The soul of journalism

At the annual gala to raise money for the Committee to Protect Journalists, the biggest names in the profession get served a reminder of the nameless journalists who often at great peril battle the darkness in places desperate for light.

From George Packer at the New Yorker:

At just the moment when any half-conscious journalist is beginning to feel a little sick—sick of the rich food, of the self-congratulatory tone, of the overdressed guests, of himself or herself, of the gap between what we say we do and what we aspire to do and what we all-too-often really do—it’s at that moment that the hosts announce the winners of the year’s awards. Along with the awards come videos that tell the recipients’ stories. The hum of chatter across the tables suddenly dies—for the stories are of brave, humorous, quietly defiant men and women, rarities and eccentrics who nonetheless seem to exist in every country, upholding high journalistic standards in the world’s most dangerous places, with no powerful backers, and almost no one paying attention except government thugs or anonymous gunmen.

Read the full post here.

NYT loses two veterans

Two veteran reporters working in Washington, DC for the New York Times have taken buyouts. Stephen Labaton, who's been covering the financial crisis and regulatory issues, said he plans to leave journalism. Neil Lewis, who covered at various times the White House, Justice Department and State Department, said he will teach a course on media and the First Amendment at Duke Law School.

Los Angeles Times loses Gold

Los Angeles Times readers' representative Jamie Gold plans to leave her job after eight years. Kevin Roderick at LA Observed wonders if her exit has anything to do with the rumors of further layoffs at the newspaper.

WaPost's newsroom spotlight

Ever wonder how many bad ideas journalists have before they land a good story idea? Well, the Washington Post has a new venture called Story Lab that's supposed to help answer that and other questions for readers. The idea is to let readers watch, and even participate in the construction of a story "from conception to publication."

From Marc Fisher, who's overseeing the project:

We’re hoping to demystify the work of a big, sometimes-anonymous institution and give readers a way to connect with the people who report and write the news.

We’re really going to try to have a number of stories each week that are, from conception to finish, formulated on Story Lab. A reporter says, “Here’s what I’m thinking of; here’s the story as we see it. What do you think?” I fully expect that stories will evolve.

I wonder how much interest there is out there for this.

(found via Nieman Journalism Lab)

Away from Google

The Associated Press provides more details about a proposal by at least three newspaper companies - News Corp., MediaNews Group and A.H. Belo - to pull some of their content from Google's search engine in favor of an exclusive partnership with Microsoft's Bing.

From AP:

In theory, getting news organizations to block Google from including links to their content might give Microsoft a slight edge over its nemesis. Bing would have a trove of material that its rival didn't, giving people more reason to search somewhere besides Google. Google handles more than six times as many Web searches as Bing, a lead that Google has translated into billions of dollars in annual revenue from ads that the company sells alongside search results.

But even if it were willing to pay for exclusive indexing rights to some newspapers, Microsoft then would have to spend heavily to make sure Web surfers knew Bing had stuff that Google didn't — and even that might not be enough to get people to break their Google habit, said Forrester Research analyst Shar VanBoskirk.

Dan Kennedy at Media Nation offers his take on the plan:

...there isn’t really any underlying principle as to who ought to pay for what online. Rather, the debate is driven by who’s making money, who’s losing money and — here’s where we get back to Microsoft — the business model of any particular Internet company.

What is Microsoft’s business interest with respect to Bing? Simply this: to build market share, establishing Bing as a serious search alternative to Google. Bing has a long way to go, with 10 percent of the market to Google’s 65 percent. That said, Bing has received good reviews since its debut earlier this year. And it’s really the only search engine to emerge as any kind of rival to Google pretty much since Google slipped into view in the late 1990s.

Flashback to '97

In 1997, freelancer Matthew Hahn interviewed Hunter S. Thompson at Owl Farm and asked him how the Internet would affect journalism. How does the answer hold up 12 years later?

Here's the exchange:

MH: The Internet has been touted as a new mode of journalism -- some even go so far as to say it might democratize journalism. Do you see a future for the Internet as a journalistic medium?

HST: Well, I don't know. There is a line somewhere between democratizing journalism and every man a journalist. You can't really believe what you read in the papers anyway, but there is at least some spectrum of reliability. Maybe it's becoming like the TV talk shows or the tabloids where anything's acceptable as long as it's interesting.

I believe that the major operating ethic in American society right now, the most universal want and need is to be on TV. I've been on TV. I could be on TV all the time if I wanted to. But most people will never get on TV. It has to be a real breakthrough for them. And trouble is, people will do almost anything to get on it. You know, confess to crimes they haven't committed. You don't exist unless you're on TV. Yeah, it's a validation process. Faulkner said that American troops wrote "Kilroy was here" on the walls of Europe in World War II in order to prove that somebody had been there -- "I was here" -- and that the whole history of man is just an effort by people, writers, to just write your name on the great wall.

You can get on [the Internet] and all of a sudden you can write a story about me, or you can put it on top of my name. You can have your picture on there too. I don't know the percentage of the Internet that's valid, do you? Jesus, it's scary. I don't surf the Internet. I did for a while. I thought I'd have a little fun and learn something. I have an e-mail address. No one knows it. But I wouldn't check it anyway, because it's just too fucking much. You know, it's the volume. The Internet is probably the first wave of people who have figured out a different way to catch up with TV -- if you can't be on TV, well at least you can reach 45 million people [on the Internet].

(found via Marc Cooper)

Mike Penner dead at 52

Los Angeles Times sportswriter Mike Penner has died. He was 52. The apparent cause of death is suicide.

Penner made headlines in 2007 when he announced he was a transsexual and began writing under the byline "Christine Daniels". In 2008, he reclaimed the "Mike Penner" byline.

Here's Times editor Russ Stanton's memo to staff on Penner's passing:

Colleagues:

I am very saddened to report that Mike Penner, whose work graced our pages for two-and-a-half decades, passed away last night.

We've posted a short story on the site this morning http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/ and a longer piece will follow for both the web and tomorrow's paper.

Mike was a first-rate journalist, a valued member of our staff and we will miss him. He respected our readers a great deal, enough to share with them his very personal journey. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family.

Happy

Thanksgiving

Dobbs: Maybe illegal immigrants aren't so bad after all

Unshackled from his desk at CNN, Lou Dobbs now feels free to be himself. Already he is making noise about running for the Senate in New Jersey, a state with a large Hispanic population. And so, in one of his first interviews, Dobbs made a 180-degree turn from his anti-immigrant brand of populism to say he now favors a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants.

Um, what?

From the Wall Street Journal:

In a little-noticed interview Friday, Mr. Dobbs told Spanish-language network Telemundo he now supports a plan to legalize millions of undocumented workers, a stance he long lambasted as an unfair "amnesty."

"Whatever you have thought of me in the past, I can tell you right now that I am one of your greatest friends and I mean for us to work together," he said in a live interview with Telemundo's Maria Celeste. "I hope that will begin with Maria and me and Telemundo and other media organizations and others in this national debate that we should turn into a solution rather than a continuing debate and factional contest."

Dobbs championed the factional contest. His proposal to legalize some of the 12 million illegal immigrants "under certain conditions" is the flip-flop of a still-young century.

Washington Post pulls out of Los Angeles

The Washington Post plans to shutter its bureaus in Los Angeles, New York and Chicago, Politico reported today. Six correspondents will be affected, including Pulitzer Prize-winner Barton Gellman. All have been offered jobs back in Washington, DC.

From Politico:

Executive editor Marcus Brauchli informed staff that "the reporters in those bureaus are being offered new roles here in Washington." However, three news aides are being let go.

"At a time of limited resources and increased competitive pressure," Brauchli wrote, "it's necessary to concentrate our journalistic firepower on our central mission of covering Washington and the news, trends and ideas that shape both the region and the country’s politics, policies and government."

...since becoming publisher, Katharine Weymouth has spoken about how the Post needs to be the "indispensable guide to Washington," and today's move reflects her goals for the paper in utilizing what resources are available for an area in which the paper should be strongest.

(found via fishbowlLA)

McChronicle

The San Francisco Chronicle plans to publish select material from McSweeney's 300-page Panorama newspaper, which is envisioned to celebrate the newspaper style but appears to include few newspaper writers. From the Chronicle news release:

The Panorama will be a 300-plus-page, single-edition newspaper published by McSweeney's, the independent San Francisco publishing house founded by author and philanthropist Dave Eggers.

The Panorama features the contributions of Michael Chabon, Stephen King, Andrew Sean Greer, William T. Vollmann, and Junot Diaz. It also includes writing from such acclaimed Bay Area authors as Michelle Tea, Tom Barbash, Robert Hass, and Daniel Alarcon, Eggers and many others. ...

"The Panorama in part is a way to demonstrate the many things that newspapers can do uniquely well, and how necessary they are to a thriving democracy," Eggers said. "From the beginning, we conceived of this as a way to show readers how much newsprint can do, and how essential to the craft of journalism readers' support of print is."

I wonder if they'll pay tribute to the yellow journalism, too?

(found via Romenesko)

MediaNews, Belo want to block Google, too

MediaNews Group owner Dean Singleton said he will follow the lead of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. and block Google News from linking to stories that are put behind pay walls, Bloomberg reported today. MediaNews plans to start charging for some content at papers in Chico, California and York, Pennsylvania, and Singleton said that content would be off limits.

From Bloomberg:

“The things that go behind pay walls, we will not let Google search to, but the things that are outside the pay wall we probably will, because we want the traffic,” Singleton said.

Belo, which owns the Riverside Press-Enterprise, also announced tentative plans to charge for some online content and said it would likewise block Google from indexing those stories.

Arnold and Abel

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has selected state Sen. Abel Maldonado, R-Santa Maria, to take over as lieutenant governor, a post left vacant when Democrat John Garamendi won a seat in Congress. Maldonado is one of the few centrist Republicans in the California Legislature. His selection will have to be affirmed by Assembly and Senate votes.

SGV Tribune loses a reporter

Tania Chatila, who worked her way up the ranks to become a reporter and a sometimes editor at the San Gabriel Valley Tribune, posted a note yesterday to let readers know that she has left the paper for a communications job at USC.

From her Leftovers at City Hall blog:

I've been working in professional newspapers since I was 19, but I have to say no newsroom has been quite like this one. Working in the San Gabriel Valley gave me a crash course in real crime, real politics and real people.

And now it's really time to go. This isn't to say I won't ever return to journalism (readers out there are either smiling or cringing at that thought) -- journalism and writing has always been my passion.

It's the art of storytelling that compels me. But for now, the transition is right for me and my future.

Her departure strikes me as a scary reminder that even good journalists are searching for a way station where they can wait out a storm that might never pass. It's also more evidence of the broken-ladder theory of journalism, one that should worry larger papers that hope to maintain their standards.

Coincidentally, the woman with whom Tania started the Leftovers from City Hall blog, Jennifer McLain, left the Tribune earlier this year and is now a student at USC.

Scientologists buy Governing magazine

Governing magazine, the ubiquitous periodical of the nation's city hall and state house offices, will be sold this week to a Sacramento-based company called e.Republic. The sale has drawn an unusual amount of attention because the prospective buyer is run by Scientologists and the magazine's current owner, Poynter Institute, owns the St. Petersberg Times, a newspaper that won a Pulitzer Prize for exposing the inner workings of the Church of Scientology.

Staffers at Governing - the new owners plan to whittle the staff down to 12 from 27 - have real concerns about working for a company that so closely ties management and religion. The New York Times reports:

Some of the anxiety among the staff stems from a 2001 article in the Sacramento News and Review, an independent weekly, about e.Republic. That article, which has been widely read by Governing’s reporters in the last few days, reported that e.Republic’s staff members are required to read a book on management called “Speaking From Experience,” written by L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology.

“There is concern,” Mr. Harkness said. “Unquestionably, there is concern.”

Officials at e.Republic say its all business, but the meltdown at the Unification Church-owned Washington Times, where attempts to raise journalism standards led to a bloodletting of top staff, has staffers understandably nervous.

Microsoft, News Corp to challenge Google

The Financial Times reports that Microsoft and News Corp, which owns the Wall Street Journal, have joined together to challenge the dominance of Google as an aggregator of online news content.

From the FT:

Microsoft has had discussions with News Corp over a plan that would involve the media company’s being paid to “de-index” its news websites from Google, setting the scene for a search engine battle that could offer a ray of light to the newspaper industry.

...the Financial Times has learnt that Microsoft has also approached other big online publishers to persuade them to remove their sites from Google’s search engine.

...the biggest beneficiary of the tussle could be the newspaper industry, which has yet to construct a reliable online business model that adequately replaces declining print and advertising revenues.

The Wall Street Journal has long held the line against giving away all of its online content for free. Meantime, Microsoft's Bing search engine has looked for ways to compete with Google. For its part, Google told FT that newspaper content doesn't account for much online revenue. But how many more people might think "Bing" when they first sign on the Internet in the morning to look for the news (depending, of course, on how many papers follow News Corp's lead)?

They can't recall

Organizers of a recall attempt against Rep. Anthony Adams, R-Claremont, learned today that they failed to gather enough valid signatures to call an election. Adams was targeted because he supported a budget bill that included tax increases. Recall backers needed 35,825 valid signatures but collected only 24,579, according to the secretary of state.

From Capitol Weekly:

Backers of the recall effort, which reportedly raised more than $100,000, included Michael Schroeder, an Orange County attorney and former state Republican Party leader, and talk-show hosts John Kobylt and Ken Champou of the "John and Ken Show," a political chat radio program in Southern California. Other recall backers included the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association.

The failure to even get the signatures to put the recall on the ballot could give spine to some moderate Republicans who might want to compromise on budget issues next year, when the state Legislature will be faced with another massive budget deficit, but who in the past feared retribution from the right-wing of the party.

Noteworthy: New American Foundation fellow Joe Mathews predicted back in August that the recall attempt would fail.

The corrections

A finger-pointing session broke out this week in the L.A. blogosphere.

Patterico claims James Rainey at the Los Angeles Times got only one side (the wrong one) in the ACORN saga ... Celeste Fremon at WitnessLA calls some of the coverage in the LA Weekly "cringe-makingly slanted" ... new LA Weekly blogger Dennis Romero points out a few mistakes in Neon Tommy's feature on the incoming editor ... and fishbowlLA slaps back at the Weekly for getting so defensive about Neon Tommy's take.

(And most of these links come via LA Observed)

AP layoffs

The Associated Press reports that 90 news employees lost their jobs this week as part of an effort to cut payroll by 10 percent. AP

Military politics

On Monday, the Fort Bragg Army base in North Carolina will host Sarah Palin, who is on a tour for her new book, "Going Rogue."

In agreeing to the public event, the U.S. Army initially banned the media from attending to ensure the promotion of a political book written by a politician didn't turn political. Army officials assumed the mere presence of journalists would encourage Palin, or her supporters (some of them in uniform, I presume), to criticize President Obama and his policies. So, the theory went, even if Palin or her supporters did say something critical, the fact that no journalists were there to report it would preserve the apolitical atmosphere.

The Associated Press and Fayettville Observer both complained, calling the ban illogical and unconstitutional. For one, they said the Army can't have a public event and then restrict the press. Second, they said the public has things like cameras, personal blogs and mouths with which they could broadcast the day's events. In the end, the U.S. Army relented and agreed to allow media in.

DA probes mayor of Industry

The Los Angeles Times and San Gabriel Valley Tribune report that District Attorney's public integrity unit is investigating Mayor David Perez of the city of Industry over allegations that he's benefiting financially from city contracts. The probe comes at a sensitive time, as a proposal to build an NFL stadium in the city pushes ahead. LAT, SGVT

(Updated)

When life gave the NY Post lemons

The Post made lemonade.

Ruth Seymour to step down at KCRW*

A major shift is coming to KCRW. Ruth Seymour informed employees last night that she plans to step down as the station's general manager at the end of February. Seymour has headed the station since 1977. Under stewardship KCRW developed into a major public radio radio voice.

Here's her email to staff:

Dear Staff,

I want to give you a heads-up on some dramatic news.

I’ve made the decision to retire as General Manager at the end of February. I will be speaking personally to many of you in the coming weeks but I wanted to make sure that you heard this from me before it becomes more public.

For almost all of you, I am the only manager you’ve known. Some of you go back with me to John Adams Jr. High. We have a lot of history together.

We have created a family of sorts down in the basement. We have laughed and cried together, quarreled and made up. We’ve welcomed new wives and husbands and lots of babies, some of whom plan to run the station themselves someday.

The College is required to engage in certain procedures to choose a new manager and they have embarked on the process. I will be here to hand off the station to my successor.

Nothing is harder than to announce that you’re leaving and then try to manage for the next few months. So I hope you’ll make it easy for me.

I’m attaching a letter which will be sent to the membership. Please read it.

I’m sure I’ll get a chance to talk individually to everyone of you in the days to come.

With love and gratitude – Ruth

A copy of Seymour's letter to KCRW members is here.

Warren Olney discussed Seymour's announcement on tonight's "Which Way, LA?"

*UPDATE: The Los Angeles Times has a good story today about the timing of Seymour's resignation. Here's an excerpt:

Her departure comes at a time when the station is seen to be in transition. Despite its reputation for superlative programming -- including its signature music and public affairs shows, such as "Morning Becomes Eclectic," "Which Way, L.A.?" and "To the Point" -- KCRW lags behind other public radio stations in local-area ratings.

In October, the month in which the most recent ratings are available, KCRW placed 30th in the Los Angeles-Orange County market, with 1% of the total audience ages 6 and older. Classical station KUSC-FM (91.5) was 19th at 2.3%, while KPCC placed 24th at 1.8%.

But KCRW officials have challenged the ratings system, which they say undercounts the station's true audience.

KCRW is looking to broaden its appeal nationally through digital initiatives such as streaming and podcasting. Seymour felt that having someone else in the general manager role might help the station more quickly realize that goal.

"It's going to be a new era," she said. "Time to begin without me."

Also, I assumed it goes without saying that I work at KCRW as a producer for "Which Way, LA?" and "To The Point." However, assuming is never a good thing to do.

Hits-based journalism*

Tony Pierce, Los Angeles Times blog editor, sent a memo to the troops yesterday. LA Observed got a copy - here's a portion of what was said:

Saturday, I am happy to report (though not surprised), Top of the Ticket had its biggest day ever. Yes, it was bigger than any of those debates, it was bigger than when Sarah Palin explained to the world the difference between pit bulls and hockey moms. Saturday Top of the Ticket, thanks to a tip from a sharp-eyed Times staffer, got more readers than when the United States elected its first Black president.

Indeed, a story that eventually was linked from the Drudge Report in 48 pt bold about Barack Obama bowing to the Emperor of Japan blew away the hits of those other historic days in American history. And this was a post published at 3:38am.

Is there any sweeter success in journalism than a link on Drudge?

*Update: Top of the Ticket writer Andrew Malcolm seems to be going for his second Drudge link in a week.

AP layoffs under way*

The Associated Press is expected to shed 70 or more jobs by the end of the year and Gawker reports that the layoffs have gotten under way today.

*Update, 11/19: Gawker has compiled list of those laid off at AP and is updating it as more names come in.

No truth in advertising

A white supremacist group sneaked an ad for its website, victoryforever.com, into a San Francisco high school newspaper. The creators of the $30 ad apparently put up a prop website that had links to innocuous music offerings and showed that to students at the Lowell High School paper. The creators then changed the site to the one that's up now, which includes links to white resistance music and racist videos.

The stress factor

"News reporter" places #4 on the Forbes list of "stressful jobs that pay badly." Of those surveyed, 62 percent described the job as stressful and the median pay is calculated at $32,900 a year.

Here's the Forbes summary:

Every minute is another deadline for those who report and write the news. While racing against the clock, reporters gather data, conduct interviews and analyze their findings all before writing about major events for a newspaper, magazine, radio show or television program.

As the industry implodes and pink slips fall like rain, are deadlines really the most stressful part of the job? How about the occasional inability to pay a bill on time? Or the frustration that comes knowing good work might never pay off?

Incidentally, the best job on the list is systems engineer (median pay: $87,100), followed by physician assistant ($90,900) and college professor ($70,400).

Zell sees his shadow

The Tribune Co. filed a motion on Friday asking for an extension of the time it has the exclusive right to negotiate its Chapter 11 bankruptcy. According to the motion, the company expects to remain bankrupt for another six months, until end of May 2010.

Here's a portion of the memo Tribune executive Randy Michaels and Gerry Spector sent to employees:

The exclusivity motion makes it clear that we’ve accomplished a lot as a company. With your help, we have stabilized and repositioned our businesses, exceeding the financial results of most of our newspaper and broadcasting peers. This year we project operating cash flow of approximately $400 million—nearly double our original operating plan. ...

Today’s motions will generate some media attention. Try to tune out the noise and focus on your job. The fourth quarter is traditionally the strongest one of the year and, with your continued hard work, we're sure this year will be no different.

The filing did in fact attract some media attention. Here's how the Tribune-owned Chicago Tribune led its story:

Signaling that infighting among creditors is bogging down reorganization efforts, Tribune Co. has asked a U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Delaware to give its management team until March 31 to craft a plan to exit Chapter 11 without interference from other parties.

Letter to Fielding

Callie Schweitzer, a reporter for USC's Neon Tommy, published an open letter to Dr. Jonathan Fielding, head of the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, asking again that he sit down with reporters from the student-run website and answer questions about how the county records deaths from the H1N1 flu.

Schweitzer and Fielding appeared together on Tuesday's "Which Way, LA?," but Fielding declined to interact with her.

Here's a portion of her letter:

After listening to what you had to say, I realized we share many of the same goals: we both want people to take the H1N1 virus seriously and be properly informed on the risks and the situation in L.A. County.

It seems only fitting that the leading public health official in the county would have a conversation with Neon Tommy, the leading voice of the public on swine flu. We have much to gain by joining forces and helping to educate the public.

The complete letter is here. Neon Tommy's story about H1N1 deaths in LA County is here.

It takes a team

In an effort to strangulate the shrinking San Francisco Chronicle, Dean Singleton's MediaNews Group has joined with Philip Anschutz's San Francisco Examiner to sell ads. The resulting "San Francisco Bay Area Buy" will offer ad space in 14 newspapers with a combined circulation of 808,000.

Solomon out at Washington Times

The meltdown at the Washington Times continues with today's announcement that top editor John Solomon, brought in to boost the paper's news cred, "resigned" last week. It's not clear if Solomon's resignation was voluntary, nor is it clear whether the Unification Church-owned paper has a future.

Editing the publisher

The publisher of the Toronto Star sent out a memo announcing the paper would outsource some of the editing functions at the paper, and so one of the editors took the opportunity to show the publisher, using a red pen, how important editing can be. Toronoist

Dobbs leaves CNN

The jowly Lou Dobbs won't be around for me to ignore anymore - at least not on CNN. The pugnacious anchor, who took up illegal immigration as his seminal cause, announced tonight that he's leaving the news network effective immediately. No word yet on where he'll land; Dobbs said he's considering a number of options.

Prosecutors claim j-school students bought favorable interviews

Faced with a new report that casts doubt on the 1978 murder conviction of Anthony McKinney, Cook County prosecutors have launched a campaign to discredit the work of the current and former students at the Medill School of Journalism who prepared the report.

In a Tuesday court hearing, prosecutors alleged that students paid witnesses for favorable interviews - $50-$100 in one case, $40 in another. The hearing is part of an effort by prosecutors to force the students to turn over off-the-record interviews, notes and even grade information about their investigation.

From the New York Times:

After the hearing, a former student, Evan Benn, who works for The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, said he had given the cab driver $60 because the driver had estimated it would cost at least $50 to take Mr. Drakes where he wanted to go. It was not supposed to be a payment for Mr. Drakes, Mr. Benn said.

So prosecutors think the students coerced a witness into placing himself at the scene of a murder with an implicit promise to give him the change from a cab ride? The man who headed the student project defended their work, and dismissed the prosecutors' allegations. From the Chicago Tribune:

Professor David Protess, of the university's Medill School of Journalism, called the filing "so filled with factual errors that if my students had done this kind of reporting or investigating, I would have given them an F."

Ask the money man

Andrew Ross Sorkin, the popular New York Times financial writer who was recently profiled by New York Magazine, is answering readers' questions at the Times website this week. The link is here.

HuffPo casts L.A. net

As LA Observed reports, Huffington Post has sent out invitations for bloggers to write about all things Los Angeles. The pay is nonexistent, but then there aren't any job requirements either. Potential authors are promised a chance to shape the "local conversation" one 400-800 word post at a time. It would be interesting to know who Huffington Post thinks thinks should be part of this conversation.

Four in the morning

1. I guess we now know what Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy thinks of prior restraint. NYT

2. California Watch and KQED's public radio program California Report have teamed up. CW

3. The LA Weekly has hired a new blogger. LAO

4. It's good to be a New Yorker: The magazine hasn't suffered the kinds of cuts that its sister publications have. NYO

ZevPost launches

You don't need two hands to count the number of reporters who cover the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors - which governs most populous county in the nation - on a daily basis. And, since L.A. County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky now has a staff of former journalists working for him that rivals some local newspapers, he's unveiled his own site to chronicle county doings.

From his inaugural blog entry:

Let me be clear, we’re not purporting to be a journalistic organization or to end-run traditional news outlets with propagandistic content. We are simply offering you another stop on your daily journey through the web for deeper coverage in areas we’ve long considered priorities: health, transportation, the environment, arts and culture, public safety, social services and the economy.

As long as readers (who I'm sure will mostly be media types and other government officials) take the above statement to heart and approach the site with a healthy dose of skepticism, ZevPost should be a net positive to county coverage. And if it further reduces press-release journalism in our staff starved newsrooms, all the better.

There are pitfalls, of course. How does the site operate during campaign season (and how is it paid for)? Does Zev restrict access to journalists in favor of his own friendly writeup - or point reporters to his site rather than agree to answer tough questions? Do news sites disseminate his reports, spin included, and call it news?

The big worry is that this type of site lets a politician leap frog the media filter. But I think this just makes the filter more vital. And given the fact that some of the other supervisors live inside protective bubbles, let's hope this experiment increases the level of scrutiny given to all five members of the board.

(found via LA Observed)

Spot.us in the Pacific

The Spot.us reporter who raised money from readers to go cover the Great Trash Dump swirling around in the Pacific Ocean has published her piece in the New York Times. The link is here.

Going rogue

This week's New York Magazine profiles Andrew Ross Sorkin. He's 32 years old and makes more than most of his veteran colleagues in the New York Times business section. He's an editor's pet and a self-promotion man. He serves as the Times answer to the Wall Street Journal and, as such, is rewarded as a brand name within a brand name. He just published a best-selling book, "Too Big To Fail," about the financial collapse.

Some of his colleagues say he's far too chummy with his sources, cherry picks his stories and rides on the backs of better, more aggressive reporters without giving them credit or respect. They wonder if the doors he's able to open will now be closed to them. It's a mix of professional jealousies and changing values, as the traditional model gets turned into the old model, and the new model gets all the breaks.

From NYM:

Some of his antagonists in the newsroom wonder what, in the end, his privileged access is in the service of. “It’s the Jon Stewart question,” one senior Times staffer said, referencing Stewart’s memorable takedown of CNBC’s pre-meltdown boosterism. The squawking, which is loudest among the reporters on the business staff and not among higher-ups, has lately gotten louder, and meaner. As Sorkin’s career has burgeoned, he’s developed another audience of close readers: his colleagues, who comb the column for evidence of favor-trading. In conversations with me, several compared Sorkin’s relationship with the Wall Street elite to disgraced former Times reporter Judith Miller’s alliance with Bush-administration officials peddling bogus intelligence in support of the Iraq War. “She got too close to her sources,” a veteran Times staffer told me. “It was disastrously wrong and we let our readers down. This is the financial equivalent of that.” The analogy seems slightly strained. But certainly, Sorkin’s sources, the ones who have often been treated with kid gloves in his column, are the very actors in the executive suites who triggered the collapse, and closeness inevitably distorts reporting. Sorkin’s critics at the Times say that this effect weakened the paper’s financial coverage during the bubble. But access is one of the places where scoops come from—the career of legendary Times columnist James Reston, among many others, is testament to that. It’s a complicated balance in any newsroom.

Health reform passes House

The House of Representatives just passed the Democratic health care reform bill by a vote of 220 to 215 -- 39 Democrats voted against the bill and one Republican, Rep. Joseph Cao of Louisiana, voted for it. The bill needed 218 votes to pass.

Four today

1. The future's so bright, I don't need to get paid: Arianna Huffington spoke to the students at Ithaca College and told them she is absolutely positively optimistic and upbeat about the future of journalism and is, in fact, saving it. Ithacan Online

2. Time to cut: Time magazine will layoff around 12 editorial employees as part of Time Inc.'s mandate to cut 500 jobs company wide. Fortune magazine looks to be hit hardest, with 24 newsroom layoffs out of a staff of about 80. New York Post

3. Google and the media: Nieman's Zachary Seward talked to Google CEO Eric Schmitt about his love for newspapers, his definition of blog, and the coming Google Wave. Nieman Journalism Lab

4. Obama's brain: Warren Olney will interview Obama's campaign architect David Plouffe about his new book, "The Audacity to Win," and Tuesday's election results on today's "To The Point." Listen live at 12:45 p.m. Pacific here or download is later here.

Cocktails with Hilburn

Robert Hilburn will be the Los Angeles Press Club's guest on Thursday, Nov. 12. Hilburn will speak about his long history with the Los Angeles Times and his new book, "Corn Flakes With John Lennon," with Times entertainment writer Geoff Boucher. The event gets underway at 7 p.m. at the Steve Allen Theater in Hollywood, 4773 Hollywood Blvd. Tickets are $15; Press Club members get in free.

"It's not your father's LA Times"

Russ Stanton stopped by USC a couple of weeks ago and talked to a graduate journalism class about what's it like being editor of the Los Angeles Times. "It's like flying a 747 with three engines out," he said.

According to a student story about the visit, Stanton told the class that after he became editor he put Times journalists through an Internet boot camp and he touted the Top of the Ticket blog, the Mapping LA project and Brand X as successful innovations under his watch.

"It's not your father's LA Times," he told the students.

Stanton also answered a question about how he dealt with staff morale in the wake of numerous layoffs and buyouts. From the student report:

Executive in Residence and former Washington Editor for McClatchy Newspapers David Westphal asked how Stanton is keeping his employees' morale high despite a large number of layoffs. Stanton admitted it has been difficult, but that he makes an effort to go to lunch with someone from the staff every day in addition to sending daily notes to writers after well-reported stories. He also said he highlights the paper's strengths: foreign, entertainment and sport coverage.

"As we've been forced to get smaller, I've tried to reinforce the reasons why I love working there," he said.

Westphal wrote his own account of the visit, noting that Stanton sees the Guardian as a good model for how to handle online news and has put his faith in the e-reader to save the modern newspaper business.

Coincidentally, the LA Times has decided to partner with USC on a series of polls in the run-up to the next year's midterm elections, LA Observed reports. The Times killed its in-house polling unit last year.

Leader, News-Press get redesigned

The three papers in the Times Community News chain are getting face lifts this week. The newly designed Glendale News-Press was unveiled Tuesday and the remade Burbank Leader came out today. The redesigned La Cañada Valley Sun gets it debut tomorrow.

Editor Dan Evans says readers have responded favorably to the changes. He had a column Sunday that laid out the highlights of the new layouts. An online poll ran with the column - as of this posting, 35 people said they liked the redesign, 12 people said they didn't, and 25 readers said they hadn't noticed.

Hello walls

For a while now Dean Singleton has been threatening to put up pay walls at some or all of his newspapers. Today, Editor and Publisher reports that Singleton's MediaNews Group will test out a pay-for-content model on the websites of the Enterprise-Record in Chico, California and the York Daily Record in York, Pennsylvania:

"We wanted to get sites that were not metro sites for the same reason that you don't open on Broadway," said Howard Saltz, vice president for content development. "But not a site that has Web traffic so small that the change would not affect anything."

So when do they get to Broadway?

Saltz said more sites, including MediaNews Group's larger papers such as The Denver Post and San Jose Mercury News, would likely add a pay wall approach if the York and Chico efforts prove successful: "We are going to be rolling out for the next two years."

The walls will go up sometime early next year. The Singleton plan calls for putting some content behind a pay wall - maybe news features, sports and some reader-generated content - and keeping the breaking news free.

Given that most of his staffs are stretched thin, it will be interesting to see whether the pay walls lead to new hires for money-making beats.

Journalism worth fighting for

A veteran editor at the Washington Post popped one his staffers in the cheek after the staffer allegedly called him a "cocksucker." The disagreement centered on an error-riddled "charticle" about "famous incidents in which key actors in history have unwittingly coughed up sensitive information to the wrong people."

Perhaps it was the very idea that words like "charticles" had entered into the vocabulary of the modern newsroom, which once prided itself on snuffing out silly jargon. Or maybe this is a case of an old dog pissed off at the rising influence, and snark, of the young pups - after all, the veteran editor, Henry Allen, is a short timer, having agreed to take a buyout. And the punched staffer, Manuel Roig-Franzia, seemed intent on poking and prodding Allen before he left, having called him a "dick" and having yanked a page from the editor's notebook, according to a detailed account of the precipitating events in the Washington City Paper.

Or maybe Allen was simply exasperated that someone would send him a story with so many errors in this late hour of his career.

Whatever it was, Post columnist Gene Weingarten is just happy to know there's enough passion left in the newsroom that someone would be willing to throw a punch.

Going big in Texas

The nonprofit Texas Tribune launched today. Aggregater, blogger, investigator, data miner, pollster, bloviater - the site promises to include all the best online journalism has to offer and with a defined mission to promote civic engagement.

From the editor, Evan Smith:

In true twenty-first-century fashion, we're approaching the task of storytelling across multiple platforms: text, audio, video, blogs, databases, mobile, social. We're treating you, the reader or viewer or listener or user, as if you're the customer, and we're busily puzzling through how best to meet your various demands. Our goal is to maximize your ability to personalize your experience; as we move to day five and day ten and day thirty, we'll be adding new and innovative ways to do just that.

The top story on the site is about the use of physical restraint to control or discipline disabled students. There are also several stories about state politics and the nasty race for governor.

Closing time

Freedom Communications has decided to close the East Valley Tribune in Mesa, Arizona after failing to find a buyer. The newspaper employs about 140 people and had already trimmed staff and a reduced its printing schedule to try to trim costs.

The Tribune won a Pulitzer Prize for local reporting this year.

Freedom, which is the parent company of the Orange County Register, filed for bankruptcy in August.

(found via LA Biz Observed)

Union-Tribune gets facelift

The San Diego Union-Tribune today unveiled its newly redesigned website. The front page is more colorful and relies on large photos and minimal text to draw readers to the day's top stories. Unfortunately, I couldn't get to the link to the paper's story about the redesign to work.