Two Bridgeport, Ct. police officers have been suspended following a complaint made by Fairfield County Weekly's Tom Gogola that they were drinking at a bar while on duty, according to the Connecticut Post. Gogola recalls the evening's events in a story that describes one cop joking, "I can't drink and drive ... I'm on duty," then later taking a bag of marijuana out of his pocket and telling the bartender: "We confiscated some weed ... I'll roll you a special cigarette. It'll make you feel better."

Continue ReadingCivilian Complaint from Alt-Weekly Editor Leads to Cops’ Suspension

The Boston Phoenix takes a look at the editorial fallout, or lack thereof, resulting from the merger, talking to staffers who have quit, some who have stayed, and VVM Executive Editor Mike Lacey himself. While former City Pages staff writer Britt Robson says that one of the reasons he quit was VVM's culture of "cheapskate-tough-guy swagger," Nashville Scene editor Liz Garrigan says the new management has helped her. "They've been really good to me, in the sense that my budget's bigger and I've been able to really hire up," she says. "They get a bad rap in so many ways, but they're committed to good shit in the paper."

Continue ReadingThe VVM/New Times Merger, One Year Out

A bill Rep. Lon Burnam (D-Fort Worth) filed in December to restrict the use of electroshock Taser weapons by police was prompted by an article in the Fort Worth Weekly suggesting that police were using Tasers frequently, according to the Austin Chronicle. But with support for it stalled, Burnam has introduced four new bills "in an attempt to further define the proper role of the Taser weapon within the police arsenal," the Chronicle reports.

Continue ReadingSpurred by Alt-Weekly Reporting, Texas Legislator Pushes Taser Bills

Lauren Fox's debut novel, Still Life With Husband, follows Emily Ross, "an editor at a medical journal who married solid citizen Kevin right out of college," according to the Daily News. She soon meets alt-weekly staffer David Keller, and quickly begins an affair with the writer and editor. "File this adroit but placid debut under chick lit for early marrieds -- the ones who are not sure they want to be on the baby-house-'burbs track," Publishers Weekly writes.

Continue ReadingNovel Casts ‘Dark, Good-Looking’ Alt-Weekly Staffer as Love Interest

Lance Gould, a veteran New York journalist, will begin his tenure in Boston in late April. Gould, formerly an editor at New York's Daily News and Spy magazine, was most recently a contributing editor at Radar magazine. He replaces Bill Jensen, who left the Phoenix to become director of online operations for Village Voice Media. Executive Editor Peter Kadzis says of Gould: "His recent work at Radar, where a premium was placed on the interdependence of print and online, will serve him particularly well at the Phoenix as we continue to work toward maximizing the convergence of our print, online, and radio content."

Continue ReadingBoston Phoenix Names New Editor

In a blistering investigation, Editor Julie Lyons, aka "Bible Girl," dives into Fort Worth Pastor Sherman Allen's decades-long history of alleged sexual abuse. She reports that since late January, when local TV station KXAS broke the story of a lawsuit against Allen by former church member and employee Davina Kelly, seven other women have come forward with tales of paddling and degradation at the hands of the Pentecostal pastor. The victims have also told her that Allen "is involved in the occult, employing such tactics as hypnosis, magic or illusions and the use of healing potions." GetReligion, a blog covering religion in journalism, says: "Lyons is an articulate, opinionated evangelical Christian who is doing some of the most freewheeling, confessional first-person religion writing I have ever seen."

Continue ReadingDallas Observer Reports Pentecostal Minister Abused Women

Just as the "hits" metric became outdated as web use evolved, the page view may be on the road to obsolescence, according to E&P. As an example, the story looks at Ajax, software used by Yahoo and others that is "enabling flashier, more convenient sites," but also is "contributing to Yahoo's decline in page views." While experts quoted by E&P say that an attachment to page views may hurt a site's usability, representatives from measurement companies say they are sticking with page views, while developing supplemental metrics for interaction and brand loyalty. "People kind of cling to it, even if they know it's flawed," says comScore's Gregory Dale. "They want to see this familiar metric."

Continue ReadingIs the Page View a Measurement Tool of the Past?

ESPN.com, FoxNews.com, and all of Cox Newspapers' sites are among the large media sites migrating from the two online giants to Quigo Technologies for contextual text ads, the small sponsored links that run next to related articles, the New York Times reports. The main reason, according to the Times, is that Quigo offers "transparency and control" by giving advertisers a list of sites where their ads have appeared and the option to buy only on specific sites. Google seems to be taking the competition seriously. A company spokesperson tells the Times that they will soon begin providing similar information to their clients.

Continue ReadingUpstart Challenging Yahoo and Google in Online Ad Market