AAN News
Las Vegas CityLife Staffer Lampoons Pols with Fake Twitter Accountsnew
Andrew Kiraly has taken to Twitter to poke fun at Nevada politicians like Sen. John Ensign and Gov. Jim Gibbons, in what he calls "a text version of an editorial cartoon." Kiraly's fake account for Ensign, who admitted to having an affair this summer, drew the attention of a staffer for the senator, who called the content "vulgar," "offensive" and "deceptive." That account has been shut down by Twitter, but Kiraly has launched a new one that is more clearly labeled as parody. The most recent entry from SenatorEnsign2: "I advise the women of America NOT to postpone breast exams. Be responsible and proactive. Take your health into my own hands."
LasVegasNow.com |
11-19-2009 10:59 am |
Industry News
Creative Loafing (Tampa) Sells Cover, Editorial Space in Holiday Auctionnew
Like several other alt-weeklies, Creative Loafing (Tampa) has put together a holiday auction to raise funds for a local nonprofit, but with a new twist: Cover space, a news story and a restaurant review in the paper are among the items up for bid. "This is our way of saying 'This is not how we do business,'" editor David Warner tells the St. Petersburg Times. "Just this once, you'll see what you get if our content actually is for sale. It's ironic, unchartered (sic) territory."
Creative Loafing (Tampa) | St. Petersburg Times |
11-19-2009 9:23 am |
Industry News
New L.A. Weekly Editor Talks About The Paper's Futurenew
Drex Heikes, the veteran journalist who came to the Weekly from the Las Vegas Sun this summer, tells the USC Annenberg publication Neon Tommy that he was brought in specifically to beef up the paper's reporting, and that's exactly what he will do. "We're pushing things that are very deeply reported," he says. "We want good, hard-nosed investigative work." Heikes acknowledges that the Weekly has seen some tough times in the past few years, but says he remains confident in the paper's future, in part because he's been told by VVM executive editor Michael Lacey that there won't be any more newsroom contractions (as the story notes, the Weekly is actually hiring again). "I would say, God willing, the place is going to grow and we can be judged on where we are a year from now or two years from now," Heikes says. NOTE: The Weekly points out that the Neon Tommy story has an as-of-yet uncorrected error -- the paper has five full-time editors, not three.
Neon Tommy |
11-18-2009 2:42 pm |
Industry News
Four More AAN Papers Join SelectAlternatives
NOW Magazine, Boise Weekly, Monterey County Weekly and Mountain Xpress are the latest AAN papers to choose the SelectAlternatives local personals/dating software for their websites. Twenty-seven AAN papers are now using SelectAlternatives.
(FULL STORY)
Sutcliffe Associates Press Release |
11-18-2009 11:09 am |
Press Releases
Suspected Seattle Arsonist Uses Alt-Weeklies to Start Firesnew
A 46-year-old man who was charged with 11 arsons this week "appears to be a fan of alternative weeklies," the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports. According to court documents and police reports, Kevin Todd Swalwell has used both The Stranger and Seattle Weekly to help start fires in the Greenwood neighborhood.
Seattle Post-Intelligencer |
11-18-2009 10:33 am |
Industry News
City Pages Mashes Up Palin Book for This Week's Covernew
The Minnesota alt-weekly has a big story this week on Michele Bachmann, the conservative Congresswoman who "has distinguished herself by saying crazy things in a very sweet voice tinged with folksy charm ... not unlike Sarah Palin," editor Kevin Hoffman writes. "The coincidence of Palin's book release this week couldn't be ignored, so art director Nick Vlcek decided to do a mash-up. It's the first time in 30 years that we're shipping a City Pages without our logo on the front, but we think it's worth it."
City Pages |
11-18-2009 10:12 am |
Industry News
AdMob Brings Interactive Video Ads to iPhonenew
CNET |
11-18-2009 10:23 am |
Industry News
Court Rules CIA Didn't Violate Valerie Plame Wilson's Free Speech Rightsnew
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has upheld a 2007 lower court decision in its ruling in Wilson v. Central Intelligence Agency, which barred the former CIA officer from revealing the length of her tenure with the agency in her 2007 memoir. The three-judge panel said that the CIA made a good argument to keep the information secret and that it would not "second-guess" the agency's decision. AAN was part of a group that filed an amicus brief supporting Wilson in the case.
First Amendment Center |
11-17-2009 10:06 am |
Legal News
Tags: Editorial, Management
Jury Rules in Lawsuit That Stemmed from Riverfront Times Storynew
A federal jury has awarded $100,000 to "Jane Doe," a cosmetic surgery patient who claimed that doctors provided before-and-after photographs of her torso without her permission to illustrate a 2006 Riverfront Times story. The woman's lawyers were seeking millions of dollars for compensatory damages alone, but one juror says the jury awarded only enough to pay something to her lawyers and to allow for her hotel and travel expenses. The St. Louis alt-weekly was not named in the woman's suit. However, one of the doctors being sued testified that Times reporter Kristen Hinman promised not to use the photos and to let him review the article before publication, charges that Hinman and her editor deny.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch |
11-17-2009 9:28 am |
Industry News
Next 'How I Got That Story' Slated for This Friday
At 3 pm EST, this Friday, Nov. 20, AAN will continue its live chat series with winners from the AAN 2009 journalism contest with Anne Schindler, editor of Folio Weekly, who won first place in the column writing category in the 50,000 and under circulation category. She will be interviewed by Santa Fe Reporter editor Julia Goldberg in a chat that will happen right here on the AAN.org home page.
(FULL STORY)
AAN |
11-16-2009 4:03 pm |
Association News
Alt-Weekly Writer Helps Put Together Book Drive for Liberian Journos
NewLiberian.com, a nonprofit human-rights news site co-founded by San Diego CityBeat's Dave Maass, is partnering with the NGO The Niapele Project in an effort to get American newsrooms to donate spare books and magazines for a "Journalists' Book Drive" to benefit reporters in Liberia. "Books are very expensive in Liberia and some reporters can't even afford a day's meal, let alone buy journalism books," NewLiberian.com editor Sematics King Jr. says. "Therefore, books will really be an added advantage to many Liberian journalists who did not get the opportunity to study journalism at all in college."
(FULL STORY)
NewLiberian.com Press Release |
11-16-2009 11:12 am |
Press Releases
Marty Petty Named New CEO of Creative Loafing, Inc.
Petty, the former publisher of the St. Petersburg Times and the Hartford Courant, has been named the new chief executive officer of the six-paper Creative Loafing chain. She will succeed Richard W. Gilbert, who has been interim CEO since the company emerged from bankruptcy. "I'm invigorated by the possibilities to deepen relationships with our readers and advertisers and expand our influence in our communities," she says in a release. "The coverage areas which have differentiated and distinguished the alternative press historically may be more important than ever." MORE from Creative Loafing (Tampa).
(FULL STORY)
Creative Loafing, Inc. Press Release |
11-16-2009 10:22 am |
Industry News
Tags: Management, CL, Inc.
Study: About Half in U.S. Would Pay for Online Newsnew
The New York Times |
11-16-2009 11:41 am |
Industry News
Craigslist Set to Roll Out $5 Mobile App Exclusively for Blackberry Usersnew
Wired |
11-16-2009 10:28 am |
Industry News
Dallas Observer Refuses to Hand Over Interview Tape to Judgenew
After a guilty verdict was handed down in Dallas' high-profile political corruption trial last month, one juror told an Observer reporter that the jurors may have discussed -- or overhead outside discussion about -- some pieces of evidence during the trial, both of which are against the rules of the court. That revelation led one of the defense attorneys to request a new trial, which led the judge to request the interview tape from the Observer. The paper said no, drawing a snippy rebuke from the judge, who wrote that the alt-weekly was citing "some vague constitutional protection unknown to this Court" in its refusal to give her the tape. "But 'round here we call that 'vague constitutional protection' the First Amendment," notes Observer managing editor Patrick Williams, adding: "We're not in the business of becoming an adjunct to the government."
Dallas Observer |
11-13-2009 10:35 am |
Industry News
