<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0When I read the front page article in what was to prove to be the last daily issue of the Ironwood Globe (August 31, 2022), it hit me like a line-drive to the forehead.\u00a0 The sudden turn of events took what their publisher described as a \u2018thriving, profitable business\u2019 and changed their business model in the matter of a couple of days.\u00a0 Nine people were suddenly looking for work and a host of customers who utilized the Globe print shop were suddenly scrambling to find a new path as the Globe condensed their operations to that of a weekly paper.\u00a0 Knowing that our own weekly, <\/span>The Ontonagon Herald<\/span><\/i>, was one of those print shop customers, I kind of held my breath wondering what this would mean for our hometown paper.\u00a0 When Barb K printed a note on the <\/span>You Know You Are From Ontonagon <\/span><\/i>Facebook site announcing some slight modifications in the <\/span>Herald\u2019s <\/span><\/i>publication schedule, I finally was able to exhale.\u00a0 The new deadline for submissions would now be noon on Mondays.\u00a0 The <\/span>Herald<\/span><\/i> would now be printed and mailed from Shawano, Wisconsin, with it hitting the streets Thursday and mailboxes on Friday.\u00a0 On the plus side, the comments posted were positive and encouraging – a good indication that people still do like to have a local paper.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Regular readers of this column are already aware of my affinity for the printed word appearing on paper be it glossy or newsprint.\u00a0 I usually do not like to re-run previous articles, but this one from 2018 certainly is appropo to this shocking development.\u00a0 We certainly have sympathy for what our brothers and sisters of the print are feeling at the Globe.\u00a0 Even though our crystal ball is dark as to what the future will bring for them, this article speaks to what happened to the folks at <\/span>Classic Rock Magazine<\/span><\/i> in 2016.\u00a0 As you will find me stating at the conclusion of the original <\/span>Power of Print<\/span><\/i> article, it is more important than ever to support your hometown paper either by picking up a copy at your local emporium or by subscribing.\u00a0 Supporting local print media is another great way to support all local business, government units, schools, entertainment venues, and charities.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0(<\/b>FTV:\u00a0 Power of Print<\/i><\/b> – originally published 5-30-18)<\/b>\u00a0 \u201cIn December of 2016, I almost subscribed to <\/span>Classic Rock Magazine<\/span><\/i>.\u00a0 I\u00a0 found myself buying a copy whenever they weren\u2019t sold out at the bookstore, so it seemed the logical thing to do would be to save a few bucks and subscribe.\u00a0 I cued up the TeamRock website and was met with an announcement that the company was under what sounded like some sort of receivership and searching for a new owner.\u00a0 No action could be taken as the website was frozen on this page.\u00a0 The last thing they suggested was checking back \u2018in the near future\u2019.\u00a0 I was a bit puzzled and the frozen web page ended all thoughts of subscribing, so I resolved to check back \u2018in the near future\u2019.\u00a0 Subscribing to a magazine that was shopping for a new owner didn\u2019t seem to be a wise course of action anyway.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Early in 2017, I able to purchase a couple of more issues, but it wasn\u2019t until the March 2017 issue (#233) that the whole story was explained.\u00a0 <\/span>CRM <\/span><\/i>editor Sian Llewellyn explained, as I had suspected, that shortly before Christmas of 2016, TeamRock had gone into \u2018administration\u2019.\u00a0 The people who publish <\/span>Classic Rock Magazine, Prog <\/span><\/i>and <\/span>Metal Hammer <\/span><\/i>magazines were facing a Christmas holiday without employment.\u00a0 TeamRock had notified their employees that there would be no severance pay, no magazines, no websites, no radio . . . nothing.\u00a0 None of that sounds very \u2018Merry Christmas\u2019 does it?<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0So how is it that Issue #233 even went to print?\u00a0 Perhaps we could call it another Christmas Miracle.\u00a0 Llewellyn says, \u201cWhat happened next was simply astonishing on every level – incredible, humbling, emotional, unbelievable and a whole load of other adjectives that I don\u2019t have room to list here.\u201d\u00a0 Under the banner, \u201c<\/span>Classic Rock, Prog, <\/span><\/i>and <\/span>Metal Hammer <\/span><\/i>are dead.\u00a0 Long live <\/span>Classic Rock, Prog, <\/span><\/i>and <\/span>Metal Hammer\u201d, <\/span><\/i>the death and resurrection of these three music publications was explained as follows (the timeline courtesy of <\/span>CRM<\/span><\/i>):<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Monday, December 19.<\/b>\u00a0 The forty-six staffers in London and another twenty-seven in Scotland are informed that TeamRock has gone under.\u00a0 The publishers, designers, journalists and all of their support teams no longer had jobs, they would not be paid and they would not receive severance money.\u00a0 Most retired to local pubs to ponder this bleak turn of events.\u00a0 Merry Christmas!<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0Tuesday, December 20<\/b>.\u00a0 Singer Ben Ward (of the band Orange Goblin) and his partner Sandie heard the sad news and opened a JustGiving page explaining, \u201cThese are good, hard-working people, committed people who, through <\/span>Metal Hammer, Prog Rock, <\/span><\/i>and <\/span>Classic Rock, <\/span><\/i>TeamRock radio, and more, have supported the rock and heavy metal scene in this country for decades, and now we, the rock community need to pull together to help give something back.\u201d\u00a0 Over the next few weeks, 3,698 people responded to the site with comments and donations.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Wednesday, December 21<\/b>.\u00a0 The administrators of the now defunct company re-employ a small number of staffers to get the next issue in print, feeling that a new owner will want continuity in the publications if they are going to invest.\u00a0 This explains how the next two issues came to be.\u00a0 The <\/span>Kerrange!<\/span><\/i> magazine staff invites the former TeamRock staffers to their Christmas party.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Friday, December 23.<\/b>\u00a0 The band Queen re-Tweets news of TeamRock\u2019s problems to their 1.1 million followers.\u00a0 Rush joins in saying, \u201cWe are thinking of the very talented and passionate staff that lived to bring the music of so many artists to their fans.\u201d\u00a0 Ward\u2019s JustGiving fund reaches 66,000 pounds and news about it reaches the pages of the London <\/span>Evening Standard.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0Wednesday, December 28. <\/b>\u00a0This was the last day for bids from anyone wishing to acquire the TeamRock holdings.\u00a0 Everyone is told, \u201cDon\u2019t expect to hear news of any substance until the new year.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0Wednesday, January 4.<\/b>\u00a0 Ex-employees are allowed back into their old offices to say their goodbyes and collect their remaining belongings.\u00a0 It is described as a \u2018wake\/coffee morning\u2019.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0Thursday, January 5.<\/b>\u00a0 Orange Goblin and Steak play a fundraising gig at London Camden\u2019s Black Heart adding another 2,692 pounds\u00a0 to the JustGiving collection.\u00a0 Vendors and subscribers are bewildered as the \u2018final\u2019 issues of the three music mags hit the streets.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0Saturday, January 7.<\/b>\u00a0 Future plc (the group that originally sold the magazine titles to TeamRock in 2013 for more than 10 million pounds) steps forward to buy the titles back.\u00a0 They release a statement saying, \u201cWe have started picking up the pieces and are hoping to get the show back on the road as soon as possible.\u201d\u00a0 Former TeamRock staffers rub their eyes and pinch themselves to make sure they are not dreaming.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Sunday, January 8.<\/b>\u00a0 <\/span>The Guardian<\/span><\/i> reports:\u00a0 \u201cFuture Publishing buys the magazines, websites, and events including 30 year-old <\/span>Metal Hammer<\/span><\/i> for 800,000 pounds.\u201d\u00a0 Having sold the lot for more than 10 million pounds four years earlier, it sounds like Future plc has found a present under their Christmas tree.\u00a0 Christmas Miracle or good business or a little bit of both: \u00a0 the deal ends a hellish month for all the former TeamRock employees who had been dismissed less than a month earlier.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0\u00a0Monday, January 9.<\/b>\u00a0 Quoting directly from <\/span>CRM:\u00a0 <\/span><\/i>\u201cWork commences on the new issues of <\/span>Classic Rock, Metal Hammer, <\/span><\/i>and <\/span>Prog<\/span><\/i> . . . So, we\u2019re back.\u00a0 And at your service.\u00a0 And beyond grateful for everything the rock family have done for us over the past two months.\u00a0 Thank you.\u00a0 For those who rock, and who have always rocked, we salute you!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The March 2017 magazine ran a full page \u2018thank you\u2019 naming Ben Ward, Sandie Soriano, Orange Goblin, Steak, and all (albeit in very small print) of the thousands of people who responded to the JustGiving page posted by Ward and Soriano.\u00a0 The JG page eventually totaled 88,790 pounds in just a month\u2019s time.\u00a0 When asked why they got involved, Ward said, \u201cThe page was Sandie\u2019s idea.\u00a0 We honestly didn\u2019t think many people would notice, so we just kept sharing it on Facebook, and within minutes, it was being shared by all our friends and contacts, too.\u00a0 Word of it really did spread like wildfire.\u201d\u00a0 When Queen and Rush weighed in, \u201cThat was just surreal.\u00a0 Being name-checked on the official Rush page was crazy.\u00a0 I got a lot of credit for what happened, but it was a group effort.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Why is this important?\u00a0 In this day and age, traditional magazines are falling by the wayside as people increasingly seek out their entertainment news on some electronic platform.\u00a0 To literally rise from the dead, these three publications have defied the odds with a lot of help from the very electronic medium that put them in peril in the first place.\u00a0 I am not advocating any kind of retro-revolution in the print industry, but there are still many people out there who enjoy, if not prefer, gathering information from printed publications.\u00a0 Imagine how you would feel if your favorite information source of any kind went dark with little or no warning.\u00a0 Imagine walking into your place of employment one day and being told, \u201cSorry, we are done.\u00a0 Go home.\u00a0 Good luck.\u201d\u00a0 For the folks at these three publications, this sad tale had a happy ending.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0The other twist here can be summed up in a couple of old adages:\u00a0 \u201cDon\u2019t underestimate the power of a small group of determined people\u201d and \u201cYou can\u2019t make a difference if you don\u2019t try.\u201d\u00a0 Okay, the second one isn\u2019t so old – it is my take on the first one, but you get the picture.\u00a0 It is high time for me to subscribe to <\/span>CRM<\/span><\/i> because I am happy for them and glad they are still around (or so I wrote when I first outlined the concept of this article early in 2017)!\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Procrastination being what it is, I kept picking up my monthly copy from Bookworld with great plans on getting a subscription to <\/span>CRM.<\/span><\/i>\u00a0 Ironically, it was the closure of all the Bookworld outlets at the end of 2017 that kind of forced my hand.\u00a0 Yes, I am still happy the magazine is still around and now arriving by mail, tempered by the sadness of watching yet another brick and mortar bookstore being shuttered.\u00a0 On the positive side, Orange Goblin\u2019s part in the story spurred me on to find out about a band (or should I say \u2018yet another band\u2019) that I never knew existed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0It is nice to know that people are still willing to roll up their sleeves and make a difference instead of doing nothing.\u00a0 We are going to need a lot of this kind of esprit de corps over the next few years.\u00a0 Let me add a couple of\u00a0 personal notes on the state of print media.\u00a0 Before moving to Ontonagon in August of 1975, I began receiving my weekly copy of <\/span>The Ontonagon Herald<\/span><\/i> which greatly simplified my search for an apartment.\u00a0 This means I have been a continuous subscriber for nearly 45 years.\u00a0 When I find myself discussing local events, I am always amazed when people ask, \u201cWhere did you hear about that?\u201d and when I tell them, \u201cin <\/span>The Herald<\/span><\/i>,\u201d <\/i><\/b>many will respond, \u201cOh, I don\u2019t get that paper.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0People, people, people . . . <\/span>the local newspaper is your first and most vital link to your community and by local paper standards, it is a good deal! <\/span>\u00a0I also subscribe to the <\/span>Ironwood Globe<\/span><\/i> and <\/span>The Milwaukee Journal<\/span><\/i> even though both of them arrive a day or two later than the news.\u00a0 Why?\u00a0 Because I like to be informed about what is going on in the world as well as the local area. \u00a0 (Writer\u2019s note:\u00a0 Once upon a time we also subscribed to the <\/span>Houghton Daily Mining Gazette<\/span><\/i> but switched to the Ironwood paper when the Gazette began treating Ontonagon County news and sports coverage as an afterthought).<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u201cBut what about Facebook or (insert the digital media platform of your choice)?\u201d\u00a0 Sorry, I do use email a lot but my personal preference is to use the time that it takes to cruise or post on Facebook (and if you deny that Facebook has the ability to suck a lot of your free time into the abyss, then you and I will not be in agreement here) to do something more useful . . . like read the local paper!\u00a0 The <\/span>CRM<\/span><\/i> story gives me hope that good old fashioned print media won\u2019t become a thing of the past.\u00a0 Remember when they sang the sad song about the demise of vinyl records?\u00a0 Support your local papers before it is too late!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0One updated note about the resurrection of <\/span>Classic Rock Magazine<\/span><\/i>.\u00a0 Hot on the heels of the magazine\u2019s rebirth, so to speak, COVID 19 issues added themselves to the mix.\u00a0 Like many other companies and organizations, the <\/span>CRM <\/span><\/i>team were able to continue most of what they do by working from home.\u00a0 Supply train issues (particularly the loss of their \u2018ship by air\u2019 capabilities) meant a disruption in their magazines arriving in a timely manner.\u00a0 It was weird to see one of the summer issues, for instance, arrive, and then be followed by two spring issues that should have preceded them.\u00a0 It didn\u2019t seem to matter to loyal readers and nary a cross word appeared in print or online decrying the delays.\u00a0 If nothing else, COVID has taught us (well, at least some of us) to be a little more patient with life in general.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Subscribers to the<\/span> Ironwood Globe<\/span><\/i> are about to learn what we have known for a long time:\u00a0 a lot of news can be found in the pages of a weekly paper.\u00a0 Thank you to the<\/span> Ontonagon Herald <\/span><\/i>past, present, and future for being here for your local community.\u00a0 I do not have the statistics in front of me, but the number of former Ontonagon County residents who keep up their subscription so they can stay in tune with the local stuff is pretty amazing.<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><\/i>The rest of you know what must be done to keep <\/span>The Ontonagon Herald<\/span><\/i> in operation:\u00a0 Buy or subscribe to your local hometown paper.\u00a0 That is the best way to help it survive!<\/span><\/p>\n Top Piece Video:\u00a0 Ah yes, Honey Cone in 1971 – reminding us\u00a0The Ontonagon Herald<\/em> also has Want Ads!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0When I read the front page article in what was to prove to be the last daily issue of the Ironwood Globe (August 31, 2022), it hit me like a line-drive to the forehead.\u00a0 The sudden turn of events took what their publisher described as a \u2018thriving, profitable business\u2019 and changed their business model […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,8,7,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2631","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education","category-from-the-vaults","category-local-music-news","category-woas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2631","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2631"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2631\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2634,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2631\/revisions\/2634"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2631"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2631"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.woas-fm.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2631"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}