Indiana Editor Blames Myspace.com Profile for Ouster

By: Joe Strupp Did the top editor at a small Indiana newspaper lose his job because of a Myspace.com profile? He says, "Yes."

"I was given a statement from the publisher and it cited the quality of the paper, which struck me as strange because in the last year we won [more than 27 awards for quality]," said Rich Jackson, who says he was fired as managing editor of The Palladium-Item in Richmond, Ind., on July 17. "It also mentioned a Myspace.com profile. There was content on there they didn't like, but they never said what it was."

Jackson, 40, had run the newsroom for four-and-a-half years prior to his departure. A 12-year Gannett Co. Inc. employee, he had also served as city editor at the company's paper in Lansing, Mich., and worked at other Gannett locations.

He contends that complaints about the paper's quality are unfounded, citing its success in winning 13 awards from the state Associated Press Managing Editors competition, eight Hoosier State Press Association Awards, and six Gannett company prizes. "We won 90 awards total in my time here," he says. "Our Web site has also increased page views by 50% and we successfully switched to a morning single-copy publication, while keeping afternoon delivery."

Jackson believes that the Myspace.com profile played more of a role in his firing, but says company officials will not give him more of an explanation.

Palladium-Item Publisher Pat Doyle did not return phone calls from E&P, while James Keough, vice president/human resources for The Indianapolis Star and all of Gannett's Indiana properties, declined to comment.

"We do not take the posture of commenting on personnel matters," Keough said. Palladium-Item Controller P.J. Blacker and interim managing editor Brian Guth declined comment.

The Myspace.com connection began last fall when the paper created a page on the site to promote stories and work in the Palladium-Item, Jackson said. The page, is still in use. "We hired a young woman at the time who reads stories in the paper and on our site," he recalled, adding that she promotes the stories on the myspace.com page, which also has developed several posting and message areas.

In May, Jackson took his interest in Myspace.com a step further, creating his own profile page, where he began posting poetry, chapters of a novel he had written, and what he described as "humor writing." He also mentioned a song parody, "The Rectal of the Edmund Fitzgerald."

"Some of my humor writing, I admit, is sophomoric," he admitted. The ex-editor claims Gannett officials who fired him mentioned the profile "had some sexual content." But he believes anything sexual on the page came from someone else posting an item.

"I didn't put anything salacious in there," Jackson said. He said he closed down his Myspace.com page and profile in mid-June, a month before his firing. Also, the Palladium-Item's MySpace page did not link to his personal page.

Jackson said the publisher told him the paper had done "an investigation on my computer at work and found that I checked my Myspace messages." He said the paper's ongoing Myspace.com page made such message checks a valid work-related act. "We are supposed to be looking for ways to innovate and here I was exploring this and I get involved and it comes back to bite me," Jackson added.

He did admit that the paper had been put on a Gannett Co. Inc. "Performance Improvement Plan," in an effort to better some elements of the operation after a company review found it lacking in, "real life, real news" stories. But he said that was not noted in the reasons for his firing.

Jackson also believes he was fired, in part, because of the paper's recent investigations into the local Economic Development Corporation, which he says drew complaints from local businesses and civic leaders. The stories included revelations about excessive spending by the EDC and delays on a $25 million dairy that had been announced for the area.

"I think the combination of that and someone disliking the content on my Myspace.com profile caused enough fear," he said.

One of those who complained about the coverage, Jackson contends, is Renee Oldham, executive director of Main Street Richmond, a local non-profit group that promotes business. Jackson said she approached the publisher and hinted that she would try to have him removed.

"That is absolutely ludicrous," Oldham told E&P. She declined to comment on the paper's coverage of the EDC.

Jackson said he has not taken any action against the paper or made any moves to try to get this job back. "I hope to just move on," he said.