36 Comments - Excitable Boy - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:21 pm: Who could have figured letting conglomerates buy up all the newspapers would lead to some questionable decisions? - Prenuer - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:22 pm: Look, in order to afford putting out quality, fact-based journalism, we have to put out poor quality, highly opinionated propaganda. - 47th Ward - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:25 pm: ===Asked directly whether printing these papers ran counter to an online Gannett mission statement “to serve as a forum for better understanding and unity to help make the USA truly one nation,” the spokesperson said: “We do not discuss our clients and have no further comment.”=== I just thought that was worth highlighting. Sums it up rather nicely I think. - up2now - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:32 pm: There are all sorts of large commercial printers who, I’m sure, could handle this print job. No ties to journalism. Problem solved. I am not a reader of these opinion products (I’ll stop short of calling them newspapers) nor of Mr. Proft, but I fear we are headed down a slippery slope when we want to restrain what can be printed, who can print it and who makes the decision. - Candy Dogood - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:35 pm: At least those papers don’t have much reputation to lose. - DuPage Saint - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:37 pm: It is a commercial endeavor. They are not endorsing the mailings unless you consider it an endorsement to take the money and print. I think it becomes a slippery slope to say they can’t ethically do this. If it is not screaming fire in a theater let it go. But right is trying to overturn liable laws for newspapers maybe that should happen. - Bippy Gluck - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:39 pm: Need to add the disinfo papers in Illinois run by Dan Proft and Brian Timpone: Carbondale Reporter Chambana Sun Chicago City Wire Cook County Record Cornell-Ransom Guide Crete Review DeKalb Times DuPage Policy Journal East Central Reporter Egyptian Review Galesburg Reporter Grundy Reporter Illinois Business Daily Illinois Valley Times Kane County Reporter Kankakee Times Kendall County Times La Harpe Guide Lake County Gazette Lansing Reporter Lynwood Times Macon Reporter Madison County Guide McHenry Times McLean County Times Metro East Sun Metro East Today North Cook News North Egypt News NW Illinois News Peoria Standard Prairie State Wire Quincy Reporter Rock Island Today Rockford Sun Salem News Wire Sangamon Sun Save Your Home Now SE Illinois News South Central Reporter South Cook News South West Illinois News Southern Illinois News West Central Reporter West Cook News West Loop Today Westfield Reporter Will County Gazette - Michelle Flaherty - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:41 pm: Sorry, still hung up on the Daily Herald/Paddock taking million(s) of dollars in payment from Proft in exchange for printing his fake papers. The only surprise with Gannett is that they charge. Figured they’d market it as “premium content” and secretly drain more money off the auto-pay subscribers. - Ron Burgundy - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:43 pm: -“We do not discuss our clients and have no further comment.”- No one sketchy ever says that. /s - Oswego Willy - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:43 pm: Ethics and Integrity are lost in the bean counters as the stock and trade of journalism isn’t measured in the dollars a reputation lost. The checks cash the same… they cash the same. - Dirty Red - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:45 pm: * curses profusely into comment filter * Huh. Isn’t this an interesting development. - Candy Dogood - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:48 pm: ===It is a commercial endeavor=== “But there’s good money in distributing propaganda” doesn’t sound like the best defense. Especially not in an age where the Right Wing settles further and further into rhetoric that seems a lot like what we might have been hearing in the Balkans 30 years ago. - Baloneymous - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:54 pm: ===but I fear we are headed down a slippery slope when we want to restrain what can be printed, who can print it and who makes the decision.=== If Paddock and Gannett are knowingly printing lies and disinformation for the sake of profit, that is the slippery slope I’m more concerned about. Jeesh. - Gfalkes - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:55 pm: I’m betting money that the printing is being done at the journal star printing facility. They spent a mint to build it for the prior owners. No that means much I guess. - XonXoff - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:56 pm: Shock. - Stormsw7706 - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:58 pm: Silver-lining is Gannett will ruin the fake newspaper like they do the real ones. - Oswego Willy - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 4:59 pm: ===but I fear we are headed down a slippery slope when we want to restrain what can be printed, who can print it and who makes the decision.=== So let them print alternative facts? It’s like saying science books that say creation… printed by, say, the New England Journal of Medicine is merely stopping that slippery slope? The comedy actually writes itself. - Shytown - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 5:02 pm: It’s all about the money - Academic union state employee - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 5:04 pm: Not a dimes worth of difference between a Proft paper and the SJR aka Paywall Central. And the subscriber only stories are junk news like restaurant reviews and entertainment. While also running out Bernie Schoenberg and subsequently eliminating respectable Statehouse coverage. - vern - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 5:36 pm: The folks saying this is a business decision baffle me. Proft is a maliciously direct competitor with journalism. He is opposed to the existence of Gannett and Paddock’s newspapers and taking direct steps to undermine them. Working with him isn’t a good business decision. The US Mint isn’t mining crypto. Dee Snyder didn’t offer an album track to Tipper Gore. - Yeah no - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 5:38 pm: Those papers should run a rider at the bottom of every editorial they write on state politics stating their parent companies distribute the Proft pamphlets. If they don’t, they’re hiding a conflict that they’d be so anxious to point out if they were an elected official. - Manchester - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 6:03 pm: Color me not surprised. Once proud pillars of true journalism were taken over by Gannet and decimated. Take the State Journal Register. It contains very little real information and certainly no investigative journalism. It’s only real use would be to line the cat box. I’m not surprised in the least that Gannet would print Proft’s rags if it means income. - Roadrager - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 6:03 pm: With this infusion of Proft-Uihlein dirty money, maybe Gannett’s next round of layoffs will come after Christmas instead of before it. - Excitable Boy - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 6:06 pm: - Dee Snyder didn’t offer an album track to Tipper Gore. - This is your second absolute banger this week by my count. - Michael Westen - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 6:26 pm: “So let them print alternative facts?” How benevolent of you to “let” someone print anything. As if the “mainstream media” have never printed “alternative facts?” If they benefit your “side” alternative facts are awesome. I’m not a big fan of Proft or these papers. But who prints them is no different than blaming Kinkos/Fedex if Proft made thousands of copies at their shop. Paddock and Gannett are in the printing business. They printed paper. That’s what they do. Glad someone thinks they have the power to “let” them decide what they can print. - Oswego Willy - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 6:35 pm: ===How benevolent of you to “let” someone print anything.=== It’s an ethics question. No ethics, no problem. :) ===As if the “mainstream media” have never printed “alternative facts?” If they benefit your “side” alternative facts are awesome.=== These Proft osiers are fashioned and advertised as “alternative news”. Proft says so. ===blaming Kinkos/FedEx=== Kinkos or FedEx… do they claim any journalism as their brand? ===Paddock and Gannett are in the printing business=== They are in the news business, then they print their news. Keep up. ===Glad someone thinks they have the power to “let” them decide what they can print.=== When you lack industry ethics to journalism, do you think they care? lol - Michael Westen - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 6:41 pm: Gannett claims no journalism at the printing plant. Neither did Paddock. So, no. Try to keep up. Wonder if Proft should run it by you to see who you will be kind enough to “let” print paper. - Oswego Willy - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 6:46 pm: ===Gannett claims=== Either you are in journalism and it matters… or it doesn’t If you lack these ethics it’s good you’re not a journalist ===Wonder if Proft should run it by you to see who=== Proft looked for soulless newspapers to print his rag. He’s doing exactly what he wants. If you lack ethics to the journalism, it’s no wonder you’re fine with it. Alternative facts as a term was created to ease the conscience of people who tried to walk this line, but ethics stopped them. Create a phony term, the grifting began. - Michael Westen - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 6:59 pm: A printing plant is not “journalism.” If they contributed to the content you’d have a point. But they don’t, so you don’t. Maybe you just don’t know what a printing plant is. It’s hard to keep track of all the things you don’t know. A printing plant takes someone else’s copy and puts ink on paper. Printing plants don’t have “ethics.” They have ink and paper. Grifting seems another term you have no clue about. There are a lot of those in your case. - Oswego Willy - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 7:08 pm: ===If they contributed to the content you’d have a point.=== No. Like the Daily Herald learned, you can’t parse, otherwise they would’ve decided their integrity would t matter. It’s like you can’t grasp why the Daily Herald stopped printing… ethics. They wrote all about it in the phony letter, lol ===But they don’t, so you don’t. Maybe you just don’t know what a printing plant is.=== The ethics of a company putting and giving content to print is the ethical question. ===Grifting seems another term you have no clue about.=== Appeasing the likes of Uihlein got the sole purpose of cash, forgetting the ethics, that’s the grift here. Anything else? - DougChicago - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 8:09 pm: Please stop giving Prof(I)t and Timpone the attention they crave. - dr. reason a. goodwin - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 10:17 pm: The Du Quoin Evening Call is no more. - Ashante - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 10:19 pm: Can we sue for unsolicited material. I even got a book today called The Governor You Do Not Know. This seems like a violation of my privacy. - Ashante - Thursday, Oct 6, 22 @ 10:31 pm: The scary thing is that they have my home address. I didn’t chose to be an election judge after hearing the testimony on the Jan 6 hearing and Ms Ruby and her daughter. These are scary times. - Franklin - Friday, Oct 7, 22 @ 8:21 am: High quality pearl clutching - Oswego Willy - Friday, Oct 7, 22 @ 8:25 am: ===pearl clutching=== Lacking ethics means mocking those who understand ethics. Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.