Devoted to publishing, publishers and to those who craft the written word

Time Inc. took some devastating lay-offs today, and scores of writers are now out of work. Gawker has provided the best coverage of the damage so far.

When these publishing disasters occur, I like to re-read a quote from the story, "Penny-A-Worder" by Cornell Woolrich--a reflection on the self-destructive joy of writing for the vicious pulp fiction industry in the 1930's.

"The story flowed like a torrent.  The margin bell chimed almost staccato, the roller turned with almost piston-like continuity, the pages sprang up almost like blobs of batter from a pancake skillet.  The beer kept rising in the glass and, contradictorily, steadily falling lower.  The cigarettes gave up their ghosts, long thing gray ghosts, in good cause; the mortality rate was terrible."

What if we emerge from the wreckage of the print economy with an army of underpaid writers handcuffed to pulp fiction production schedules? I'm scared that ten years down the new media road, thousands of frenzied writers will be publishing millions of disposable blog posts, all of us earning Depression-era salaries.

This is not a moment to crow about new media beating old media. These industry cuts will eventually affect us all, from the Times reporters all the way down to fledgling web writers. We're all in this together now...