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Wednesday, August 2, 2006

Chucked Out

Posted by on August 2 at 15:11 PM

Another head rolls at Seattle Weekly:

From: Chuck

To: everyone

As you know, Andy Van De Voorde, executive associate editor of Village Voice Media, is here today, and we finally had a chance to talk about the future of Seattle Weekly after Skip’s departure. We’re not in agreement about that future, so I’ve decided to step down effective the same day as Skip, which is Wednesday, Aug. 16.

Your new managing editor will be Mike Seely. I’ll be working with him over the next two weeks to make the transition as smooth as possible. As you know, Mike has limitless energy and passion. He’ll be a radically different M.E., to be sure, but this job can accommodate a wide range of talent and style.

The past four years have been a blast. I’ve loved working with all of you, and you’ve taught me a lot. Maybe we can do it again sometime.

Chuck Taylor
Managing Editor
Seattle Weekly



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Um, so? Who gives a rip about the Weekly? ;-)

Chuck's out, but no big loss. The man is an idiot. Your post should read "fat head rolls." Not sure Seely will be better—Chuck sure doesn't think so. "He’ll be a radically different M.E., to be sure..."

Vintage passive-aggressive Chuck. You're out now, Chuck, grow a sack and tell us what you really think.

As for you, Strangers: Pray for us down here. And let us know when you're hiring.

See? Not even Weekly employees care about the Weekly!

The Seattle Weakly is racist. The more people they get rid of the better.

Is there anything in the Weekly about the shooting in Belltown last week? Did Mel Gibson guest edit their "Best of Seattle" issue?

Seattle Weekly doesn't care about black people.

Bound to happen. Ex-Seattle Times TV critic Chuck was hired because he was Skip's friend and with Skip leaving, that position no longer exists.

How long has Seely been with the Weekly, anyway? Months?

The Seattle Weekly isn't racist. The paper is just hyper-dull. I know, I have to read it as part of my job. And since the new guys took over, it's been even worse. The only thing interesting about the paper is that it appears the whole staff has either been fired, quit or about to be fired. It's like a spooky ghost paper.
I know Mike Seely from when he worked at a WA state political campaign. What a fucking annoying frat boy! Seriously, that guy would make everyone cringe: from volunteers to the boss. How does he get these jobs? Maybe just showing up and acting like you care is the key to working in corporate America? Or maybe he's just the last man standing?

Agree about how dull the Weekly is.

Funny thing is, I'm their target audience, and I find them boring.

Seattle Weekly ordered the hit on Harvey Milk and MLK Jr.

Man, it makes me feel like a vulture.

I've already heard that George Howland might be out too, another resignation? True?

A couple of weeks ago I read in the Seattle Times that there will only be one main weekly paper in Seattle's future. They said that the Stranger and Seattle Weekly will eventually merge into the other. Something about advertising dollars.

Yes, the Weekly is boring as hell, but Seattle desperately needs an alternative paper that identifies with life and perspectives outside of the Capitol Hill hipster and disaffected youth demographic.

The current Weekly editors are a bunch of incompetents, and should be fired. The thing is, it wouldn't take much brilliance for the Weekly to draw away your highest-earning audience, and I think that scares the shit out of you folks at the Stranger. Just because the current Weekly editorial board thinks that it's still 1970 in the Space City doesn't mean that the next one will agree.

How much more benign and irrelevant can the Seattle Weekly become? They might as well have robots manage the paper. It might end up with more personality.

True Mike Seely story:

I wrote him a few months ago in response to this story about Sasquatch Books' Best Places restaurant reviews. Long story shot: Sasquatch's Web site claimed its policy was to review restaurants anonymously, then it didn't.

His Weekly article compared the unethical practices therein to the way-ethical practices "at periodicals including Seattle Weekly and the daily newspapers." OK.

So I asked Mike -- why didn't he and Weekly compare Sasquatch's policy to the policies at local city magazines or other hardback guidebooks?

He said, and I quote:

If you think that's such an interesting story, write it yourself.

I do hope he tells this to an increasing number of Seattlites while he enjoys his new position.

If the SW is a ghost paper, Chuck was part of the reason. A total bore and politically milquetoast person unfit for alternative journalsim, as was evident with his stint at the union record. No one should miss him, or worry about the paper's fate because of his departure.

There's enough talented writers in this city, and enough demand for an alternative to the Stranger's news style that it might not be as hard as you think to rebuild its front section. But for that they need some savy, probably local, leadership. Hell: George Howland is easily a better editor than Chuck and Mike. Chances of him or anyone else good taking over aren't great, however. And the arts sections seem beyond redemption...

What a wreck the SW is.
It's been a lackluster paper for as long as I can remember. So, I guess losing Chuck Taylor can't be a bad thing. But still, it's an absolute mess at SW right now.

This is a golden opportunity for the SW to become a great alternative weekly. The tone of the coverage of the firings here on the slog is kind of strange, like you are half gloating that shit is going down at the paper you hate, but then on the other hand you realize it is going to be an entirely different publication, so how can you really be critical of that, since you hate what it's been? And perhaps a bit of fear that the new SW will actually be really good!

Who was Chuck? I remember Skip, he was the hippie who supported sprawl and global warming. Points for originality, at least. But which one was Chuck?

Thing is, the New Times style kinda sucks, and that's what they're going to enforce. Ask any of the hundreds of Phoenix transplants kicking around. The general aesthetic is one of tedium: take a story worth 2000 words and make it 6000 words. What doesn't make sense is how such an un-noteworthy paper in an un-noteworthy city has managed to become the insatiable corporate monster it is.

Is New Times that hippie dippie weird Yoga magazine in town? Do they really own the Seattle Weekly now?

Here's an example of Mike Seely's writing:

http://www.eastbayexpress.com/Issues/2004-09-15/music/music.html

If you thought this was an entertaining and joyful piece, I'm sure you'll feel the same about the New Seattle Weekly Times in general very soon.

Ah, but what's this?

http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/Content?oid=12313

The upcoming Seattle Weekly editor once wrote for the Stranger just years ago?

Shock horror guilt faint.

Roadrunner and Wile E. politely punch their time cards once again in this make-believe "competition" between The Stranger and New Times. (Never mind Savage Love getting syndicated in New Times -- sorry -- Village Voice Media papers, that is.)

Chuck: You had a meeting with Andy the day your "Best Of" came out? Did you really think there was a chance he wasn't going to can you?
Note to all VVM "legacy paper" editorial employees: if you're meeting with Andy right after "Best of" you're dead. You're gone.
The prick isn't going to fire you when he needs you. That would be inconvenient. He's going to fire you after you worked your ass off.
The New Times guys tell you how great you are until it's convenient to pull someone from one of their other papers who is either cheaper or more their style. (read: drink with Lacey, tell him how great he is)
On the biz side they give you an award then fire you. You are only as good as your last issue.
Everyone at NTM/VVM is a pawn save for Mike and Jim. Everyone.

The prick isn't going to fire you when he needs you. That would be inconvenient. He's going to fire you after you worked your ass off.

Actually, that's standard practice these days in any business. When they want you gone, they use you and use you until you've finished a huge project for them, and then they dropkick you out the back door. I had companies do this to me once or twice.

And perhaps a bit of fear that the new SW will actually be really good!

Cite, it's part of a conglomerate, and given the rash of departures right after SW assumed new ownership from a bigger conglomerate, it's pretty clear the paper's going through some homogenization right now.

Living in Vegas, our conglomerate paper was the Las Vegas Weekly (hey, notice the similarity in names). As ownership changed hands to bigger and bigger conglomerates, editors got flushed out and the papers usually became more bland and more benign.

Expect a more boring, generic version of the Seattle Weekly than you're used to as new editorship sinks its teeth in. New Times, like any conglomerate, likes their papers to read the same across the board.

re:
http://www.swissinfo.org/eng/international/ticker/detail/Charles_Taylor_complains_of_draconian_Hague_jail.html?siteSect=143=6913327=1153490001000

It’s amazing that with that kind of internationally reviled background, Chuck Taylor still sailed through the rigorous Greater Seattle Press Club membership screening process. But it does make perfect sense he was a metropolitan daily TV critic.

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