DENVER—On Aug. 25, The New York Times’ chief political reporter, Adam Nagourney, was looking for a pair of seats for an interview in a sawdust-ridden tent in the parking lot of Denver’s basketball arena that served as the paper’s media workspace.

The Times wound up bringing so many staffers to this event (60!) that nearly every seat in its space was occupied in that area; he walked over to Bloomberg News, where there were another 30 workstations set up.

The thing about the conventions is that so many reporters come to them. The result is that it’s rare for anyone to write anything important.  read more »

Is New Jersey really that uninteresting?

Since the start of summer, The New York Times emptied out its two New Jersey bureaus in Trenton and Newark; in June, The Record of Bergen County announced it would shut down its headquarters and its reporters would be homeless; in July, The Star Ledger announced that it was cutting about a third of its newsroom, and its owners said they would consider selling the paper.

It’s becoming reasonable to wonder if, at this rate, there will be anyone left to cover the state soon.

“Can you cover the big stories that really mean something to people—how taxes are spent, projections for jobs, stuff you just need to know if you live here—if you have too few journalists?” said Frank Scandale, the editor of The Record.  read more »

At lunchtime on July 29, the New York Times masthead invited a group of reporters and editors up to a conference room in the paper’s executive hall on the 16th floor to eat roast beef and turkey sandwiches and talk about the paper’s massive investment in the Olympic Games.

How, they wanted to know, could The Times best use the 32 credentialed reporters and editors that would cover the Olympics in China?

George Vecsey, the paper’s longtime sports columnist, answered by not talking about sports at all.

He told the group the real story in Beijing over the coming three weeks was not about athletes, but about China, its geopolitical aspirations and how they were staked on the games.  read more »

At first glance, the Web sites elasticwaist.com, productfiend.com and dailybedpost.com look like garden-variety blogs created by average civilians. There’s little clutter, no ads, links to other sites with similar post-feminist themes (dieting, skin care and sex, respectively) and sporadically updated content.

But upon closer inspection, there’s something suspiciously … slick about the layout of all three, isn’t there? Aha! Down the left-hand side of each loom the logos of Glamour, Allure and Self, rendered in varying shades of pink. And then in size 7.5 Veranda font, tucked away at the bottom of the page, is the telltale line: “Copyright © 2007 Condé Nast Publications.  read more »

Two and a half weeks ago Chris Hine, who this fall will enter his senior year at The University of Notre Dame, was saying his goodbyes to staffers he'd met at the beginning of his summer internship at the sports desk of The Los Angeles Times.

They'd been around at the beginning to help him out with stories, give him pointers, and occasionally have him make a call for a fresh take on a bit of news. And then, with one of the recent rounds of layoffs at the newspaper, they were gone, leaving the intern behind.

The firing of these mostly younger reporters - people practically straight out of college - hit home for Mr.  read more »

In 2005 things took a turn for Mr. Essex. He was hired to be editor in chief of a magazine called Absolute—one of those shiny luxury publications that straddle the line between advertisements and editorial and leave the reader (flipping through it idly in a shiny luxury condo lobby, perhaps) feeling glazed and hollow, not sure exactly why.  read more »]]> http://origin.observermediagroup.com/2008/media/church-cuddles-state-media-s-glossy-new-reality#comments Media Andrew Essex Ellen Asmodeo Gotham Magazine Haute Living Jason Binn Manhattan Magazine Seth Svmilof Stephen Kong WSJ. Tue, 22 Jul 2008 19:39:31 -0400 John Koblin 72261 at http://origin.observermediagroup.com http://origin.observermediagroup.com/2008/media/katharine-second-begins-reign-washington-post

Katharine Weymouth, the most powerful person at The Washington Post, was making her way from the elevator bank across the dingy lobby to the exit of the building, a big brutal concrete thing on 15th Street NW. Fred Hiatt, the paper’s editorial page editor, was at the door right before her and almost let it close on her before he realized who she was. There was a big lurch, and with all his arms and legs, he kept the door from slamming on the new publisher.

"Thanks," Ms. Weymouth said. "Getting a coffee and some sunlight!"

"Yeah," Mr. Hiatt said.  read more »

After Clay Felker passed away Tuesday morning in Manhattan, The Observer spoke to some who knew him well.

Robert Benton

The first time I ever screamed “fuck” in front of a room full of women was when I got mad at Clay at the Esquire offices. We were having this argument that went up and down the hall and I reached my wits end; I just said, “You fuck!” It came out of my mouth before I knew what I had said. Clay could drive you crazy, but you never stopped caring for him.

Milton Glaser

We were once in Paris.  read more »

Last week, The Wall Street Journal’s managing editor, Robert Thomson, announced sweeping masthead changes—new people have been added, some familiar names dumped.

Laurie Hays, former deputy managing editor, is off to Bloomberg; Bill Grueskin, another deputy managing editor, is packing away for Morningside Heights and semi-retirement at the journalism school at Columbia University.

Other people left, too. Earlier this month, The Journal’s formidable Federal Reserve reporter, Gregory Ip, said that he was leaving for The Economist; a special writer from the San Francisco bureau, Rebecca Beckman, said she was leaving for Forbes.  read more »

]]> http://origin.observermediagroup.com/2008/13-months-after-murdoch-journal-diaspora#comments Media Rupert Murdoch The Wall Street Journal Tue, 24 Jun 2008 19:06:45 -0400 John Koblin 71192 at http://origin.observermediagroup.com http://origin.observermediagroup.com/2008/make-nice-nikki-l-times-starts-hollywood-blog

“I’ve been getting e-mail for years from people who think that I’m a moron,” the Los Angeles Times’ entertainment columnist Patrick Goldstein said in an interview with The Observer this week. “I don’t think that’s gonna change.”

Mr. Goldstein, who’s been with the Tribune paper since 1979 and has written an entertainment column called The Big Picture since 1998, was talking about his newly launched blog, also called The Big Picture. “I have a thick skin,” he says, when asked how he plans to deal with any negative feedback he’s sure to get from commenters and other more established industry bloggers.  read more »