Twelve former employees of the Cleveland Free Times have filed a lawsuit in Ohio against New Times and Village Voice Media, reports the San Francisco Bay Guardian. The suit is the latest fallout from an October 2002 deal between the two companies that shuttered Free Times and New Times Los Angeles. The deal led to a Justice Department antitrust investigation that culminated in a consent decree in which neither company admitted guilt. The suit alleges that the workers who lost their jobs when the two papers closed were terminated illegally; the lawyer who filed the suit is seeking class-action certification.
A plaintiff who alleges the Observer wrongfully disclosed his HIV-positive status has sued the Dallas alt-weekly; its parent company, New Times; and other parties, Texas Lawyer reports. In "Fallen Angel," an article published last December, the Observer referenced the man by name. The plaintiff doesn't dispute that he's HIV-positive but contends that the paper didn't have the right to disclose his condition without his consent. By doing so, he claims, the paper violated the Texas Health and Safety Code. Miriam Rozen writes: "Most attorneys have assumed the statute applied to parties in the medical and insurance industries -- not media organizations." Three of the defendants are seeking the outright dismissal of the plaintiff's petition.
NT Media of Phoenix, Ariz., has licensed iPIX AdPlus Prism software, a publishing tool offered by Publishing Business Systems. AdPlus allows advertisers to upload and edit their own photos and graphics, as well as proof their own layout for publication. NT says that the new online ad system will improve work flow and cut costs at its 11 papers by reducing support and maintenance needs in their advertising departments.
"Throughout the day I'd witnessed police provoke protesters," writes Celeste Fraser Delgado, who was reporting on the protests surrounding last week's free-trade meetings. "I'd seen young people cuffed and lined up along the street, but I thought they must have done something bad to be detained." Her perceptions quickly changed when she was handcuffed and jailed by Miami police who ignored her press credentials. Her crime: Doing "nothing but walking down the street."
Newspapers in the Phoenix-based alt-weekly chain picked up seven of the 11 awards handed out last month in the under 150,000 circulation category of the National Association of Black Journalists' annual contest. Dallas Observer's Jim Schutze and Julie Lyons, Cleveland Scene's Thomas Francis and Riverfront Times' Jeannette Batz all were named first-place winners.
