Subject: William Dean Singleton

• Chuck Smith Heralded as Jesus in Backwards California County

  Tehama County, California, is one of the Golden State's more-backward counties, with a population of about 60,000 and a local economy predicated on tourism and...uh, not much else. The main newspaper in town, the Red Bluff Daily News, is a Dean Singleton-owned rag, and thus we can't expect much of it. But the Daily News' advance story last week to publicize an appearance by homo-hating Chuck Smith (founder of Santa Ana's Calvary Chapel) goes even below the depths of mainstream journalism. "He h

  November 16, 2007

• OC Register Death Watch Part Two

  Last week, I reported that the Orange County Register is in secret talks with Dean Singleton, owner of the Denver-based MediaNews Inc. and an all-around Darth Vader of daily news--he bought and all but killed the Long Beach Press Telegram, just as one example--to share content and lay off writers. I also wrote that Register publisher Terry Horne plans to give away free issues and depend on ad sales to save his failing paper. Horne wouldn't comment for my story, but confirmed the details in a p

  February 20, 2008

• OC Register Death Watch Part Three

  It's been just over a week since I wrote that the Orange County Register is in content-sharing talks with Dean Singleton's MediaNews Inc. and a week since Register publisher Terry Horne told one of his own reporters about his vision for saving the paper, including the formation of "a consortium with other companies, to be announced soon, that will share advertising and news content." There's no evidence the reporter even asked Horne about my story about Singleton, which is pretty bizarre given

  February 26, 2008

• More newsroom cuts! Who is it this time?

  LA Daily News staff are bracing for a possible shakeup after, as media blog LA Observed reports, employee representatives have sent memos saying a meeting this very afternoon could produce some very bad news. We expect there will probably be a staff meeting called Wednesday afternoon and that they will offer buyouts, but this is not certain. I wish I had some news to offer, because I hate this confusion and darkness as much as everyone, but all I can say is that as soon as we hear anything, we

  February 27, 2008

• Devil Dean Calls Obama "Bin Laden"

  Most people know Dean Singleton as the owner of the Denver-based MediaNews, Inc., a man who loves to buy newspapers like the L.A. Daily News and Long Beach Press-Telegram so that he can slash salaries, bust unions, earn huge profits, and generally quicken the destruction of print journalism. (His effort to buy the OC Register a few years back failed, but now he's using their copy to allow him to lay off his own reporters). But did you know that Singleton also happens to be chairman of the boar

  April 14, 2008

• OC Register Laying off Five Percent of Workforce

  It's never fun being right about this kind of thing, but apparently the OC Register is laying off 80 to 90 employees, according to a post today on the newspaper's website. Here's about half of the post (it's really short): "... [Publisher Terry] Horne cited Orange County’s sluggish economy, especially in real estate, as affecting the company’s revenues from local retail, automotive and classified advertising for jobs. The company provided no financial details about the decline in adverti

  April 28, 2008

• Dumbest Register Story Ever?

  According to folks we know who work there--see our OC Register Death Watch archive for all the depressing details--morale has never been lower at the Orange County Register. Last weekend, I bumped into one prominent Reg writer who told me it takes all his strength to even show up at work for fear of what terrible internal e-mail about layoffs or cutbacks will pop into his inbox. But at least one Reggie writer is having a good time—maybe too much of a good time: Barry Koltnow. He's the longti

  July 2, 2008

• What's Red and Blue and Drops Balloons All Over?

  Sniff. Sniff. Ecch. You smell something? What the... OK, who let all those elephants and donkeys in here? Yes, a fun temporary feature tracking the movements of America's favorite symbolic political herbivores now lurks in the lower-right-hand area of our home page: Two blogs from our Village Voice Media sister papers dedicated to covering the Democratic and Republican national conventions. Check out Westword's "Demver" (in blue, duh) and City Pages' "Elephants in the Room" (in red, double duh,

  August 22, 2008

• OC Register Refuses to Close Down Its Own Secret Sex Club

  April 24, 2008

• The Content-Sharing Deal Between the OC Register and MediaNews Hasn't Led to Cuts at the Reg (Yet)

  March 20, 2008

• Letters From OC Weekly Readers

  February 28, 2008

• The Register in talks with MediaNews about sharing content

  February 14, 2008

• See You, Suckers!

  This time, she means it

  February 1, 2007

• Diary of a Mad Year

  Jan. 1-Dec. 13

  December 28, 2006

• Diary of a Mad County

  Nov. 29 - Dec. 5
  

  December 7, 2006

• Safe For Now

  November 6, 2003

• Has the Decline of the Register Created Space for Nonprofit Site the Voice of OC to Put Down Roots?

  October 22, 2009