Pointing to a sunnier overall economic outlook as well as to the continued strong ROI that marketers are getting from the Yellow Pages, Norton commended the industry for embracing change while at the same time tending to its core strengths. "We're not just paper anymore," he noted. "Most of the paper companies are online now, plus some of them have CD-ROMs and some are moving into wireless. Publishers are doing a good job of getting information to consumers wherever and whenever they want it."
Working from the notes of a fundraiser for Texans for a Republican Majority, Jake Bernstein and Dave Mann explore possible connections between campaign contributions and laws passed by the Texas Legislature. They scrutinize bills that allow line-of-credit home equity lending and increases in customers' gas bills. "The big lie of politics is that money doesn't influence legislation," they write in The Texas Observer, contending the matter was only made worse when legislative districts were redrawn along partisan lines.
The president of the well-funded environmental organization has warned members of "an unprecedented level of outside involvement" in this year's election. Leaders worry a takeover by proponents of non-environmental causes—including white supremacists and animal-rights extremists—could compromise the club's mainstream appeal. Matt Kettmann reports in The Santa Barbara Independent that the board candidates labeled as anti-immigration are far from being "right-wing wackos" and gives voice to arguments that the influx of foreigners, coupled with uncontrolled population growth, endangers biodiversity and food production in California.
Internet portal Yahoo has ramped up its efforts to capture a share of the local advertising market with an improved mapping tool that allows people to quickly find local restaurants, movie listings, ATM machines or other services.
The former publisher of the Seattle Weekly will begin his new dual role in April. He succeeds Jane Levine, who will remain with the Reader but step aside from day-to-day operations after 10 years as its publisher and chief operating officer. Crystal will also serve as COO of Washington City Paper, the Reader’s sister publication in Washington, D.C. Crystal and Levine once worked together at Seattle Weekly, both as vice presidents.
It's an extra challenge to be alternative in a town where marijuana coffee shops and prostitutes posing in brothel windows are the norm. Todd Savage, a former Chicago Reader freelancer, didn't let that daunt him. He debuted his new English-language alt-weekly in the Netherlands' largest city this week. The Reader is a major investor in the enterprise.
John Sugg wasn't too pleased to receive a call from an FBI agent telling him he was "all over the wiretaps" the agency had made of fired University of South Florida professor Sami Al-Arian. Judging from the cover of Weekly Planet Tampa, Sugg even feels a little defiant; he's not naming any confidential sources. The former editor of the Planet and now senior editor of Creative Loafing Atlanta is on the FBI's tapes because he's been covering the investigation of the accused mastermind of terrorism Al-Arian for eight years. In a story for the Planet, Sugg reflects on disclosures he's made about officials working on the government's case.
