New Times' Martin Cizmar has sold his book Chubster to Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Publishers Marketplace describes it as an "appropriately snarky weight-loss and lifestyle guide for hipsters looking to shed pounds and stay cool," according to Grub Street New York. (Publishers Marketplace is available to subscribers only.) "Expect the core program to center around a regimen of street-cart tacos, Old Granddad, and cigarettes," Grub Street writes.
New Times, which got its start in 1970 as a reaction to the Kent State shootings, hosted a party over the weekend to celebrate 40 years in existence. Native Arizonan and former alt-weekly writer and NPR editor Bill Wyman takes the anniversary occasion to look back and take stock of what New Times has built; it was the first paper started by Michael Lacey, who now oversees the Village Voice Media chain with business partner Jim Larkin. After saying he has "no reason to suck up" to Lacey and Larkin, Wyman concludes: "Aren't they everything we supposedly value about the press in the U.S.? They are idiosyncratic and uncorruptible, uncompromising and fearless; unlike a lot of places that adopt the motto, Lacey and Larkin really do print the news and raise hell. And as this troubled time for a troubled industry continues, they just may end up being the last men standing."
Phoenix Media/Communications Group, which owns the Boston, Portland and Providence Phoenix papers, has let ten employees go. The layoffs include CFO/COO Richard Gallagher; corporate controller Michael Notkin and assistant corporate controller Chris Crandall. The Weekly Dig broke the news of the changes yesterday when it published a staff memo sent by Phoenix Media president Bradley Mindich, which says Mindich will take over some of Gallagher's duties, while Mike Fuller will take on the interim CFO/COO role as they search for a replacement. "This is the sort of strategic reshuffle that prudent companies engage in to stay on top in demanding markets," Phoenix executive editor Peter Kadzis says in a statement released last night. His comments are echoed by Mindich, who tells AAN News in an email that Phoenix Media is focused on "performance across the board" and "ensuring we have the best of the best here to continue to execute our multi-platform strategy." MORE from the Boston Herald.
In a note to readers published last week in Phoenix New Times, Village Voice Media executive editor Michael Lacey and CEO Jim Larkin say that VVM is underwriting the cost of the American Civil Liberties Union of Arizona's forthcoming litigation against the state's new and controversial immigration law, would make the failure to carry immigration documents a crime and give police broad power to detain anyone suspected of being an illegal immigrant. "Arizona has chosen to insist that all law enforcement in the state adopt the police-state tactics of infamous Sheriff Joe Arpaio," write Lacey and Larkin, who both have been the target of Arpaio, before inviting New Times readers to chip in to help the ACLU fight the new law. "We would like to extend an invitation to you, our readers, to join in this struggle against the cracker policies of Arizona politicians and certain elements within law enforcement typified by Sheriff Arapio."
John Dougherty, who left New Times in August 2006, says he has filed documents with the Federal Elections Commission as a first step to run in the upcoming Democratic primary for a U.S. Senate seat. New Times reports that, if he collects enough signatures to get on the ballot, Dougherty will be matched against two other Democratic hopefuls before potentially facing off with the winner of the Republican primary battle between incumbent John McCain and J.D. Hayworth. "This will be a great exercise in the regular folks standing up and saying, 'Enough of this bullshit,'" Dougherty says. "We're going to try to make the debate more than just about rounding up people and tossing them back across the border and thinking that will solve everything, including our economic crisis."
The Phoenix points out that New York's cover story this week, "Palin Inc.," is pretty similar to its July 2009 story "Sarah, Inc." Both pieces explore how Palin is set to make tons of cash in what the Phoenix called "the burgeoning right-wing marketplace," and they use similar imagery.
From The Pope to The Situation, from Glenn Beck to Tiger Woods, the Phoenix has rolled out its annual list of the year's 100 unsexiest men. "Nike's robotically perfect pitchman took that whole 'Just Do It' slogan a smidge too literally -- with virtually any hooker, cocktail waitress, golf groupie, substitute teacher, den mother, and rodeo clown within a chip shot of his 5-iron," the Phoenix says of Woods, who took top honors this year. "Making matters worse, to repair his nuked image, he hired evil former Bush White House press secretary Ari Fleischer as his public-relations caddy."
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.)
New Times editorial operations manager Jay Bennett, a 40-year-old music fan and musician, is authoring the "Nothing Not New" blog, where each weekday, he listens to one new record and writes about it. Music editor Martin Cizmar says the project springs from Bennett's "aesthetic atrophy," an "unavoidable consequence of aging" defined as the "wasting away of the ability to appreciate new, different, or avant-garde music." Checking in a little more than two months into the year-long experiment, Bennett says it has been "fun, but difficult," adding: "It's like traveling abroad for two weeks but really missing American junk food after day 10, or dining out so much that you've forgotten the simple joy of preparing and eating a home-cooked meal."
Brian Stauffer has received the Society of Illustrators' highest honor for a cover he conceived for Phoenix New Times. The winning illustration will be printed in a hard-bound book later this year. "I can't really describe how surreal this experience is for me, given that I started out in this business 18 years ago assigning illustrations to the industry legends I now consider close friends," Stauffer writes on his blog.
