Shop Talk 

November 2012
In This Issue
 

Quick Links
Upcoming Events

Legislative session begins on January 15th

NMPA Legislative Breakfast
Rio Chama
January 25 7:30AM

 

 

 

Webinars 

Here is a current list of upcoming Inland Webinars. Please note: Through co-sponsorship NMPA members are eligible for the member rates

Visit Inland Press Association for upcoming webinars.  

Upcoming Inland webinars: FREE for December!!

Thursday, Dec. 6 | 10:30 a.m. CST

Successful Shared Mail: Understanding the math behind the strategy


Monday, Dec. 10 | 2 p.m. CST

Offer reputation management and create a new-and recurring-revenue stream


Friday, Dec. 14 | 10:30 a.m. CST

Top 5 Print and Digital Revenue Generators from 2012


Tuesday, December 18, 2012 | 2:00 p.m. CST


2013 Leading edge: The innovations that publishers should-and will-be thinking about





Featured Article

John Foust
How losing a sale can be good for business

 

 

Technology with Kevin Slimp
The latest news in publishing technology



 

Greetings!

Please enjoy the latest edition of ShopTalk.  

If you have interesting news items please forward them to director@nmpress.org and we will include them in the next available bulletin.  

For any membership questions or inquiries please call the NMPA office. 

Phil Lucey
505-275-1377  
phil@nmpress.org  


  

State Headlines

 

NMPA Legislative Breakfast  

Look for details in the next few weeks. We will be hosting a legislative breakfast at the Rio Chama on Friday January 25th.  Save the date!  

 

Journal, Rio Rancho Observer Announce New Affiliation

The parent companies of the Albuquerque Journal and Rio Rancho Observer have announced a partnership that will mean a closer working relationship between two of New Mexico's leading newspapers.

The newsrooms and editorial pages of the two newspapers will remain separate and independent, although cooperative efforts in news-gathering will enhance the ability of both the Journal and the Observer to serve their readers.  Read more  

 

Local Media Assoc. names The Taos News top weekly

This has been an award winning year with The Taos News receiving recognition from the Local Media Association, which named it the best non-daily in the nation with up to 10,000 circulation, "Community weeklies in general, and The Taos News in particular, have a lot to be proud of, as they continue to improve to meet community needs." according to the official statement made by the contest's judges.

 

Free Press celebrates third anniversary

While the delivery of newspapers throughout the United Sates has changed dramatically during the last few years, skeptics have declared newspapers as a dying industry. Community newspapers have defied that label and amidst a national recession, the Ruidoso Free Press was founded Nov. 17, 2009.  Read more 

 

Bulletin project earns regional book awards

Las Cruces Centennial publication honored

"Las Cruces: A Photographic Journey" won two awards at the sixth annual New Mexico-Arizona Book Awards banquet Friday, Nov. 16, in Albuquerque.

"A Photographic Journey," a 300-page color book produced by the staff of the Las Cruces Bulletin, celebrates the New Mexico centennial through the eyes of Las Cruces. One hundred years and more of Las Cruces history are told through stories and photographs. Read more  

 

 

Levine credits Observer for launching NASA career

ALBUQUERQUE - It was a classic case of déjà vu for Jay Levine Wednesday afternoon, as he walked into the Cibola High gymnasium.

Déjà vu not only because he'd once been a student, sitting in the very bleachers some current CHS students were assembled in to hear about where his path has led since he graduated Cibola in 1986, but déjà vu because this was the site of the first step of his career path.

Almost three decades ago, Levine had been first an intern and then an employee of the Rio Rancho Observer. He started with the newspaper in October 1985.  Read more  

 

Sun-News readies transition to new building

LAS CRUCES - Development isn't just happening along the former downtown "racktrack." While the opening of Main Street has captured most of the attention, head west a block and you'll see another institution near completion.

The Las Cruces Sun-News, a downtown landmark for decades, expects to occupy its new digs by early next year.

Publisher Frank Leto said the construction timetable for the approximately $1.2 million building should allow the city's only daily newspaper to return to 256 W. Las Cruces Ave. almost two years since a fire displaced the operation.

 
The Las Cruces Bulletin purchased by S.C. company

The Las Cruces Bulletin, along with the award-winning newspaper's affiliated specialty publications, has been acquired by a family-owned media company in South Carolina. OPC News, LLC, owned by members of the Osteen family in Sumter, S.C., purchased the weekly newspaper from David and Jacqueline McCollum of Las Cruces. The sale closed Monday, Nov. 5.

OPC News is owned by three members of the Osteen family, brothers Graham, Kyle and Jack Osteen.

In a statement, the brothers said they were attracted to the Bulletin because of the quality of the Las Cruces community and the paper's strong brand. "Las Cruces is a great community with a large audience that traditionally loves to read newspapers. David and Jaki have put together a superb organization over the years, and we are thankful they selected us to keep their tradition of newspapering alive," the brothers said in a statement.

Richard Coltharp, general manager of The Las Cruces Bulletin since 2010, has been named publisher of the newspaper. Coltharp has 27 years of experience at six different newspaper organizations, and has worked in southern New Mexico since 1995.  Read more

Sandoval Refuses School Board Closed Session

GRANTS - Veteran Grants/Cibola County School District board member Dion Sandoval walked away from an executive session closed board meeting on Monday. The meeting was to discuss the salary range for the new superintendent who is expected to start early next year. - said he felt that they were violating the Open Meetings Act and was going to go home and have dinner. 

   

Salary Database To Have Names

Bernalillo County commissioners reversed course Tuesday and narrowly agreed to add employee names to the county's online salary database.

Until now, the county has identified most employees only by job title in the county "Transparency Portal," where salaries are listed on the Web. Department heads and above, however, are mentioned by name.

Tuesday's 3-2 vote was a victory for the commission's new GOP majority, which said it would make transparency a priority. Republicans Wayne Johnson, Simon Kubiak and Michael Wiener supported the addition of names.

   

Cop files complaint after text probe

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M.-An officer accused of exchanging sexually charged text messages with an underage girl filed a racial discrimination complaint against the Albuquerque Police Department.

Deputy Chief Alan Banks said the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaint had nothing to do with the decision to suspend Tillman instead of firing him.

"The information is from his internal affairs file and we cannot release it under the (collective bargaining agreement between the city and the police union,) and it is exempt under (the New Mexico Inspection of Public Records Act) as it is part of the deliberative process and a matter of opinion," Banks wrote in an email to the Journal.

 

Questa Schools' Case Delayed

Attorneys who were representing Questa Independent School District school board members in a dispute with the New Mexico Public Education Department are no longer doing so, and a public hearing to address PED's suspension of the school board has been postponed.

The hearing, originally scheduled for Monday in Taos, is now set for Dec. 10.

A PED spokesperson would not provide a reason for the postponement. PED officials did not respond Friday to emails and phone messages seeking comment.

 

New officers elected for Association, Inland Press Foundation
Des Plaines, Ill.--Lloyd Case, president and CEO of Fargo, N.D.-headquartered Forum Communications, was elected Inland Press Association president at its 127th Annual Meeting in Chicago Oct. 29.
Elected to the Foundation Board of Directors:
Robin Martin, owner, The Santa Fe New Mexican


 

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.  

   

 

Industry Headlines

 

Around the Industry

 

From the lighter side...
Dunbar Family Forced To Discontinue Print Edition Of Christmas Newsletter
AULLINA, IA-
In an e-mail to readers on Monday, editors of the Dunbar Family Annual Christmas Update announced that due to logistical constraints, they had decided to cease print publication of the newsletter, which will move to a web-only distribution model.

Mobile Advertising in 'Perfect Storm' Moment
Michael Depp NetNewsCheck

LOS ANGELES -- It's a "perfect storm" moment for mobile advertising, but those ads must think beyond the banner and dynamically adapt to customers in real time, digital veteran Bill Gross told attendees at the ILM West conference here on Tuesday.

"Ads with code that can change and adapt in a particular situation" will be key, said Gross, the CEO of IdeaLab, a business incubator.

He added that smaller, nimbler players are likelier to get such mobile ads out of the gate first ahead of larger legacy companies.

Citing the power of smartphones as a kind of "remote control that we have in our lives," Gross said that consumers are maturing in their smartphone usage. And reaching such consumers in the evolving world of local search means giving them the most relevant results, not necessarily the most popular ones.  Read more  

 

Cross-ownership ban has outlived its purpose
CAROLINE H. LITTLE. NAA

In 1975, Sony introduced the Betamax video recorder. Atari's Pong was the top-selling holiday gift. And the Federal Communications Commission, fearing that one company would control local news, prohibited investors from owning both a newspaper and a television or radio station in the same city.

Much has changed in the past 37 years. Generations of newer technology have replaced Betamax and Pong. Newspapers face unprecedented online competition for advertising revenue and readers. Yet the FCC's antiquated cross-ownership ban remains on the books, discouraging much-needed investments in local newsrooms.  Read more  

 

Lame-Duck Congress may push postal reform

WASHINGTON-As the nation waited over Thanksgiving to learn whether Congress would push the economy over the fiscal cliff, watchers of the U.S. Postal Service were paying attention to rumors of a deal on postal reform legislation that might get a bill through the 112th lame-duck Congress.  Read more  

 

Newspapers concerned with impending USPS barcode change
Stanley Schwartz Managing Editor | Publishers' Auxiliary
An impending change by the U.S. Postal Service from its PostNet barcode to the new Intelligent Mail barcode has some newspaper owners concerned. Brad Hill, who is one of the National Newspaper Association's representatives on the Mailers Technical Advisory Committee, recently presented a webinar hosted by the Iowa Newspaper Foundation and NNA, where he outlined the coming change and answered questions about how the change will affect community newspapers. 

Publishers urged to attend summit

Community newspaper executives across America are being asked to join a leadership summit March 14, called specifically to address critical problems with the U.S. Postal Service.

National Newspaper Association President Merle Baranczyk said the purpose of the summit would be to oppose the Postal Service's recent decisions targeting newspaper advertising for diversion to direct mail and to discuss the future of newspaper delivery with senior postal officials.  Read more  

 

NNA seeks funds for postal fight for fairness
The Valassis postal discount is targeted at pulling advertising out of newspapers.
This is not just a new salvo from direct mail competitors. This is about a federal power being used to weaken newspapers.
But to many in Washington, this is simply another skirmish over the embattled U.S. Postal Service. Neither postal regulators nor many in Congress really understand what this attack is about.
The National Newspaper Association has work to do and its resources are tight. Members have to invest to win this battle. 

2nd 'Free to Tweet' campaign celebrates First Amendment, offers scholarships

WASHINGTON, D.C. - During a 15-day online celebration of First Amendment rights, high school and college students nationwide can win one of five $5,000 scholarships through the "Free to Tweet" competition. More information at FreeToTweet.org.

Beginning at midnight on Dec. 1 through 11:59 p.m. on Dec. 15, students at a high school, community college or university ages 14 and up can tweet their support for the First Amendment with the hash tag #FreeToTweet, which will enter them in the "Free to Tweet" scholarship competition.

 

 


People in the News  

The Silver City Sun-News welcomes new reporter Benjamin Fisher to the staff.

Margaret A. Fensterer,78, a resident of Rio Rancho for the past 42 years, passed away.  Margaret loved to draw and paint, and was one of the original members of the "Rio Rancho Roadrunner" and the Kirtland AFB's The Nucleus newspapers working as a graphic artist until spending nearly 20 years with The Observer newspaper. 


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

  
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