Uitgever Hearst maakte maandag bekend dat de krant Seattle Post-Intelligencer ophoudt met de papieren uitgave en online verdergaat. De laatste editie van de krant verschijnt op dinsdag. Kathy Mulady beschreef voor De Nieuwe Reporter de laatste dagen van de Seattle Post-Intelligencer. In de loop van de maandagavond heeft zij haar verhaal aangevuld. “It feels like death.”

UPDATE: Only a small group of reporters, copy editors, and photographers were in the newsroom just before 10 a.m. Monday morning, when it was announced the the 146-year-old Seattle P-I would print its last newspaper Monday night. The immediate reaction was mainly a sad silence. Most of us knew this day would come.

The P-I will continue online only. It’s the first time a major American metropolitan daily has closed its print publication, and attempted a digital version only, according to P-I business reporter Dan Richman.

In announcing the plan for seattlepi.com, Steven Swartz, president of Hearst Newspapers, said it won’t be a newspaper online, but instead, it will be “an effort to craft a new type of digital business with a robust, community news and information Web site at its core.”

Hearst kept about 20 reporters and editors, including beloved sports columnists Art Thiel and Jim Moore, and two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning political cartoonist David Horsey.

Swartz said if successful, the online model could be copied in other U.S cities.

Seattlepi.com will also include columns by prominent Seattle residents and 150 reader blogs, according to the announcement.

Some of the employees who were in the newsroom Monday morning when the announcement was made, toasted the end of the printed P-I with glasses of Wild Turkey Bourbon and George Dickel Tennessee Whiskey – not our normal newsroom practice.

Pub
The newsroom was abnormally quiet as the day continued. Reporters finished stories for the final edition, other employees tossed desk items into boxes to take home, or in the trash to throw away. Some planned a get-together at a pub near the office at the end of the day.

“No matter how much warning is issued ahead of time, the death of a newspaper is gut wrenching”, said Seattle P-I investigative reporter Eric Nalder.

Hanging in the air is the knowledge that the P-I is not the first major newspaper to stop printing, and probably not the last.

Sometimes being part of a trend is no fun at all.

**

News that the Seattle Post-Intelligencer was for sale and probably going to close, came as a shock to the newspaper’s reporters and editors. Embarrassingly, the first we heard about it was on the television evening news. Over the next few hours, top managers at our paper looked shocked and gave interviews to media, including our own reporters, saying they didn’t know anything about it.

The next day, January 9, at noon in our newsroom Steve Schwartz the president of the Hearst Corporation newspaper division, confirmed that the P-I was for sale. And if no buyer was found in 60 days, the company would stop publishing a printed paper. Keeping our online P-I was possible, but not definite, he said. He refused to answer any questions.

And that’s how it has stayed. For the next 60 days – and now a week past that deadline, we have been told nothing.

Workshops
The last two months brought people in our newsroom closer. But the lack of information and uncertainty also created nervousness, frustration and distrust.

For the first few weeks, we were numb. We worked and we waited for a white knight to arrive and save the 146-year-old Seattle P-I. The only thing that arrived was a WARN notice, required by the state when a company is going to layoff a large number of employees. Our last day at work, it said, would come between March 18 and April 1.

As reality began to sink in, that we were going to lose our jobs, co-workers with specific skills began offering each other workshops. The online staff helped the print staff improve their Internet skills, learn how to build a blog and upload photographs. They urged us to join social networks like Facebook and LinkedIn to help find jobs — if the worst should happen.

Deep financial trouble
There are two daily newspapers in Seattle. The P-I is the smaller. The other, the Seattle Times, is also in deep financial trouble and is expected to close. Seattle could become the first large city in the United States without a major daily newspaper. It is unthinkable, especially with Seattle’s reputation as the most literate city in the country.

We are worried about losing our jobs, but we are also worried about who will watch over our elected government leaders, school boards, police, social services and environmental issues when the journalists are gone.

In the P-I newsroom, two separate groups simultaneously and secretly began planning online websites, hoping to continue to provide good journalism if the newspaper closes and the surviving online P-I doesn’t cover local news. One group is planning a regional investigative website, the other group plans to cover Seattle news in depth. Both efforts face the same problem – how to raise money.

Shredding machines
But now, on day 67, we still don’t know what Hearst is planning to do. There were some hints last week. A few reporters and editors were offered jobs at an online P-I, sworn to secrecy, but reportedly at lower pay and with reduced benefits.

Shredding machines and boxes to pack up our files and desk items arrived in our office last week. More workshops were scheduled, this time on how to file for unemployment benefits, how to write a resume, and when to apply for health insurance. Last Friday, employees were called into the Human Resources office to pick up envelopes containing details on their retirement earnings.

We have also found out what it is like to be on the other side of the news. Television crews wait outside our office doors. We wave and hurry by, saying we don’t have any information. It’s the truth, we don’t.

Sources offer hugs and sympathetic looks. Longtime readers call and write with fond memories of the newspaper. The newsroom is emptier each day as people take vacation time they have earned but won’t be paid for. The stress has taken a toll, on others, who call in sick. Some are using extra time to look for work.

It feels like death.

Sinking life raft
A married couple at the paper, Dan DeLong, a photographer, and Vanessa Ho, a reporter, have two small children and an old house they are in the middle of remodeling. When the newsroom learned of their situation, the couple received a deluge of offers of help — if reporters armed with hammers, saws and beer can be considered help.

There is a warm sense of camaraderie, but also a feeling that we are all holding hands on a sinking life raft.

As it grows clear that the final days are here, we seek memorabilia. Graphics designer Andrew Saeger made commemorative T-shirts for all of us. Science reporter Tom Paulson ordered baseball caps with our P-I globe logo on the front.

Photographs in the hallways, taken by Phil Webber, a photographer at the P-I for almost 50 years, were given to a lucky few employees in a drawing. Seventy people put in their names for a chance.

For years we have had an “employee of the month,” usually a reporter or photographer acknowledged for recent excellent work. This month, the honored employee is Katherine Barnett, our human resources director, who is helping us gather information we will need when the door closes behind us.