Richard Karpel's response to a column questioning the future of investigative journalism was posted today in the Letters section of Editor & Publisher's Web site. Karpel cited examples of recent investigative work by alt-weeklies and concluded, "Readers of dailies who can no longer find the investigative reporting they crave don't need to wait for NPR or Yahoo! to fund in-depth reporting. They can turn to the pages of their local alternative weeklies."
For several years, AAN staff head Richard Karpel has written a periodic report on association activities for the benefit of the organization's Board of Directors. At the Board's request, Karpel will now begin sharing the report with all AAN members who are interested in reading it. His latest report was posted yesterday in the new AAN Library. To download a copy, visit this page.
In an opinion piece published in Boulder Weekly, AAN executive director Richard Karpel recounts a phone interview he gave to The Daily Camera. The Boulder, Colo., daily is launching Dirt, a free weekday paper targeting 18- to 24-year-olds, and its reporter wanted a comment. Karpel obliged, explaining why Dirt, like any number of similar tabloids, would ultimately fail to reach young people: Daily papers tiptoe around potentially offensive language and subject matter; they're too "objective" for passion or point of view; and they're institutions far removed from the world most young people inhabit. The Camera chose to publish his one comment that tended to make the opposite point, so he lays out his full argument here.
Reporters who kick butt can get their butt kicked, too. It happened to Richard Leiby at the 1994 AAN convention in Boston. Leiby's recent appointment as the Post's gossip columnist spurred Press Action editor Mark Hand to try to get to the bottom of the juicy story. Who put out the hit on Leiby? Who delivered the kick? What was the motive? Has all been forgiven? Leiby graciously tells Hand he would love to attend another AAN gathering, but "I'll be sure to pack my ass armor…just in case." The outfit he wore in Iraq might do.
Responding to Michael Ryan's "It's Not Norman Mailer's Village Voice Anymore," which uses the anti-trust investigation of the New Times-Village Voice deal as a platform to excoriate alternative newspapers, AAN Executive Director Richard Karpel says, "The Village Voice and New Times are for-profit companies subject to the same economic rules as every other business: Their papers need to make money so they can pay employees and vendors, and if they don't they have to shut down."
While publicly traded media companies are laying off employees and warning Wall Street of sharply diminished returns, Chicago's free circulation papers are holding their own, Kathy Bergen of the Chicago Tribune reports. "There isn't the voracious need to satisfy shareholders and start making layoffs," Richard Karpel, executive director of AAN, tells the Trib. Chicago Reader Publisher Jane Levine tells Bergen: "Our total revenue in 2001 will be about even with 2000, and I feel blessed for that."
