Matthew Hansen leaving OWH for Buffett Early Childhood Institute

[Uffda]

Hansen: It's time for me to say farewell to piecing together stories about the state we love

After 13 years here as a reporter and columnist, my last week is next week. I have taken a new job as a managing editor at the Buffett Early Childhood Institute at the University of Nebraska.

https://www.omaha.com/columnists/hansen ... 1c0e8.html

[Greg S]

Tony Boone is leaving the OWH too.

Greg

[Uffda]

Kent Sievers one of their long time photographers has already left for the UNMC PR dept.

[Omaha Cowboy]

Wowzers..

They’re dropping like flies at the W-H lately...

Ciao..LiO...Peace

[almighty_tuna]

So much talent has been kicked out the door at the OWH. Frankly I'm surprised that Kevin Coffey hasn't gone full Half Baked yet...

[youtube][/youtube]

[nativeomahan]

The World-Herald has had many good journalists working for them. Lately many have left or retired and they don’t seem to ever be replaced. There is apparent no longer a film reviewer working at the paper. I don’t ever remember that being the case.

[Uffda]

Another one.

World-Herald Executive Editor Melissa Matczak announced Monday that she is resigning.

Matczak began at the World-Herald in 1997 as an education reporter and served as managing editor for four years before taking over the newsroom’s top role in 2017.

https://www.omaha.com/news/metro/execut ... 0eac7.html

[Cermak]

Really amazing how small the OWH is getting. It’s been a rather dramatic decline. I think we will still have a need for newspapers but they will just be much smaller than they used to be.

[bigredmed1]

Really amazing how small the OWH is getting. It’s been a rather dramatic decline. I think we will still have a need for newspapers but they will just be much smaller than they used to be.

The papers are getting back to boiler plate with a handfull of articles from 1 or 2 local reporters. Going to be pretty hard to justify what they are no charging for a paper.

[GrandpaaSmucker]

Really amazing how small the OWH is getting. It’s been a rather dramatic decline. I think we will still have a need for newspapers but they will just be much smaller than they used to be.

The papers are getting back to boiler plate with a handfull of articles from 1 or 2 local reporters. Going to be pretty hard to justify what they are now charging for a paper.

The justification for ripping people off by charging them 2 dollars for a paper that is 75% made up of articles they got off the internet? It appears their justification is that if we are dumb enough to keep buying and reading it then they are going to see just how far they can ride this sinking ship before she finally goes under. There is no dignified way to bail out of a failing business. At some point the guys on top have to man up and shut the thing down and be done with it. How far will they push this thing is about the only question left?

[damonhynes]

Or Alzheimer's victims like my mom. The newspaper is always correct, because...it's the newspaper. Just like she's convinced that ABC News always tells the truth.

[bigredmed1]

Really amazing how small the OWH is getting. It’s been a rather dramatic decline. I think we will still have a need for newspapers but they will just be much smaller than they used to be.

The papers are getting back to boiler plate with a handfull of articles from 1 or 2 local reporters. Going to be pretty hard to justify what they are now charging for a paper.

The justification for ripping people off by charging them 2 dollars for a paper that is 75% made up of articles they got off the internet? It appears their justification is that if we are dumb enough to keep buying and reading it then they are going to see just how far they can ride this sinking ship before she finally goes under. There is no dignified way to bail out of a failing business. At some point the guys on top have to man up and shut the thing down and be done with it. How far will they push this thing is about the only question left?

Boiler plate newspapers got us Joslyn Castle. They sold stories that were shipped out on brass cylinders that fit the newspaper presses of the day. The newspapers would set their title and date, then add in a few stories and obituaries from the local city, and push the start button. All the canned articles filled the paper that would otherwise be something they could have filled with one or two sheets of paper. Substitute the brass cylinders for the internet and Josyln Castle for the Silicon valley and you see how we have just gone back and repeated history.

[jag42]

Pretty sad The OW-H no longer sends a beat writer to Omaha StormChaser home games

[nativeomahan]

Sarah Baker Hansen is also leaving her restaurant beat with the W-H. She announced it yesterday on her Twitter account. She is the wife of Matthew.

Will the last one out of the building please turn off the lights.

[Omaha Cowboy]

As bad as the W-H has become, losing her won’t be that dramatic of a loss.. The W-H could probably employ a 20/21 year old UNO undergrad who could do just as competent a job...

Ciao..LiO...Peace

[bigredmed1]

Sarah Baker Hansen is also leaving her restaurant beat with the W-H. She announced it yesterday on her Twitter account. She is the wife of Matthew.

Will the last one out of the building please turn off the lights.

Honestly, not much of a loss. We never seemed to agree with her food reviews and her articles about other stuff were competent, but not compelling.

[nativeomahan]

As bad as the W-H has become, losing her won’t be that dramatic of a loss.. The W-H could probably employ a 20/21 year old UNO undergrad who could do just as competent a job...

Ciao..LiO...Peace

Well I always looked forward to her reviews, as well as her podcasts. She is very knowledgeable when it comes to food, and has the ear of Omaha’s best and brightest chefs and restaurant owners.
I worry that the paper will let the position remain vacant for too long, just like they have failed to hire a single person to write movie reviews.
The paper has become a paper tiger. According to statistics they published in today’s paper, their paid Sunday subscribership is down over 6% in the past year. Electronic only subscribers now constitute 15% of the total paid subscriptions, at 14,294. Their overall numbers have fallen from well over 200,000 a decade ago to 80,762 now.

[Omaha Cowboy]

As bad as the W-H has become, losing her won’t be that dramatic of a loss.. The W-H could probably employ a 20/21 year old UNO undergrad who could do just as competent a job...

Ciao..LiO...Peace

I worry that the paper will let the position remain vacant for too long, just like they have failed to hire a single person to write movie reviews.
The paper has become a paper tiger.

I agree with you completely here. The quality and overall thoroughness of their coverage has noticeably dipped over the past 5-10 years. Kind of embarrassing for a metro of 1 million imo. This paper should have a competent movie and TV review critic, music and entertainment critic.. along with an additional “food” (not foodie) critic as well..

The W-H is just sagging overall in the aforementioned areas, along with their newsroom. The only area they are still good at, is covering Nebraska Football, 24/7, 365 days a year...

Ciao..LiO...Peace

[EastCB]

I thought her reviews were really bad. Not much that I agreed with.

[bigredmed1]

As bad as the W-H has become, losing her won’t be that dramatic of a loss.. The W-H could probably employ a 20/21 year old UNO undergrad who could do just as competent a job...

Ciao..LiO...Peace

I worry that the paper will let the position remain vacant for too long, just like they have failed to hire a single person to write movie reviews.
The paper has become a paper tiger.

I agree with you completely here. The quality and overall thoroughness of their coverage has noticeably dipped over the past 5-10 years. Kind of embarrassing for a metro of 1 million imo. This paper should have a competent movie and TV review critic, music and entertainment critic.. along with an additional “food” (not foodie) critic as well..

The W-H is just sagging overall in the aforementioned areas, along with their newsroom. The only area they are still good at, is covering Nebraska Football, 24/7, 365 days a year...

Ciao..LiO...Peace

Agreed with the over coverage of Huskers (and Jays BBall in the winter)

The critical work in the paper has been a severe hole for a long time and she did little to repair the deficit, so I don't see her departure as a bad thing.

The OWH is a MAJOR homer for the arts. It got so bad that my wife and I used to joke that if they didn't have some fawning masturbatory "review" in the paper then the Opera was going to stink out loud...we were never wrong. Any flaw got ignored or minimized. It is the same with restaurants. Her reviews were pretty much always positive and the few times she gave a bad review, it was like getting a B+. She never just shredded a place. She never violated the "Must Not Dislike" rule. Those places that the cool kids like and therefore you must not dislike any aspect of it. Even if one or two dishes made her blow chunks.

The OWH needs a reviewer that will say the new Star Wars movie is a feminist wetdream and its not worth the money. Its ok that a restaurant that specializes in Thai food is too sweet or that they don't have a broad enough menu so that a person who doesn't like 5 alarm spice can't enjoy their dinner while their companion is loving the heat (or vice versa). Most importantly, and this is seriously holding back the arts scene in Omaha: we need a critic with enough credibility inside the Art community that when they say the Opera was ridiculously bad for the following 5 glaring flaws, that it gets taken seriously and they stop making the flaws happen. We will never be more that what we are Arts wise if the entire Arts scene gets to hide behind the skirts of the Homers at the OWH.

Same with sports. We will never develop further in Hockey or Soccer, or other sports if the coverage has no breadth. People don't find out that UNO's Vball team is on a hot streak till they don't have any home games in the near future, so they don't go to the game and get into that team. Same, sadly with the Stormchasers and the soon to be pro-soccer team. The Huskers and the Jays won't ever get better than they are if they don't have to. Put the Jays and the Mavs on the same weekend, the Jays could be winning a game against some NAIA school and the Mavs could upset the #1 team in the nation, the Jays will still be above the fold. CU doesn't have to get better because they are going to fill the arena and get glowing coverage no matter what.

Seriously OWH, if you want my money, learn from the Wall Street Journal (which gets a lot of my money), Be Freaking USEFUL!!! Give me a review that warns me off of a cheesy broadway show or a "so bad you can smell it outside the Orpheum" Opera. Tell me the especially good meals at a good restaurant, but warn me off of the ones that aren't. If the Bemis or other gallery has some really cool show, tell me about it (BEFORE hand), but again, a lot of art is redundant and perfunctory. I don't want to drag my sick wife across town to see some |expletive| show just because Jun Kaneko has a piece in it. |expletive| is |expletive|, even if it's famous or has a rich person funding it. Be useful! Give me some reason to buy your paper and I will.

[ChadJK]

I'm not surprised the Hansens are leaving OWH. I used to follow both of them (mostly her) and they were a little salty (as salty as you can be while maintaining job security) when OWH went through a round of layoffs in February of 2018 and an additional smaller round in August of 2018. That's probably when they started looking for other opportunities. She's a good source for restaurant news and happenings (her OWH position means she can actually get owners and chefs to reply to her when they're ignoring the rest of the world), but I don't agree with many of her reviews. I find most professional restaurant reviewers tend to grade trendy restaurants on a curve and I prefer blunt honesty in reviews.

[Omaha Cowboy]

As bad as the W-H has become, losing her won’t be that dramatic of a loss.. The W-H could probably employ a 20/21 year old UNO undergrad who could do just as competent a job...

Ciao..LiO...Peace

I worry that the paper will let the position remain vacant for too long, just like they have failed to hire a single person to write movie reviews.
The paper has become a paper tiger.

I agree with you completely here. The quality and overall thoroughness of their coverage has noticeably dipped over the past 5-10 years. Kind of embarrassing for a metro of 1 million imo. This paper should have a competent movie and TV review critic, music and entertainment critic.. along with an additional “food” (not foodie) critic as well..

The W-H is just sagging overall in the aforementioned areas, along with their newsroom. The only area they are still good at, is covering Nebraska Football, 24/7, 365 days a year...

Ciao..LiO...Peace

Agreed with the over coverage of Huskers (and Jays BBall in the winter)

The critical work in the paper has been a severe hole for a long time and she did little to repair the deficit, so I don't see her departure as a bad thing.

The OWH is a MAJOR homer for the arts. It got so bad that my wife and I used to joke that if they didn't have some fawning masturbatory "review" in the paper then the Opera was going to stink out loud...we were never wrong. Any flaw got ignored or minimized. It is the same with restaurants. Her reviews were pretty much always positive and the few times she gave a bad review, it was like getting a B+. She never just shredded a place. She never violated the "Must Not Dislike" rule. Those places that the cool kids like and therefore you must not dislike any aspect of it. Even if one or two dishes made her blow chunks.

The OWH needs a reviewer that will say the new Star Wars movie is a feminist wetdream and its not worth the money. Its ok that a restaurant that specializes in Thai food is too sweet or that they don't have a broad enough menu so that a person who doesn't like 5 alarm spice can't enjoy their dinner while their companion is loving the heat (or vice versa). Most importantly, and this is seriously holding back the arts scene in Omaha: we need a critic with enough credibility inside the Art community that when they say the Opera was ridiculously bad for the following 5 glaring flaws, that it gets taken seriously and they stop making the flaws happen. We will never be more that what we are Arts wise if the entire Arts scene gets to hide behind the skirts of the Homers at the OWH.

Same with sports. We will never develop further in Hockey or Soccer, or other sports if the coverage has no breadth. People don't find out that UNO's Vball team is on a hot streak till they don't have any home games in the near future, so they don't go to the game and get into that team. Same, sadly with the Stormchasers and the soon to be pro-soccer team. The Huskers and the Jays won't ever get better than they are if they don't have to. Put the Jays and the Mavs on the same weekend, the Jays could be winning a game against some NAIA school and the Mavs could upset the #1 team in the nation, the Jays will still be above the fold. CU doesn't have to get better because they are going to fill the arena and get glowing coverage no matter what.

Seriously OWH, if you want my money, learn from the Wall Street Journal (which gets a lot of my money), Be Freaking USEFUL!!! Give me a review that warns me off of a cheesy broadway show or a "so bad you can smell it outside the Orpheum" Opera. Tell me the especially good meals at a good restaurant, but warn me off of the ones that aren't. If the Bemis or other gallery has some really cool show, tell me about it (BEFORE hand), but again, a lot of art is redundant and perfunctory. I don't want to drag my sick wife across town to see some |expletive| show just because Jun Kaneko has a piece in it. |expletive| is |expletive|, even if it's famous or has a rich person funding it. Be useful! Give me some reason to buy your paper and I will.

I agree completely with what you’re saying here red..

Well put...

Ciao..LiO...Peace

[nativeomahan]

I'm not surprised the Hansens are leaving OWH. I used to follow both of them (mostly her) and they were a little salty (as salty as you can be while maintaining job security) when OWH went through a round of layoffs in February of 2018 and an additional smaller round in August of 2018. That's probably when they started looking for other opportunities. She's a good source for restaurant news and happenings (her OWH position means she can actually get owners and chefs to reply to her when they're ignoring the rest of the world), but I don't agree with many of her reviews. I find most professional restaurant reviewers tend to grade trendy restaurants on a curve and I prefer blunt honesty in reviews.

Do any of you recall what happened to the World-Herald’s prior longterm restaurant critic, Nichole Aksamit? She had a reputation for telling it like it was, and criticizing places that deserved it, though still with a velvet glove at times. Soon after savaging a now long gone restaurant outside Westroads mall for their sexist attitudes, she was schitcanned by her overlords, who feared a loss of restaurant advertising.

Omaha isn’t a big city. Everyone in the restaurant industry knows everyone else, and critics for the W-H, The Reader, and Omaha Magazine work with an unwritten rule that they must never strongly criticize a restaurant. So the reader was forced to read between the lines, as it were.

[bbinks]

Do any of you recall what happened to the World-Herald’s prior longterm restaurant critic, Nichole Aksamit? She had a reputation for telling it like it was, and criticizing places that deserved it, though still with a velvet glove at times. Soon after savaging a now long gone restaurant outside Westroads mall for their sexist attitudes, she was schitcanned by her overlords, who feared a loss of restaurant advertising.

Omaha isn’t a big city. Everyone in the restaurant industry knows everyone else, and critics for the W-H, The Reader, and Omaha Magazine work with an unwritten rule that they must never strongly criticize a restaurant. So the reader was forced to read between the lines, as it were.

Magazine editor.


https://www.omaha.com/living/savor/form ... da772.html