“The decision by Sun-Times Newspaper Group to eliminate its entire photography staff, with its 500 or so collective years of professional experience, has everyone wondering what could possibly justify such a move,” Dan Mitchell writes for Fortune. “Is it union-busting? A way to squeeze profits out of a rapidly sinking business? A genuine, if seemingly clueless, attempt to shed a fusty ‘old media’ image and forge ahead into the glorious digital future? Sadism?”
Mitchell writes, “It could actually be a combination of any or all of those things. The newspaper’s executives have been mostly mum, but their public statement was all about ‘forging ahead.’ Here’s that statement in full: ‘The Sun-Times business is changing rapidly and our audiences are consistently seeking more video content with their news. We have made great progress in meeting this demand and are focused on bolstering our reporting capabilities with video and other multimedia elements. The Chicago Sun-Times continues to evolve with our digitally savvy customers, and as a result, we have had to restructure the way we manage multimedia, including photography, across the network.'”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Welcome to television, circa 1990, Chicago Sun-Times. Better late than never, we guess, but maybe 23 years is a bit too late?
Did you know that, even in local TV (UHF stations, even), until around the mid-90s there were local commercial “writer/producers” who did not shoot or edit video at all, but relied on staff photogs and editors to shoot and edit (analog A/B roll, no less) their spots? Same for local TV news reporters. The look on their faces when they were told to learn how to shoot and edit or find a new line of work was either priceless or painful, depending on your perspective. If you were already doing it all for half the pay, it was mostly the former, we can assure you. The next wave of producers and TV reporters knew how to, and did, it all. They still do. And the end product was better and faster because producers who know what can be done with the equipment doesn’t waste time on impossibilities and instead writes and produces with full knowledge of what needs to be done, how long it will take, and how to do it.
Yes, it’s too bad that the era of specialization is largely over, but, after a shakeout, we expect newspapers will find what TV discovered long ago: Yes, there are good “one-man bands,” but your old non-shooting reporters likely aren’t among them. The product will suck for awhile, but then new blood will arrive and the few quick learners with talent already on staff will bloom and together they’ll raise the quality to acceptable levels. In the meantime, get ready for some awful photography in the Chicago Sun-Times.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Fred Mertz” and “Tayster” for the heads up.]
Nobody reads the Sun-times anyway, the Tribune is the paper of note in Chicago.
I disagree with MDN’s take, the news is not better today than it was twenty years ago, quite the opposite actually. Locally produced commercials still stink in most cases.
No, you don’t disagree with MDN’s Take.
MDN said “acceptable levels,” not “better today than it was twenty years ago.”
And, if local commercials “still stink,” in your opinion, then there was no great loss when local TV producers were called upon to do it all.
Shortsighted thinking on their part.
Wow! For simple stuff OK. Sports photography? Will they get some sort of telephoto lenses? I’m not saying it is a direct replacement but they need something more than just the naked iPhone. I like the iPhone camera but I also have a nice Canon DSLR with good lenses for times when I need quality pictures. Probably they will rely on independent photographers and buy their photos as needed like Peter Parker.
The world is moving toward the contractoresque Peter Parker model which translates to: “We don’t want full time staff that we have to pay benefits to.” I’m sorry but not everyone is a born photographer nor will just anyone get those special shots for the ages. “Good enough” is our culture accepting mediocrity more and more as the norm.
When you gotta cut costs, “good enough” becomes the way of getting things done.
Let’s see you have a PC and a Droid in your arsenal, just good enough.
But, what about Andy and his Droid?.
“Yes, it’s too bad that the era of specialization is largely over…”
I don’t see how that can be true – unless you are satisfied with lowest-common-demominator drivel. Imagine if Ive had to also be program his interfaces, or design the chip in the computer. Or an excellent copywriter also has to know how to do four-color separation AND become a good designer AND implement the marketing campaign AND take sales calls.
Not sure but I think they’re referring here to the changing landscape of media production…
Buy your photos? You must be joking? Independent photographers are expected to provide photos free to the local rag in Norwich UK. They sacked their staff photogs last year or even the year before….. They say a picture speaks a thousand words, yet they keep the hacks and sack the toggies…..
Interesting vernacular…fun and easy to decrypt.
Yup. When “good enough” becomes the standard everyone suffers because the standards are lowered so much. In the beginning of my career I got more than a bit of my work from people and companies who thought they could do it well enough to pass for professional.
It’s the same in most industries. Print design in the 90s was no different. And the eyesore crap that gets published now is far more plentiful than before pros the with design backgrounds were marginalized and priced out of the market because expectations had been lowered.
Can you imagine what Apple’s products and marketing would look like if they let the secretary do the design work because the software was cheap and ubiquitous?
It’s the 21st century. I think they should join us.
What’s so 21st century about not having professional photographers? Oh, yeh, silly me… Twitter, Facebook, inane blogs by everyone and their dog… you’re right.
Chicago Symphony Orchestra fires it’s conductor and lets the audience conduct the orchestra.
You’re not thinking 21st century enough. Fire all those poncy, elitist, professional musicians. Ask for volunteers from the audience.
Synchronized iPods!
Exactly. Anyone can just wave their arms about, nothing special there…
So, the paper has decided to become a “throw-away” newspaper. Managers often forget that they need to convince their readers to pay for their paper on a daily bases.
While I’m on the subject, Hey MDN editors, my daughter can do your job!
The owners also suggested that DJs perform all songs live on the radio instead of using the real tracks because who needs Bob Dylan when you can have Cranston Snord’s rendition on his Wal-Mart guitar?
OK, I love my iPhone and the snap shots that take with, but I don’t delude myself that they are as good as a those from a skilled photographer using top end gear.
I will be surprised if the Sun-Times even exists in five years. Decisions like this one only show this paper is about finished.
So, the Sun-Times is the Android of newspapers.
I hope the Sun Times readers appreciate Selfies.
America continues its slide into mediocrity.
So, now the Sun Times becomes almost completely outsourced. Humans are just recources to be tossed about and augmented or depleted as required by the ability of the money changers to force a profit off of their swill…
FU** YOU. Here’s hoping you dry up and blow away in your Murdoch business model.
The Sun Times has just entered a cost-cutting death spiral. If their reporters are little better then bloggers with iPhones, then what do we need the Sun Times for when we can just listen to the bloggers directly?
A newspaper publishing company I worked for as a photo editor made a decision to eliminate the entire photo department for all three of their newspapers, making the “reporters” shoot the pics. They wound up with a bunch of grip ‘n grins and extremely mediocre photos, as well as crappy color post production and 4-color separations, since none of the reporters had a clue about photoshop. They lost all their advertising photo sub-contract work. They lost most of their readers, since the photographers had actually been better at gathering all the info on the stories than the reporters in the first place. When they cut corners further by switching formats to a tabloid layout and lost most of their subscribers, the entire, previously profitable newspaper publisher panicked and again scrambled to find relevancy by focusing on advertising, with maybe one or two stories, and a bunch of business stories as filler, rewarding their advertisers with pseudo-advertisements disguised as real news stories. The last straw before they folded was to simply mail the publications (former city newspapers) out to certain zip codes for free… essentially junk mail. Even their advertisers realized that reaching mailboxes in what had become junk mail wasn’t the same as reaching eyeballs of readers who read the paper for the local content and actual news. This outfit, once an actual respected part of the news media had reduced itself to a pile of ashes, like the dinosaurs. Readers aren’t stupid. Today, yes, there is instant delivery, but for readers to return, even to websites that consider themselves a bastion of journalism, reporters still have to understand what makes a story worth reading, have a reasonable understanding of what they write about, know how to write (put a complete, cogent paragraph together,) avoid the asinine misspellings so common today… and compelling images which complement and enhance the story still have to come from somewhere…
…or, at least they used to.
Maybe the Chicago S/T will survive in this age of more quantity, more volume, more gossip/entertainment, less research/fact checking, instant gratification (with little staying power, however,) and often incoherent writing with no true photojournalism… but it’s a sad world if this becomes the norm where we accept more noise in exchange for less real information.
MDN’s take is dumb multiplied by the largest number you can think of.
Just because you use an Apple product to make your product doesn’t mean your product is any good. Sure it’s a sale for Apple (and don’t those short term stockholders love that?), but don’t ever confuse that with making good products yourself.
Really, really, really stupid.
In other news, Chicago Hope Hospital fired all its doctors. Orderlies can do brain surgery “well enough,” management said. “It is elitism to claim that anybody has any special skills or talents that would allow them to perform any task better than an amateur.” This news followed the decision by the Chicago City Council to eliminate the fire department so that homeowners can handle their own fire.suppression. As one councilman observed, “The business of government is to cut taxes, not provide services. In the 21st century, we can’t afford specialization.”
… News photographers do more than compliment the story. The best of photojournalism often tells *another* story of the same event – sometimes more compelling than the print. Often times, in fact. As we reflect upon such events as the Watergate saga, say – what do we most remember? Its images (such as those from the committee hearings where David Douglas Duncan – as just one photographer – filled a huge, coffee table book with them) – or the individual paragraphs of Woodward and Bernstein? And for those a little older, what fills your head when you think of Vietnam? The print coverage? The very same can be said of events far more current. The Chicago Sun-Times doesn’t get that. Or worse … care.
I am thinking quadcopter and a reporter is all you need.
Yes but to fire the entire staff?
I agree that the iPhone camera is good but there is no mobile camera today not will there ever be that can replace a real system camera. If you don’t want a shoe box as a mobile phone.