The P-I Is Dead, Long Live the P-I!

03/17/2009

The Seattle Post–Intelligencer published its final print edition last night, marking the end of a 146–year–old tradition. The newspaper will fold and be replaced by a much smaller online operation, seattlepi.com.

The Seattle P–I's publisher, Roger Oglesby, made the announcement in the morning. Standing in the newsroom, he told the staff, tonight we'll be putting the P–I to bed for the last time.

The move wasn't a surprise. The P–I's parent company Hearst had announced two months earlier its intention to sell the newspaper and to end the print edition if no buyer came forward. The company had been closed–mouthed about its intentions since then.

After the announcement, P–I Managing Editor David McCumber admitted to mixed feelings. He said he was sad but also relieved that the news was finally out.

McCumber: "I'm not glad this day is here, but given that it was going to come, I'm glad that it's over with. It's been really hard on the staff this last two months. I'm very proud of the way they have kept the quality of this newspaper high during this period though, I mean, it's been amazing, we've had good investigative work, we've had good enterprise work, we've had great photojournalism, we've really kept the quality of the P–I up there in this time, and that's just a testament to the professionalism of the staff."

The newspaper will be replaced by an online–only news site. A press release says it will be a "community platform" that aims to be the leading news and information portal in the region. It will include breaking news, columns from prominent Seattle residents, community databases, photo galleries and 150 citizen bloggers.

P–I Business reporter Andrea James will work for the new site. She says in addition to doing her own reporting, she will be aggregating news from a variety of sources.

James: "I think it will be different. I think that before, I was competing with The Seattle Times, as well as a lot of other different media outlets. Now I won't be competing, I'll be doing stuff that other people won't be doing, and if The Seattle Times does something great, I'll link to it."

But the online P–I will have a much smaller news gathering operation than the current P–I. Only about 20 staff members will continue on. That's out of a total of well over 100. In addition to James, they include reporter Casey McNerthney and columnist Joel Connelly. Sport Columnist Art Thiel will continue to contribute, but as a freelancer. And the site will have only one photographer.

The vast majority of P–I staffers were packing up their desks on Monday. And according to the news report on the P–I Website, some marked the occasion with bottles of bourbon and whiskey.

Late in the afternoon, a handful of journalists from The Seattle Times gathered in the cold outside the P–I building. They made the cross town journey to pay tribute to their former rivals and to say goodbye. Danny Westneat is a Seattle Times columnist. He used a megaphone to address the crowd.

Westneat: "You know, it's hard to work in this industry right now because all you get is a bunch of grief from people who say you deserve to go out of business, or you're doing a lousy job, or what have you, but don't believe it — it isn't true, and what is happening today is not your fault. You people have done great work at this newspaper, you don't sell advertising and you didn't invent the internet. You guys are great storytellers and you've done a fantastic job."

And Westneat concluded with a good luck to the online P–I. Maybe you can make some money and hire some reporters, he said, so we can go back to doing what we have always wanted to do all our lives.

I'm Deborah Wang KUOW News.

© Copyright 2009, KUOW