During a three-hour staff meeting Thursday, Texas Tribune leadership revealed that budget overestimates for the year had propelled the company to institute its first-ever layoffs.
The Tribune — a nonprofit newsroom that has been covering Texas politics and policy issues since 2009 — first announced layoffs Wednesday, cutting 11 people including several longtime journalists and the outlet’s entire copy desk. Those cuts shocked staff and outside observers, many of whom had come to view the Tribune as a beacon of stability in a struggling industry.
Newsroom executives told staff Thursday that the layoffs would save the Tribune $1.1 million, according to several people who attended the meeting. For three hours, staff grilled leaders about their decision to institute layoffs, with some employees growing visibly emotional as they spoke. Executives said that they had considered other options, including buyouts and furloughs, but decided those would be insufficient and hinder severance packages. Both CEO Sonal Shah and editor-in-chief Sewell Chan will take 10% pay cuts.
For years, the Tribune had been able to turn a profit, growing both its staff and budget. This year, however, the Tribune overbudgeted when it planned for 10% revenue growth, leadership said at the meeting. Revenue is currently pacing down roughly 5% compared to this time last year.
Tribune leaders said they do not expect any more layoffs in the foreseeable future. In a statement posted to the Tribune website after the meeting, Shah revealed that the company would invest in its sponsorship and development teams. She also wrote that the outlet was putting two of its podcasts on hiatus.
“Since the beginning, we’ve shared the lessons we’ve learned as the Tribune was being built. One is that the Texas Tribune is not immune to external forces,” Shah wrote. “We don’t get to opt out of the realities of an unsteady economy, an evolving media industry, the pressures of technology or the world in which we’re operating in. No Texas exceptionalism here.”
Staff at the Tribune have organized a GoFundMe for their laid off colleagues. The fund, which was started Wednesday evening with a $2,000 goal, had raised more than $17,000 less than a day later.
By Angela Fu, media business reporter
CNN 24/7 channel coming to Max streaming service
CNN+ is dead. Long live CNN Max.
Starting Sept. 27, CNN is jumping back into the streaming game with a 24-hour channel on Max, parent company Warner Bros. Discovery’s streaming service.
The channel will feature new programming built specifically for the streaming audience, including news shows with Jim Acosta, Rahel Solomon, Amara Walker, Fredricka Whitfield and Jim Sciutto.
Additionally, the streaming channel will occasionally feature segments from the network report, including “Anderson Cooper 360” and “The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer.”
Variety originally reported the plan on Wednesday, followed by a Thursday announcement from the network.
The plus sign is gone, but CNN’s previous foray into streaming looms over the move. CNN+, the cable news network’s short-lived streaming app that quickly became a media punchline after folding weeks after its launch last year, was a casualty of the network’s tumultuous business tides.
CNN+, as Poynter’s senior media writer Tom Jones recounted during the app’s downfall, was a pet project of ousted CNN CEO Jeff Zucker. The app floundered with lagging subscriber numbers in early days, and was an easy kill after parent company WarnerMedia merged with Discovery, now in charge of the network.
In the time since the Warner Bros. Discovery merger, HBO Max became Max, bundling all of the subsidiary brands into one service and mashing together prestige documentaries and voyeuristic TLC reality shows. That structure, with its built-in subscribers, could provide a fighting chance for CNN Max. But there’s no telling if viewers will switch over to Wolf Blitzer from “90 Day Fiance.”
It seems like a lot of fanfare for something NBCUniversal has been doing for months with MSNBC, CNBC and NBC News over at its streaming service Peacock.
By Annie Aguiar, audience engagement producer
ESPN gets Sharpe
Former NFL star Shannon Sharpe is going from debating Skip Bayless on FS1 to debating Stephen A. Smith on ESPN’s “First Take.” Smith announced on Thursday’s “First Take” that Sharpe will join the show on Mondays and Tuesdays starting Sept. 4.
Sharpe spent seven years on FS1’s “Undisputed,” but left in June. On Sharpe’s final show, he thanked Bayless, tearing up and saying he was “forever indebted” to him. Meanwhile, Bayless complimented Sharpe for being a “worthy adversary.”
But their relationship had deteriorated in the recent months and many predicted they were headed for a breakup. After a very public clash discussing the collapse of Buffalo Bills player Damar Hamlin, Sharpe skipped a show and then the two argued again on the air after his return — an argument that seemed more personal than their usual made-for-TV, embrace-debate format. That episode appeared to be the beginning of the end for the two co-hosts.
By the summer, Sharpe wanted out and he negotiated a buyout with FS1.
By Tom Jones, senior media writer
‘Wrinkles should merely indicate where the smiles have been’
After 10 years at Poynter, I’ve had all sorts of notable meetings, interviews and run-ins with journalists. None of them will ever match — in peculiarity and impact — my first and only brush with Mike Randall, the longtime features reporter for WKBW-TV in Buffalo, New York.
Randall was the guest speaker at my high school graduation ceremony. I don’t remember if the school didn’t warn us or if I just wasn’t paying attention, but Randall spoke not about his journalism or his career. He did not offer pearls of wisdom gleaned from decades on the job. Instead, he donned a disheveled wig and white linen suit, lit up a cigar and — to the amazement of everyone in a gown and tassel — warned of the dangers of education … as Mark Twain.
Turns out, Randall has been performing as Twain for half a century. He’ll continue to do so even as he retires from WKBW this week after 40 years at the station. Buffalo News TV critic Alan Pergament rounded up some of Randall’s top moments, but I’ll always remember him as a man who, in appearing onstage as somebody else, taught me a valuable lesson about being myself.
By Ren LaForme, managing editor
Media tidbits and links for your weekend review
- Former President Donald Trump was booked in Georgia last night on racketeering charges. We’ll have more on this in the coming days but, if you’re really interested, check out this newsletter about the State of Georgia v. Donald J. Trump from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
- Speaking of, it’s Eamon Whalen from Mother Jones with “Trump’s Arrest Is a Reminder Mugshots Are Bad.”
- Fox News had good ratings for Wednesday night’s Republican presidential debate, surpassing most expectations. The network reported an average of 12.8 million viewers, making it the largest cable TV audience for a nonsports program so far this year. Fox also reported the debate drew a larger audience than the network’s previous debate in Iowa in January 2016 without then-candidate Donald Trump. That debate averaged 12.5 million total viewers. Then again, as The Washington Post’s Paul Farhi noted, the first GOP debate in August 2015, which did include Trump, drew 24 million viewers.
- Writers for New York Times Opinion rated each debate participant’s performance on a scale from 1 to 10 and provided a brief review. The rankings might not surprise you but their feedback — some of which is blistering — is worth a read.
- Military.com’s Drew F. Lawrence with “Inside the Marine Corps’ Fight with Fox News over a False Gold Star Family Story.”
- The Atlantic’s Anne Applebaum with “Prigozhin’s Death Heralds Even More Spectacular Violence.”
- Now for something a little lighter. It’s The New York Times’ Caryn Ganz with “Olivia Rodrigo, Pop’s Brightest New Hope, Just May Be a Rock Star.”
- And for The Associated Press, Dee-Ann Durbin with “Starbucks’ Pumpkin Spice Latte turns 20, whether you like it or not.”
More resources for journalists
- Bring Poynter to Your Newsroom, Classroom or Workplace
- Poynter will honor Anderson Cooper at the Bowtie Ball in Tampa, Florida, on Nov. 18. Learn how to get first dibs on tickets during a donor pre-sale event Sept. 5-10.
- Poynter Leadership Academy for Women in Media (Mar., May & Sept. 2024) — Apply by Sept. 8, 2023.
- Power of Diverse Voices: Writing Workshop for Journalists of Color (Nov. 15-18) (Seminar) — Apply by Sept. 15.
Have feedback or a tip? Email Poynter senior media writer Tom Jones at tjones@poynter.org.
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