Zell: Too much “complacency” in newspaper industry
By Leah McBride Mensching, Tuesday 23 October 2007 at 21:20 :: General :: #741 :: rss
Billionaire Sam Zell, who plans to buy the Tribune Company, told a group of newspaper executives Monday that part of the industry's problems are due to complacency, comparing the industry to Nero fiddling while Rome burned, the Canadian Press reported.
“I think the newspaper industry has stood there and watched while other media enterprises have taken our bacon and run with it,” he told the Inland Press Association. “It's too much complacency.”
Zell had made an $8.2 billion buyout deal to take the Tribune Co. private, which will put him in a powerful industry position when the deal closes.
He said that the Internet's rise, cross-selling different forms of media and 24-hour news channels are major challenges newspapers have not met well. Newspapers have been “standing there and letting this happen while Rome is burning,” the Canadian Press quoted Zell as saying. However, he would not comment on specific plans for Tribune after the deal goes through. Zell has said he does not want to own the Chicago Cubs, which are owned by Tribune.
“The Cubs are a wonderful national icon, and maybe it's a business, but it sure is a business I don't understand,” Zell is quoted as saying by the Chicago Tribune. “So I'm going to pass the risk on to somebody who either understands it or gets enough psychic income” that they don't care.
But despite industry woes, Zell said he still sees Tribune as a great long-term investment.
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