Category Archives: Hearne_Christopher
Hearne: Dramatic Cutbacks in New Orleans Bad Sign for Newspapers
Just when devotees of newspapers thought it was safe to go outside…
It’s been an incredibly tough four-plus years for newspapers and magazines. And not just because of the dour economic landscape. The Kansas City Star has laid off hundreds – going from a staffing of more than 2,000 employees 10 years ago to around 700 today. The city’s second largest print player, the Johnson County Sun, is no longer even in business having been shuttered by its area owner that had invested millions in buying and running the suburban weekly. The Pitch was fire saled off to an out-of-town buyers a year ago after years of churning out red ink, its long term future yet in doubt.
And now comes news that the vaunted New Orleans Times-Picayune is poised to enact massive staff cuts and reduce its newspaper circulation from daily to just three days a week this fall. To which I now suggest that you read it here first.
How few times a week can a daily paper publish and remain viable, I asked former Star publisher Art Brisbane in February of 2009.
Hearne: Mancow Falls for Knuckleheads, Makes Up with Rainmakers, Disses KC Crowd
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It was the best of times and the worst of times…remember that one?
This time out however we’re talking about Saturday’s Rainmakers show at Knuckleheads in the East Bottoms, not the French Revolution. And while it was clearly the age of foolishness, it was hardly the age of wisdom.
Not according to the Kansas City-bred, Chicago shock jock Erich "Mancow" Muller.
"It was fantastic," Mancow says of the show. "I tell you, Bob Walkenhorst‘s hair was gray – which is startling – but they’re still a great band. They’re as good as they were in 1986."
When the Rainmakers took the stage Saturday, Mancow was Johnny on the Spot.
"And the first thing Bob did when he walked out was reach down and shake my hand," Mancow says. "I was front-and-center with my belly against the stage and quite honestly, I was surprised he recognized me."
Hearne: Jack Searches the Heavens for Rationale for AMC Sale to Chinese
What to think of the deal by Chinese company Wanda to buy local movie giant AMC?
Well for starters, that nothing is sacred in the world of high finance and international business. As promised – but not reported locally until recently by KCC – Wanda president Wang Jianlin had boasted in a speech last year that "his company would ‘shock the world’ with an acquisition to be made within the year."
Well, it certainly did come as a shock to Kansas City that one of its prized corporate possessions would no longer be under local (or domestic) ownership and control. After all, AMC employs about 18,500 staffers and owns 346 theaters.
And while undoubtedly the Chinese will want things to remain intact where AMC’s domestic and international business is concerned, it does make one wonder how much longer those two and three connection international flights to the Cowtown will make sense to Wanda execs. Especially given that Kansas City is hardly an entertainment hub.
So we’ll see.
Hearne: Star Asleep at the Wheel While KCTV Breaks Boffo Local News
Look, I’m in Mexico, so I couldn’t be much more out of it but…
Looking at the morning news on kansascity.com, the Kansas City Star Web site, a couple of things jump out.
Funny, lame kinda things.
Because since forever local television news has been newspaper’s enemy. For obvious reasons. The main one being that – first and foremost – everybody in the news game wants (and treasures) the scoop. That’s just the way it is. Including local radio personalities who want to be first to "break" the news whatever it may be.
Even local bloggers who seldom-to-never sully their hands at doing even the most basic reporting relish laying claims to silly things like "TKC Exclusives."
So yeah, the going can get pretty goofy but the basic, underlying deal is news is news and first is foremost.
Hearne: Down (But Not Out) in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico
With all due respect, it’s not every day I take Craig‘s advice…
Yet as many of you were preparing to party this weekend I was emerged in a great escape to the country many Republicans want to fence out, Mexico.
That’s right, the land where I bought my first switchblade knife as a teenager after playing underage, cool guy in Nogales by going into a bar and ordering a Carta Blanca. Maybe drank like half of it or less, but it was the thought that counted.
This time out my Mexican destination of choice is Cabo. And while I won’t be bringing back any illegal cutlery, there’s all sorts of other ways to go wrong in the land down under. Like getting murdered or ransomed for vast sums to the good readers of KC Confidential. I doubt the Star would bail me at this point (although they and the Pitch would doubtless have fun covering the story).
However all of that’s highly unlikely, right?
And unlike Craig’s Puerto Rican wilding, my short trip is unlikely to involve any bimbo eruptions or dirty dancing.
Hearne: Best Buy Victim of Times, Sex Scandal, ‘Psychological Marketing’
What goes around comes around…
Last year Jack Poessiger and I were talking to the head of one of Kansas City’s biggest commercial real estate firms about a fancy-schmancy new retail development he was working on. One for which he’d procured Best Buy as an anchor tenant. Isn’t that a little risky, I asked. Nah, he assured me, Best Buy was blue chip. A few days later I sent him a couple links to business stories suggesting otherwise.
Now check out this graph from an Associated Press story earlier this week about an unrelated sex scandal that has cost Best Buy both its CEO and founder.
"The latest revelations are part of a scandal that couldn’t have come at a worse time for the 46-year-old retailer. The company, which has more than 1,400 U.S. locations, is struggling to regain its footing as it faces increased competition from online retailers and discounters. Customers have all but abandoned buying at so-called ‘big box’ stores like Best Buy."
"All but abandoned" Sound familiar? It should.
Hearne: RockFest 2012; So Many Boobies, So Few Beads
About last weekend’s RockFest at Liberty Memorial…
The one where an estimated 55,000 head-bangers bellied up to 15 bands for nearly a dozen hours of drunken and disorderly debauchery. A politcally correct, freelance concert review in the Star glossed over the depravity by referring to "the antics of uninhibited women" and musicians who "actively encouraged…lewd behavior."
Leaving to reader’s imaginations the question, how lewd was it?
"It was a great people watching crowd," says Westporter Bill Nigro, who worked the event. "Because you saw everybody from the beautiful people to the not-so-beautiful people. There were some stunning women there and there were some other ones that weren’t."
Diplomatically said – but let’s take it a step farther – how stunning?
"There was quite a bit of flashing," Nigro says. "I’ve never seen so many flashes. Ever."
Hearne: KU Students & Fans Celebrate Basketball Coach Bill Self’s Rug
You know what they say about, if it ain’t KU basketball season in Lawrence, it ain’t happening…
And while it’s not like every single thing in Larry revolves around Allen Field House, it does seem that way at times. Take the recent student newspaper Top 20 "KU Bucket List" of stuff the kids want to do before graduating.
No. 10: "See Bill Self without his toupée: ‘That’s something I’ve always been interested in. It looks so real. I think he has the sides still, but not the top.’ — Killian Cull, a sophomore from Overland Park."
KU fans and foes have argued for years about whether the KU basketball coach wears a rug or not.
Hearne: Pitch Congratulates Bogus ‘Best Of’ Buddy, Travel & Leisure Magazine
Will we ever learn?
I mean, really – we’re such suckers. It’s high time Kansas City media quit pandering to inconsequential "best of" promotions promulgated by loser magazines with little to no research credibility. Publications’s like Travel & Leisure, which twice in two months has annointed KC in one of its so-called "surveys."
Contrived surveys that are published with zero information about how they were complied, the number of participants – you know, pretty much whatever one would want or need to know to consider the survey relevant or legit.
Kinda like those Pitch ‘Best Of" issues…
So it’s not really surprising that it was the Pitch which annointed Travel & Leisure‘s latest bit of tripe by "reporting" the results:
That Kansas City is the country’s 8th best burger city.
Hearne: And Now the ‘Rest of the Story’ on the AMC Entertainment ‘China Crisis’
It’s one thing for the hometown paper to get scooped on a huge story like AMC Entertainment selling out to the Chinese…
Quite another to pull up short on its front page followup. Unfortunately, that’s exactly what happened earlier this week when the Star rolled out its version of the New York Times scoop on AMC being in talks to sell the company "or a significant stake" to China’s Wanda Group.
How serious is Wanda? Apparently very.
"The Chinese group has reportedly been eyeing an acquisition since president Wang Jianlin said in a speech at Tsinghua University in Beijing in 2011 that his company would ‘shock the world’ with an acquisition to be made within the year," the news organization Want China Times reported yesterday.
Now a little much-needed background and perspective.
Hearne: The Gloves Are Coming Off for Next Year’s ‘420 Day’ Bash in Westport
Westport sparkplug Bill Nigro learned a very important lesson last month…
That when it comes to pot smoking, you can’t be just a little bit pregnant. If you’re going to localize and promote an annual celebration like 420 Day – the day that honors all things marijuana – you’ve got to be all in.
No pussyfooting around.
Not that Nigro’s faint-hearted first off 420 Day blowout was a, you know, bust.
"Well, we had 1,200 paying people and we had another 200 comps," Nigro says. "But I just thought it would be busier."
And well it might have been, had Niro not chickened out in promoting the event with weak-wristed quotes like, "Well, we’re not calling it 420 Day. Our event’s called the Westport Smokeout and we’re going to do some fun things."
See what I mean?
Hearne: KU Students Fly Down Mountain, Through Fire & Into Potter Lake
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Good, clean fun alert…
Slot this one atop on your "Don’t try this at home" to-do list. From the Lawrence Journal World‘s Andy Hyland comes the followingg newsworthy nugget from the bucket list of Totally Ridiculous Things College Kids Do.
Perhaps you’ll recognize it from your young adulthood past.
"While walking on campus on Friday, I happened on one of those little moments that ensures that walking around a college campus is never dull," Hyland begins.
"A small group of students had come up with an inventive way to celebrate Stop Day. Namely, they were taking bikes up to the very top of the hill near Memorial Drive, and then were riding them down the hill to a ramp, and then jumping into Potter Lake."
For the uninitiated, that’s some serious downhill, cross country sledding.
Hearne: City Market Concerts Reportedly to Relocate to Berkley Park in August
One local concert venue’s loss is another one’s gain…
So it is that the recently cancelled to save the Steamboat Arabia museum, "Buzz Under the Stars" concert series will magically reappear in August at the Richard L. Berkley Riverfront Park, sources say.
The word on the street being that the fest (August 9 or 10?) will feature a kickass bill thought to include headliners Fun and Garbage with Silversun Pickups and Alabama Shakes.
The Buzz fest will follow in the footsteps of the Dancefestopia Music Fesitval in June at Berkley Park, which incidentally will be going head-to-head with Entercom’s Buzz Beach Ball at Livestrong.
Hearne: Nick Wright Leaving Grumpy Naysayers, 610 Sports, Kansas City in the Dust
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The days of the George Bretts and Johnny Dares are long gone…
If they ever existed in the first place. Nobody today really cares if the home team has any hometown heroes on it. Or if they bend the rules or cheat a little bit – long as they don’t get caught.
Just win, baby…am I wrong?
So maybe it was naive to think 610 Sports rising star Nick Wright would be a homegrown, hometown institution.
You know, like the Raven, forevermore.
Hearne: Lawrence Busts Orscheln for Trafficking in Baby Chicks, Duckies
Talk about going Daffy Duck…
Lawrence officials have put the kibosh on "Chick Days" at the Kansas City-based Orscheln Farm and Home. Something about it being a violation of a city code intended to regulate raising of chickens in the city limits.
"Oh my god, are you kidding me?" says Kansas City attorney / Orschlen owner Phil Orschlen. "That’s just crazy. I mean, we’ve sold chickens and ducks from our stores since the 1960s. We call it ‘Chick Days’ and it’s one of our best sellers. It’s amazing."
Among other things, the ordinance requires Orschlen to maintain a minimum living space of 10 square feet per peep. In other words, 1,000 square feet of store space for every hundred chicks. That’s a lot.
Practically converting Orschlen’s farm fowls as "free range," if you will.
Hearne: Who Gives a Dam? Local Metal Station Dies Quiet Death
You know that line about a tree falling in the forest?
Ditto for last week’s pulling of the plug by Cumulus on its local HD Translator station The Dam at 103.7 FM. The heavy metal radio station which debuted just two years ago with a Metallica song, is now simulcasting the somnambulant slate of boring right wingsters from KCMO 710 AM that range from Sean Hannity to Laura Ingraham to Mike Huckabee.
How boring does that sound?
As a hard rock refuge, The Dam was good for about a one share point in the ratings, which ain’t much.
Hearne: Star’s Mellinger Obliterates Memory of Past Sports Columnists
Who doesn’t love a good, I told you so?
So allow me to take just a moment to congratulate myself and remind you guys what I told you in 2010 about Kansas City Star sports scribe Sam Mellinger:
"The Star Sports Kings – Jason Whitlock and Joe Posnanski – are dead," I wrote. "Long live new King, Sam Mellinger…Rome wasn’t tacked together overnight and rookie columnists don’t always hit full stride the first few steps out of the blocks. But Sam started out good and is attaining critical mass. He’s been kicking some pretty high quality journalistic butt. And dishing out corporal punishment when called for."
Some readers probably wondered at first how Sam might shake out. Would he be a bombastic Jason-ator? A painfully passionate Posnaski? Something inbetween?
And after more than a decade of W and P, did any other form of sports column writing even exist? Well, Sam has now proven that indeed that is the case. He’s totally his own man and Kansas City is the better for it.
A prime example being today’s column about the sorry state of the Chiefs quarterback situation.
Hearne: Don’t Believe Everything You Read, Digital Movie Conversion Costs Plummet
About the effort to save the tiny town of Higginsville, Missouri‘s local movieplex…
"Digital update costs $70,000," shouts an incorrect headline atop a front page story today in the Star‘s FYI section.
With movie studios rapidly switching from 35 mm to digital projection, small theaters nationwide – like Higginsville’s Davis – have been scambling to convert.
With the days of film being numbered, the conventional wisdom has been that the cost of conversion to digital was $70,000 per screen. Or $300,000 for Higginsville’s four-holer.
Thus a $25,000 prize the Davis won from a Readers Digest contest would only cover a fraction of the switchover cost, the story states.
Hearne: Landlord Spruces Up Jardine’s in Preparation for ???
Not to belabor the subject but…
Inquiring minds want to know…what’s the latest on Plaza area jazz club Jardine’s? It’s been five long months since the you-know-what hit the fan and owner Beena Raja found herself on the wrong end of a mini staff revolt that grew into a musician boycott and a tabloid TV news feeding franzy.
Since then Jardine’s doors have remained dark while owner-candidate after owner-candidate strode in (and then out) of the media limelight. And while sundry former and prospective owners and managers watched their fortunes rise and then fall.
In other words, it’s been one big, fat mess.
Which brings us to the here and now, and the buzz on the down-for-the-count jazz club about workers being spotted hard at it in Jardine’s space.
"Looks like the story is over," emailed propsepective Jardine’s buyer Paul Wilson. "I drove by (Friday), there is some kind of construction going on inside."
Hearne: Is Joplin Better Off a Year Later Because of the Tornado?
They’ve got a new mayor and a new lease on life…
As Joplin preps for the onslaught of its one-year tornado anniversary, the untold tale is that the disaster has transformed the battered midwestern burg into something of a boom town.
If you weren’t hit or killed by the tornado (or left town), there’s a good chance you’re better off now than you would have been had the tornado not struck.
The reason for the financial uptick?
"We’ve had over 125,000 registered volunteers and that’s not even counting the unregistered ones," says new mayor Melodee Colbert-Kean. "And it’s helping out everybody. Our sales tax for the city is up. The stores are doing good. The hotels are doing good. The restaurants are doing good."
In other words, a disaster boomlet?
