And now the other shoe drops: I blogged in August about Gannett buying the FSView and Florida Flambeau, the Florida State weekly student newspaper. Turns out that wasn’t a one-off deal, which doesn’t surprise me. What does surprise me is the newspaper they bought: UCF’s Central Florida Future, which isn’t exactly in a position to be a sister newspaper the way the FSView was. The Sentinel has the scoop:

The company’s Central Florida unit, Florida Today/Cape Publishing, paid an undisclosed amount for the Future, a free paper published three times a week during the academic year. It also bought the Seminole Chronicle, a weekly circulated in Oviedo and Winter Springs, and Sales, a coupon book distributed at UCF.

“It is a good fit for them,” said Heissam Jebailey, who was co-owner of the three publications. “It has become a great publication.”

The Future, with a circulation of 15,000, was once the university’s official newspaper. Jebailey said it moved off campus in 1992 and eventually became a for-profit business. Jebailey and a partner, Brian Linden, bought the Future in 2001.

[…]

But [newspaper analyst John] Morton said corporate ownership could bring unforeseen change to student newspapers, which are often freewheeling operations.

“They will be answering to a different master,” Morton said. “And it will be a more strenuous master.”

[Link]