AAN News
L.A. Weekly Founder Recalls Its Progressive Pastnew
After getting fired from Larry Flynt's L.A. Free Press, Jay Levin founded L.A. Weekly and put out the first issue on Dec. 7, 1978. Seed money came from several investors, including actor-producer Michael Douglas. In an interview with Kristine McKenna for the paper's 25th anniversary edition, Levin recalls the grueling early days when the L.A. Weekly was undercapitalized and then grew rapidly. The paper, now owned by Village Voice Media, had a strong emphasis on international as well as local news and was more progressive than it is today, Levin says. But rumors that the office was a hotbed of drug abuse and interoffice sex are wildly exaggerated.
L.A. Weekly |
12-11-2003 5:03 pm |
Industry News
Tags: L.A. Weekly, Jay Levin
Veteran Alt-Weekly Reporter Found Dead at 43new
Ron Curran (pictured), a "dogged, award-
winning
investigator and unblushing idealist" died this week
in his Southern California home, according to his
former
employer, the LA Weekly. Curran, who left
the Weekly after ten years to work at the
San Francisco Bay Guardian, recently
founded the alternative wire service, Pulp
Syndicate. "Ron was one of the best writers and
reporters I ever worked with," Bay Guardian Executive
Editor Tim Redmond tells the Weekly.
LA Weekly |
11-20-2003 12:49 pm |
Industry News
New Players Nibbling Around the Edges of Growing LA Weeklynew
One year after New Times LA was
shuttered, several new papers are scrambling to
compete in the cramped quarters not already
occupied by a fatter LA Weekly, according
to the local business journal. "The LA Weekly is a
Goliath ... But there is still a way to make money,
even by picking up their crumbs,” says former
employee turned competitor, Jim Kaplan.
Southland Publishing's Charles Gerencser
says the Village Voice Media paper, which recently
published a phone-book size "Best of",
was becoming “publishing’s version of urban
sprawl.”
Los Angeles Business Journal |
10-28-2003 12:22 am |
Industry News
Tags: L.A. Weekly
LA Weekly Writer Heading to Stanfordnew
Sara Catania, staff writer at LA
Weekly, is one of 12 journalists awarded
John S. Knight Fellowships at Stanford
University for the 2003-04 academic year.
During their stay at Stanford, the Knight
Fellows design independent courses of
study and participate in special seminars.
Catania will pursue her interests in
mental illness and criminal law.
Stanford University news release |
04-30-2003 10:11 am |
Industry News
LA Weekly Dissects Competitorsnew
Howard Blume says no "upstart"
among the "lower-budget alternatives"
springing up in the LA Basin will
challenge LA Weekly citywide. The paper
has fired Valley Business
Printers, owner of its
newest competitor, Southland Publishing
Co., Blume reports. Southland purchased
the assets of the closed New Times LA,
plans a summer launch of weeklies in
L.A. and the Valley, and has hired
Editorial Art Director Dana
Collins away from LA Weekly. Plus
former LA Weekly Publisher
Michael Sigman is consulting
with Southland, Blume writes.
LA Weekly |
04-17-2003 2:08 pm |
Industry News
LA Prosecutor Responds to Meyerson, Laceynew
Los Angeles County Dist. Atty. Steve
Cooley calls a column by LA
Weekly's Harold Meyerson and a
letter to the editor of the Wall Street
Journal written by New Times'
Michael Lacey "self-interested
positions staked out by those who are
directly affected by this investigation."
Cooley claims he reads LA Weekly
"because it is a valuable news
organ" and says New Times LA was
"occasionally very funny, on occasion very
insightful, on occasion very cruel." He
argues that "It's wrong ... to attribute
political motives to government
agencies that are just doing their jobs. ...
we're at the investigative stage. At the end
of the exercise, there may be a
determination that what's been uncovered
falls short of establishing a violation
of the law."
Los Angeles Times |
01-26-2003 4:09 pm |
Industry News
Meyerson on the Antitrust Investigationnew
The Justice Department's investigation of
the Village Voice Media-New Times deal
to close weeklies in Cleveland and Los
Angeles is apparently driven by a concern
"that the assisted suicide of New Times
in Los Angeles
reflects
a narrowing of political
perspectives in the city, and that it is
the government's responsibility
to create
more ideological space," Harold
Meyerson writes. He
adds that if investigators really looked
they would find at least as much
"ideologically driven or
monomaniacal" editorial slant at the
dailies as at alternative newsweeklies.
LA Weekly |
01-23-2003 9:34 am |
Industry News
Media Consolidation, Alternative-Stylenew
The Village Voice/New Times deal that
closed New Times Los Angeles and
VVM's Cleveland Free Times, is another
sign of an "imploding economy,"
Cynthia Cotts writes in The
Village Voice. She suggests that when
VVM's
venture capitalist owners start
looking
to cash out they could find a
buyer in
a daily newspaper chain or another
alternative media company.
Village Voice |
10-08-2002 2:24 pm |
Industry News
New Times/Village Voice Deal: Cutting Lossesnew
Iconoclastic alternative weeklies are doing business like the big boys, former Washington City Paper Editor David Carr writes in the New York Times. Carr reports that New Times received $8 million from Village Voice Media to close its money-losing New Times Los Angeles. "The willingness of the two ferociously competitive chains to make a deal in their common interest could mean that the next big deal by the companies could leave only one standing," Carr writes.
New York Times |
10-07-2002 10:33 am |
Industry News
New Times, VVM Cut Deal, Close Papersnew
Village Voice Media paid NT Media
more than $1 million to close New
Times Los Angeles, sources tell the
Los Angeles Times. New
Times paid VVM a lesser amount to
shutter
Cleveland Free Times, the daily
reports.
An anti-trust lawyer says the
transaction, negotiated quietly over the
past three months, "could raise rather
interesting antitrust issues."
Los Angeles Times |
10-03-2002 10:43 am |
Industry News
LA Weekly Ad Staff Rejects Unionnew
By a two-vote margin, LA Weekly's
advertising and promotional staff voted
not to join the union that represents
editorial employees, the Los Angeles
Times reports. The close vote and
hard-fought campaign have opened
wounds Publisher Beth
Sestanovich says she wants to heal.
Los Angeles Times |
10-02-2002 10:07 am |
Industry News
LA Weekly Ad Staff Consider Unionizingnew
Advertising staff at LA Weekly are to vote Friday on whether to join the union that already represents editorial employees at the alt-weekly. Editorial staff are shocked that management is resisting extending union representation to ad staff because the paper has always had an ardently pro-union editorial stance, reports the Los Angeles Times. Publisher Beth Sestanovich, however, tells the Times she pushed for a vote rather than the more pro-forma card check organizing because "while
our editorial policy is pro-union, it also is
pro-democracy."
Los Angeles Times |
09-25-2002 10:01 am |
Industry News
Tags: Management, L.A. Weekly
Sestanovich Named Publisher of LA Weekly and OC Weekly
05-30-2002 4:15 pm |
Press Releases
LA Weekly Task: "Reinvent Alternative Journalism"new
Los Angeles Magazine reporter R.J. Smith says the city's dominant alternative "has improved" since "smart and low-key" Laurie Ochoa took over as editor a year ago. Smith calls the paper Ochoa inherited "lucrative but dull, a cash cow in need of a prod" and says Village Voice Media CEO David Schneiderman -- who argues that "anxiety is healthy" -- is doing the prodding. "The pressure I'm putting on them is not because of investors," Schneiderman says. "It's so we don't become dinosaurs."
Los Angeles Magazine |
04-01-2002 12:08 pm |
Industry News
LA/OC Weekly Announce Ad Department Positionsnew
Michael Sigman, president/publisher of LA/OC Weekly, announces that the papers have brought veteran advertising executives on board at the two Village Voice Media papers. Dar Brown has been named associate publisher/advertising for LA Weekly, and Melissa Fisher has been named advertising director for OC Weekly.
LA/OC Weekly news release |
12-11-2001 4:00 pm |
Industry News
