90K print jobs lost? What’s a “print job”?

Gawker says: “Nearly 90,000 print jobs have been lost in the last year.”

I say: “What’s a print job?”

Newspapers and magazines are considered part of the print publishing category. Which makes sense to a large extent. But I suspect most news organizations have very few people who can be defined as working exclusively in “print jobs.” Which means that even though “internet-based jobs” are excluded from the count, the characterization of everything that remains as a “print job” is not entirely accurate.

I’m looking at The Daily Telegram’s staff directory right now. Except for a few people in circulation and the press room, there’s hardly anyone whose job is exclusively focused on print. In the newsroom, there’s not a single person who isn’t engaged in producing content for two different platforms. But because our jobs span two platforms, they’re apparently considered “print jobs” (and thus, if we get laid off, anyone who’s pushing the print-is-dead narrative will have another statistic to feel vindicated by).

So, do I have a “print job”? No, I don’t. I work for a news organization that operates across more than one platform, and my job is to produce and edit content — no matter what medium it’s distributed in.

Comments