How a newspaper dies! What happens at the end?

Ever wonder what happens in the final days of a daily metro newspaper's life? For the first time this year, we now have an insider's look at what transpires once reporters find out their employer is shutting down the press for the final time. Joseph Tartakoff of paidContent.org writes that reporters and staff were largely kept in the dark at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

The Seattle P-I's owner Hearst originally placed a 60-day deadline on its attempt to sell the paper, and said that the P-I would close or go online only in the event of no buyer being found. When that 60-day deadline came, many P-I staffers expected to hear from Hearst. Instead, they were left wondering about the paper's fate, as boxes, paper shredders and recycling bins showed up.

What followed for P-I reporters were days spent fielding calls from subscribers who were also in the dark, meetings with executives who wouldn't take questions and then the ultimate sign of the end -- people started selling P-I memorabilia. Tension spread throughout the P-I newsroom when Hearst executives started trying to recruit staffers to move to the online-only venture.

We all know the rest of the story -- the P-I went online only last week after struggling to get staffers to accept new job offers for the Web version. Tartakoff's insights into the experience of dealing with the demise of a major daily newspaper should be absorbed by all those reporters working at newspapers such as the San Francisco Chronicle, where the end is almost near.