AAN News
More Staff Cuts Could Be On the Horizon at Washington City Papernew
DCist reports that City Paper's parent company Creative Loafing needs to cut the paper's budget by $170,000. The belt-tightening could lead to additional layoffs at the alt-weekly (some production and editorial staffers were laid off after CL purchased City Paper and the Chicago Reader last year). "Like a lot of media companies, we are going through an exceptionally rough period, and indeed we are discussing how to cut expenses," editor Erik Wemple tells DCist. "I don't want to cite any figures at this point because we are trying our best as a company to minimize the impact. But yes, layoffs are part of the discussion."
DCist.com |
09-02-2008 8:28 am |
Industry News
City Paper Arts Editor on the State of Book Coverage at Alt-Weekliesnew
"Books coverage at American daily newspapers is asphyxiating. That's the bad news," writes Washington City Paper's Mark Athitakis. "Here's more bad news: The situation is just as dire at alternative weeklies." He goes on to cite the cost-cutting that occurred when Creative Loafing purchased City Paper last year as an example. But he says there are reasons to be optimistic about alt-weeklies. "We've taken one hell of a beating, but our basic mandate -- to give people informed and lively coverage of subjects that often fall outside the larger media's radar -- remains intact," Athitakis writes. "And books are still part of that mandate." He wraps up his post by listing some tips for any critics hoping to contribute to alt-weeklies.
National Book Critics Circle Blog |
08-29-2008 8:21 am |
Industry News
Former Alt-Weekly Editor Turns into Crime-Fighting Vigilantenew
Former Rocky Mountain Chronicle and Colorado Springs Independent editor Vanessa Martinez was eating lunch on Monday in Denver when a thief made off with her bag, which included cash, credit cards and her ID, which she needed to get into DNC events. After she called her credit card company and found out the guy was already on a spending spree nearby, she headed to the Virgin Megastore where he'd just bought some items. Before she got there, though, she ran into him on the street. "The poor guy couldn't have seen it coming," Westword's Joel Warner writes. "Biff! Bam! Kapow! Martinez punched him in the face, walloped him with his own shopping bag and tore at his shirt. He pulled out her stolen credit cards in surrender, but that didn't stop the fury." The pickpocket was taken into custody, and Martinez got her stuff back shortly after the scuffle. In other DNC-related news, check out this blog post, in which Westword writer Jason Sheehan's takes New York Post columnist Cindy Adams to task for her boneheaded comments about Denver.
Westword |
08-28-2008 12:05 pm |
Industry News
New LEO Owner Talks About His Plans for the Papernew
Chris Ferrell, whose SouthComm Communications bought the Louisville alt-weekly in May, tells the 'Ville Voice that they are busy working on a redesign of LEO's website, and that there will be a lot of emphasis on the web when the new site debuts in late September. He also says that he's added one staff writer and has been working on the design of the print product. "The paper looks better now that (sic) it did three months ago," Ferrell says. "We've created a larger news hole, and we wanted to make sure we have the kind of content people expect, even when the ad/edit mix doesn't justify it."
The 'Ville Voice |
08-28-2008 10:08 am |
Industry News
New Owners Shuffle the Editorial Deck at Worcester Magazinenew
With the exception of one person, the entire editorial staff will no longer have jobs at the paper tomorrow when the sale to Holden Landmark Corp. closes, the Worcester Telegram & Gazette reports. Three non-editorial staffers also will not be offered jobs with the new company, and one full-time position will be made part-time. "As we merge the Holden Landmark Corp. and Worcester Magazine, we are retaining 88 percent of the combined company's employment base," the paper's new publisher Gareth Charter says in a staff memo explaining the changes. Jim Keogh, current editor-in-chief of the Holden Landmark newspaper group, will take the reins as editor of Worcester Magazine, and Doreen Manning will be the paper's arts & entertainment editor. Outgoing editor-in-chief Noah Bombard tells the Telegram & Gazette that while he expected to lose his job as a result of the sale, he was "stunned" by the depth of the changes. "Cuts were expected, but nobody expected them at this level," he says. MORE: Read Bombard's farewell email.
Worcester Telegram & Gazette |
08-28-2008 8:30 am |
Industry News
Outgoing Editor-in-Chief's Farewell Email to Worcester Magazine Staff
AAN News |
08-28-2008 12:48 pm |
Industry News
How the Jackson Free Press Built an Uncommon Alt-Weekly Audiencenew
The JFP has "resurrected the alt-weekly tradition of maverick investigations and cultural provocation," Casey Sanchez writes in Next American City magazine. In doing so, "it has cultivated an audience uncommon in the South and practically nonexistent among alt-weeklies -- young, white conservatives and black professionals, many of whom are lifelong Jacksonians." Editor Donna Ladd says the paper's dogged coverage of City Hall has helped build a loyal following. "Any cover with the mayor on it doesn't stay on the stands more than a day," she says.
Next American City |
08-26-2008 11:11 am |
Industry News
Alt-Weeklies Get Short Shrift at the Newseumnew
The $450 million museum dedicated to the news "might be seven levels high, take up 250,000 square feet, and feature floors of multi-media displays on topics as wide-ranging as gangsters vs. the FBI (and the daily newspaper coverage of it) and the history of tabloid newspapers (with covers of the National Enquirer from the days it was talking about Elvis's ghost) -- but it has no space for alternative weeklies," blogger Gina Vivinetto notes. She says that our corner of the news industry is "summed up behind a glass display with exactly one cover of the Village Voice and a paragraph saying alt-weeklies were born in the turbulent 1960s to cover news outside of the mainstream press."
Gina Vivinetto's Greatest Hits |
08-25-2008 12:28 pm |
Industry News
Scores of AANies Head to Denver for the DNC
At last count, 24 AAN member papers will be sending 40 reporters, bloggers and photographers to Denver to cover this year's historic Democratic National Convention, which begins Monday. There will be plenty of alt-weekly staffers attending, and a few papers have secured notable bloggers for their coverage. Popular political blogger Atrios, aka Dr. Duncan Black, who runs Eschaton, will blog for Philadelphia City Paper, while "Slowpoke" cartoonist Jen Sorensen will blog for C-Ville Weekly and Tom Tomorrow will blog for the New Mass. Media papers. Westword, meanwhile, has published a special "Unconventional Guide to Denver" for all the press, pundits, and pols invading their city. And of course, Westword will continue to cover the DNC on its Demver blog, as it has been for months, with a dozen or so people on the ground blogging and taking pictures. For a list of AAN members attending the DNC, email web (at) aan.org.
AAN News |
08-22-2008 1:01 pm |
Industry News
How The Stranger Negotiated a Deadline-Day Power Outagenew
On Tuesday -- "the busiest day in The Stranger's production cycle" -- a blown transformer caused power in the paper's offices to go out. After being told that the power might not be restored until 6 am Wednesday, the staff of The Stranger had to take matters into their own hands. "We did something that has never happened before in The Stranger's history," writes Christopher Frizzelle in the appropriately-titled blog post, "How We Got This Week's Issue to the Printer." The staff ended up taking all of the equipment in the production department over to web development director Anthony Hecht's living room, where they wrapped the issue on time.
The Stranger |
08-21-2008 11:59 am |
Industry News
News & Review Reporter Lands on 'Power & Influence 100' Listnew
Sacramento Magazine's annual "assessment of those wielding power and influence in the region" includes one unlikely pick that caught our eye: an alt-weekly reporter. The mag picked Sacramento News & Review's Sena Christian -- known as the "Eco Warrior Princess" -- because she "goads and guilts us into environmental stewardship with lively prose about all things 'green,' from fashion to toilets." Christian covers the sustainability beat full-time for the N&R, and she's chronicling the paper's $1.4 million "green" renovation of an old grocery store, which will serve as the paper's offices when complete later this year.
Sacramento Magazine |
08-21-2008 9:04 am |
Honors & Achievements
Alt-Weeklies Honored in Missouri Lifestyle Journalism Awardsnew
Two AAN members placed in the overall General Excellence categories: Louisiana's Independent Weekly finished second in the Class I division and OC Weekly finished third in the Class III division. In addition, both Riverfront Times (Special Sections and Arts and Entertainment) and Westword (Consumer Affairs and Food and Nutrition) were finalists in two story-topic categories. More than 1,100 entries were submitted to the annual contest administered by the Missouri School of Journalism, which calls it "the oldest and best-known feature writing and editing competition in American newspapering."
Missouri School of Journalism |
08-21-2008 8:12 am |
Honors & Achievements
C-Ville Weekly Sending Jen Sorensen to Blog the DNC
C-Ville Weekly Press Release |
08-21-2008 11:33 am |
Press Releases
Alt-Weekly Editor is Main Character in Katrina Novelnew
Tom Piazza's new novel City of Refuge, released yesterday by Harper books, features an editor of a fictional New Orleans alt-weekly named Gumbo who evacuates to Chicago after Hurricane Katrina. As the Times-Picayune points out, that character "certainly bears a resemblance to Michael Tisserand, former Gambit editor." But Piazza explains that all the characters are fictional. "Even if a writer is writing a novel about his or her best friend, in the course of that writing, the friend turns into something else -- a character," he says. When asked about the resemblance, Tisserand tells Gambit that "the scaffolding [for the character] is in part me, but the building is all Tom's."
The Times-Picayune |
08-20-2008 10:07 am |
Industry News
Worcester Magazine Sold to Local Weekly Publishersnew
The Holden Landmark Corp. yesterday purchased the alt-weekly from Worcester Publishing Ltd. for an undisclosed sum, according to reports. Landmark owns four community weeklies in Central Massachusetts and a monthly parenting magazine. Owner and publisher Allen Fletcher tells the Worcester Business Journal that he sold the magazine because he had arrived "at a time in my life when I was looking to make a change. It's a personal path I've been on for a few years." He told the Telegram & Gazette that the paper was in good health, with this year seeing a 30 percent increase in revenues over last year. Landmark publisher Gareth Charter says they have "no interest whatsoever in suburbanizing Worcester Magazine," but he hopes it can expand the company's advertising reach, by allowing businesses to target the city as well as individual suburbs where Landmark already has weeklies. The deal is expected to close Aug. 29.
Worcester Telegram & Gazette | Worcester Business Journal |
08-20-2008 8:01 am |
Industry News
