"Reports of my demise are greatly exaggerated."

There's a rumor floating around the Peninsula that the Daily News is ceasing operations and being folded into the San Mateo County Times and San Jose Mercury News.  I'm happy to say it is not true.


There is some consolidation going on.  The paper has been printed under two mastheads (Palo Alto Redwood City, San Mateo and Burlingame Daily News) for several years, but will now go under the title "Daily News" alone without a city designation.  The rumor may have been given rise that the parent company of the Daily News Group, MediaNews Group Incorporated, was renegotiating their loan on the purchase of the Daily News Group in Los Angeles.

Things are tough all over, but it doesn't mean and end to all things.  Both the Daily News Group and the San Mateo Daily Journal have been hit hard with dropping ad revenues, as well as increased competition from the upstart Daily Post (from the founders of the DNG who sold to Knight Ridder who sold to Media News Group).  Part of the problem all those papers face is that they give away their content for free on line, unlike the Post, which makes you go get a paper and actually see the ads for which they get paid.  But local media is still alive and relatively well on the SF Peninsula.