Every year, Seattle Times Publisher Frank Blethen ends the year with a holiday message to the Times staff that usually includes a roundup of the year's notable achievements, plus a dollop of holiday cheer. But this year's message, while not inscribed on a lump of coal, won't go down easily for Times
Newly public e-mails show that the attorney general's office chose not to investigate the paper's management of a joint operating agreement with the Seattle P-I, despite knowing about a sworn allegation that the Times had secretly tried to shortchange the P-I. Former state Supreme Court Justice Phil
Papers like The Seattle Times are in a tough spot: Online advertising revenue is a long way from covering expenses. Meanwhile, print advertising is vanishing. So why not ditch the presses and trucks and go electronic? It just might pencil out.
McClatchy, which owns 49.5 percent but has no say in operations, says its share of the locally owned, private company dropped in value in less than a year from $102 million to $19 million.
The latest McClatchy Co. filings give us a window into the Times' tightly held finances, and the picture isn't pretty: a decline of 12 percent in value for its stock in the past six months. Some of that is the new Joint Operating Agreement kicking in, but the problems run deeper than that.
