TALKING BIZ NEWS EXCLUSIVE
Seattle Post-Intelligencer business reporters John Cook and Todd Bishop have left the paper — a big blow to its coverage of the top industry in the city — Â to go to the weekly business newspaper in Seattle, the Puget Sound Business Journal.
Cook covered venture capital, and Bishop covered Microsoft. Each wrote blogs for the paper that were among its top traffic generators for the paper’s Web site.
Cook he launched in 2001 the P-I’s Venture Capital Notebook — an online resource for those in the startup and venture capital communities. The site — developed in conjunction with P-I online developer Mike Thompson — won a top prize from the Society of Professional Journalists in 2001.
Wirecutter editorial director Lauren Sullivan sent out the following: I’m elated to announce that Maxine Builder, a…
"Morning Brew" and Yahoo Finance are partnering to include Yahoo’s market data in the “Markets”…
Modern Healthcare has hired Bridget Early to cover health care regulators. She is currently a health care reporter…
Bloomberg Industry Group seeks a junior reporter to cover environmental litigation. Performs general assignment and…
The Star Tribune is seeking an accomplished, motivated and versatile journalist and leader to shape…
The Deputy AME-Business is responsible for the development and planning of coverage on all Newsday…
View Comments
anyone know why two veteran reporters would leave a daily newspaper like the p-i to go work for a weekly? seems odd and i would think it doesn't bode well for the p-i.
Got an error message the first time I tried to post this, so sorry if it shows up twice.
This is interesting if only because the normal career path has been to start at a business weekly and graduate to a daily. But with so many dailies cutting back pages from their business sections or folding them into other sections of the paper, and laying off reporters, I wonder if more staff writers will follow suit. Business weeklies haven't had a reputation as hard-hitting investigative news vehicles, but maybe current conditions could be a turning point for how they're operated and perceived.
This is an obvious move. The information world is moving to an even more targeted arena and the "graduation" reference from a daily to a weekly is simply incorrect this day in age. IE: If I'm a mountain biker, the Seattle Times weekly "Get Away' piece is OK, but I probably already subscribe to Mountain Bike Magazine and a various other outlets that are rooted in the meat of the industry.
Likewise, daily newspapers have astoundingly weak coverage of all niche industries as they are trying to be all things to everyone. If we examine the business sections in daily papers you'll see they average about 4 pages - half of which are stock quotes that are out of date the second they print. The PSBJ is simply another example of niche appeal...and as for local business news they are the best game in town, and they just got a lot better with these two on board.
It's unlikely that this is as clear-cut as two reporters leaving for a rival paper. John and Todd have a franchise on tech reporting in the Seattle market -- no one even comes close, despite what the SeaTimes folks would say.
I'd suspect that they have worked out some kind of hybrid deal in which they own the content and the PSBJ supports the advertising efforts. It's unlikely that they will simply join the PSBJ as reporters -- lateral moves make no sense.
This just in: http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/stories/2008/09/15/daily19.html?f=et80&ana=e_du
Hard to imagine the Puget Sound Business Journal competing with already established online tech news sites like ZDNet and TechCrunch. I hope these guys maintained relations with the P-I.