Former Neon Tommyer goes to TPM

Former Neon Tommy Editor-in-chief Callie Schweitzer has accepted a job as assistant to the publisher at the liberal news blog Talking Points Memo. She'll work under TPM founder/editor/publisher Josh Marshall.

For those unfamiliar, Neon Tommy is the online news site run by USC's journalism school. Schweitzer's new job was reported by Gorkana.

Four in the morning

1. The Pearl Project has completed its investigation into the murder of Daniel Pearl. Key finding: "Twenty-seven men were allegedly involved in the kidnapping and murder of Wall Street Journal bureau chief Daniel Pearl, but only four have been charged and convicted." The rest of the report is here: Pearl Project (found via LA Observed)

2. 25 essential writing tips you may or may not agree with. Guardian

3. NPR and its 1.4 million Facebook fans. Nieman Journalism Lab

4. The USC j-school news site Neon Tommy is having an open house "today from 3-4 p.m. in the West Lobby of the Annenberg School. All are welcome."

A neon light shined on Skid Row

Neon Tommy, the online publication put together by USC's journalism school students, is doing a series on community health care clinics. The first story looks at the Center for Community Health in LA's Skid Row. (found via LA Observed)

Getting the Bell story*

Paresh Dave at Neon Tommy writes about how reporters at the Los Angeles Times broke the story on the salary scandal in the city of Bell. It all started with a tip from the District Attorney's public integrity division...

Initially, [reporter Jeff] Gottlieb called the L.A. County District Attorney's Office to see if there was any trouble in Maywood. As it turned out, there wasn't. But the District Attorney's Office did acknowledge that a neighboring city, Bell, had city council members who were oddly earning more than $100,000 annually.

Presented with brand new information, [reporter Ruben] Vives' attention shifted from Maywood to Bell.

The two reporters will recount the tale Thursday at the LA Press Club.

*Update: Speaking of Bell, residents have finally begun a recall effort. BASTA (Bell Association to Stop The Abuse) is behind it.

Building up a defense *Updated

Los Angeles Councilman Richard Alarcón has rasied about $9,000 to defend himself against possible charges that he's been living outside of his council district, Neon Tommy reports.

*Update: Paresh Dave at Neon Tommy reports that a person claiming to be a member of the L.A. County grand jury investigating Alarcón has posted on Craigslist to say the councilman will be indicted. Divulging grand jury deliberations is a criminal offense, so if this is true, the juror could be in trouble - and so could the integrity of case against Alarcón.

Four today

1. Former LA Times reporter Bill Boyarsky lauds USC's online news site, Neon Tommy, as the future of IF Stoneian journalism (although I thought the name referred to something completely different). Truthdig

2. CNN's website expands - becomes even less relevant to me. Business Insider

3. Former Boston Globe reporter comes up with an unfortunate name to describe gripping stories. JLocal

4. Voice of San Diego wants to turn people into civic activists. Nieman Lab

LA Times goes back to school

Graduate students at USC's journalism school will become contributors to the newly revived homicide blog at the Los Angeles Times, the newspaper announced today. From the Times:

Under the partnership, students from USC will write dispatches for the Homicide Report. Among the goals is to provide more content for the blog and to offer crime-reporting experience to student journalists from Neon Tommy, the publication of Annenberg Digital News.

Marc Cooper and Alan Mittelstaedt will be heading up the effort on USC's side.

This is the second time the Times and USC have worked together on news coverage. Last year, the Times enlisted the USC College of Letters and Sciences to help conduct a series of polls on attitudes in California.

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)

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.

J-school starts news site

Students at USC's graduate school of journalism have started an online news and commentary site called Neon Tommy under the supervision of Marc Cooper, who's also digital news director at the school. Cooper told fishbowlLA that NeTo is "meant to compete with anybody and everybody on local and national news."