until the lights are turned out, traffic or no traffic. That is the least we can do to mark the rise and fall of the Toronto Sun and its siblings and to thank Doug, Peter and Don and the original 62 for making it all possible.
DeleteThe Independent in Petrolia launched today. Respected journalist who once freelanced for Sun before those funds began drying out.
DeleteIn competition with the Sun's Petrolia Topic which has been sliding badly. Wonder if the Independent will publish the Topic's obit soon.
anyone hear any more on layoffs, or paper closures?
ReplyDelete