Monday, August 23, 2010
Media Matters: Crawler Canceled
Posted By Josh Loftin on August 23, 2010, 6:10 PM
The great Salt Lake Tribune online experiment is over. Glen Warchol, canceled.---
In a staff memo this evening, Salt Lake Tribune editor Nancy Conway announced that The Salt Lake Crawler is no longer. Instead, Warchol will now be a features writer. She doesn't explain the reason, except to say that he is going to focus on profiles and "under-covered" business stories. She says his blog had a loyal readership, but his skills would be better utilized elsewhere -- emphasizing one of my greatest frustrations, a print-first mentality at newspapers.
It's a shame, because Warchol was one of the better local bloggers, even if he worked for a giant media corporation. He had a voice of his own and was one of the best at pointing out the absurdities of local politics. Beyond that, however, he brought a reporter's mentality -- due to, of course, his many years as a reporter -- and often did his own work for his many daily posts.
Warchol was also one of the better media watchdogs, and usually had stories about the trials and tribulations at the Deseret News during my time there, especially the last couple of years.
I have asked Warchol if he's willing to talk through his Twitter account, but have not heard back. His final post is scheduled for Tuesday morning.
The memo from Conway:
Colleagues,
In an effort to better serve readers in print and online we are reassigning Glen Warchol to a reporting position in the features department.
We have asked him to focus on the under-covered consumer and business side of arts and entertainment and to put an emphasis on personality profiles. Michael, Ellen and Glen will be working out the finer details of his beat as it develops.
Glen's blog, The Salt Lake Crawler, was launched as an experiment more than two years ago and while it has a steady and loyal readership we feel his considerable skills and abilities will be better used enriching the daily offerings for both the print and online products.
Thanks,
Nancy
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