In a profile in the Jewish Ledger, Paul Bass explains why he left the Advocate Weekly chain after 15 years: "I was fed up with corporate journalism. I really liked the people at the Advocate but the Advocate got bought out by one of the largest corporate chains in America ... Their whole commitment was not just to the bottom line, which was fine, but to an unrealistic profit margin that meant continuous pressure for budget cuts, which in turn meant abandoning any commitment to quality journalism. More importantly, the corporate atmosphere drained the creativity. I went crazy with all the forms of bureaucracy and group think." The Advocate Weekly chain was acquired by the Tribune Co. in 1999. Bass now runs the Web site newhavenindependent.com, while his wife, Carole, continues to serve as associate editor of the New Haven Advocate.
Hartford Advocate Editor Alistair Highet calls the listings calendar his paper's "universal point of interest." The calendar is -- and long has been -- indispensable for most alt-weeklies, attracting readers who don't necessarily agree with a paper's perceived political stance. But the marketplace is increasingly crowded with online and print publications listing concerts and theater times. Freelance reporter Charlie Deitch speaks with AAN members to find out what they're doing to fend off competitors' attempts to infringe on the alts' longtime stronghold.
India Blue (pictured), 48, was a staff photographer and music writer at the alt-weekly since 1995. According to the Hartford Courant, she was a single mother with two college-age sons who "was very active in prison outreach and regularly visited inmates in Niantic." Advocate Publisher Janet Reynolds says, "She was a great woman and a great employee."
"Newspapers want the benefit of being read worldwide but not the responsibility that comes with it," an attorney told a federal appeals court June 3 in Stanley Young vs. The New Haven Advocate. The libel lawsuit by a Virginia prison warden is an appeal of a federal district court ruling in Virginia that granted jurisdiction because the Connecticut newspapers that he was suing published their material on the Web. AAN joined amicus briefs in support of the publishers in both Young and Gutnick vs. Barron's, a similar case before Australia's highest court. The case may be the first federal appellate ruling on whether a newspaper can be sued anywhere its Web site is read.
In a case against two Connecticut Tribune Co. papers, The Hartford Courant and AAN-member New Haven Advocate, knotty issues of jurisdiction and Web pages are at stake. Editor & Publisher examines the "long-arm statute" case involving coverage of housing Connecticut prisoners in Virginia jails and whether the two papers libeled a Virginia prison warden. AAN is one of more than two dozen newspapers and trade associations signing onto an amicus curiae brief in the case.
AAN, along with more than two dozen other media companies and organizations, has joined an Amicus Curiae brief, filed Jan. 23 in federal court in Virginia. The case involves news coverage of the housing of Connecticut inmates in Virginia prisons and whether a newspaper’s Web site opens it to jurisdiction in distant states.
