State Headlines

Digital BNC contest   

This year entries for the Better Newspaper contest be will be entered and judged by digital submission.   NMPA will be sending out a series of emails on how to upload entries and will give you plenty of time to get familiar with the entry website before contest time.   This year the BNC contest will be judged by the Kentucky Press Association and we will return the favor by judging their contest in the fall.   Look for more details to follow.    Entries will be entered at http://betternewspapercontest.com/   

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Go to:  http://www.facebook.com/NewMexicoPress   for updates on stories posted to nmpress.org, upcoming events and news around the state.   Make sure to like us and post your own stories.  New hires?  Staff promotion?  Win a Pulitzer?  Share with everyone by posting on the NMPA Facebook page     

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You can find the NMPA twitter feed at @newmexicopress   Follow us and we'll follow you.     

Lea County Electric Cooperative members elected John Graham of Lovington to replace trustee Thurman "Slick" Duncan at its April 27 annual meeting.  Read more 

Political advertising guidelines

Public Notice promotion 

Thanks to Maria Lopez Garcia and the Rio Grande SUN we have new promotional ads letting the public know they now have several options to find notices: in print, the NMPA website, sunshineportlanm.com and now newmexico.gov.   The state websites do not upload our content, they only provide a link to the existing website.  Please run the ads as space permits.  Not only does it let the public know where to find these notices, it will also be instrumental in the upcoming legislative session to make legislators aware of how the newspaper industry has made these notices accessible and a clear message to any outside interests that have thoughts of creating new public notice websites that newspapers already have that covered.   No other medium can deliver public notices to the public in print and online like newspapers can.     Find the ads online at NMPA Public Notice Ads.  

Webinar Training

There are a series of upcoming webinar training sessions offered through Inland Press.   NMPA members are afforded special member prices through co-sponsorship of these convient training sessions.  Please take a look at the upcoming topics on the left hand side of this newsletter.   Clicking on the title will bring you to the registration page and provide additional information.  

Around the Industry

Arlington, Va. - The Newspaper Association of America called today for the U.S. Postal Regulatory Commission to reject a proposed negotiated services agreement between the U.S. Postal Service and direct-mail giant Valassis, saying this special rate proposal will cause significant financial harm to newspapers throughout the country, and will not improve the financial condition of the nation's postal system. NAA's call was made in comments filed with the PRC, which is reviewing the NSA recently proposed by the Postal Service.

"Since the days of Ben Franklin - the first U.S. postmaster general as well as a newspaper publisher - there have been strong ties between the U.S. Postal Service and America's newspapers," said Caroline H. Little, NAA president and CEO. "But newspaper publishers are shocked by the specifics of this special deal for the country's largest direct-mail company. The proposal to provide steep discounts to a major newspaper competitor is a dagger aimed at the financial health of newspapers.

General Motors Co. plans to stop advertising on Facebook after the company's marketing executives determined their paid ads had little impact on consumers, people familiar with the matter said, a move that comes as more companies question the effectiveness of advertising on the social networking site.

Arlington, Va. - Caroline H. Little, president and CEO of the Newspaper Association of America, issued the following statement on today's release of the Audit Bureau of Circulations' FAS-FAX report:

"These new FAS-FAX tallies, which for the first time incorporate a metric for 'total circulation,' are certainly a welcome change. Although they don't yet capture all of the various digital platforms that newspaper companies are using to expand their audience reach, they are a step in the right direction. In particular, they provide advertisers with more transparent and useful information about the various components that showcase the increase in readership of newspaper content, and the strong market reach for buyers of newspaper advertising. We're particularly gratified to note that newspapers' embrace of digital platforms as well as smart and efficient circulation strategies for print products are reflected in the numbers, which clearly demonstrate positive trends in total circulation growth for publishers.

Reports on the media habits of Millennials, those "digital natives", have given some the impression that young people never read newspapers. However, survey evidence stubbornly insists that they do.

For instance, the recent Pew State of the News Media study notes that 23% of people aged 18-24 reported reading a newspaper yesterday. As a Millennial myself, I was slightly skeptical. Were these 18-24 year olds just confused about what a newspaper is? Further evidence confirms the existence of young people looking to print: The New York Times reports that 10% of its hard copy subscribers are aged 18-24, which is on par with the 9% of this age cohort who subscribe digitally.  Read more 

DALLAS, TX, May 18, 2012 - AIM Media Texas, LLC ("AIM" or the "Company") announced today that it has reached agreement to acquire the Texas print and online newspaper publishing assets from Freedom Communications, Inc. ("Freedom"), of Irvine, California.

Terms of the transaction, which is expected to close in approximately 30 days, were not disclosed. In conjunction with the transaction, AIM announced that all Freedom employees at the publications in Texas will continue in their respective jobs and positions with the new Company.

by: Jeff Fleming

Send updates of new hires, promotions, retirements, memorials, etc to  director@nmpress.org.  We will print the news in this section each month.