It's part of a newspaper employee's daily ritual: Check out Jim Romensko's industry blog to find out what paper has announced staff cuts today. (Yesterday it was 80 jobs at the Chicago Tribune.) It's the journalistic equivalent of reading the obits to see if you're still alive.

But yesterday's announcement that the Deseret News is cutting 34 newsroom employees brought the pain close to home.

In the Tribune newsroom, we all know people at the D-News, our crosstown rival - and although they're the competition, we have a lot of respect for most of them. So the news that some of them won't be writing for Salt Lake City's other newspaper is a body blow.

Just a few names you might know: Feature writer Elaine Jarvik, arts writer Susan Whitney, visual arts critic Dave Gagon, book critic Dennis Lythgoe, and the copy-producing machine that is Carma Wadley.

Even more, those who stay behind will have to pick up the slack. My friend Jeff Vice, the D-News' film critic, is keeping that job - but he also will be writing about visual arts (for the departing Gagon) and filling in on the book beat (to replace Lythgoe).

But finally, the news is a reminder of how precarious the newspaper industry - dealing with declining revenue and still scrambling to find a new business model in the Internet age - can be. Though the Tribune's management promises no layoffs or buyouts are coming, we all know the ax could fall at any time.