Nashville-based SouthComm purchased the Scene from Village Voice Media last month, and has swiftly been making changes. Former managing editor and longtime staffer Jim Ridley has taken over as editor, and the paper rolled out a glossy look this week. In addition, SouthComm has brought all editorial staffers of its Nashville properties (it owns The City Paper, NashvillePost.com and a handful of smaller print publications) under one roof, and done the same -- in a different building -- for business-side staff. Scene writer Bruce Barry says Nashville is "the alpha test" of SouthComm's publishing theory, which involves owning a unique blend of niche publications in a single market. Barry also points out that many SouthComm higher-ups are "very conservative" and wonders how that might affect the alt-weekly going forward.

Continue ReadingNew Owners Bring Changes to Nashville Scene

In his new book, The Governor, Rod Blagojevich points fingers at many local politicians for his fall from grace. But he also blames the press, including the Chicago Reader, for his problems. In the middle of a chapter on how 33rd Ward alderman Richard Mell (who is also Blago's father-in-law) used the media to spread damaging rumors, he writes: "The first story I recall seeing was in the Reader newspaper. I think the title was 'Mell Gets the Shaft.'" He continues: "I felt violated. I felt betrayed. Who goes to the press about his own family?" Ben Joravsky, the author of said article, points out that the story was actually titled "Rod Gives 'Em the Shaft," and then goes on to tell his side of how that story came about.

Continue ReadingBlago Says the Reader Started Media Onslaught That Led to His Fall

A new Online Publishers Association study finds that people in 2009 on average spent 42 percent of their web time on content sites compared to 34 percent in 2003. The actual amount of time spent on content sites has nearly doubled in that time period, from an average of three hours, 42 minutes to six hours, 58 minutes.

Continue ReadingOPA Study: Web Users Spending More Time on Content Sites

The Weekly will join The Mountain View Voice and The Almanac in a new three-story building built and owned by parent company Embarcadero Media later this month. "The new building boasts energy-efficient and other environmental features that will make it among the 'greenest' buildings in the area," the Voice reports. READ MORE about the building in a 2008 story in the Weekly.

Continue ReadingPalo Alto Weekly Will Move into New ‘Green’ Building With Sister Papers

"Independents were repeatedly ahead of the curve on covering the mortgage and real estate bubble and in connecting the dots between vital elements of the bigger story," former City Limits editor Alyssa Katz writes on CJR.org. So how did indie magazines and alt-weeklies do it? Katz offers three main reasons: The reporting focused on "the real-world impacts of business practices" and was based "out in the real world," while reporters were "free (and predisposed) to question authority, not to mention the basic business practices of large financial institutions."

Continue ReadingHow Indies Beat MSM on Mortgage-Crisis Story