So, Lileks, didja get your dead tree version, or what?

No offence, but the online version of the newspaper downright sucks in most all areas.

I have a friend that works at the Strib, and she says that they arent even allowing expensing papers for in-the-field reporters to check their own work. So, bascaily, a reporter sends in his story, and has no idea how its been edited, changed, or if any errors have creeped in.

where did the britney baby drop thread disappear to?

Did someone realize all of you morons were commenting on a tabloid story that did not exist in the AP or news.google.com but took it as truth anyways?

caguru

This is not news, this is FARK.

Where DID that thread go?? I was enjoying it!

Birds of all species find the Strib too awful to use as cage liner. Fifty cents is WAY too much to spend on it.

for some things, the e-version just isn't a suitable replacement for print.

I can attest that trying to read the sports section on a laptop in the crapper can be quite awkward.

Hey - anyone else just get kicked out of the Brit-Baby-wit -the-broken-head thread? I was in there and then it said I'm a liter and was no longer alowed to listen to the TFer blather.

/feels used and dirty

Ack! It's been deFarkified!

Let's just use this thread. It was only created as Lileks bait anyway. Here Lileks, Lileks, Lileks.

/Lileks baiting
//"O'Lileks?"

///Babies are slippery. However, mine makes it to 12 months last month and I have yet to drop her! For her first birthday it is tradition in my tribe to leave her on the side of the mountain with a satchel of beefjerky, The Essential Fantastic Four, a diet Coke and a .45.

well, let's continue the britanny thread here.

on-topic: did this britanny news come out in print?

susieloveselvisp "This is not news, this is FARK."

yeah, i know, but fishing from tabloids is boring.

As Publisher Keith Moyer said then, taking advantage of electronic distribution is a way we can save a considerable sum of money while still providing employees with a complete newspaper every day for personal use.

The transition has gone very smoothly and I thank all of you for your part in that. There has been one unfortunate and unacceptable byproduct of the switch - employees are stealing print copies from the vending boxes that we placed throughout our buildings as a convenience for those who still want a print copy.

Employer steals from employees by eliminating longtime, standing employee benefit. Employees fight back by taking their free papers anyway.

Employer complains, even though 59% of papers are still paid for.

Note to vice president pinhead who wrote this article: You can't read a computer screen in the john. You're the same type of corporate nimrod that wants to eliminate unpaid sick time.

waste301: feels used and dirty

The modmins be wielding belaying pins on the H.M.S. Farky today. Yarrr.

I worked at a newspaper once, in the little shiat-hole logging town of Longview, WA. And they gave everyone a paper who wanted one, every day. We're talking about 100 newspapers here, with a grand retail value of maybe $50.

The Star-Trib must be the biggest cheapskate employer of all time. I wonder if they charge for toilet paper in the bathrooms?

Pioneer Press > Star Tribune anyday. Plus it's cheaper.

Somehow I think "online version" training my puppy is not going to be desirable...

What will they make hats out of when the pulitzers are announced Monday? I guess it's possible they won't win any.

Newpaper publishing profits are still obscene compared to industry averages. This is really sad.

As I've said before, it's awkward to use a laptop while taking a dump.

boo! the only thing lamer than taking away free papers from the people that frackin' WRITE THEM is complaining when they lift some from the newsstand.

it's called "the cost of doing business" -- I'll pay for my papers if I can invoice them for the wear & tear on my shoes tracking down their frackin' stories.

/writes for a paper
//not the Star-Tribune
///gets free copies

The Red Star/Tribune blows, smart people read the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Well, they did, but now the Red Star owns the Pioneer Press, so I bet they'll destroy the PiPress too.

Does the star have disapering front page stories like Fark?

/at least three today.

I get the paper delivered to my house, and I pay for it, too. Seems the right thing to do, since that's how the customers go about it. Don't like online newspapers, and I think the new policy is . . . amusing, but it has one nice side effect: it's gradually eliminated the gigantic mudslides of old papers that usually sit six feet thick on most reporter's desks, which are already messy heaps of unread PR crap, faxes, unwanted books and the rest, all dusted with a fine powder of bitterness and silverfish feces.

/bait worked!

The Strib sucks for anything but basic, local news. It also does a nice job of sitting in the recycling bin.

///Babies are slippery. However, mine makes it to 12 months last month and I have yet to drop her! For her first birthday it is tradition in my tribe to leave her on the side of the mountain with a satchel of beefjerky, The Essential Fantastic Four, a diet Coke and a .45.
Dad? Why diet Dad? Why torture me? My skull may be perfectly round and dentless but my battered sense of self worth and beaten down anger management is only appeased by the deadly accuracy of my blue steel .45. Dad, I'll be home for Easter to see if you are the Messiah. Have dehydrated treats ready, I'll bring the sci-fi movies.

Yeah, St. Paul Pioneer Press is way better. The Strib has an agenda, and pushes it hard. I don't even necessarily disagree with a lot of what they're preaching, but the fact is, when I read the paper, I don't want to be preached to. And their editorial section is downright wacky.

The pioneer press is pretty much just a good ol' newspaper. It reads like a newspaper, and nothing more. Too bad it's been gobbled up by the parent company of the Strib. Soon it will be nixed, and our only option will be that crap out of Minneapolis.

OMF!

Hey Lileks, remember that part of "The Gallery of Regrettable Food," when you showed that pot roast and said it looked gross?

That was awesome.

Hey Lileks. What are you doing wasting your time here. You should be out finding a publisher for Joe.

you show me how to make a pirate's hat out of an online newspaper and I'll show you an asshat who took away longstanding benefits and needs a kick in the nads.

illuminix: Too bad it's been gobbled up by the parent company of the Strib. Soon it will be nixed, and our only option will be that crap out of Minneapolis.

Anti-trust laws will force the Strib's parent company to sell the Pioneer Press.

They should just print the electronic version on the office printers and see how well that goes over. :)

- the Hun

They probably feel they're entitled to it. Can'texpect anything different when you employ communists.

A guy pimping the local paper would have essentially paid me $8.something to get the paper delivered for 3 months. It was a dollarsomething for the subscription and I'd get a $10 Home Depot card immediately. I was walking into Home Depot at the time so it was an appealing offer. I was about to go for it when I thought about having to throw out all that paper every day. If I got it, I'd read half a dozen articles and the comics then toss the rest in the trash. (We don't have separate recycling bins here. Recycling is separated from trash by the waste management specialists after pickup.) Talk about wasteful. :P

"I told ya. We haven't had any papers go missing."
"But are ya sure? 'Cause I mean, how do you know? Do you do a count, or what kind of a routine do you have here?"
[growing uncomfortable with this questioning] "Maam, I answered your question!!"
"I'm sorry, sir?"
"Maam, I answered your question. I answered the darned...I'm cooperatin' here!"
"Sir, you have no call to get snippy with me, I'm just doing my job here."
"I'm...I'm not arguing here! I'm cooperating. So there's no need to...we're doin' all we can here."
"Sir, could I talk to Mr. Gustafson?"
[Jerry gives her a glassy-eyed look, knowing full well that he's now dead]
"Mr. Lundegaard?"

They still print newspapers?

Ooh ooh...I cant believe I'm going to get an actual legitimate opportunity to say this, but here it goes...

I work for the Star Tribune.

So I am really getting a kick out of these replies.

Some of you guys are very good at making it sound like you know what you are talking about.

But trust me....(dang!) I guess that's all I can use, because that's exactly the message that showed up on our extranet this morning.

As someone that walked by the free copies for several years wondering why anyone would actually pick one up when all of the news was already on the Web site, I find it incomprehensible that someone would risk their job to steal a $.25 paper.

In further cost-savings effors, employee batheroom breaks will be replaced with the online version...

I should also note, that soon after the change I noticed that some people have been printing out articles to bring them into the john with them.

1. Jesus, does it really take so long for you to take care of your business that you cant bear to do it without something to read.

2. These have always been printed in full color off of our most expensive printer (so much for your grand savings plan)

I have worked for 5 dif. newspapers. I'm a designer. I use the print version as archive of my work, (which will never be put online) and to keep clippings. I DO feel like it's my employers' obligation to supply me with a free print version of my work. It's rediculous for them not to.
so there. :)

Lileks wept.

Lileks
/bait worked!

Next time, Glue Traps!

I work for a newspaper, though not one as large as the Strib. We get free papers on the days we work as well -- it's actually touted as a benefit here.

I'm amazed at this move. Why? Because I know if our paper were to pull this stunt, it would be to encourage/force the employees to subscribe and pull circ numbers up - not to encourage use of the online product.

/Hi, Lileks! :)
//please mention us in your Bleat!

Their online paper sucks. I like how they encourage their employees to rat each other out.

I'm not in the biz anymore, but if I had a picture printed in a magazine, and I asked for a dozen copies, in the mail I would get a dozen free shrink- wrapped copies. Are those days over, too? And if I was in any paper's newsroom, I'd take a paper at least as a courtesy, to show I'm interested in what they're doing.

They should just print the electronic version on the office printers and see how well that goes over. :)

- the Hun

You think we don't?
-Anonymous strib employee

I've worked at papers from the Arctic Sounder (Barrow, Alaska) to the Surrey Advertiser (Guildford, England) to the Baltimore Sun and the Washington Post and always got as many papers w/ copies of my articles as I wanted.

But that said, I am sympathetic to the paperless office. Gawd, I well remember the 6-foot mudslides of papers, with mouse dropping decoration ...

And the Coffee-Matics with a thick baked sludge of Science Experiment biohazard on the hot plates ...

/ good times!

As someone that walked by the free copies for several years wondering why anyone would actually pick one up when all of the news was already on the Web site, I find it incomprehensible that someone would risk their job to steal a $.25 paper.

The barometer measures both ways. If my employer would actually fire me over taking a $.25 newspaper - just the idea that I'd be that poorly valued there - I'd definitely haul my ass to one who would treat me better.

Newspapers get circulation credit for the employee's free newspaper, even for those that do not get read.
They are getting credit for the electronic edition as well. Plus, they get to count the copies the employee's buy. Talk about a sweet deal... Eat _THAT_ ABC

There are 'service' copies for employees who need to read the newspaper as part of their job. So that part about reporters not getting a copy is bull....

/works for the strib...
/really getting a kick our of some of these replies...
/some of you guys are very good at making it sound like you know what you are talking about...

Newspapers have to count free papers differently for ABC than their "paid circulation".

I do not know how the accounting is handled for pilferage, particularly for pilferage from the vending boxes in the Strib building. Do the "stolen" papers count as paid circulation?

Curiously enough, the Strib was giving away *free* papers in my local grocery store last weekend.

Free newspaper guy: "Would you like a free copy of the Star-Tribune?"

Me: "Free paper? Heck yeah."

Him: "How often do you buy the Star-Tribune?"

Me: "I don't buy it. I read it online for free (lies--I don't even read it online, I just wanted to goad him)."

Him: "Do you like Sunday papers? There are a lot of things in the Sunday paper that aren't available online..."

Me: "No."

/OK, kinda pointless.
//But at least I got to be on the same thread as Lileks!

And I got to follow Max, whose profile says he owns THREE liquor stores. This thread has now achieved perfection.