Lisa Fung appointed Online Arts and Entertainment Editor

Here's the memo from Editor Russ Stanton:

Colleagues:

Lisa Fung, who has overseen our arts and culture coverage in Calendar for the last nine years, is our new online arts and entertainment editor, effective immediately.

She will oversee our formidable online entertainment report for latimes.com and theenvelope.com, which includes more than a dozen blogs and a team of producers, editors and freelancers. Lisa also will work closely with editors and reporters in Calendar, Company Town and The Envelope to keep these sites fresh 24/7. The goal is to extend our online readership locally, nationally and globally.

In addition, Lisa will be responsible for developing new properties and services that enhance our standing as the authoritative source for news, features, information and analysis about pop culture, celebrity, movies, music, television, social media, video games, arts, culture, awards and the business of Hollywood. She will report to Sallie Hofmeister, Assistant Managing Editor for arts and entertainment.

Sean Gallagher appointed Los Angeles Times' managing editor/online

Here's the note from Editor Russ Stanton:

Colleagues:

I’m pleased to announce that Sean Gallagher, managing editor of latimes.com, will fill the masthead-level position of managing editor/online, effective immediately.
 
Sean has played a key role in the growth and continued improvement of our website, including overseeing the recent redesign that has won much acclaim from our readers and industry colleagues. In his new position, Sean will be responsible for the overall reader experience on latimes.com and the rest of our nearly dozen other digital efforts, which we will continue to expand.

He will work closely with section editors and his colleagues on the masthead, particularly Jon Thurber, managing editor/print, to ensure that the needs of the paper and the site are being met and that our coverage on these platforms is complementary. This includes coordinating and implementing the daily news and features report for our online readers, supervising the large and talented team of your colleagues who produce latimes.com, and helping with the continued integration of our print and Web efforts.

Over his 16-year career, Sean has mastered virtually every facet of online publishing, whether running a news report, producing home pages and building new sections, or working with sales, marketing and IT to develop new products. He joined latimes.com in 2006 as an associate editor; in that job, he helped coordinate the news report and then oversaw the expansion of the Health and Business sections online.

In the three years since, Sean has worked with almost everyone in the newsroom, educating and training staffers about the workings and wonders of the Web, helping with the integration of the print and Web staffs, and finding solutions to vexing technological problems. He also was a member of the Reinvent Committee, formed in 2007 to recommend improvements to the paper during this period of rapid change.

Before joining The Times, Sean was Web director of sddt.com, the website of the San Diego Daily Transcript, where he ran the daily news report. He previously spent more than five years at nytimes.com, where, among other things, he rebuilt and then ran the Science and Health sections and was a producer on the home page. He also worked at the Village Voice as a researcher and at Scholastic Books as a production editor.

Sean is a 1993 graduate of Fordham University, where he earned a bachelor's degree in media studies with a focus on print journalism.

Russ Stanton
Editor

 

(Even) more Qs & A's on the revamped latimes.com

Between comments published on the initial and follow-up posts on this journal about the redesign, and e-mails sent to the readers’ representative office, almost 900 notes have come to praise or heckle the revamped latimes.com, some three-quarters of those responding saying they like the changes.

Meredith Artley, Managing Editor, Online, addressed several often-asked questions last Thursday. Two of those questions have persisted: Why did the “print edition” option disappear, and “where is California news?” More information on those and other questions readers have asked over the last few days is below.

• Where is California news?
That question comes in still, even after Artley answered Thursday to say that “by clicking ‘Local’ in the navigation bar ... you will find continuous coverage there, including our breaking news blog, LA Now, other daily coverage and recent special projects.”

Reader Wayne Dernetz is one who probed more: “But that says nothing about coverage of state political news. Is the L.A. Times cutting back on its Sacramento Bureau?  Egads, I hope not.”  The response from Assistant Managing Editor, California, David Lauter: “You can reassure readers on the state news issue, and particularly the reader who asked about Sacramento: The Times recently added another reporter to our Sacramento bureau, and we have plans to expand the bureau further in the fall as we continue to ensure that we provide our readers -- in print and online -- with the best, timeliest and most authoritative coverage of California government and politics. We've grouped all that coverage as part of "local" because California's local and state institutions are so intertwined.”

• Add more space to the left margin!
Editors say they’ll be adding more space to the left margin.

• Bring back the single-page button.
Readers have asked, editors have answered: The option to read a story on one page is coming back as soon as possible.

Changes in Sports: John Cherwa, deputy editor; Houston Mitchell, assistant editor

Here's the memo from Sports Editors Mike James to the staff:

I’m happy to announce two additions to the Sports staff.

John Cherwa, who was deputy sports editor to Bill Dwyre from 1990 to 1995 before leaving to become sports editor of the Chicago Tribune, is returning to The Times as deputy sports editor. John will have a variety of duties that will include developing multimedia strategies, working on investigations and projects, helping to run the daily operation of the section and directing the department in my absence.

Many of you will remember John from his days in Southern California; he began at The Times in 1980 in the Orange County Edition, becoming sports editor there before moving downtown. He worked tirelessly through the 1984 Olympics in L.A. and was the architect of our expansive and award-winning coverage of the soccer World Cup in 1994. John is a past president of the Associated Press Sports Editors, has won several APSE awards for sections, news reporting and investigative reporting and was editor of the year at the paper in 1995. He left Chicago for the Orlando Sentinel in 2002 and, among other duties, has been the sports coordinator for Tribune papers and in charge of special projects in Orlando since then. His role as Tribune coordinator will continue to be an important one for him in L.A. We’re fortunate to get him back. And by the way, for those of you who don’t know John, the ‘w’ in his last name is pronounced as a ‘v.’
 
Also, Houston Mitchell, an outstanding member of the Sports copy desk since 1998, will be moving to the Sports staff as an assistant sports editor. Houston will help with web production and the creation of interactive features for the website, take over responsibility of the Fabulous Forum sports blog and assume line-editing duties as well.
  
Houston has worked his way up since starting at The Times in 1991 as a desk assistant and has become a reliable sounding board for reporters during his time on the copy desk. He is a creative and thoughtful editor who has been responsible for creating many of the charts that provide important added value to our stories.

John and Houston will begin their new positions the week of Aug. 30.

Measuring the relaunch of latimes.com

Online editor Meredith Artley files this update after hearing from several hundred readers:

Less than 24 hours ago we launched a new latimes.com. We’ve been reading the feedback very closely, including comments on this journal, on Twitter and via regular old e-mail.

The majority of the feedback is positive, which is music to our ears. There are also some vocal voices who prefer the old site. We appreciate hearing from so many savvy readers who care about news presentation, design and navigation. Here are the most common complaints and what we are doing about them:

I can’t find the crossword puzzle/Sudoku…
You can find both in the black navigation bar at the top of every page in the “Games” section, which is available under the “More” tab. We also added it as the last item under “Living” in the text navigation at the bottom of every page.

Where are the obits?
A link to the obituaries section can be found in both the local and national sections. And we added it to the text navigation at the very bottom of every page, under “News.”

Where is the print edition?
Virtually all stories that appear in the printed version of The Times continue to be found on the site. An image of page one of the newspaper is updated daily at latimes.com/print. At that link, you can also find home delivery information and links to the e-edition, Kindle services and archive search services.

Where is California and local news?
You can find our outstanding local coverage by clicking “Local” in the navigation bar. You will find continuous coverage there, including our breaking news blog, LA Now, other daily coverage and recent special projects.

Meredith Artley
Managing Editor, Online
Los Angeles Times

Times unveils 'cleaner, crisper, more innovative site'

Here's a note of introduction to readers from Meredith Artley, managing editor, online, and Russ Stanton, editor, about changes at latimes.com:

 

Welcome to the new latimes.com.
 
We’re bringing you a site that’s easier to read and use and that better showcases the world-class journalism our newsroom produces around the clock. 

Thanks to your frequent visits, latimes.com has seen unparalleled growth among top newspaper sites over the last year. We’re breaking more news than ever on latimes.com; we’ve expanded our blog network; we’re publishing more stunning visual, interactive journalism; and we have savvy readers like you contributing to conversations.

And now you can find all that and more in a cleaner, crisper, more innovative site. 

Key changes include:

- Streamlined navigation at the top of every page, highlighting our main coverage areas such as local news, sports and entertainment. The idea is to make it easier to get around the site from wherever you are.

- Right below the black navigation bar, you’ll see topics “In the News.” Here, you’ll find quick access to big stories we are following, whether it’s the state budget or the Emmys or coverage of unrest in Iran.

- Our new modular approach to the homepage means you can quickly find and access multimedia packages of the news of most interest to you. Scroll down the page, and you’ll see features including the award-winning investigative coverage of “Mexico Under Siege,” excerpts from popular blog posts and columns, top headlines from well-read sections and interactive databases such as Mapping L.A.

- Our video player has improved, with faster-loading video and more sharing features.

- We’ve simplified our articles, making them easier to scroll without interruption from related content or advertising. We’ve enhanced our article-sharing features as well to include more seamless interaction with social-networking sites and the ability to send articles to instant-messaging services and mobile devices.

- Design aficionados will note that we have gone from a sans-serif font (Arial) to a serif font (Georgia). Not only did we find that this was a more readable font, but we also felt it connected to our overall brand much better. 

For more details on what’s new, check out our site tour.
 
Our work is not done. We approached this redesign as another step in the evolution of the Los Angeles Times, as a building block for more things to come. 
 
Thanks for supporting the work we do by visiting us and engaging and interacting with the site. As always, your feedback is welcome in the comments below or by e-mailing readers.rep@latimes.com.

-- Meredith Artley, managing editor, online,
Russ Stanton, editor

[Updated: Artley answered some reader questions in a follow-up post Thursday.]

July numbers for latimes.com: 'Strong month for breaking news of all stripes'

Meredith Artley, Managing Editor, Online, gives the latest figures in this memo to staff:

Colleagues: Latimes.com drew 142 million page views in July – up 10% over this time last year. And we had more than 23 million unique users, an increase of 27% from last year. Visits from local readers continue to grow at a solid pace of 30% year over year.
 
Some incredible work this month, including the launch of an ongoing video Q&A with Harriet Ryan and Andrew Blankstein on the evolving story of Michael Jackson’s death. Also, look at this slick, in-depth, interactive timeline on Jackson’s life.
 
In addition to the Metro team’s insightful coverage of the tragic and untimely death of young Lily Burk, there is this timeline tracing the criminal history of Charles Samuel through court and prison documents.   
 

Best to hold the 'Los' when it comes to Angelenos

The article was about a beloved place that's been on the local landscape for 75 years, so perhaps the headline was even more a stick in the eye to Peter Rutenberg of Westwood. He sent an e-mail expressing irritation for the language over a story about a local farmers market. He had no problem with the main headline -- "Still fresh, yet familiar, at 75." But he balked at this subheadline: "Los Angelenos and the Original Farmers Market have mingled cozily since 1934."

Rutenberg's letter to the editor started out, "I've been a fan of the Farmer's Market for 52 years, so I loved the story. But c'mon guys! The people of this town are 'Angelenos' not LOS Angelenos. It's one thing when out-of-towners blow it, but it's an insult when the hometown paper can't even get it right."

Reader sees partisanship in 'partisan lines in the sand' angle

"Sotomayor Vote Sets a Partisan Tone," read the headline over a news report published Tuesday detailing how the Senate Judiciary Committee voted 13-6 to send Judge Sonia Sotomayor's nomination to the full Senate.

Citing the headline and other language in the article as examples of The Times' "consistent shading of the news," reader Alan Frank of Glendale opened up an e-mail exchange with National Editor Roger Smith.

The article started with this line: "Republicans' unflinching opposition Tuesday to Judge Sonia Sotomayor drew a partisan line in the sand, signaling that any future Obama nominees to the Supreme Court are unlikely to win significant GOP support even if they have solid legal credentials and moderate records."

Scott Sandell appointed morning entertainment editor, Calendar

Here's the memo to the staff from Sallie Hofmeister, Assistant Managing Editor, and Craig Turner, Arts and Entertainment Editor:

We are pleased to name Scott Sandell as the morning entertainment editor for the Calendar and Company Town operations. In this newly created position, Scott will give us an earlier jump on the news each day and improve coordination among Calendar, Company Town, the Web, the photo and graphics departments and the rest of the paper. Working a 7 a.m.-to-3:30 p.m. shift, Scott will scour the wires, papers and the blogosphere to put together our early morning coverage. He will be responsible for an internal memo that will be distributed to senior editors at 7:30 a.m. that gives a heads-up on stories moving to the Web and enterprise on deck for the day.

For many, seeing isn't believing

 

Victor Garcia of Bakersfield was among several readers asking about the July 22 photo published online only with a Business article about the booming economy in the high desert city of Ridgecrest. He wondered if the image had been altered, noting “I don't think you can see the road with all the houses at the top of  the photo. (College Heights Blvd.) from Las Flores, the light signal next to the Toyota dealership (the Toyota dealership is actually further south)  There is an Enterprise Rent-A-Car and a Speedy Lube at the corner of Las Flores and China Lake Blvd. It could just be the way the photo was taken, but it may be worth looking into.”

All such inquiries are worth looking into, and editors did so in this case. It was taken with a long lens, which, as photographer Mark Boster said in an e-mail to the reader, "compresses the view."

This inquiry is one of a growing number of questions that come in about the authenticity of published photos. Other images questioned this year include one of actress Anne Hathaway (someone thought she was too unrealistically ugly) and a picture of a member of the Taliban (readers thought he looked too nice).

One particularly adamant questioning of another photograph published earlier this year came from an online reader who said she teaches Photoshop at a continuing education department of a university in another state. Even after being assured by editors who investigated the original digital files, the reader was unconvinced that the image hadn't been manipulated.

In fact, in all such situations, editors peruse the originals and talk to the photographer to be able to assure readers the photos weren't doctored. Photographer Boster sent editors his original files, notes on where he took the shots -- and even an offer to go back to Ridgecrest to review the area. But this inquiry was a fairly open-and-shut case, says Deputy Director of Photography Calvin Hom, who added: "We seem to get queries whenever our photogs use long lens while shooting landscape. It's a technique that time and again seems to jolt the readers into thinking there's something wrong with the photos."

Richard Rushfield to leave latimes.com

Here's the memo from Meredith Artley, managing editor, online:

 

I come bearing sad news. Richard Rushfield, entertainment editor for latimes.com, has been wooed away by Gawker.

 

Richard is perhaps best known for covering a little TV show called "American Idol" like no one else, bringing unique coverage and discussion of a popular culture juggernaut to latimes.com. But that’s just one part of his legacy – his leadership and contributions to our online entertainment effort are countless and something that our talented team of producers and editors will continue to build upon.

 

Richard’s last day is Aug. 4. Please join me in thanking/kicking him in the meantime. We will miss him, and even though we thought we’d never say it, we’ll miss that green plaid jacket.

 

Meredith Artley

Managing Editor, Online

 

Mike James named sports editor [Updated]

Here's the memo from Editor Russ Stanton:

Mike James, deputy sports editor for the past three years, is our news sports editor, effective today.

Mike has been instrumental in maintaining our award-winning Sports section in print while expanding its reach to the Web and beyond. He was an early convert to working in other media, having spent 2000 to 2002 as coordinating producer for Foxsports.com and then on the television side as executive editor of Fox Sports Net. Mike has drawn on those experiences in managing the ongoing transition of The Times’ Sports section to a multimedia operation.

He joined The Times in 1985, supervising daily sports coverage of the Orange County edition as an assistant sports editor. He moved downtown in 1989 as a news editor and later was promoted to assistant sports editor and then senior assistant sports editor. After leaving Fox, Mike returned to The Times as senior copy chief. He was named deputy sports editor in April 2006. He also has written extensively for The Times, primarily on golf.

Mike began his newspaper career as a sportswriter for the Burlington Free Press, where he worked from 1978 to 1981 before moving to the Hartford Courant, where he ran the sports desk. He has a BA in psychology, which has served him well in newspaper management.

Of course, no announcement involving Sports would be complete without a statistic, so here’s this: Mike is only the seventh editor of The Times’ Sports section since 1928.

Russ Stanton
Editor 

[Updated at 4:28 p.m.: Reader David asked what happened to the previous sports editor. A post earlier this month noted that former Sports Editor Randy Harvey had assumed new duties.] 

Weather page updates

Since the change Sunday that took the weather page down to a half-page, about two dozen readers have sent e-mails and called to comment. Here is a summary of the suggestions:

Bring back various cities.

Editors are considering readers' requests to reinstate certain cities (though adding one means another will have to be removed).

• For readers bemoaning the loss of Colorado Springs, Colo., in the listings, editors note that the city is between two cities still listed (Denver and Pueblo) and say Colorado Springs’ temperatures aren’t too far off from those cities.
• Mission Viejo is still on the map, though not on the list; editors say they’ll add it to the list again (making it one of the few cities that is on both the list and map).

Bring back the daily high-low precipitation column in the U.S. and World lists.

• The list of California cities still shows information for yesterday, today and tomorrow, but  U.S. and World lists now show only today and tomorrow. Editors cut the “yesterday” column figuring Southern California travelers would rather know what to expect on the day they arrive than what happened the day before. They’re thinking of resurrecting the column of information (but it would mean the loss of the forecast information for tomorrow.)

Font size:

• Some say the typeface is too small, but one reader thought fonts should be made smaller to fit in more text. Graphics editor Les Dunseith says that the font sizes are the same as before. (And the text for the listings section is the smallest option available.)

More changes based on readers' requests: 

• “I think we may be able to squeeze Ventura County sunrise/moonrise info back onto the page,” says Dunseith. “We also think we’ve figured out a way to fit tiny versions of the phases of the moon on the page.”

These tweaks and other fixes based on readers' suggestions should start showing up in the paper within the next few days. Editors can be reached at yyweather@latimes.com.

Claire Noland named Obituary Editor

Here's the memo from Editor Russ Stanton:

Colleagues:

Claire Noland, deputy obituary editor, is being named Obituary Editor, effective immediately. She will manage the day-to-day operations and planning of our obituary department, supervising a writing and editing staff of four.

Claire joined the department as deputy editor in January 2006, and her strong editing skills and keen news judgment have served the department well. In addition, she has honed her latent writing skills, contributing dozens of highly readable obituaries on a range of topics.

Previously, Claire spent 11 years in Sports, where she worked as an assignment editor overseeing both short- and long-range coverage planning. She also served as sports copy chief, after having been hired as a copy editor and news editor. She returned to Sports last year to work as an editor at the Beijing Olympics.

Before joining The Times, Claire worked as a sports copy editor at the Minneapolis Star Tribune and the Los Angeles Daily News. She began her journalism career as a copy editor at the Antelope Valley Press.
Claire was born and raised in Lancaster, has a bachelor’s degree in English from Mount St. Mary’s College in Los Angeles and did graduate work at UC Riverside.

She will report to Managing Editor Jon Thurber.

Russ Stanton
Editor

Michael Jackson news, Iran updates contribute to record Web numbers

Here's the memo with Web numbers for June from Meredith Artley, managing editor, online:

Colleagues: Our strong, swift coverage of major events in the past month attracted a record-breaking 26 million unique users to our site. That’s up 50% over June 2008. Those 26 million users generated more than 155 million page views, 30% growth over last year. Visits from our local audience grew 30% over this time last year, a good sign that more of our immediate community is turning to us for local news as well as stories in our backyard that have a national or global impact. Speaking of...

Our coverage of Michael Jackson’s tragic death continues to be the most insightful and most thorough anywhere. Our nimble, well-sourced team continues to break news daily on L.A. Now. The photo galleries, which are being constantly updated, have drawn millions of page views. We’ll be launching a few impressive interactive features in the coming weeks as the story unfolds and becomes more complex. We set a new daily record for page views the day Jackson died.

It’s important to note that our coverage of the Jackson story is not the sole reason for this readership leap.

During the height of the crisis that grew out of the Iran elections, readers flocked to Babylon & Beyond to read a constant stream of updates around the clock from Borzou Daragahi in Tehran, Alexandra Zavis and Amber Smith here in L.A. and Jeffrey Fleishman in Cairo. Borzou's story of “Neda” was particularly well-read and commented upon.

Readers also came to us for coverage of Farrah Fawcett’s death -- the obituary, appreciations and galleries were all of great interest.

And a hometown team won the NBA finals in the past month --  readers flocked to us for the coverage that included fast-paced staff updates during game time, sharp analysis, live blogging and chats, outstanding photo galleries and video analysis.
 
What a month.

What’s next? We’re throwing a lot of energy at the site redesign, launching in mid-July. Much more to come on this.

When 'mediums' becomes the matter

The article reported on a change in staffing at The Times, a fairly serious matter. But some readers saw an equally worthy topic in the choice of a particular word. Gene Aker of Los Angeles, in fact, saw what he considered a misused word as a dire sign of the changing Times.

The line in question: "Two senior Los Angeles Times editors were given new responsibilities Thursday as part of an effort to create a 24-hour newsroom serving multiple mediums."

"Mediums? Individuals through whom others seek to communicate with the dead? Do you even have a copy desk these days?" Aker wrote, wondering if this apparent goof reflected "the downward spiral of the quality of your newspaper."

(Aker wasn't alone in seeing the specter of psychics in that phrase. On Friday Alan Mutter's Reflections of a Newsosaur blog had a post featured an exchange about the word.)

In fact, Times copy editors put some consideration into using "mediums" (the word, not the psychics). Henry Fuhrmann, who oversees style and grammar in the newsroom, explained in a note to Aker.

Weather news, Sunday comics changing July 5

(The map above was used by editors in determining which cities to keep on the weather page.)

The weather page will be streamlined starting Sunday, and there are changes as well to the Sunday comics. Both moves are to being made to save newsprint.

Details on changes to the Sunday comics pages are below.

About the weather pages, graphics department editor Les Dunseith says the news, information and listings that used to take up almost a whole page will now be fit on half a page.

In carrying out the cuts, Dunseith said, a decision was made to keep the focus on California. The lists of temperatures and conditions continues for 73 California cities (four were deleted); cuts were made mostly in the lists of U.S. cities (77 U.S. will be listed, down from 93) and  international cities (37 remain; 43 were dropped).  Some other features, including diving conditions and phases of the moon, were eliminated. (Those and more, of course, can still be found online.)

In choosing what to keep and what to cut, editors consulted census data and researched population trends.

Of the California cities listed, editors looked for overlap with the map that will also show cities and temperatures. The four places that ended up being cut from the page completely (Blythe, Mt. Wilson, Rialto, Santa Rosa) were either small in population or close enough to listed cities that the weather information was essentially the same. Editors kept representative locations where temperature or precipitation extremes are often noted in news stories (Woodland Hills, Barstow, Big Bear Lake, etc.)

To decide which national cities to keep, editors checked a graphic from 2007 (shown above) that showed U.S. regions from which California residents have moved or where Californians’ family members are most likely to have relocated. (The map was based primarily on IRS data.) That’s one reason the list tends to skew a bit toward the West and Northeast, with fewer cities from the Southeast and Upper Midwest.

To choose international cities, editors used census data showing the native countries of SoCal residents, and they tried to retain locations with large local immigrant populations. (That’s one reason a larger percentage of Asian cities than Canadian cities remains.)

Dunseith says the graphics department worked hard for a design that would be elegant and logical: "The ultimate goal was to make the information as helpful and useful for as many people as possible despite the smaller footprint." Readers can send their reactions and suggestions to yyweather@latimes.com.

John Arthur to leave The Times

Editor Russ Stanton sent the following to the staff just after the announcement of masthead changes:

Colleagues:

Executive Editor John Arthur will be the leaving The Times after a distinguished 23 years here.

John and I did not agree on the need for the just-announced masthead changes, and we differ on the best approach to reaching our goals.

This decision was a difficult one. John has served in a host of leadership roles at The Times that have included assistant city editor in the Orange County edition, assistant national editor, editor of the Valley edition and managing editor with responsibility for the three regional editions as well as the national edition.

He later served as deputy Page 1 editor/nights, Page 1 editor, managing editor and, most recently, executive editor.

His numerous accomplishments include helping direct coverage of the Northridge earthquake and the North Hollywood bank shootout, for which the Times won Pulitzer Prizes in the breaking-news category.

John has served this newsroom -- and our readers -- with pride and distinction, and for that owe him our gratitude and our best wishes.

Thurber, Harvey joining Times masthead

Here's a memo from Editor Russ Stanton announcing organizational changes in The Times newsroom:

Colleagues:

The launch of the redesigned latimes.com in the coming weeks is a good reminder of the continually changing nature of our business, and our need to adapt to the shifting reading, viewing and consumption habits of our ever-expanding audiences.

To that end, we are making some changes at the masthead level to improve upon our commitment to a 24-hour newsgathering operation, the goal being to continue to expand the reach of the high-quality journalism produced by the Los Angeles Times.

First, Randy Harvey, our Sports editor since 2006, will become associate editor, effective immediately. In this role, Randy will take on a host of broad and important responsibilities that currently keep me from spending more time in the newsroom. Chief among them:

--Helping complete the implementation of the strategic plan that we developed last year. To compete and thrive, our newsroom must operate as a fully functional 24/7 operation, feeding print, the Web, mobile devices, television, radio, Twitter, Facebook and anything else that helps us increase -- and better connect with -- our audience. Randy will work closely with me to ensure that organizational and journalistic decisions are made in accordance with that plan.

--Be the point person for editorial with the other departments of The Times (advertising, marketing, circulation and operations), including managing company- and corporate-wide initiatives.

Randy is getting these additional responsibilities because of his outstanding leadership of our Sports section, the best in the country. The Sports staff has consistently led the newsroom in broadening our coverage beyond print, and Randy has overseen that effort by sharpening our focus to the things that matter the most to our readers, and then owning those areas in every medium in which our readers consume news.

Also taking on an expanded role is Jon Thurber, who will become managing editor, print, effective immediately. Jon, our obituary editor since 1998, will now have primary responsibility for coordinating and carrying out the content plans for the newspaper and other print products produced by our newsroom, including overseeing the front page and the A1 desk.

Over the last 11 years, Jon has built our obituary desk into one of the best in the country. The formidable work of Jon and his staff -- both in print and online -- has been front and center in recent days with the spate of celebrity deaths we’ve covered.

Jon and Meredith Artley will work closely together -- and with our section editors --  to ensure that the needs of the paper and the website are being met and that our coverage on these platforms is complementary. We are changing Meredith’s title to managing editor, online, and she will continue to oversee our digital properties, which will expand over time.

Davan Maharaj will continue as managing editor, news, and it will remain his responsibility to supply engaging journalism so that Jon and Meredith can fulfill their respective missions. Davan, Jon, Meredith and Randy will report to me.