The paper's editor and publisher, James Shannon, announced the closure on Friday. Shannon predicted that alternative voices like his will increasingly gravitate to the web "as opposed to the more costly print product that requires a level of support hard to obtain without excessive pandering in a free publication funded solely by advertising dollars." With a lineage that began in 1991 and evolved from predecessors Creative Loafing-Greenville and MetroBeat, the latest version of The Beat lasted 31 months. "(We) only wish we could have done it better and for a longer period of time," said Shannon. "But hell, at least we tried."
James Renner has released a book-length investigation into the unsolved 1989 abduction and murder of 11-year-old Amy Mihaljevic, reports the Record-Courier. "Amy: My Search for Her Killer," is published by Gray & Company, and grew out of a 5,000-word feature originally written for the Free Times. The book has already led to numerous tips for local law enforcement, says Renner. "My hope is that someone comes forward to say that they know who killed Amy," he says.
A recent story about Gannett distribution networks published in Des Moines' Cityview mistakenly reported that Greenville, S.C.'s MetroBeat "now exists only online." (The mistake was repeated in a similar story published earlier this month in The Billings Outpost.) In fact, MetroBeat no longer exists, having been replaced by The Beat, which became an AAN member in June and celebrated its 1st anniversary on July 25. The confusion stems from the fact that the Beat's owner, James Shannon, was the editor of MetroBeat when it was shuttered and initially kept the name going online before launching his new publication in 2005.
Foodies at Creative Loafing (Atlanta), Riverfront Times, Westword, L.A. Weekly, East Bay Express, City Pages (Twin Cities), Phoenix New Times, and Houston Press picked up ten of the 21 nominations for which they qualified in the 2006 James Beard Foundation Journalism Awards announced today. The complete list is available as a PDF here. Alt-weeklies were particularly dominant in the "Newspaper Writing on Spirits, Wine or Beer" category, in which all three nominees are AAN members. The awards recognize and honor excellence and achievement in the culinary arts.
In an article published Jan. 26, LA Weekly's Matthew Fleisher called into question whether the Navajo memoirist Nasdijj is actually Timothy Barrus, a writer of gay pornographic fiction. The allegations come soon after similar stories about memoirist James Frey and novelist J.T. Leroy. Nasdijj is the author of Geronimo's Bones, The Blood Runs Like a River Through My Dreams, and The Boy and the Dog Are Sleeping, which won a PEN/Beyond Margins award for racial and ethnic diversity.
Editor James Shannon announced yesterday that 20,000-circulation MetroBeat has ceased publication. The paper was known as Creative Loafing-Greenville until its sale by that chain to its founder, Debby Eason, in August, 2001. Of the 14 papers that applied for AAN membership in 2002, MetroBeat was the only one that was accepted. A letter from Shannon announcing that he will continue the publication as an online magazine is posted at MetroBeat.net .
