Gannett Editors React to Corporate Convergence Directive

By: Joe Strupp Gannett Co. Inc.'s plan to shift all of its newspapers to 24-hour converged newsrooms has prompted predictions of everything from smaller print papers to more Pulitzer Prize notice among editors at some of the 89 dailies the company owns.

Gannett editors who spoke with E&P about the planned program, revealed late last week, welcomed the approach, saying it was time for every newspaper to use the Web more. But most admitted it would take a marked change in approach.

"We are restructuring our entire newsroom," said Jon Broadbooks, editor of The Observer-Dispatch in Utica, N.Y. "You are going to work differently, shift people around, or [shift] hours, and make sure that this is important." He said he had already expanded Web site use, noting an increase in daily updates online from about three last January to an average of 12-15 each day today.

The Gannett initiative, titled the "Information Project," is requiring each newsroom to submit a plan for a fully 24-hour converged newsroom by mid-November, editors said. Most will be implemented by next May.

Three Gannett papers -- the Des Moines (IA) Register; The Argus Leader in Sioux Falls, S.D.; and Florida Today in Melbourne, Fla. -- have been implementing the approach in recent months as test sites.

Des Moines editor Carolyn Washburn said the changes have included more online databases, from election information to local events calendars, with added staff as well. "The biggest challenge has been workflow," she told E&P. "Everyone is trying to figure out how to balance [demands]."

Karen Magnuson, editor of the Rochester (N.Y.) Democrat and Chronicle, said her newsroom also began shifting priorities in the past year, basically eliminating its online department and shifting pieces of it to the main newsroom and advertising departments. "It is all about a mindset and a culture," Magnuson, who is president of Associated Press Managing Editors, said. "For many years we were focused on putting out a print product. But as circulation of the print product declines, people are looking to get their information differently."

Paul Anger, editor of the Detroit Free Press, cited his paper's recent success with coverage of the Detroit Tigers in the World Series. He noticed then that Web traffic was reaching record highs. "It is a way for us to grab the future," said Anger, noting he had bloggers at each World Series game and more fan online interaction. "It is what we ought to be doing."

But Anger admitted his newsroom still had to do more to make it a 24-hour news source. "We are working on the weekend and night times," he said of staffing assignments. "We are working for an expansion of updating [the Web site] when most people use the web, which is early morning and before they head home." He said job descriptions could change as well as the size of the paper.

"It could be a combination of using less space in the printed newspaper," he said. "Making sure you are producing the content that people want to use. You may kill fewer trees."

Dennis Ryerson, editor of The Indianapolis Star, agreed. "Are we filling space with wire stories just because we have the space to fill?" he said. "Newspapers need to look at consolidating sections. There are some things that we have been doing that maybe we don't need to do."

Ryerson saw a definite impact on assignments and staff priorities. "Consumers don't want news when it is convenient for us," he stressed. "We can continue everything as we have in the past and die or we can survive by providing more content to more readers when they want it."

At the Home News Tribune in East Brunswick, N.J., Executive Editor Charles Paolino predicted an earlier workday for many staffers. "Most activity now is 4 or 5 O'clock in the afternoon, but I can see a few people being here quite early in the morning," he said. "One of the biggest changes will be organizing when we go to work."

But he said it is also an overall approach that looks at Web and print together. "We are pretty much operating most newsrooms as though it were 1956," he said. "We are living in an environment where people are used to getting information right away."

Broadbooks in Utica said one of the positive results could be more notice of major packages and investigations. "I think it is causing us to approach First Amendment projects in a way that gets them more attention online," he said. "If we are going to plan a project, let's plan it online first and then for print."