Media Roundup: Tuscon Citizen Stops Publishing, CNN to Focus on Economy for Entire Week and More
Tuscon Citizen stops publishing -- Arizona's oldest newspaper, The Tuscon Citizen, will cease publication on Saturday, March 21. Gannett Co., the owner of the newspaper, announced in January that if no buyer was found, the paper would risk closure. The Citizen is down to less than a third of the subscribers it had during its prime in the 60's and has had trouble competing with the 100,000+ subscription base of the Arizona Star. The closure comes a week after Denver's Rocky Mountain News ceased all operations. [Source: Editor and Publisher]
CNN to focus on economy for entire week -- Amidst Jon Stewart's war with financial network CNBC, CNN announced it will fill all non-breaking news content this week with economic news and analysis. The network is attempting to emerge as the non-partisan channel covering the slowdown as its competitors Fox News and MSNBC have tilted right and left, respectively. CNN has dedicated an entire day to a topic in the past, but has never focused an entire week's coverage on one issue. [Source: New York Times]
Mobile users double news consumption over last year -- The people who accessed news via their mobile devices in January has doubled over the same period last year. That puts news consumption just ahead of social networking as the most popular mobile browsing activity. A third of users accessed news through a downloaded application. [Source: TechCrunch]
NYT considering online subscription fees -- New York Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger told an audience yesterday that the paper is considering putting some its content behind a pay wall. The Times tried a similar strategy in years past called Times Select that placed Op-Ed columnists behind a pay wall, but the program was considered a failure and was ended in 2006. The paper has been trying to add more cash to its books as its pays down debt, most recently selling space in its Manhattan headquarters. [Source: Business Insider]
San Fransisco Chronicle workers vote for concessions -- Chronicle workers voted by a ratio of 10 to 1 to lesson the workweek and reduce paid time off. By voting for the cutbacks, the paper will now eliminate only 150 jobs, as opposed to the threatened 225. The paper's owner, Hearst, told employees that if significant cost cutting measures weren't taken, the paper would have to be sold or closed down. [Source: San Fransisco Chronicle]
Digg creator launches Twitter app -- Digg founder Kevin Rose has launched a new user directory for the micro-blogging site Twitter named WeFollow. The site allows users to tag themselves with three terms that describe their tweets. Users can then browse term-specific directories to find Twitter users that are relevant to them. Previously, users were limited to using the site's search engine and Twitter's "suggested users" list to find new people to follow. [Source: Mashable]