The Nov. 16 issue of the Press contains a letter from its editors drolly scolding the editors of the Times. Apparently, a Nov. 6 article in the Times referenced the Press's endorsement of a mayoral candidate but missed the joke. The Press editors note, "Maybe The New York Times sees nothing suspicious or even funny when an alternative weekly writes, 'We're honored to add our name to this list [of endorsements], and offer the all-important escort-seeking demographic.'"

Continue ReadingNew York Times Misses Satire in New York Press Endorsement

In the same year that Ayana Taylor served as a diversity intern for the Jackson Free Press, she wrote three news stories that won her a first-place AltWeekly Award. She believes it's her persistence that has made interview subjects open up to her, even when they didn't want to talk to the media. This is the 15th in a "How I Got That Story" series highlighting the AltWeekly Awards' first-place winners.

Continue ReadingAyana Taylor: Gaining the Trust of Resistant Sources

Journalist Maurice Possley claims that two of Fisher's columns about a Texas arson case were only slightly changed versions of articles he and Steve Mills wrote for the Chicago Tribune, according to New York Daily News gossip columnist Ben Widdicombe. The Long Island Press posted a response suggesting that Possley was seeking fame by exploiting Fisher's notoriety. The response concludes by thanking Possley "for creating the opportunity for us to document and remind ourselves about all the research Ms. Fisher puts into her columns."

Continue ReadingAmy Fisher Accused of Plagiarizing Long Island Press Columns

The National Association of Black Journalists announced the winners of its Salute to Excellence Awards competition this weekend in Washington, D.C. The organization handed out six first-place prizes for newspapers with circulations of 150,000 or less, and every last one of them were awarded to New Times papers. Here's the complete list of NABJ award winners.

Continue ReadingNew Times Newspapers Dominate NABJ Awards

The editor-in-chief of the Jackson Free Press never intended to write the story that won her a 2005 AltWeekly Award for Feature Story. She'd assigned it to another writer. And then she ran into one of the subjects of the piece, they got to talking, and over the next six months she developed her heart-rending account of a family that suffered at the hands of a priest. This is the second in a "How I Got That Story" series highlighting the AltWeekly Awards' first-place winners.

Continue ReadingDonna Ladd: Reporting Her Face Off in Mississippi

In an unsigned article titled "Negress Awarded for Interviewing Nationalist," the Mississippi-based Nationalist Movement takes a swipe at one of the three pieces that netted Ayana Taylor of Jackson Free Press an AltWeekly Award earlier this year. Richard Barrett, editor of the group's Web site and the subject of Taylor's profile, "X Marks the Boycott," calls the story "light on accuracy," claiming he was misquoted and that Taylor "editorialized considerably in the article." Barrett also says he had "trouble understanding (Taylor)," and congratulates himself for "departing from precedent in which pro-majority activists invariably refused to speak to Negroes."

Continue ReadingWhite Supremacist Comments on AltWeekly Award-Winning Article in “Hippy-Newspaper”