In his yearly report to readers, Willamette Week publisher Richard Meeker says the Portland, Ore., newsweekly's financial situation has been "lousy." Advertising is down since July and the paper is more than ten percent below budget for the year. But the news isn't all bad. Meeker says WW's "total audience has remained steady" and its sister paper, the Santa Fe Reporter, is having a good year. Nevertheless, WW has laid off several staffers and transferred one staff writer to Santa Fe. Editor Mark Zusman tells AAN News that the paper laid off three classified sales representatives, one designer, and staff writer (and "Queer Window" columnist) Byron Beck, while Corey Pein moves to the Reporter. Although the paper will "be lucky to eke out a small profit this year," Meeker says he and Zusman are "eager to tackle the challenges we all now face, and more committed than ever to continuing -- and improving -- the quality of reporting and thinking we do." More on Beck's departure from the Portland Mercury and Just Out magazine.
In the fifteenth installment of this year's "How I Got That Story" series, Village Voice music editor Rob Harvilla talks to Ling Ma about his winning columns, which included a memorable Venn diagram-based breakdown of a breakout hip-hop hit. While Harvilla doesn't take himself too seriously (he says his career choice is "pretty frivolous"), you can tell he is serious about music by reading his work. In this Q&A, he discusses the rock critic's lexicon, how blogs and the web have impacted music criticism, and the distinct absence of rock-critic groupies. "It's a great job and I love it, but I don't think women are generally attracted to rock critics on the basis of them being rock critics," Harvilla says. "It's usually in spite of that fact."
Proponents of the California ballot initiative to mandate parental notification before teen abortions tell the Oakland Tribune they will likely try a fourth time after this year's attempt, Proposition 4, was narrowly defeated last week. The ballot measures are funded in large part by San Diego Reader publisher Jim Holman. "Talking to Mr. Holman, he was commenting about how close it was, and I think he was feeling a little down as if a little extra effort might have put it over," Proposition 4 spokesman Albin Rhomberg tells the Tribune. "When you see it's that close, it sort of increases that sense of obligation to follow through."
According to FBI documents obtained by the Washington Post via FOIA, the bureau "closely tracked the grand and mundane aspects of the acclaimed novelist's life" from 1962-1977. It all started when notorious FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover read a Mailer essay on Jacqueline Kennedy in Esquire in 1962, and decided that he needed more info on the author and social critic, who helped start the Village Voice in 1955. The Post obtained 165 pages of the FBI's 171 pages on Mailer, many of which were stamped CLASSIFIED and SECRET and SUBV. CONTROL, apparently referring to a program to watch suspected subversives, the Post reports.
Today the Sunshine in Government Initiative (SGI) is urging the administration of President-elect Barack Obama to take four immediate, concrete steps to strengthen open government. The coalition of media organizations that includes AAN is pressing the administration to restore the presumption of disclosure across the executive branch; create an independent, online FOIA ombudsman; ban agencies from proposing or endorsing unnecessary statutory exemptions from disclosure; and speak on the record in all policy statements and current news about public matters. "These actions would show President-elect Obama intends to fulfill his pledge to restore open government in Washington," SGI coordinator Rick Blum says in a release.
Looks like the Chicago Reader isn't alone in running a post-election cover that ruffled some feathers. The Boise Weekly's cover illustration by Alejandro Lempkin, which includes the phrase "Barack Oboner," apparently upset a few readers. "I don't think many of those who I heard from understood that 'Barack Oboner' was not meant to demean the president-elect so much as it was meant to poke fun at people just like me," writes editor Rachael Daigle. "That is, people who live in a certain area of town -- the same area in which I live -- where Barack Obama was heavily supported, a part of town that -- crudely speaking -- had a boner for Barack." MORE: Chicago's CBS affiliate reports on the Reader dustup.
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