Oh the sad reality of journalism

As I write this, the Democrat and Chronicle is in the midst of lay people off. Chances are sports will have some cut backs, it always does.

Personally I have a few friends from college working there. It's a fine paper and their work is a reason for it. However as the saying goes, last one in; first one out. Hopefully, this won't be the point.

Turnover and reducing staffs are a huge trend in media. My mentor, Mark Gruba, was not resigned this summer at WHEC, which to me was a sad thing to see. Nothing against Robin DeWind, but Gruba was the kind of guy who worked hard every night for that station and taught me many lessons about television journalism. Sports is a dispensable department now as people want more weather reports from their local affiliate.

Radio Stations suffer the same fate. Apart from being replaced by XM and Sirius, radio stations are all about selling, selling and more selling. While interning at WHTK, the name of the game was having more ads, especially live ads done by the main talent. Clearchannel is a great company in that they care more about selling ads than giving me money for parking. This is not a bitch out since I worked there five days a week for a semester for free. The least they could do was pony up four bucks a day to pay for Midtown Parking.

The fact remains, the media is on thin ice. While this country loves tuning into CNN or ESPN for universal coverage, everyone underneath is being crushed by tightened budgets and reduced staff. There is a disease spreading over local and smaller media. We need journalism for journalism sake. No more need to watch talking heads on ESPN speculate opinion after opinion. Local coverage such as the Scholar Athlete or interviews with local high school or collegiate athletes brings journalism back to its purest forms.

Let's try to save local media, buy a D&C and watch the evening sportscast people!