After looking through hundreds of comments on Twitter about the “bold” and rather odd reorganization at the Dallas Morning News, one freelance copy editor summarized in a tweet: “Consensus: apocalypse.”

The comments she read through were attached to retweets of a link to a blog of the Daily Observer in Dallas. Robert Wilonsky republished a memo from Bob Mong, Dallas Morning News editor, and Cyndy Carr, senior vice president for sales, that laid out a strategy for “business/news integration” in which editors would report to general managers responsible for different segments of advertising sales.

“I think I just heard the wall fall,” a friend tweeted me. “Journalism: Dead in Dallas,” said another.

Twitter conversations can be an interesting way to gauge opinion. The Web site bit.ly compiles data on links it provides, and it allows a quick look at hundreds of comments added to Twitter messages as people pass along a link.

Reading through bit.ly’s list, at http://bit.ly/info/6d5AHv, one can almost feel the collective gasp.

Here are the comments on the bit.ly list at 3 the afternoon the story came out.They are mostly in order, with Twitter names, links and repetition removed. I didn’t look for the controversial or clever. I didn’t have to. This is pretty much all of them. It’s a long list, but a quick skim will give you an idea:

• Okay, this is the worst thing to happen in the history of the printed page
• I just died a little
• Wait, what?!: wow, Dallas Morning News editors reporting to ad sales
• Yikes is right. RT Yikes. Dallas News has a bold new strategy. Yikes.
• Mourning the Dallas Morning News. Because what’s happened there means it’s no longer a newspaper. It’s an ad circular
• Commenter said: “DMN RIP.”
• Holy cow!
• Wow. Unbelievable
• Ugh; it’s wrong on so many levels.
• This is not ok
• More pervasive that you’d think…
• Really interesting developments in Dallas, where some editors will now report to sales managers
• OMG! News is all about ad revenue now.
• uh-oh
• Dallas Morning News editors now report to ad sales managers. Seems the death of real journalism is upon us
• Bold strategy n DMN reorg: Breakng dwn old walls (between sales & edit)
• oh yeah, this is good for society.
• OMFG. I quit. Journalism R.I.P. “Dallas News, a New “Bold Strategy”: Section Editors Reporting to Sales Managers”
• I’m devoting a week’s worth out outrage to this
• Surely nothing bad could come of this
• Very disturbing: Editors reporting to sales folks.
• Editors to report to Sales Managers at The Dallas News (Nothing bad could happen here, right)
• OMG! Stop the madness: Dallas Morning News editors now report to sales managers.
• So very wrong
• Newsroom and Sales integration in Dallas? They say progressive. I say bad idea for content integrity
• Really, is it already time to sell your soul? Dallas Morning News editors now report to sales teams.
• This memo must be a few years old. Advertisers have been guiding “news” in this fish wrapper for a long time.
• Yeah, WTF??
• And the wall came crumbling down
• Well, the Dallas Morning News has ceased to be a newspaper.
• First sign of the apocalypse?
• Recipe for total disaster
• The end of the world as we know it. Editors reporting to sales people.
• Whoa.
• Wha- What?
• Journalism FAIL
• Probably not the best way to foster journalistic integrity
• dear, sweet God in heaven, yes. > Did the Dallas Morning News just jump the shark?
• It’s the end of the world as we know it, and I feel … rather queasy.
• not in my newspaper
• wow, Dallas Morning News editors reporting to ad sales
• It’s like the journalism end of days
• Wow. This is new ground.
• •ridiculous.
• If all true, this is nuts
• Dallas News makes The Onion irrelevant …
• I just died a little
• Dallas Morning News sections now report to sales staff. In case you needed more bad news about journalism…
• Wow indeed! Putting ads in charge of news #journfail
• wow, Dallas Morning News eds reporting to ad sales
• This is not ok
• This is so very wrong
• Sad state of affairs in “journalism.”
• that’s transparency, but not substantive change
• Unbelievable, ridiculous.
• Another sign of the journalistic apocalypse facing the newspaper business
• My newspaper and journalism friends, it’s a dark day for journalistic integrity
• The #DMN has sold its soul.
• taking things further: Dallas Morning News section editors to report directly to sales execs
• splain it to me, pls. I just don’t see how sales managers bossing news editors can work
• If I find out this is happening at B-CS Eagle, I may cry.
• What could possibly go wrong, journalistically speaking ?
• A huge nail in the nearly finished newspaper coffin
• •Scary direction for the DMN.
• This looks like a steaming pile of bad judgment
• Wow, this is like the most astoundingly bad idea ever
• God help us all
• I have no words
• DMN turns over editorial content to the ad reps. Can we just count that as another dead paper?
• Holy schnike
• OK, you got me. That was a bigger WTF! than me seeing Tiger all over my front page this morning. WTF!
• So much for church/state
• Scary
• Ahhhh!!
• Is this the future of journalism?
• La foto de cómo sí desaparecerán los periódicos… y el periodismo. Editores reportando al Jefe de Ventas en Dallas.
• They’d B OK w/editors replaced by Enquirer staffers
• No. WHAT?!
• Editorial to report to sales directorate at Dallas News. Un-bee-LIEVE-able.
• this is like the most astoundingly bad idea ever
• Wow!
• A really different way of doing a newspaper, courtesy of the DMN
• So what do the editor and managing editor do now?
• Some Dallas Morning News editors now report to SALES managers… Wow.
• And people wonder why “news” is so sanitized.
• “To a dark place this line of thought will carry us.”
• Well, there goes any trust I had in the DMN. Sales department now supervises
• Oh. This is not good.
• GASP!!!
• Whoa
• Kinda long, kinda freaky: newspaper hands editorial reigns to the ad sales dept!
• Another newspaper bites the dust. The Dallas News hands the newsroom over to the sales dept
• Mr. Editor, tear … down … this … wall!