East Bay Express went home with eleven awards at the East Bay Press Club’s 2009 Excellence in Print Journalism Contest last week. Five awards were for first place: Stephen Buel won for best page design, Kathleen Wentz took first in the investigative reporting category, Robert Gammon received two first place awards for best columnist and best analysis, and Rachel Swan won the top prize in the profile category.
Gary Coleman, best known for his role on the TV sitcom Diff'rent Strokes, died on Friday at the age of 42. Many of his obituaries note that Coleman was an unlikely candidate for California governor in 2003, a piece of "political theater" the East Bay Express created. In a blog post, editor Stephen Buel explains the idea behind the idea. "We would point out the folly of replacing an imperfect but duly elected governor with an actor whose primary appeal appeared to be his fame. Of course, the actor we were wary of wasn't Gary, but Arnold," Buel writes. "But, of course, things didn't turn out like we planned. Far from provoking high-minded discussion about the perils of Hollywood populism, we helped propel the recall into altogether surreal territory. Although the world media lapped up the story, and Gary improvised his lines with sly humor, we soon realized there would be no larger point. Celebrity, it turned out, was the point."
Local sustainability advocate Stacy Mitchell writes that independent business groups across the nation have brought the "bank local" message into their already existing push to urge people to "buy local." She points to an campaign the Express was a part of last year that highlighted the benefits of using a local credit union or bank, and also produced a guide to community-conscious financial choices.
The clip below is of a SXSW panel featuring Joran Oppelt and Stephen Hammill of Creative Loafing, Carly Carioli of the Boston Phoenix and the East Bay Express' Jody Colley. (Note: there are a few minutes of video before the discussion begins.)
Two law firms have filed a class action lawsuit in Los Angeles federal court alleging unfair business practices by the popular user-generated review site. The suit's plaintiff, a veterinary hospital, allegedly requested Yelp remove a negative review from the website. The suit says the company refused to do so, a move that was followed by repeated calls from Yelp sales reps demanding payments of roughly $300 per month in exchange for hiding or deleting the review. The East Bay Express explored similar charges in-depth last year. Yelp denied everything in the Express' coverage, and went as far as to attack the reporter for being inaccurate. Regarding the class-action suit, a Yelp representative calls the allegations "demonstrably false" and says the company will "dispute [the suit] aggressively."
The Oakland-based alt-weekly is sticking its toe into the beer and entertainment business with the launch of EBX Bleeding Heart Lager and Club X. The lager is brewed by the local Linden Street Brewery, and all of the proceeds will go to local nonprofits of the Express' choice. The venue is on the first floor of the Express' office building, and will book all-ages shows in a partnership with the Oakland Metro Operahouse.
On Friday, Jan. 29 from 11:30 am to 1:30 pm, the East Bay Express will host a tour of its office in Oakland before the AAN West conference gets rolling later that day, walking attendees through the paper's production process as a way to start a discussion about creating an accurate and efficient operation.
The "buy local" and community-building philosophy the Express has been practicing since its ownership change in 2007 has paid off, publisher Jody Colley tells the Newspaper Association of America newsletter Big Ideas. "Since we've taken an active role in supporting and producing community events and working with the business community, we're now referred to as the 'media of record' for our area," she says. "The Express is typically approached first for business opportunities, story leads and advertising buys."
The Express' Small Business Monthly will launch in February 2010 and "will focus on local reporting of small business issues in our region," according to an email sent out by publisher Jody Colley. "In a broader purpose," she continues, "it will also serve to inform community members, investors, entrepreneurs and policy leaders on how integral our 'Main Street' independent businesses are to a healthy and sustainable local economy." The publication will be distributed as an insert in the Express each month.
The Northern California Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists announced the winners of its 2009 Excellence in Journalism Awards last week, and three alt-weeklies took home honors. The SF Weekly's Joe Eskenazi won the Explanatory Journalism (print, non-daily) award for "Service with a Snarl," a piece that "examines, with clarity and humor, the laws around the use of service animals in San Francisco." Kathleen Richards of the East Bay Express won the Investigative Journalism (print, non-daily) award for "Yelp and the Business of Extortion 2.0," which the judges say is "a strong example of consumer-affairs reporting." And the staff of the North Coast Journal won the Student Special Project award for "Meltdown," a project the paper undertook with students from Humboldt State University's Investigative Reporting Class.
