Metro Times and pro-pot activists will take over almost 30,000 square feet to inform, educate and celebrate medical marijuana.
Topics covered will range from culture to legality issues, from law enforcement to the politics of pot.
Metro Silicon Valley celebrated its 25th anniversary with a new look and a swanky bash last week, the Mercury News reports. Metro publisher and co-founder Dan Pulcrano says that passion for the product has been what's kept the paper alive for this long. "It's a hard business. You have to love it," he says. "You have to be incredibly passionate about it." Meanwhile, the paper's new design, which features a glossy cover and a new logo, is Metro's first major overhaul in its first 25 years.
The California Newspaper Publishers Association recently gave out 480 first and second place awards in its 2009 Better Newspapers contest, and nine alt-weeklies received at least one. The Sacramento News & Review won ten awards, including firsts for Public Service, Columns, Sports Story, Front Page, Freedom of Information. SF Weekly won seven awards, including first-place finishes for Writing, Investigative/Enterprise Reporting and Environmental/Ag Resource Reporting. The North Coast Journal won six awards, including firsts in the Writing, Local News Coverage, Business/Financial Story and Environmental/Ag Resource Reporting categories. Palo Alto Weekly took home five awards -- all first-place wins -- in the Editorial Comment, Local News Coverage, Sports Coverage, Feature Photo, Best Website and General Excellence categories. Chico News & Review won two awards, both firsts, for Editorial Pages and Special Issue. Pacific Sun also took home two awards, both firsts, for Feature Story and Lifestyle Coverage. Metro Silicon Valley, Pasadena Weekly and the San Francisco Bay Guardian each took home one award.
The Detroit alt-weekly has received six awards -- including top honors for criticism and feature writing -- in the annual contest held by the Detroit chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Bryan Osborn has left his position as publisher of Augusta, Ga., alt-weekly Metro Spirit, AAN News has learned. Osborn had been with the paper since November 2007; a replacement has not yet been named.
As the Augusta, Ga., alt-weekly celebrates its 20th anniversary, reporter Angel Cleary talks to "the only person, save founder David Vantrease, who has been around for the entire history" of the paper: senior music contributor Ed Turner. He discusses what Metro Spirit has meant to the music scene, how much the paper has grown over the years and how he got his column started. "I freelanced starting with the first issue of the Spirit," Turner says. "It was, of course, B.C. (before computers) and (get ready for this) I did not know how to type. And I barely do now! David and Lisa Smith (who was Spirit editor for the first five years or so) agreed to accept handwritten columns from me, which I would slip in the mail slot."
Stacy Eidson returns to her hometown of Augusta, Ga., to take the helm of the paper where she previously served for eight years as a reporter, according to a press release issued this morning by Metro Spirit. Eidson will be leaving the daily Bradenton Herald in southwest Florida for the position with the 20-year-old Spirit. She will be taking over for Tom Grant, who recently announced that he would be stepping down in late July.
