ALT: Weekly Readership Battle -

San Francisco Bay Guardian INDY vs
Michael Lacey & New Times VVM -

Eli Sanders of The Seattle Stranger delivers a very articulate report on the newspaper war that's been grinding along on the West Coast USA.

Many younger people have expressed the view that this is a battle between geezers who are peddling anachronistic paper products which are doomed anyway, but I view it as a Quality of Life issue.

Anchoring the issue here in Broward County FL, we don't have an Indy. Instead, we have two sleazy corporate products which seem locked in a race to the bottom of the barrel.

They are so thin on contents that they are only one step away from being outright junk mail. They appear to be competing only to gleefully establish which one can give the public the least amount of content and still meretriciously pretend to be an airquote newspaper. Many residents of our area view them as simply another form of pollution.

I am appalled that they seem to be getting away with it - it's like they have a license to print money in their basements while flipping us their middle fingers, which can leave one with the distinct impression that they are indeed a bunch of nasty people who are only up to no good.

There have been many other such publications that have come and gone over the past several decades, like the Oracle and the East Village Other. Several current weekly publications are struggling to just survive. Some survive, but have changed character and mission so drastically that only their banner is the same. They are, to some degree, creatures of their zeitgeist.

For his part, Sanders was very forthcoming about The Stranger's rather complicated relationship with VVM, and I appreciated that.

Many people here in the U.S. are going to be impacted in some way by the ripples that emerge from this epic battle in San Francisco.

:: Eli Sanders :: at The Stranger ::

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Raising Psych Profiles (2#) -

An accused serial killer . . .

complains that his privacy has been violated because a
psychological evaluation of him was shown to a reporter.

# A professor at the University of Huddersfield UK may not have planned a career as a profiler, but he's been consulted "on everything from the psychology of terrorist bombers to the case of the murdered Leeds University student Meredith Kercher in Italy."

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Antic Scoops (6#) -

Not all is doom and gloom . . .

Alexis Petridis shares the sometimes
wacky world of local news headlines in the UK.

# Overheard in the Newsroom [blog]

# Are you bothered? Many people are these days.

# The State of the News Media 2010: key findings.

# The Newspaper Club - Do it
yourself with a customized edition.

"The team is heading over to the hip SXSW Festival in
Austin, Texas, to float a possible US version of the site."

They've got a Blog, too... and they're on Twitter.

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Mez: Rear View Media Mirror -

The Media's treatment of the Meredith Kercher Murder Case will be on the program of the International Journalism Festival which is scheduled for April 21-23 in Perugia Italy.

A panel discussion on Wednesday April 21 will include:

Sabina Castelfranco of CBS,
Barbie Nadeau of Newsweek,
Andrea Vogt of The Seattle Times,
and Massimo Mapelli of La7.

:: IJF program :: - - - :: IJF panel ::

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SoFlo: Keyboards at Dawn Update (6#) -

Tempestuous Blogging,
Crime Writing & Art Theft . . .

Via Rick at SFDB comes word of the outcome for this year's Combative Blogging Ordeal. Winning blogs included Miami Beach 411 for Best News Blog and Carlos Miller for Best Overall Blog.

"in a contest that was ripe with
contempt, conflict and controversy" --Gus Moore

:: MB 411 :: - - - :: silicon beach ::

# This Thursday evening at 6:30pm, the Historical Museum of Southern Florida will present a panel discussion called Crime Stories of the Magic City with Les Standiford, Edna Buchanan and James Grippando.

# Art Theft: A $1 million painting by Juan Gris was recovered last Thursday in Jupiter FL. An MSM-shared story originally at the PB Post written by Michael LaForgia.

# Prohibition Style: During the overnight, thieves broke through the roof of a convenience store in nearby northern Dade County to steal cigarettes and calling cards. They then removed $30,000 from the safe.

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Bookish: Lit Bits (3#) -

Contest & Local Festival . . .

This year's Lit Live Gathering, sponsored by the Broward Public Library Foundation and Nova Southeastern University, is open to the general public on Saturday, March 20th, at no cost.

There will be authors, discussions,
and lectures. More information at their website.

**************************************
Writer Christopher Fowler has
been cooking up a writing competition!

The old vampires and werewolves scenarios have been done to death - what are the new fears that reflect our era? Write what you feel in just 500 words and submit your scariest story.

The project is called the Campaign for Real Fear.

The deadline for entries is Friday, April 16th.

More details at his updated blog entry.

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Iran: 70K Cyber Termites (4#) -

The regime has arrested 30 people on espionage charges for conducting psychological warfare using anti-filtering computer software. The arrests may be real enough, though the cyberwarfare scenario seems more like a fairytale fantasy.

It's a bit difficult to determine just what they imagine has been going on. People all over the world have objected to the Iranian regime's policy to isolate its citizens, and they far outnumber the U.S. Government.

"Members of the network... confessed that their proxy anti-filter software... was... used for espionage purposes."

According to Dutch Radio, Sadegh Naghashkar and Behrouz Javid Tehrani were identified as the alleged founders of this ring of cyber spies. They were arrested in July 2009.

See Also: Thomas Erdbrink at WaPo
:: Change in Cyber Policy ::

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