Newspapers

The Press-Telegram and Daily Breeze, two newspapers owned by MediaNews Group Inc., will cut staff and merge their Internet, copy editing and pagination operations in response to sagging ad revenue, an editor said Monday. The move involves the loss of nine jobs at the Daily Breeze, located in Torrance, and about 10 jobs at the Press-Telegram in Long Beach, Daily Breeze Editor Phillip Sanfield said.

Between 80 and 90 employees of the company that owns the Orange County Register will lose their jobs this week, the publisher told the staff Monday. The layoffs are necessary for the paper's survival, Publisher Terry Horne said. About 5% of the people who work for Santa Ana-based Orange County Register Communications, which owns the newspaper and several other publications and websites, will be out of work. "We're still in troubled waters," Horne said in an e-mail to employees.

Draw your own conclusion about political cartoons. Neighbors Bob Scheibel and Daryl Cagle certainly have. Scheibel contends that editorial cartoonists no longer have the free hand -- or the public clout -- that they enjoyed for more than 200 free-wheeling years. Cagle counters that today's political cartoonists are doing the most significant work in the history of their barbed pen-and-ink profession.

Over THE past few weeks, whenever I've told someone that I'm starting a new Big Picture blog here at The Times, they invariably have the same reaction: That's nice, but are you going to keep the column? I know it's meant as a compliment, but it's also a bracing reminder that people prefer familiarity to, well, unfamiliarity. It's why Hollywood keeps churning out sequels. It's why "Law & Order" has been on TV forever.

Despite declines in revenue and repeated staff reductions, most American newspaper editors remain optimistic that their publications will regain their footing by shifting news to online editions and by employing innovations like video and computer-assisted reporting, a study has found.

They were a distasteful breed, all in all, the loud-mouthed young hustlers who sold newspapers on this city's street corners, and when the 11- and 12-year-old newsboys got driven out in the early part of the last century, the old men and toothless reprobates who replaced them were scarcely any better. "In every condition of decrepitude, some with two crutches, some with one, some with but one arm, some partially blind and some totally blind," a county judge wrote in 1937.

Spacious and airy, the newsroom of the National seems a newfangled journalistic field of dreams, with its stylish furniture, flat-panel monitors and roomy, uncluttered desks. Though the new United Arab Emirates newspaper has a daily circulation of only 70,000 to 90,000, it has grand ambitions and leaders who are bullish on print journalism. "Don't panic!" editor Martin Newland advises his counterparts in the West. "Don't head to the hills yet.

Facing falling revenue in a stalling economy, the Los Angeles Times on Monday laid off 75 editorial employees, part of a 200-person reduction that began last week. "The Times is no less immune to the twists and turns of the current economic situation than virtually all other businesses and institutions," Publisher Eddy W. Hartenstein said in a prepared statement. "As such, we continue to evaluate and realign our organization and operations."

The century-old Christian Science Monitor said Tuesday that it would discontinue its daily print edition in April and move almost exclusively to online publication, becoming the first major national newspaper to abandon a daily paper-and-ink format. The move, which had been expected by industry professionals and the Monitor staff, will cut annual costs by millions of dollars for the money-losing newspaper, which is subsidized by the Christian Science Church.

Apparently looking for something old to go with something new (Barack Obama) and something blue (a more Democratic Congress), the American people bought newspapers in huge numbers Wednesday, a day after the historic election of the nation's first black president. From the nation's largest daily, USA Today, to its more modest broadsheets, newspapers expanded press runs to accommodate enormous sales. Some papers even sold special gift editions and framed front pages.