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It wasn't just the Daily News that failed to come out in full this morning. All the Singleton papers except for the Breeze and Press-Telegram [nope, them too] appear to have been hit by the latest in a series of system hiccups. Gary Scott has a roundup of the editor notes and memos. Here are some highlights:
Indeed, it looks like the server was knocked completely off-line last night and continues to be down this morning. I'm told the morning papers look they were written on typewriters and that Unisys, the database reporters and editors use to actually create the paper, continues to be off-line as well.Tim Berger, New Media Editor at the San Gabriel Valley Newspaper Group, sent out this memo:
There was a major failure with the main Unisys system last night and there is no indication yet when it will be restored. IT is working to bring up a backup system which, I'm told, has a lot less capacity and power than the main system and a limited number of users is allowed. Newsrooms please prepare ahead of time who is most necessary to be logged in. For now, reporters can likely write and edit stories using desktop software and e-mail them to editors. The photo department will be logged into SII for photo assignments. Send an SII message to SPEDS when you need something.
LANG, of course, is an organization that famously tries to do it all on the cheap and that recently lopped off a huge share of its workforce. I guess they're learning there is such a thing as cutting too much. I love that Scott's blog has a recurring tag for Bad decision-making.
* Bad day to screw up: MediaNews slasher-in-chief Dean Singleton is apparently in town today.