When the Nasdaq exchange shuts down at 4 p.m. tomorrow, the name Tronc, Inc. (TRNC) will shut down with it. Wednesday morning, the company will reappear as Tribune Publishing Co. (TPCO).
Less than two years ago, Tronc (also styled tronc) was the future of journalism. It was time for the Tribune company, the coast-to-coast empire of fading, once-independent newspapers, to drop its newsprint-banner name and become something new, something compact, a single sharp syllable squeezed down from “TRibune ONline Content.” The company definitely had a real and valid plan for its new transcendent existence, and was not just shuffling buzzwords.
Now that future, like so many other futures before it and like so many newspapers or newspaper bureaus or newspaper jobs (including jobs previously held by some of us) under Tronc, is defunct. But before the old future becomes operative again, we pause to remember and celebrate what the old new future looked like, via Tronc’s own introductory explanatory video. This is where journalism was going. Savor the feeling of having formerly looked forward to it.
