Layoffs Come to the Journal-- Though Not As Many As Expected
Long expected, and some said overdue: layoffs at the Wall Street Journal were announced Thursday. Rupert Murdoch-owned News Corps' most venerable publishing arm is cutting staff, but thankfully, far less than the 50 jobs predicted. WSJ's publisher Robert Thomson explained in an in-house memo, 14 editorial positions at the the paper will be slashed, while the paper had lost another 11 staffers to recent "attrition."
The layoffs arrive amidst a dismal earnings call for parent News Corp. Although the WSJ is losing staff, Thomson's memo noted a ray of sunshine through the gloomy news: no jobs will be cut from Dow Jones Newswires, which is actually expanding internationally by way of new efforts in India and a Spanish-language edition.
Still, the news of the Wall Street Journal's layoffs comes as another punch to traditional publishing, which is struggling to reinvent itself in the midst of a challenging economic and advertising climate. And eyeballs aren't the WSJ's problem. As Thomson pointed out, "We are also in the midst of an unprecedented increase in our readership, in print and online, but a precipitous decline in print advertising revenue has forced a close examination of our structures and of our costs." Source: All Things D more
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