Go, Read: Eric Devericks Moves On



One of the interesting thing about the economic is that a lot of people have seen it coming in a way that's allowed them to adjust. It's not hard to imagine that an apparently (although not confirmed) better-than-expected Black Friday shopping day this year was the result of retailers discounting in an aggressive fashion that drove more business. A current hot topic in e-mails I'm getting is just how much the big mainstream companies are adjusting their 2009 publishing schedules to better reflect current financial realities.

This profile of departing Seattle Times cartoonist Eric Devericks is all sorts of melancholy, but it also notes how the cartoonist has adjusted to getting a new job and broadening his artistic output during the last days of his old one because he was slated to be let go much earlier this year. As a result, the final outcome suggested here is still sad but doesn't have that despairing quality that some staff cartoonist departures manage, where you get the picture of a bewildered guy shrugging his shoulders and maybe trying to make a go of it from his syndication income.

Another thing I'd suggest taking notice of in the piece is that the Times seems to have let Devericks go because of major shifts in advertising revenue available to the paper. It's important, I think, to keep an eye on that issue as the primary one in a lot of those positions being eliminated. It's easy to qualify an editorial cartoonist's journalistic value, but much, much more difficult to quantify their ability to add to the bottom line.

Eric Devericks' last day is December 12.
 
posted 7:15 am PST | Permalink
 

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