LA Weekly, Chicago Reader. Gambit Weekly, and Cincinnati CityBeat each took two firsts today in the eighth annual Alternative Newsweekly Awards. Among individual contestants, Thomas Francis of Cleveland Scene and Heather Swaim of OC Weekly led the field, each taking two awards, including one first-place prize.
New Times Executive Editor Mike Lacey calls Cleveland Free Times' recent attacks on New Times and Cleveland Scene "an explosion of bluster." Lacey accuses Free Times' Editor David Eden and Publisher Matt Fabyan of concocting "conspiracies wrapped in an ad hominem attack" and of publishing "organ discharge." He cites sales and profit figures that starkly contradict Free Times' assertion that it was winning the alternative newsweekly battle in Cleveland.
A local state attorney caught up in an acrimonious divorce proceeding is suing the Phoenix for Kristen Lombardi's January story about custody battles involving child abuse claims. Lombardi's article described allegations that the plaintiff had abused children from two different marriages. A critical question in the case may be whether the plaintiff is a "public figure." The Phoenix's lawyer told the Boston Globe, ''(Lombardi) is . . . very capable. We think her standards and the Phoenix's standards are high.''
The Board of Directors of Creative Loafing, Inc., announced that it will investigate two of its directors from Cox Newspapers, Inc., owner of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The question is whether the two directors used the confidential board meetings to learn enough about publishing alternative newsweeklies to launch "accessAtlanta" as a direct competitor to Creative Loafing (Atlanta).
Spokane, Wash., City Councilman Steve Eugster has dropped a libel suit against The Local Planet Weekly's parent company. He claimed the Local Planet defamed him in a column that suggested he followed no law but his own and depicted him with a pitchfork and horns.
The unwritten law in Orange County DA Tony Rackauckas's office is not to talk to OC Weekly. R. Scott Moxley says that's because the Weekly writes the ugly truth about the DA's incompetence and wasteful spending of taxpayer money. On the other hand, "Newspapers that routinely marble their DA stories with ham-fisted flatteries or merely ignore embarrassing facts about Rackauckas are rewarded with insider scoops and exclusives on major breaking crime stories," Moxley says.
In its second issue since reopening after a seven-month closure, Cleveland Free Times writes a snarling cover story on the finances of its rival Cleveland Scene and its parent, New Times. The story by Editor David Eden charges that the Scene "is living on life support and is awaiting its day of reckoning."
Tom Picou (pictured), president, chairman, and CEO of the company that owns the Tri-State Defender in Memphis, warns Chicago Reader's Michael Miner to be objective about reports of plagiarism at the paper or "I will not hesitate to come after you." Several former employees say Picou himself was Larry Reeves, the mysterious unpaid freelance writer who lifted stories from AAN papers coast to coast, including the Reader. Picou calls the reports about the Defender's plagiarism "bullshit" and says he never even read Reeves' stories. "I just laid them out. And that was my job."
The first alternative newspaper in history to be spawned by an antitrust settlement hit the streets last week exploding with entrepreneurial energy and vitriol directed at its main competitor, Cleveland Scene. Debuting with a summer-special issue weighing in at 112 pages, the new Cleveland Free Times unleashed a fusillade of name-calling and planted the flag of "local" ownership even though all but a sliver of the paper is owned by Times Publishing of Erie, Pa.
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