“WTF?” was the subject line of the email sent to me linking to this tweet by Todd Vogt, whose San Francisco Newspaper Company acquired the SF Weekly Wednesday.

As noted yesterday, though reports in the Chron, the Ex and the Guardian (the latter two also owned by the SFNC) say that all three publications will live on as separate publications in blissful harmony (cue longtime rival Weekly and SFBG staffers singing “You have no right to ask me how I feel. You have no right to speak to me so kind…“) at 225 Bush Street, Weekly staffers say layoffs are on their way.

Those layoffs are one reason last night’s tweet from Vogt saying “It was quite a day. Only thing that would have made it better was a resignation” was auspicious enough that some local media figures wasted a little time this afternoon IMing about What It All Means.

“‘It was quite a day’ watching Guardian staff acting smug after they had to deal with the Weekly’s taunts all last year,” SFist’s Andrew Dalton said of yesterday’s events.

“The fact that [The Weekly and the Guardian] have to share an office now isn’t even the best part,” Dalton said. “I just like how they keep going back and forth, ‘We’re fine over here!’ ‘Nothing changing over here either!'”

The Huffington Post’s Aaron Sankin recently referred to Vogt as “arguably the most powerful figure in the world of San Francisco media.” His take on the tweet?

“Hmmmm…I’m guessing he’s figuring out some sort of SF Weekly restructuring thing and is happy about how it went,” Sankin said.

“Maybe he got everyone at both the Guardian and Examiner to agree that Little Star isn’t actually any better than Patxi’s?” Sankin mused.

Everyone I spoke to (and I myself) are hopeful, however, that Vogt’s “resignation” remark was less a wish that employees would quit instead of being fired, than a questionably timed reference to his ongoing campaign against Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi.

A call to Vogt for tweet clarification was not returned at publication time.

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the author

Eve Batey is the editor and publisher of the San Francisco Appeal. She used to be the San Francisco Chronicle's Deputy Managing Editor for Online, and started at the Chronicle as their blogging and interactive editor. Before that, she was a co-founding writer and the lead editor of SFist. She's been in the city since 1997, presently living in the Outer Sunset with her husband, cat, and dog. You can reach Eve at eve@sfappeal.com.

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