On today's Exchange we're reminded of Joni Mitchell's song from 2002, "Big Yellow Taxi." The lyrics in the refrain are "Don't it always seem to go ... that you don't what you've got till it's gone ... they paved paradise and put up a parking lot."
We're talking about the April 10 screening of a documentary film at Southern Oregon university titled, "Stripped for Parts: Journalism on the Brink" It's free and open to the public. Venue: SOU Music Recital Hall. Time: 6:30pm. Learn more.
Joining the Exchange is David Sommers. He's a board member at Ashland.news and one of the panelists discussing the film at the screening.
David was the inaugural publisher of the Rogue Valley Times and Chief revenue Officer at EO Media Group, which published more than a dozen newspapers around Oregon. His career covers a long list of leadership at various media organizations in Oregon and California.
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Backed by the NewsGuild union, the newsmen and women go toe-to-toe with their “vulture capitalist” owners in a battle to save and rebuild local journalism in America. Who will control the future of America’s news ecosystem: Wall Street billionaires concerned only with profit, or those who see journalism as an essential public service, the lifeblood of our democracy?
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