Free Republic

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e54Ic1OFpsE&NR=1

One problem with managing a bunch of print journalists is that when you fire them — or cut their budget, or the size of their newspaper — they are still journalists, prone to grumbling about whatever they consider unfair. At the Tribune Company, the grumblers have found an outlet in a blog, Tell Zell, that lets them rip into Sam Zell, the Chicago real estate mogul who took Tribune private last year for $8.2 billion. The blog, set up in May, is mainly an encyclopedia of gripes about cutbacks at The Los Angeles Times, though other Tribune papers, like The...

Tribune Tower is in play. Tribune Co. Chairman Sam Zell told staff today the company is in discussions with "a number of real estate firms" to determine how to generate the most value from the neo-Gothic Michigan Avenue home of the flagship Chicago Tribune, an iconic bookend of the city's Magnificent Mile. The company is also weighing its strategic options concerning the Los Angeles Times' downtown Times Mirror Square complex, another high-profile real estate asset. "When we started this adventure together, I made a point of saying we would challenge traditional thinking, that there would be no sacred cows, and...

Sam Zell vs. The Future Billionaire takeover artist Sam Zell has a problem. It has nothing to do with the financial structure of his proposed takeover of the Tribune Co., or the fact that he openly admits to knowing next to nothing about the newspaper business. No, Zell’s problem is that he seems to be fundamentally opposed to the one thing that could save newspapers like the LA Times. Speaking to a group of Stanford Law School students last week, Zell asked rhetorically: “If all the newspapers in America did not allow Google to steal their content for nothing, what...

The Associated Press Rupert Murdoch and Sam Zell, two media figures who led major newspaper acquisitions in recent months, are among four new members joining the board of directors of The Associated Press, it was announced Monday at the news cooperative's annual meeting. In other results, four incumbent directors were re-elected to three-year terms. They are William Dean Singleton, who is vice chairman and chief executive officer of MediaNews Group and chairman of the AP board; Jon K. Rust, publisher of the Southeast Missourian and co-president of Rust Communications; Michael E. Reed, chief executive officer of GateHouse Media Inc.,...

Tribune Company newspapers like The Los Angeles Times and The Chicago Tribune will quickly cut costs — by printing fewer papers and employing fewer journalists — top company executives said on Thursday. Samuel Zell, the chairman and chief executive of Tribune, and Randy Michaels, the company’s chief operating officer, revealed the cuts during a conference call with Wall Street analysts. They also said the struggling company has looked at the column inches of news produced by each reporter, and by each paper’s news staff. Finding wide variation, they said, they have concluded that it could do without a large number...

Rupert Murdoch and Sam Zell, two media figures who led major newspaper acquisitions in recent months, are among four new members joining the board of directors of The Associated Press, it was announced Monday at the news cooperative's annual meeting. In other results, four incumbent directors were re-elected to three-year terms. They are William Dean Singleton, who is vice chairman and chief executive officer of MediaNews Group and chairman of the AP board; Jon K. Rust, publisher of the Southeast Missourian and co-president of Rust Communications; Michael E. Reed, chief executive officer of GateHouse Media Inc., and Victor F. Ganzi,...

Just passing along what I was told this morning from a possibly good source — no confirmation, no independent reporting, no warranty implied. But my contact travels in the right circles to have picked up the scent and reports hearing from "three excellent sources (all with first hand information)" that David Geffen is in talks with Sam Zell to buy the Los Angeles Times from Tribune. The talks are serious enough, my source hears, that the moguls may have been close to a deal last week. For what it's worth.

Since taking control of the Tribune Company in December, Sam Zell has drawn a lot of attention in journalism circles for speeches laced with profanity, political incorrectness, insults and self-deprecating humor. But all the twittering and tut-tutting over Mr. Zell’s remarks — and his suggestions that some reporting jobs are not needed — masks a more serious concern. With the newspaper industry going through an unexpectedly sharp contraction, Tribune is struggling under $12.8 billion in debt, and its financial condition has deteriorated, creating what specialists say is a very real risk of credit default in the next year or so....

Tribune Co. plans to cut 400 to 500 jobs companywide, including about 100 each at the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times, the company announced Wednesday. The cuts, which amount to about 2 percent of the Chicago-based media company's workforce, are a necessary response to a weak economy and "significant declines in advertising volume at our newspapers," Tribune Company Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Sam Zell said in a memo to employees. "Unfortunately, I can't turn this ship from its course of the past 10 years within just a few months," said Zell, who took the company private in an...

The comment about some of his best friends going to gentlemen’s clubs was separate from the above line. That came earlier in the talk, when saying that when he learned of the ban on running ads from the clubs, he was stunned because “some of my best friends go to gentlemen’s clubs.” The un-American comment came later, in reference to advertising guns, to which he said hunting is American … and somehow made the leap to the above comment. He believes that the Times needs to go after advertising from gun manufacturers and the Indian casinos. . . . At...

Topic: Memos Sent to Romenesko Date/Time: 1/22/2008 1:02:54 PM Title: Zell removes the Internet filters Posted By: Jim Romenesko Memo to Tribune employees from Sam Zell From: Talk to Sam Sent: Tue 1/22/2008 11:03 AM Subject: Censorship, the First Amendment and the Fourth Estate Everyone, I learned on the first leg of our tour of Tribune's business units that some of them were filtering Internet content. I do not see how a member of the Fourth Estate, dedicated to protecting the First Amendment, can censor what its own employees and partners can see. I have instructed that all content filters...

Departing L.A. Times editor Jim O'Shea addressed the newsroom this morning and reiterated that he was pushed out and did not quit. He also criticized Tribune's priorities, and said that — like every suit Tribune sent here before him except Publisher David Hiller, incidentally — he came to the conclusion while in L.A. that the best future strategy is to grow the Times not shrink it. From: OShea, James Sent: Monday, January 21, 2008 10:53 AM To: yyeditall Subject: I made these farewell remarks in the newsroom today and I wanted to share them with everyone in case they took...

Liberators and Defenders

Chicago (AP) -- Real estate magnate Sam Zell took control of newly private Tribune Co. on Thursday and began shaking up the newspaper and TV company the moment the $8.2 billion buyout he led closed, reshuffling the board, naming two top executives and promising more action ahead. Taking on the CEO's role as well as chairman, Zell made clear he won't hesitate to make sweeping changes at the media conglomerate even though he has no previous experience in the industry. He signaled he has no immediate asset sales in mind at the company that owns 23 television stations and nine...

Relief was palpable in Tribune Tower on Friday. Clear victories, after all, have been few in Tribune Co.'s long, star-crossed struggle to restructure itself amid the worst financial crisis the newspaper industry has ever faced. But even as the Federal Communications Commission granted exemptions Friday that should allow real estate magnate Sam Zell to finally close his $8.2 billion deal to take the Chicago-based media conglomerate private, sources close to Tribune acknowledged that closing the transaction may prove to be the easy part. With indications that the economy is teetering on the brink of recession and several of Tribune's key...

Property magnate to buy LA Times Sam Zell sold his company for $36bn last year The owner of the Los Angeles Times and other US newspapers has agreed to be bought by real estate magnate Sam Zell.Mr Zell, who sold his own property firm last year, won the $8.2bn (£4.14bn) bidding war for Tribune Corporation and will become its largest shareholder. He beat off fierce competition from businessmen Eli Broad and Ron Burkle, who also bid for the firm's assets. The US newspaper industry has been suffering from falling sales and advertising revenues in recent years. Ownership kudos Tribune...

LANCASTER - "Moral scurvy" is weakening America, retired U.S. senator Zell Miller said Friday at a fundraising dinner for Desert Christian Schools. "As a country we're dying and we don't even know it," he said. "We're drowning and we don't feel it." The majority of Miller's talk focussed on Christian faith and the role of Christians and Christian education in the life and welfare of America. "There's a war being fought," he said. "Not just the war in the Middle East - a war for our children's souls." "It has been said, if you want to change the world you...

Since I last stood -- Thank you very much. Since I last stood in this spot, a whole new generation of the Miller Family has been born: Four great grandchildren. Along with all the other members of our close-knit family -- they are my and Shirley's most precious possessions. And I know that's how you feel about your family also. Like you, I think of their future, the promises and the perils they will face. Like you, I believe that the next four years will determine what kind of world they will grow up in. And like you, I...

Another Video for my FR friends, From the only Democrat (currently living) That I respect.