Eddy Hartenstein, the former head of satellite television provider DirecTV, will become the new publisher of the Los Angeles Times on Monday.
Hartenstein said Friday that he would fill the post vacated when publisher David Hiller resigned July 14, the same day parent company Tribune Co. began implementing the latest round of staff cutbacks at the paper.
Hartenstein takes over at a time when The Times and most other newspapers are losing readers and advertising revenue at a significant rate. Some observers are even questioning whether the newspaper business as currently constituted can survive.
"I'm not coming into this with blinders on," said Hartenstein, 57. "I realize that the problems are huge and daunting, but I don't believe there's anything that can't be fixed as long as everyone is pulling in the same direction."
An avid reader of The Times since his boyhood in Alhambra, he said, "I love challenges. I love complex issues and problems, and this certainly met all that."
Sam Zell, who has led Tribune since taking the Chicago-based media company private last December, approached the former satellite TV executive about becoming publisher about a month ago, said Hartenstein, who met Zell for the first time last fall.
After mulling it over and doing some research -- which included a 3 1/2 -hour lunch with Times Editor Russ Stanton -- Hartenstein agreed to take the job.
"I wanted to know that I would have the ability . . . to call the shots," said Hartenstein, who said his new boss made no demands concerning future staff cuts. Zell "basically said, 'You're the publisher and CEO. It's yours to run,' and that was pretty much it."
Hartenstein said he also sought assurances that Zell had no intention to simply "dress up the paper for a sale."
"One of the questions I asked Sam was: Are you going to keep this?" Hartenstein said. The answer "was a strong, affirmative 'Yes. This is a keeper.' "
The Times has been particularly hard hit by the current turmoil in the newspaper industry. Its daily circulation has tumbled from a peak of 1.2 million in the early 1990s to about 774,000 this year while advertising revenue has slumped. Traffic to the paper's website, at latimes.com, has increased sharply in recent years but that has not offset the declines in advertising.
