INDUSTRY NEWS 6-13-2013

Media: No mistaking how NSA story reporter feels

The man who claimed to leak state secrets on U.S. government eavesdropping sought to break the story through a columnist for a U.K.-based publication who has made no secret of his distaste for intrusions on privacy.

Edward Snowden brought his information first to Glenn Greenwald of The Guardian, illustrating the passion an opinion-driven journalist can bring to a breaking newsstory at the same time it raises questions about fairness.

Greenwald, author of three books in which he argues the government has trampled on personal rights in the name of protecting national security, wrote the original stories exposing the extent of the government's data collection. Over the weekend, he identified intelligence contractor Snowden as his source at Snowden's request, and said more stories are coming.

"What we disclosed was of great public interest, of great importance in a democracy, that the U.S. government is building this massive spying apparatus aimed at its own population," Greenwald said Monday on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."

Greenwald also told The Associated Press that he's been contacted by "countless people" offering to create legal defense funds for Snowden.

The topic is personal for Greenwald, 46. A former constitutional and civil rights lawyer who was educated at the NewYork University Law School, he began the "Unclaimed Territory" blog in 2005 and wrote "How Would a Patriot Act?" a year later. The book criticized the Bush administration for its use of executive power.

Greenwald, now based in Brazil, wrote a regular column for Salon for five years until joining The Guardian last year. He said he wanted to reach a more international audience, a desire that coincided with the newsorganization's effort to expand its reach in the U.S. market.

One program he wrote about collects hundreds of millions of U.S. phone records. The second program takes in audio, email and other electronic activities primarily by foreign nationals who use providers like Microsoft and Apple. Greenwald described the collection of phone records on Monday as "rampant abuse and it needs sunlight. That's why this person came forward and that's why we published our stories."

On "Morning Joe," he snapped that co-host Mika Brzezinski was using "Obama talking points" when she challenged him with a question.

"The wall of secrecy behind which they operate is impenetrable and it is a real menace to democracy," said Greenwald, who won a 2010 Online Journalism Association award for his coverage of Bradley Manning, who is charged with giving classified documents to WikiLeaks.

Snowden, however, didn't bring his information only to Greenwald.

Barton Gellman of The Washington Post wrote on Sunday that Snowden had contacted him about the story. He said Snowden had asked that the Post publish within 72 hours the full contents of a presentation he had made about the collection of electronic activity from the Silicon Valley companies.

Gellman said the Post would not make any guarantees and sought the government's views about whether the information would harm national security. The Post eventually agreed to publish a small sample of what Snowden was offering, but Snowden backed away, writing that "I regret that we weren't able to keep this project unilateral."

Snowden then contacted Greenwald, the Post said.

Greenwald's clear point of view doesn't necessarily weaken the story, said Jay Rosen, journalism professor at NewYork University and author of the Press Think blog.

"In many ways it strengthens it," he said. Greenwald has a clear stance on privacy and national security, but they aren't partisan; he's criticized Democratic President Barack Obama and his Republican predecessor, George W. Bush.

"The fact that sources now may choose (outlets) on the basis of commitment is a fact and journalists whose professional stance is no commitment may find themselves at a disadvantage," he said.

Greenwald's known feelings on the issue "does leave a little opening for critics," said Ellen Shearer, head of the national security journalism initiative at Northwestern University. There's always a risk that such passion can work against a journalist; some people would worry that facts contradictory to a predisposed belief could be overlooked.

People who disagree with Greenwald, perhaps in the Obama administration, have reason to wonder if they'd get a fair shake, said Bob Steele, journalism professor at DePauw University. The public is well-served by journalists who exercise independent judgment on a story, he said.

Shearer noted there's been little pushback on the facts, with the debate primarily about whether the information should be published.

In a story over the weekend, Greenwald praised Snowden, saying he "will go down in history as one of America's most consequential whistle-blowers, alongside Daniel Ellsberg and Bradley Manning." He called him a "quiet, smart, easygoing and self-effacing man" who "showed intense passion when talking about the value of privacy and how he felt it was being steadily eroded by the behavior of the intelligence services."

A NewYorker column by Jeffrey Toobin had the opposite view. Toobin called Snowden "a grandiose narcissist who deserves to be in prison."

There's nothing heroic about Snowden sabotaging a program he doesn't like, Toobin wrote. How would government function if everyone who didn't like a program acted in the same way?

Intelligence officials are investigating the leak and its impact on its programs. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper called the revelation of the intelligence-gathering programs reckless and said it has done "huge, grave damage."

The Guardian took care not to publish material that may help other countries improve their eavesdropping or could put the lives of covert agents at risk, Greenwald said.

"We've published these things they marked 'top secret' that don't actually harm national security but conceal what they've done from the public," he said.

The story is a coup for the Guardian, which started covering the United States more aggressively when it determined that one-third of its web traffic came from the U.S. Offices in NewYork and Washington were opened in 2011, and the Guardian now has 57 employees in the U.S.

The Guardian doesn't offer its newspaper for sale in the U.S. But web traffic from the U.S. has increased 47 percent over last year and is likely to jump further with this month's exposure.

Ellsberg: No leaks more significant than Snowden's

Pentagon Papers leaker Daniel Ellsberg calls the revelations by a government contractor on U.S. secret surveillance programs the most "significant disclosure" in the nation's history.

In 1971, Ellsberg passed the secret Defense Department study of U.S. involvement in Vietnam to The NewYork Times and other newspapers. The 7,000 pages showed that the U.S. government repeatedly misled the public about the war. Their leak set off a clash between the Nixon administration and the press and led to a landmark Supreme Court ruling on the First Amendment.

Ellsberg, 82, told The Associated Press Monday that the leaks by Edward Snowden, 29, to The Washington Post and The Guardian newspapers are more important than the Pentagon Papers as well as information given to the anti-secrecy website Wikileaks by Army Pfc. Bradley Manning, an intelligence analyst.

Snowden, a former CIA employee who later worked as a contractor for the National Security Agency, told the newspapers about a government program that tracks American phone records and another one that tracks phone and Internet messages around the world.

"I was overjoyed that finally an official with high or a former official with high access, good knowledge of the abusive system that he was revealing was ready to tell the truth at whatever cost to his own future safety, or his career, ready to give up his career, risk even prison to inform the American people," Ellsberg said.

"What he was looking at and what he told us about was the form of behavior, the practice of policy that's blatantly unconstitutional. I respect his judgment of having withheld most of what he knows, as an information specialist, on the grounds that its secrecy is legitimate and that the benefit to the American people of knowing it would be outweighed by possible dangers. What he has chosen, on the other hand, to put out, again confirms very good judgment."

Manning is being tried in military court under federal espionage and computer fraud laws for releasing classified documents to WikiLeaks about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, among other items. The most serious charge against him is aiding the enemy.

Ellsberg recently expressed support for Manning but said he didn't have access to information with the same "degree of significance" as the revelations released by Snowden.

"There has been no more significant disclosure in the history of our country. And I'll include the Pentagon Papers in that," Ellsberg said of Snowden's leak.

"I fear for our rights. I fear for our democracy, and I think others should too. And I don't think, actually, that we are governed by people in Congress, the courts or the White House who have sufficient concern for the requirements of maintaining a democracy."

Journalist in US surveillance case: More to come

The journalist who exposed classified U.S. surveillance programs leaked by an American defense contractor said Tuesday June 11 in Hong Kong that there will be more 'significant revelations' to come from the documents.

"We are going to have a lot more significant revelations that have not yet been heard over the next several weeks and months," said Glenn Greenwald of The Guardian.

Greenwald told The Associated Press the decision was being made on when to release the next story based on the information provided by Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old employee of government contractor Booz Allen Hamilton who has been accused by U.S. Senate intelligence chairwoman Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California of committing an "act of treason" that should be prosecuted.

Greenwald's reports last week exposed widespread U.S. government programs to collect telephone and Internet records.

"There are dozens of stories generated by the documents he provided, and we intend to pursue every last one of them," Greenwald said.

Snowden's whereabouts were not immediately known on Tuesday, although he was believed to be staying somewhere in Hong Kong.

No charges have been brought and no warrant has been issued for the arrest of Snowden.

Refuge in Hong Kong may not last

Will he be safe in Hong Kong? Not necessarily.

Edward Snowden, the U.S. defense contractor who says he leaked information on classified U.S. surveillance programs is hoping to stay out of U.S. custody by taking refuge there. But the refuge might only be temporary.

Although it has some autonomy, Hong Kong ultimately answers to Beijing, which is often at odds with Washington. But the U.S. is one of the largest investors in Hong Kong, and there's an extradition treaty between the two.

And the government in China might not want to stand up for Snowden. Beijing has often criticized foreign governments for harboring critics of Chinese leaders. And China is looking for U.S. cooperation on retrieving corrupt Chinese officials who have fled to America.

Still, Hong Kong has some ways to say "no" to extradition. Under its treaty with the U.S., one side can refuse an extradition request if it's considered to be politically motivated, or if the suspect is unlikely to get a fair trial.

A reporter for the British newspaper The Guardian -- one of the two papers to which Snowden leaked details of the surveillance programs -- says Snowden doesn't think he can get a fair trial in the United States. He says Snowden went to Hong Kong hoping to "avoid ending up in the clutches of the U.S. government as long as he can -- knowing that he likely won't succeed.

NSA leaker could be latest to seek help in Iceland

From seafaring Vikings to digital dissenters, Iceland has always attracted outsiders.

This North Atlantic island nation has welcomed eccentric chess master Bobby Fischer, WikiLeaks secret-spiller Julian Assange and the online freedom advocates of the Pirate Party. Could its next guest be Edward Snowden, the American intelligence contractor who leaked secrets from the National Security Agency?

In an interview published Sunday, June 9, outing himself as the source behind stories about the U.S. spy agency's online surveillance programs, Snowden floated the idea of heading to Reykjavik. He told The Guardian newspaper that he was inclined to seek asylum in a country that shared his values — and "the nation that most encompasses this is Iceland."

That has left many in this tiny seafaring nation, population 320,000, flattered, if bemused.

"I think it would be great for (Snowden) to come to Iceland," Bjorn Sigurdarson, an executive at the University of Iceland, said Monday. "The actions by the U.S. government are disturbing and if we could protect him here, we should. But it's a little funny how our tiny country is in the newsabout this."

Iceland may be a global minnow, but it has a tradition of providing a haven for the outspoken and the outcast.

Descendants of Viking settlers in a country that for centuries made its living from the sea, Icelanders have never lacked confidence. The country has produced global figures from genre-bending musicians such as Bjork to the credit-fueled capitalists who snapped up businesses around the world before Iceland's economy collapsed in 2008.

Facing a harsh environment prone to earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and deep freezes has forged a hardy nation unafraid to go its own way and stand up to bigger countries. Iceland has faced off against Britain over fishing rights — in the "Cod Wars" of the 1970s — and continues to hunt whales in the face of wide international opposition.

From seafaring Vikings to digital dissenters, Iceland has always attracted outsiders.

This North Atlantic island nation has welcomed eccentric chess master Bobby Fischer, WikiLeaks secret-spiller Julian Assange and the online freedom advocates of the Pirate Party. Could its next guest be Edward Snowden, the American intelligence contractor who leaked secrets from the National Security Agency?

In an interview published Sunday outing himself as the source behind stories about the U.S. spy agency's online surveillance programs, Snowden floated the idea of heading to Reykjavik. He told The Guardian newspaper that he was inclined to seek asylum in a country that shared his values — and "the nation that most encompasses this is Iceland."

That has left many in this tiny seafaring nation, population 320,000, flattered, if bemused.

"I think it would be great for (Snowden) to come to Iceland," Bjorn Sigurdarson, an executive at the University of Iceland, said Monday. "The actions by the U.S. government are disturbing and if we could protect him here, we should. But it's a little funny how our tiny country is in the newsabout this."

Iceland may be a global minnow, but it has a tradition of providing a haven for the outspoken and the outcast.

Descendants of Viking settlers in a country that for centuries made its living from the sea, Icelanders have never lacked confidence. The country has produced global figures from genre-bending musicians such as Bjork to the credit-fueled capitalists who snapped up businesses around the world before Iceland's economy collapsed in 2008.

Facing a harsh environment prone to earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and deep freezes has forged a hardy nation unafraid to go its own way and stand up to bigger countries. Iceland has faced off against Britain over fishing rights — in the "Cod Wars" of the 1970s — and continues to hunt whales in the face of wide international opposition.

In 2005, the chess-loving country risked the anger of the United States by offering citizenship to Fischer, who was wanted in the U.S. on charges of breaking international sanctions against the former Yugoslavia by playing a chess match there in 1992. Fischer lived in Iceland until his death in 2008.

More recently, Iceland stood up to strong pressure from the British and Dutch governments during the 2008 financial crisis, when it refused to reimburse those countries' citizens who lost money in an Icelandic savings bank that went bankrupt.

The country also was an early base for the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks.

Iceland's abrupt economic collapse in 2008 boosted the country's anti-authoritarian mindset and spurred calls for greater transparency. Many Icelanders blamed a too-cozy relationship among its banks, politicians and mediafor the crisis.

Thousands of Icelanders held angry protests that toppled the country's center-right government, clattering pots and pans in what some called the "Saucepan Revolution."

The revelations of fiscal and political mismanagement behind Iceland's economic chaos spurred a campaign for better access to information and more protection for whistle-blowers.

Iceland's Pirate Party, founded on a program of direct democracy, digital innovation and mediafreedom, won three of the 63 seats in Iceland's parliament, the Althingi, in April's national election. Its members are pushing Icelandic authorities to extend a hand to Snowden, who revealed his identity on Sunday from a hotel in Hong Kong.

"We have called in our lawyers and are ready to assist him if he comes to Iceland," said Smari McCarthy, a Pirate Party member and founder of the Icelandic Modern MediaInitiative, a group campaigning to give Iceland even stronger freedom of speech protections.

He said the group was planning to meet with the interior minister to discuss a possible asylum request for Snowden. Icelandic Interior Ministry spokesman Johannes Tomasson, however, said the government has not had contact with the 29-year-old American.

"We have not received any application, and so his idea of maybe seeking asylum here is for us just speculation," he said.

To apply for asylum, Snowden must be on Icelandic soil. His current whereabouts are unknown.

It's not clear whether Iceland could protect a leaker like Snowden from American demands for his return. Iceland has a longstanding extradition treaty with the U.S., though it has never been used to deport an American citizen.

McCarthy said Iceland could offer Snowden one key thing — popular and political support.

"If (Snowden) decides to come to Iceland, I think we could protect him," he said. "It's really about the political will to do so. The U.S. is one of our biggest trading partners and we have diplomatic relations with them that the parliament may not want to jeopardize. But, historically, Iceland has never extradited a U.S citizen back to the U.S."

US officials long denied massive data trawling

For years, top officials of the Bush and Obama administrations dismissed fears about secret government data-mining by reassuring Congress that there were no secret nets trawling for Americans' phone and Internet records.

"We do not vacuum up the contents of communications under the president's program and then use some sort of magic after the intercept to determine which of those we want to listen to, deal with or report on," then-CIA Director Michael Hayden told a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing in July 2006.

But on Friday, June, June 7, President Barack Obama himself acknowledged the existence of such programs even as he gave the government's standard rationale to ease fears that Americans' privacy rights are being violated.

"By sifting through this so-called metadata, they might identify potential leads of people who might engage in terrorism," Obama said during an exchange with reporters at a health care event in San Jose, Calif.

Obama's comments marked the first time a U.S. president publicly acknowledged the government's electronic sleuthing on its citizens. They came in response to mediareports and published classified documents that detailed the government's secret mass collection of phone and Internet communications.

When top officials in the Obama and Bush administrations have been asked in recent years whether U.S. citizens' communications were swept up as part of government surveillance, they've often responded with swift, flat denials. The denials were often carefully constructed to avoid any hints of the activities they were denying.

Even Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush, sidestepped what he described as a kerfuffle about his administration's secret electronic intelligence-gathering.

During a March 2006 appearance at the City Club of Cleveland, Bush described the NSA effort only as "a program that will enable us to listen from a known al-Qaida person and/or affiliate from making a phone call outside the United States in or inside the United States out, with the idea of being able to pick up quickly information for which to be able to respond in the environment we're in." He added: "I believe what I'm doing is constitutional, and I know it's necessary. And so we're going to keep doing it."

His vice president, Dick Cheney, was more blunt during a radio appearance, denying the government was engaging in domestic surveillance.

"This is not a domestic surveillance program," Cheney told radio host Hugh Hewitt, adding that "what we're interested in are intercepting communications, one end of which are outside the United States and one end of which we have reason to believe is al-Qaida-related."

Technically, Cheney's description of the program was accurate. His insistence that the Bush administration was not engaged in domestic surveillance is more debatable.

Reports that first appeared in Britain's Guardian newspaper and The Washington Post indicate that the NSA pulls in phone records, though not the actual content of the calls, from its secret warrants allowing it to collect data from major telecom companies. The program is aimed at detecting the calling patterns of terrorist suspects. A separate government program also collects massive amounts of data from at least nine Internet and electronic firms, pulling in everything from emails to photographs. Obama said Friday that the electronic data-mining is not aimed at American citizens or inside the U.S.

Several top Bush administration officials adamantly insisted that the government was not engaged in mass data-trawling as part of its secret NSA programs.

After a NewYork Times expose raised concerns about NSA targeting Americans' phone records, Hayden told a National Press Club audience in January 2006 that there was no effort to cast a wide net over communications data.

"This is targeted and focused," said Hayden, the principal deputy director of national intelligence at the time. "This is not about intercepting conversations between people in the United States. This is hot pursuit of communications entering or leaving America involving someone we believe is associated with al-Qaida."

Bush's attorney general, Alberto Gonzales, also minimized the reach of the NSA data-gathering, telling a Senate Judiciary hearing in February 2006 that "this surveillance is narrowly focused and fully consistent with the traditional forms of enemy surveillance found to be necessary in all previous armed conflicts."

Bush administration officials were repeatedly pressed by Congress about the NSA efforts in 2005 and 2006, as the Senate and House debated whether to extend the Patriot Act and many of its provisions that gave the government broad power to conduct surveillance and data collection. But once the Patriot Act's main provisions were reauthorized and signed into law by Bush in March 2006, public congressional concerns over the NSA's authority seemed to dissipate.

A review of congressional transcripts shows that from 2006 well into Obama's first term, top administration officials were rarely questioned publicly about the NSA's data-gathering activities. Instead, the agency's newdirector, Keith B. Alexander, was most often pressed about the NSA's growing efforts in cyberwarfare and security.

It was not until May 2011, as the Patriot Act again faced another reauthorization, that the NSA's secret programs began to receive cryptic attention from two Democratic senators, Ron Wyden of Oregon and Mark Udall of Colorado. Hobbled by the classified nature of the secret programs, the two senators offered up only guarded warnings.

"When the American people find out how their government has secretly interpreted the Patriot Act, they will be stunned and they will be angry," Wyden said during a floor speech in May 2011. He added: "Many members of Congress have no idea how the law is being secretly interpreted by the executive branch, because that interpretation is classified."

Still hamstrung by the programs' security classification in 2013, Wyden pressed National Intelligence Director James Clapper at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing in March about the NSA. "Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?" he asked.

"No, sir," Clapper replied. He added: "Not wittingly. There are cases where they could inadvertently perhaps collect but not wittingly."

This week, after the newrevelations about the NSA's massive data haul, Clapper acknowledged the existence of both of the agency's secret operations and denounced the mediadisclosures as "reprehensible."

When contacted by the National Journal about his earlier exchange with Wyden, Clapper stood by his earlier comments denying that the NSA is collecting massive troves of data.

"What I said was, the NSA does not voyeuristically pore through U.S. citizens' emails," Clapper said. "I stand by that."

Guardian makes splash in US with security scoops

Before this past week, the Guardian newspaper's gradual move into the U.S. — hiring dozens of employees in the last two years — hadn't produced much of a splash in terms of scoops.

In the last three days that has changed.

The newspaper, which started publishing in the English city of Manchester in 1821 and is now based in London, has established a significant presence in Washington by uncovering the vast scope of secret surveillance operations carried out by U.S. officials at the National Security Agency.

The revelations have put President Barack Obama and his national security team on the defensive with reports of government snooping on a comprehensive scale. Its coverage expanded Friday, June 7, to Britain with an exclusive report that the U.K.'s electronic surveillance agency also has had access to the information trove collected by the U.S. government.

While there had been hints of government accessing domestic U.S. phone records in the past, including reporting of domestic surveillance by the NSA that earned a Pulitzer Prize for the NewYork Times in 2006, Glenn Greenwald — a lawyer turned journalist, blogger and commentator for the Guardian — broke the newsWednesday, June 5, that the NSA had collected the telephone records of millions of U.S. customers of the telecom giant Verizon under a recent secret court order.

A day later, the Washington Post's Barton Gellman weighed in on the existence of another secret NSA program — codenamed PRISM — that reportedly gave the U.S. government direct access to the systems of Google, Facebook, Apple and other US internet giants,

Greenwald's piece on that same program appeared only about 20 minutes after the Post's story broke online. Gellman, himself a Pulitzer-prize winning investigative reporter, was quoted by the Huffington Post that he "started to hear some footsteps, so I had to move."

Guardian defense correspondent Nick Hopkins added to the British newspaper's string of newsbreaks Friday, June 7, revealing that the U.K.'s electronic surveillance agency has had access to the data trove collected by the U.S. government.

The stories have brought the Guardian wide attention in mediacircles and its website a substantial spike in traffic — company figures show a 20 percent increase in Internet visits. Thursday was the company's busiest day for U.S. traffic ever, it says.

Steven Barnett, a communications professor at the University of Westminster, called the Guardian's journalistic achievements in recent days "a breakthrough" in the paper's bid to establish a stronger presence in the U.S.

The company has been moving into the U.S. market in a determined way in recent years — with 57 employees in place — but hasn't had a major impact on the U.S. national debate until now.

Roy Greenslade, a mediacommentator who blogs in the Guardian and elsewhere, said the paper's surveillance stories have made it a serious player on the U.S. scene.

"It is doing something that traditional mainstream outlets in the States failed to do," he said. "So it beats the might of American journalism in its own backyard."

Greenslade said the newspaper has been "slowly and surely" building a following in the U.S. It's also launched a newdigital edition in Australia and hired journalists there.

Along with the NewYork Times, the Guardian published many of the first secret WikiLeaks cables dealing with U.S. military and diplomatic affairs despite U.S. officials' claims that doing so would put lives at risk.

Unlike some of its major rivals, the Guardian doesn't charge for Internet access — a factor that swells its page views but does little to help its bottom line.

Chief editor Alan Rusbridger told a conference in April that the Guardian's U.S. web traffic grew roughly 37 percent last year and now accounts for about one-third of the paper's global audience, estimated by the paper at 40 million readers.

The paper has been owned by the Scott Trust since 1936, but experts warn that funds are running low and the paper is running at a substantial loss. The print circulation has fallen sharply, dropping from more than 353,000 in May 2008 to just over 192,000 in May.

Barnett cautions that it is not clear the Guardian will be able to capitalize financially on its reputation for breaking big news.

"They're clearly trying to establish themselves as a world leader in authoritative investigative journalism," he said. "But if you are delivering it for free, how do you ensure you derive some proper revenue from their expansion? That's been a problem for months and years."

He said the "pennies" from Internet advertising do not offset the many dollars being lost as the Guardian's more lucrative print advertising fades.

The paper has acknowledged that it is focusing on increasing Web traffic and Web advertising.

Manning trial resumes as new leak scandal unfolds

Army Pfc. Bradley Manning's court-martial for giving hundreds of thousands of sensitive documents to WikiLeaks entered its second week Monday June 10 at Fort Meade, Md., in a fresh spotlight cast by a brand-new leak by another low-level intelligence employee.

Like Manning, Edward Snowden could find himself hauled into court by the U.S. government after he unmasked himself Sunday as the leaker who exposed the nation's secret phone and Internet surveillance programs to reporters.

Legal experts closely following both cases said they were shocked to find out young, low-ranking people had such access to powerful government secrets. Manning was 22 when he turned over the military and diplomatic cables about three years ago; Snowden is 29.

"In that respect, these cases suggest we should be much more careful about who is given security clearances," said David J.R. Frakt, a former military prosecutor and defense lawyer who has taught at several law schools.

At the same time, legal experts saw differences between the two cases, namely that Manning's secret-spilling was more scattershot, while Snowden appeared more selective.

"I'm not awarding him the Presidential Medal of Freedom here," Eugene R. Fidell, who teaches military law at Yale Law School, said of Snowden. "I'm just saying you could say it is something more akin to educating the American public about sensitive surveillance issues that have some level of First Amendment concern attached to them."

As for how Snowden's revelation will affect the Manning case, Fidell said it probably won't influence the military judge, who is hearing the case without a jury, but "it ratchets up the entire subject in the public eye." Fidell said it could spur outrage about government secrecy in general, but could also underscore the dangers of leaks — and that, he said, won't help Manning.

"It's a reminder that if what Manning did and what Snowden did is OK, then it's basically every man for himself," Fidell said, adding that national security would end up with "more holes than cheese."

Manning is charged under federal espionage and computer fraud laws. The most serious charge against him is aiding the enemy, which carries a potential life sentence. Testimony was expected to continue Tuesday.

As the trial opened last week, prosecutors said they would show that some of the secrets fell into the hands of Osama bin Laden himself. Manning's attorney said he was young and naive, but a good-intentioned soldier who wanted to make the world a better place by exposing the way the U.S. government was conducting itself.

Snowden said his motives were similar but told The Guardian newspaper of London: "I carefully evaluated every single document I disclosed to ensure that each was legitimately in the public interest."

Manning never publicly acknowledged his actions until more than two years after his arrest. He was seized only after an informant turned him in. Snowden is hiding out in Hong Kong, perhaps eventually hoping for asylum somewhere.

At Manning's trial Monday, his defense team won an intense battle over the admissibility of a piece of evidence supporting his claim that he leaked secrets to expose wrongdoing by the U.S. military and State Department.

The evidence was WikiLeaks' "Most Wanted Leaks of 2009." Army criminal investigator Mark Mander testified he found several versions of the list, including one prefaced by an explanation that the records were sought by "journalists, activists, historians, lawyers, police or human-rights investigators." That's the version the defense sought to admit; prosecutors offered a version without the preface. They objected strenuously to the defense's version but the military judge, Col. Denise Lind, said both versions were equally relevant.

Inside the court-martial, Manning's supporters mostly cheered the Snowden leak.

"We're all complicit in the crimes that these wonderful, brave young people told us about," said Kathy Boylan, a charity worker in Washington.

Nearly $200K paid in 'Billy the Kid' records case

A New Mexico county has paid $125,000 in attorney fees to a weekly newspaper for violating open records laws in a lawsuit over Billy the Kid's death.

The Albuquerque Journal reports (http://bit.ly/17DVeOu) that a De Baca County News attorney said the settlement agreement represents only the payment from Lincoln County to the newspapers, which sued along with East Mountain resident Gale Cooper in 2007.

The lawsuit sought documents relating to an investigation into Billy the Kid's death and whether he was buried in Fort Sumner.

Four other law firms previously involved in the case were paid another $70,000 combined and one claim is outstanding.

Cooper had filed written requests for records pertaining to a DNA analysis by celebrity forensic scientist Dr. Henry Lee of blood left on a carpenter's bench where the Kid's body purportedly was placed after he was shot in 1881. Cooper also wanted Lee's DNA report of two others who had claimed to be Billy the Kid.

One theory explored by the much-ballyhooed investigation, which started with the backing of then-Gov. Bill Richardson, was that Sheriff Pat Garrett shot someone else after the Kid's escape from the Lincoln County jail. That person was buried in Fort Sumner while Billy the Kid escaped to Texas and lived out his days as Brushy Bill Roberts.

Billy the Kid's grave is Fort Sumner's main tourist attraction and still draws a steady stream of visitors.

The Lincoln County sheriff's office has opened an investigation into the escape of the famous New Mexico outlaw from the Lincoln County jail 122 years ago, hoping to determine if he had an accomplice.

De Baca County News publisher Scot Stinnett joined with Cooper in seeking the records in the lawsuit, naming Lincoln County Sheriff Rick Virden, ex-Deputy Steven Sederwall and ex-Sheriff Tom Sullivan as defendants.

Sederwall and Sullivan have said in court documents and continue to maintain that the investigation they opened in 2003 into Billy the Kid's death was "conducted . as private citizens and not in their capacity as sheriff's department officials."

They claimed they had no records subject to the state Inspection of Public Records Act.

But Jeremy Theoret, who with Patrick Griebel of Albuquerque Business Law represented the De Baca County News, said it was clear from evidence that the investigation, which had a Lincoln County case number, was public record.

Thirteenth Judicial District Court Judge George Eichwald entered an order in March 2010 finding that "Sullivan and Sederwall were acting either as employees or agents of defendant Lincoln County Sheriff at all times pertinent. . (The) sheriff opened the investigation and continued with the investigation which is the subject of this (lawsuit)."

"Lincoln County fought us for five years over this and provided lawyers for the defendants," Stinnett said. "They ended up paying all those fees to us and as part of our settlement we insisted they pay other attorneys who had previously worked on the case. That was another $70,000."

The De Baca County News and Cooper eventually parted ways, but both proceeded with the action.

Charlotte newspaper reporter released after arrest

A Charlotte Observer reporter has been released after he was arrested while covering a protest at the North Carolina General Assembly.

The newspaper reported (http://bit.ly/191VlBc ) that religion reporter Tim Funk was released around 11 p.m. Monday, June 11.

Funk had been arrested Monday as a crowd of about 80 people was demonstrating and peacefully surrendering to police for arrest in Raleigh.

General Assembly Police Chief Jeff Weaver said Funk did not respond to a final warning to disperse that was issued before officers began arresting protesters at the Legislative Building.

Observer Managing Editor Cheryl Carpenter said Funk was wearing mediaidentification and was there to do his job as a newsreporter. He was covering Charlotte clergy taking part in the protest.

He was charged with trespassing and failure to disperse.

Ga. student sues Board of Regents for budget docs

A former student journalist at Georgia Perimeter College filed a lawsuit Monday, June 10, against the university system's Board of Regents, saying it failed to produce documents under the state's open records law.

David Schick, past editor of the student newspaper, had been seeking records related to the college's $25 million budget shortfall and layoffs in 2012.

Schick is seeking an injunction compelling the university system to comply with his requests. The lawsuit filed in Fulton County claims the university system has not produced all the records requested and engaged in "obstruction, delay and at times outright misrepresentations."

Schick, who is now an Atlanta-based freelancer and blogger, is receiving legal counsel referred to him through the Student Press Law Center.

"The public deserves to know how so much money could have gone 'missing' from the budget and how it could go undetected for such a long period in time," Schick said in a statement. "The buck stops with the Board of Regents and the records I requested could go a long way towards revealing what officials knew and when they knew it."

SPLC officials say Schick filed two requests with Georgia Perimeter College and with the Board of Regents for emails, memos and other communications related to the budget shortfall. The University System asked Schick to pay nearly $3,000 to receive the records. SPLC officials say University System representatives eventually said they could fulfill Schick's request for about $300, but continued withholding the documents when he asked for them.

Schick's attorney, Daniel Levitas, says Georgia Perimeter College also asked that he pay nearly $1,000 for the records.

"This is an exorbitant and illegal fee and should be reduced," Levitas said in a release.

"What's going on in Georgia is a microcosm of what's happening all over the country, with state universities contemptuously defying their public disclosure responsibilities through foot-dragging and astronomical fees," SPLC Executive Director Frank LoMonte said in a release. "This is the 21st century, and emails are searchable and retrievable within a matter of seconds, not months."

Regents' spokesman John Millsaps told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution (http://bit.ly/14sffnL) he's unaware of the lawsuit, and system policy prohibits commenting on pending litigation.

BH Media exec takes over as Tulsa World publisher

Bill Masterson Jr. will take over as publisher of the Tulsa World after John Bair resigned.

Masterson serves as BH MediaGroup's vice president of the southwest region. BH MediaGroup, which is a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Co., bought the Tulsa World this year.

The newspaper says (http://bit.ly/11RwNV7) Masterson is a native Oklahoman who previously served as publisher of Times MediaCo. of Munster, Ind. He also worked as operating vice president of Lee Enterprises.

Bair resigned Monday after serving 12 years as an executive with the Tulsa World.

He joined the newspaper as circulation director in 2001. Bair was named president and chief operating officer of World Publishing Co. in 2007 and was named publisher when Omaha, Neb.-based BH Mediapurchased the newspaper in February.

Study: Nonprofit news sites need business help

The growing number of nonprofit newswebsites say they need more help from business experts than journalists.

Many of the reporting sites relied on large startup grants and haven't effectively broadened their fundraising sources or extracted promises from their original funders to continue support, said a study released Monday, June 10, by the Pew Research Center.

Pew looked at the 172 nonprofit newssites that have emerged since 1987. Among them is the Pulitzer Prize-winning ProPublica, based in NewYork; the Texas Tribune, which covers public affairs issues in that state; The Hechinger Report on education issues, operated out of Columbia University; and MinnPost on civic life in Minnesota.

These sites have a variety of sponsors, including individuals, ideological groups or foundations.

Pew said 93 of these sites completed surveys, and 54 percent said that their greatest need came in business, marketing or fundraising, compared to 39 percent who cited reporting or editing help. Nearly two-thirds of the groups said it was a major challenge to find enough time to focus on the business aspects of their operations.

Many of the sites are bullish about their futures, however, with 81 percent saying they are confident they will be financially healthy in five years, Pew said.

The organizations tend to be small, with 78 percent reporting having five or fewer staff members, Pew said. They also tend to work in specialized niches, including the environment, health and foreign affairs, the study said.

Appeals court says USTR can withhold document

An appeals court ruled Friday, June 7, that the U.S. Trade Representative can withhold a classified position paper prepared during free-trade negotiations, reversing a lower court that had ordered the document's release under a Freedom of Information Act request.

The three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said the disclosure would reveal a position taken by the U.S. in the past. "It seems perfectly reasonable to think that could limit the flexibility of U.S. negotiators," wrote Judge A. Raymond Randolph, an appointee of President George H.W. Bush. He was joined by Judges Janice Rogers Brown and Brett M. Kavanaugh, both appointees of President George W. Bush.

The paper had been prepared during negotiations for a Free Trade Agreement of the Americas, conducted in the 1990s and 2000s. The talks never resulted in a deal.

U.S. District Court Judge Richard Roberts last year sided with the Center for International Environmental Law, which had sought the document. Roberts ruled there were no plausible or logical explanations to justify its secrecy. It was a rare court order to reveal a classified document. Roberts is an appointee of President Bill Clinton.

In its ruling Friday, the appeals panel wrote that courts are in a poor position to second guess the Trade Representative's judgment in these types of matters, "but that is just what the district court did in rejecting the agency's justification for withholding the white paper."

The USTR said although the paper was not binding, international arbiters might still look to it in future cases, which the appeals court said was plausible.

"It is important to keep in mind that the Trade Representative was expressing concerns about the United States' flexibility in future negotiations not necessarily with the governments that participated in the Free Trade Agreement of the Americas negotiations, but with governments that did not take part in those negotiations," the panel wrote. Without the disclosure of the paper, such governments wouldn't know the position the U.S. had taken in earlier negotiations.

The appeals court ruling opened with a 1796 statement by President George Washington, refusing a request from the U.S. House for a copy of instructions provided to the U.S. minister who negotiated a treaty with the king of Great Britain, and other related documents. In that statement, Washington wrote, "The nature of foreign negotiations requires caution, and their success must often depend on secrecy; and even when brought to a conclusion, a full disclosure of all the measures, demands, or eventual concessions, which may have been proposed or contemplated ... might have a pernicious influence on future negotiations."

The court ruled that the government's position in this case "has the force of history behind it. It echoes what George Washington wrote more than two centuries ago."

Mark Caramanica of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press called Friday's ruling "yet another unfortunate example where the executive branch lays out theoretical harms for classifying information and a federal court effectively defers to that conclusion, agreeing that the government's withholding justification lies within the universe of all possible harms no matter how speculative." The committee and 32 other mediaorganizations had filed a friend-of-the-court brief urging that the lower court ruling be upheld.

The Center for International Environmental Law did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Publisher of The State Journal-Register retires

The publisher of The State Journal-Register, of Springfield, Ill., has announced his retirement, effective June 19.

Richard Johnston was named publisher of the Journal-Register in July. He is also publisher of the Lincoln Courier. Both newspapers are owned by Fairport, N.Y.-based GateHouse MediaInc.

Johnston was publisher of several Midwestern dailies prior to joining the Journal-Register. He was publisher of The Pantagraph in Bloomington from 2007-2011.

GateHouse Mediavice president Brad Dennison announced Thursday, June 6, that GateHouse vice president of sales Michael Petrak will serve as interim publisher of the Springfield newspaper, starting June 17.

Mass. residents sue NY Post over marathon coverage

Two Massachusetts residents have sued the NewYork Post, saying the newspaper falsely portrayed them as suspects in the Boston Marathon bombings in part by featuring them on the front page under the headline "Bag Men."

The lawsuit said photographs and articles the Post published three days after the bombings made it appear that law enforcement officials suspected 16-year-old Salaheddin Barhoum and 24-year-old Yassine Zaimi as the attack's perpetrators, before the FBI publicly identified two brothers as suspects.

But the Post still stands by its story, and says it never identified them as suspects.

Lawyers for the two Moroccan plaintiffs said Thursday, June 6, the friends had hoped to run the race that day as unofficial entrants, and had running gear in their bags.

The civil action said the Post's headline implied they had bombs in their bags and accuses the newspaper of libel, negligent infliction of emotional distress and privacy invasion. Filed Wednesday in Boston, the claim seeks unspecified monetary damages.

A Post spokeswoman referred questions about the lawsuit Thursday to a statement the newspaper's editor made in April.

"The image was emailed to law enforcement agencies yesterday afternoon seeking information about these men, as our story reported. We did not identify them as suspects," NewYork Post editor-in-chief Col Allan's statement said at the time.

A copy of the April 18 front page, which is included as a lawsuit exhibit, shows the publication also included a line in smaller print on its cover saying there was no direct evidence linking the two males to the crime but that authorities wanted to identify them.

But Barhoum's attorney Max Stern said Thursday that the plaintiffs, whose names the Post didn't use, were "collateral damage" in the newspaper's rush to scoop the competition.

The lawsuit said the photos came from one or more social mediawebsites after users began discussion groups dedicated to finding the bombers by scouring finish line photos.

The claim said the plaintiffs saw their photos on the Internet in connection with the bombing and voluntarily went to local police departments before investigators told them early on April 18 they weren't suspects.

But that day, the Post hit the streets with them on the cover.

The lawsuit said Barhoum didn't know about the story until arriving home from a track meet, when a reporter showed it to him and he "became terrified, began to shake and sweat, and felt dizzy and nauseous."

The Revere High School sophomore previously told The Associated Press he was scared to go to school and thinks some people will always blame him for the bombings. His father told the AP in April that he moved his family to the United States five years ago and worried after the Post story that someone would shoot his son.

On Thursday, a neighbor of the Barhoum family called them kind people who mind their own business.

"If he's suing them, I think he should," Kay Krahmouni said. "Now everybody knows the poor guy ... They made a big deal and nothing was sure."

The plaintiffs' attorneys said both their clients are permanent residents of the United States. They are friends from a running club.

Zaimi, who lives in Malden, Mass., arrived from Morocco four years ago and works as a database clerk at a financial company while going to school part-time, according to his lawyers.

One said the man broke out in boils, has been unable to sleep or run, and has sought counseling after becoming depressed since the Post's story.

US gives political asylum to Mexican journalist

U.S. government officials have granted political asylum to a Mexican newspaper photographer who fled his home state of Veracruz after unknown assailants killed his father.

A Thursday, June 6, statement from El Paso lawyer Carlos Spector said Miguel Angel Lopez Solana is the first Mexican journalist whom the Committee to Protect Journalists has helped obtain U.S. asylum.

Lopez Solana's father, a well-known columnist, was gunned down alongside his wife and son outside his house. At least eight other journalists were killed shortly thereafter.

Spector represents several other journalists from Mexico who have fled their country after the spike in drug cartel-related violence and are seeking asylum in the United States.

Fired Sun-Times photographers picket outside paper

Former Chicago Sun-Times photographers and supporters are protesting the newspaper's decision to lay off its entire full-time photography staff.

About 100 people picketed outside the newspaper's headquarters Thursday, chanting and carrying signs that read "Save the photogs." Some Sun-Times reporters also joined the protest.

The newspaper fired all 28 full-time photographers last week, saying it was shifting toward more online video. It says it now will rely on freelancers and reporters for pictures and video.

The layoffs included photographers and editors at the Sun-Times' sister publications in the suburbs.

The Chicago Newspaper Guild is asking the National Labor Relations Board to rule that the Sun-Times bargained in bad faith. Guild Executive Director Craig Rosenbaum says the company told the union during contract negotiations that no photographer layoffs were planned.

Holder seeks better balance after press subpoenas

Addressing the aggressive government leak probes that have angered the newsmedia, Attorney General Eric Holder said June 5 a better balance needs to be struck between press freedom and safeguarding national secrets.

The attorney general has been conducting a series of meetings with newsorganizations to review how the Justice Department treats the mediawhen the government investigates national security leaks. The department secretly subpoenaed some phone records of The Associated Press without prior notification. It also obtained a search warrant to secretly gather emails of Fox Newsjournalist James Rosen.

In an interview with NBC, Holder said the Justice Department will come up with ways in which notice can be given to the media. The attorney general held out the possibility of involving the judiciary in such cases.

"I'm a little concerned that things have gotten a little out of whack," Holder said. "I think that we can do a better job than we have. We can reform those regulations, reform those guidelines, to better reflect that balance."

The attorney general also spoke out against a legal requirement that arose in the Fox Newscase.

In addressing the requirement for obtaining a search warrant for Rosen's emails, the government characterized the journalist as a probable co-conspirator of a State Department contractor who was suspected of leaking classified information to Rosen.

Holder said he doesn't like that requirement because it means that Holder is in the position as a government official of branding a journalist as a criminal.

"I'm just not comfortable with that and we're going to change that," he told NBC.

Holder signed off on the search warrant application for the emails of the Fox Newsjournalist.

Holder said that he has no intention of stepping down now and that he still has things that he wants to do and has discussed them with President Barack Obama. He said that once he's finished with those tasks, he and the president will determine when it's time to transition to a newattorney general.

Rebekah Brooks denies phone hacking charges

Rebekah Brooks — a friend of British Prime Minister David Cameron and once one of the most powerful people in the British media— last week formally denied charges of phone hacking, bribing public officials and trying to thwart a police investigation into tabloid wrongdoing.

Brooks, the former chief executive of Rupert Murdoch's NewsInternational, answered "not guilty" in a firm voice to five charges during a hearing Wednesday, June 5, at London's Southwark Crown Court.

The period covered by the charges stretches over more than a decade — from 2000, when Brooks was the youngest-ever editor of the Newsof the World, though her tenure as editor of its sister paper, The Sun, to her time as CEO of Murdoch's British newspaper operation.

Brooks is a key figure in the phone-hacking scandal that has rattled Britain's press, police and political establishments.

WHAT HAPPENED?

The phone hacking scandal erupted in 2011, after it was revealed that journalists at Murdoch's Newsof the World tabloid routinely eavesdropped on the mobile phone voicemail messages of celebrities, members of the royal household and other people in the public eye, including crime victims and a murdered 13-year-old girl.

The scandal led Murdoch to close down the Newsof The World and led to extensive police investigations into phone hacking, computer hacking and the bribery of officials.

WHO WAS INVOLVED?

NewsInternational maintained for several years that phone hacking had been the work of a single rogue reporter and a private investigator, who were jailed in 2007 for intercepting the voice mails of royal aides.

That claim began to unravel in 2011. To date more than 30 people have been charged, including senior journalists and editors from both the Newsof the World and The Sun.

Allegations of wrongdoing have spread to other papers outside the Murdoch empire, as well as to police, prison officers and former members of the armed forces alleged to have sold information to newspapers.

Only a handful of suspects have stood trial so far, including three former police officers convicted of selling or trying to sell information. One constable, Paul Flattley, was sentenced to two years in jail for selling information to The Sun about high-profile cases on 39 occasions over three years.

Several suspects have been cleared, including former Sun defense correspondent Virginia Wheeler. Charges against her were dropped on Wednesday.

THE FALLOUT

The scandal spurred Cameron to set up a judge-led public inquiry into mediaethics, which found last year that there had been a subculture of unethical behavior in the British press and advocated tougher regulation. Attempts to set up a newsystem of regulation have been resisted by the media, however, and are currently stalled.

The furor has hit both the reputation and the bottom line of Murdoch's NewsCorp. The company has fired a slew of executives — some of whom now face trial — and paid out millions to settle lawsuits from hundreds of targets of illegal eavesdropping. Victims including actor Jude Law; Prince Andrew's ex-wife, Sarah Ferguson; soccer star Ashley Cole; and singer Charlotte Church have received payouts of tens or even hundreds of thousands of pounds.

In February, NewsCorp. revealed that settlements, official inquiries and police investigations stemming from the scandal had cost it $56 million.

THE LEGAL LABYRINTH

The sheer number of defendants means a long, complicated legal road ahead.

Wednesday's crammed pre-trial hearing saw Brooks appear in court along with a dozen other former NewsInternational employees, close to 30 bewigged lawyers and a large press pack.

Brooks, 45, denied five counts of intercepting voicemail messages, conspiracy to commit misconduct involving public officials and obstructing a police investigation by withholding evidence.

Several former Newsof the World staff, including ex-chief reporter Neville Thurlbeck, former newseditor James Weatherup and former managing editor Stuart Kuttner, also denied intercepting voice mails.

Defendants including Brooks' racehorse trainer husband Charlie Brooks; former NewsInternational security staff members Mark Hanna, Lee Sandell and David Johnson; driver Paul Edwards; and Rebekah Brooks' former assistant, Cheryl Carter, denied trying to pervert the course of justice by concealing documents, computers and other material from the police.

INDUSTRY NEWS 6-6-2013

U.S. Supreme Court rules against Post-Gazette access to polling places

Elections officials can bar journalists and others from polling places, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in an opinion issued June 3 in a case brought by the Post-Gazette, of Pittsburgh, Pa.,when its staffers were barred from voting sites in Allegheny and Beaver counties last fall.

Additionally, the court said U.S. District Judge Nora Barry Fischer was right when she rejected a consent agreement between the newspaper and the Allegheny County Board of Elections, which would have allowed reporters and photographers access to people signing in on Election Day, unless the voters objected.

State law bars anyone except voters, election workers and registered poll watchers from coming within 10 feet of entrances to polling places on Election Day.

The Post-Gazette had argued that access was especially important in November as the state conducted a dry run of voter identification requirements. The voter ID law, which has not yet gone fully into effect, is being challenged in a separate Commonwealth Court suit filed by several voters claiming disenfranchisement.

Leak probe latest big case for US prosecutors

Ronald Machen and James Cole have pursued their share of headline-makers, taking on between the two of them an All-Star baseball pitcher, government contractors, members of Congress, a federal judge and a mayoral campaign.

The two Justice Department officials are accustomed to overseeing big cases and riling defendants with their decisions. But it's their involvement in a White House crackdown on national security leaks — including the secret gathering of telephone records of Associated Press reporters and editors and the emails of a Fox Newsjournalist — that has invited unusually broad and bipartisan condemnation.

Attorney General Eric Holder says he removed himself from the AP leak investigation, leaving Machen, the U.S. attorney for Washington assigned to run the case, and Cole, the Holder deputy who made the decision to seek the phone records, as focal points for anger over the intrusion into newsgathering operations.

Lawyers describe both men — whose careers have blended public service with private practice — as methodical and aggressive, with track records that include tough demands for documents they think are needed to construct a case, but also displays of restraint and negotiation.

"There are real stakes on both sides," former Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick, who worked with Machen at the law firm of WilmerHale, said of leak investigations. "You have the national security imperative on one side, and you have the equities and interests of a free press on the other."

The Justice Department says it's trying to hunt down sources of information for a May 2012 AP story that disclosed details about a foiled bomb plot in Yemen. Cole has said the department followed its rules on newsmediasubpoenas.

Machen, who was assigned the probe last year, hasn't discussed the investigation publicly and wasn't available for an interview, his spokesman said.

The AP investigation bears parallels to another leak probe involving Machen's office, in which investigators prosecuting a State Department expert on North Korea obtained a search warrant for some private emails of a Fox Newscorrespondent.

Furor over the AP and Fox investigations prompted President Barack Obama last month to order a review of the Justice Department policy under which the government obtains reporters' records. Cole participated Thursday in a meeting with Holder and newsexecutives where government officials expressed a commitment to changing guidelines on issuing subpoenas in criminal investigations involving reporters.

Washington's top prosecutor since 2010, Machen, 44, has balanced the leak probe with running an office unique in its responsibility for both federal crimes and local offenses typically prosecuted by district attorneys. He's known as an ambitious, demanding and driven manager who involves himself heavily in strategy talks and decision-making on cases that generate headlines or that he considers critical. Those have included investigations into District of Columbia politics and the campaign of its mayor, Vincent Gray.

"He has a management style that is going to cause some conflict with people who are like him — who are determined, vigorous, smart people who are trying to make the right decisions," said former prosecutor Tom Zeno, who calls his ex-boss meticulous and engaged.

Machen prosecuted violent crimes as a young lawyer under Holder, then the U.S. attorney. He left the federal government for a private law firm, where he represented corporations facing government investigations, before returning to the U.S. attorney's office.

"I think he really is a true believer. He sees himself as the protector of the public interest," said lawyer Frederick Cooke, whose clients include an ex-District of Columbia Council chairman prosecuted by Machen's office for bank fraud.

Machen's record includes some significant wins — including convictions of two district council members, three mayoral campaign aides and federal workers in a massive bid-rigging fraud. His office recently secured guilty pleas from former Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. for misusing campaign money and from a Mexican drug cartel member for killing a federal agent.

The office has shown aggressive maneuvering in certain high-profile violent crime prosecutions. A man arrested for shooting at the White House was charged with attempting to assassinate Obama, even though the president wasn't there at the time. Another man who shot a security guard at the headquarters of a conservative Christian lobbying group became the first defendant prosecuted under a local anti-terrorism statute.

Other investigations, however, have plodded along unresolved or ended with nothing to show. He's drawn criticism over use of government resources for pursuing select people — former major-league pitcher Roger Clemens, among them — with dogged resolve. After the first perjury prosecution ended with a mistrial, the office added to its trial team and again went after Clemens, who was acquitted after less than 10 hours of deliberations.

"We believed from the beginning that the case should not be brought against Roger and that the government was fixated on obtaining a conviction in one of these baseball-steroid cases," said Michael Attanasio, a lawyer for Clemens.

Cole, the deputy attorney general, has spent even longer under the spotlight.

A former deputy chief of the Justice Department's public integrity section, he successfully prosecuted a NewOrleans federal judge for bribery — even persuading a drug dealer cooperating with the probe to keep quiet about it. He won a guilty verdict against former Idaho Rep. George Hansen for knowingly filing false financial disclosure reports, though the conviction was vacated and Hansen was released early from prison.

He also investigated a House of Representatives check overdraft scandal, where he demanded access to records of lawmakers' check transactions.

In 1995, he was called on as special counsel to lead a congressional ethics investigation of House Speaker Newt Gingrich that concluded with a reprimand and a $300,000 penalty.

More recently, while in private practice, he counseled accounting firm Arthur Andersen on document management and compliance procedures during the Enron scandal. He also did independent consulting work for insurance giant American International Group Inc., which received a government bailout worth more than $180 billion at the height of the credit crisis.

He was confirmed as deputy attorney general in 2010.

Oklahoma court: Video from police dash-cam is public record

Reversing a decision by a Rogers County judge, the Oklahoma state Court of Civil Appeals ruled Friday, May 31, that a dash-cam video made by the Claremore Police Department in 2011 does constitute a public record under the Oklahoma Open Records Act.

"This is definitely a win for the citizen and definitely a win for the press and the people who support open government," said attorney Josh Lee, who, along with attorneys Stephen Fabian and Clint Ward, fought for the release of the records. "Open government wins today."

The appellate court also ruled that the city of Claremore must pay attorneys' fees as determined by a trial court.

"These police departments are so paranoid about what we, as defense lawyers, are liable to find out," Fabian said. "That's the whole crux of all this. That's why they deny it. They don't want us to see what's happening out there, what's happened on the arrest, whether the officers did their job or not.

"There should be video cameras in every police car in the state of Oklahoma."

Lee routinely represents people accused of alcohol- and driving-related offenses.

Attorneys seeking the police video records of a client sued the city of Claremore in May 2011, alleging that the municipality violated the Open Records Act in refusing to provide requested videotapes and audiotapes from the arrest of Richard Stangland, a 22-year-old Claremore man who was charged in March of that year with aggravated driving under the influence of alcohol.

Stangland pleaded guilty in August 2011 to a reduced charge of DUI and received an 18-month deferred sentence.

Arguing for the release of the records, Fabian said then that audiotapes and videotapes are covered by the Open Records Act. Matt Ballard, who represents the city, told the court that videotapes are evidentiary and subject to the privilege of confidentiality.

The Open Records Act includes sound and video recordings in its definition of a public record.

After hearing evidence in the nonjury trial, Associate District Judge Sheila Condren ruled in August 2011 that the police department's dash-cam recording is a "direct piece of evidence" and "not a public record."

In an opinion written by Chief Judge Robert Bell, the state Court of Criminal Appeals disagreed.

"Appellees' argument - and the trial court's holding - that the video is exempt because it could be used as evidence in a subsequent criminal prosecution is without legal support," Bell wrote. "There is no such exemption enumerated in the (Open Records) Act."

Fabian won a lawsuit against the state Department of Public Safety in March 2005 after the Oklahoma Highway Patrol started denying the release of traffic arrest videos. Later that year, however, state lawmakers exempted the department's audio and video recordings from open records requests, making it the only law enforcement agency with such an exemption.

Fabian, who worked in law enforcement for about 20 years as a Wichita, Kan., police officer and general counsel for the Oklahoma Department of Public Safety, said he has viewed thousands of police videos.

"I've seen just about everything you can see from a standpoint of how law enforcement deals with stuff over the years, from riding in the cars with them to being one (police officer)," Fabian said. " There are situations where what they do out there is just absolutely un-understandable.

"But from the standpoint of protecting a law enforcement officer when they do their job right, it's the best thing in the world. I can't argue with that. It's what's right."

Register owner sells Marysville paper

Freedom Communications Inc. on Friday, May 31 announced the sale of the Marysville Appeal-Democrat, a 16,000-circulation daily newspaper in northern California, to Vista California NewsMedia, Inc.

Terms of the Marysville deal were not disclosed. Freedom, headquartered in Santa Ana, owns the Orange County Register.

Vista is affiliated with Illinois-based Horizon Publications, publisher of about three dozen community newspapers in the United States and Canada. Horizon also is affiliated with Rhode Island Suburban Newspapers Inc., which acquired two other Freedom newspapers on April 30 the Yuma Sun in Arizona and the Porterville Recorder in California.

"The Appeal-Democrat is a newspaper with a longstanding reputation for quality service to its community," said Roland McBride, executive vice president of Vista. "We are very pleased to have the opportunity to continue that service and look forward to participating in their continued success in the dynamic newsgathering and dissemination industry."

Marysville marks Freedom's fourth newspaper sale since the 2100 Trust investment group bought the company in July. In November, Freedom sold The Gazette in Colorado Springs to Denver billionaire Philip Anschutz's Clarity MediaGroup.

The sale leaves Freedom with the Register and two other newspapers the Daily Press in Victorville and the Desert Dispatch in Barstow.

News execs, Holder discuss subpoena issue

In a meeting with Attorney General Eric Holder, executives from several newsorganizations said government officials expressed a commitment to changing guidelines on issuing subpoenas in criminal investigations involving reporters.

The newsexecutives made the comments Thursday, May 30, after meeting with Holder and some of his aides.

The discussion took place following an outcry from newsorganizations over the Justice Department's secret gathering of some Associated Press reporters' phone records and some emails of a Fox Newsjournalist.

Last week, President Barack Obama ordered a review of the Justice Department guidelines.

One of the newsmediaparticipants, Marty Baron, executive editor of the Washington Post, said the newsexecutives told the department officials that reporters were concerned about using their email and concerned about using their office telephones.

"It was a constructive meeting," said Baron. "They expressed their commitment to the president's statement that reporters would not be at legal risk for doing their jobs."

Jerry Seib, Washington bureau chief of The Wall Street Journal, said that in addition to the commitment to change the guidelines, there also was a renewed commitment to support a federal shield law for journalists. Such laws in force in many states protect journalists from having to reveal confidential sources.

"We diplomatically raised our concerns — don't know what's going to happen if anything," said Jim Warren, Washington bureau chief of the NewYork Daily News. "Who knows what's going to happen if they practice what they seem to preach and try to change some laws that we feel are very relevant. I think it's sort of an opening gambit." Warren said "there were some specifics talked about, more of a legal and statutory nature," but he did not elaborate.

Other newsmediaparticipants were Jane Mayer, a staff writer for the NewYorker; and John Harris, editor in chief of Politico.

The Associated Press didn't attend the meeting because it objected to the meeting being off the record. The NewYork Times said it wouldn't attend because of the department's off-the-record ground rules.

Asked why the newsexecutives decided to participate, Baron said people in the press frequently have off-the-record discussions.

"We feel very strongly about the issues here," said Baron. "This was an opportunity for us to share our views with people at the highest level of the Justice Department."

Besides Holder, Deputy Attorney General James Cole and seven other Justice Department officials also participated.

Holder conducts 2nd day of media meetings

Attorney General Eric Holder has met with more mediarepresentatives after easing some of the U.S. Justice Department's restrictions on the gathering.

The attorney general met Friday, May 31, with representatives from organizations such as Reuters, USA Today and Bloomberg News. This follows similar meetings with other newsorganizations on Thursday.

The discussions are taking place after complaints about the department's secret gathering of some Associated Press reporters' phone records and some emails of a Fox Newsjournalist. Last week, President Barack Obama ordered a review of the Justice Department guidelines.

Mediarepresentatives said afterward Holder had relaxed demands for the meeting to be off the record and also allowed company lawyers to be present.

The Associated Press has not attended because of earlier demands that it would be off the record.

Missing journalist's parents to travel to Beirut

The parents of a freelance journalist who disappeared while covering civil war in Syria said Thursday, May 30, that they hope upcoming talks aimed at peace between the Syrian government and rebels will hasten his release.

In a statement issued through a family spokesman, Austin Tice's parents said they plan to travel from Houston to Beirut soon "to reach more deeply into the region on behalf of our son."

The statement is the first issued by the family since a video of Tice was posted online in late September. The 47-second video, which Marc and Debra Tice called "distressing" in their Thursday statement, showed their son blindfolded and saying "Oh, Jesus" in a frightened voice in the custody of armed men.

The video shows Tice trying to recite the Muslim declaration of faith, or shahada, until he switches to English and says, "Oh Jesus. Oh Jesus," and rests his head on a captor's arm.

The video was the first sign of Austin Tice's condition since he disappeared in August. Tice, a 31-year-old former Marine, had been reporting on Syria's civil war for The Washington Post, McClatchy Newspapers and others. He was one of a few journalists reporting from Damascus when he vanished.

His parents said they were uncertain who is holding their son. "Above all, we request that the Syrian government search vigorously for Austin in order to secure his safe return. Soon, we plan to return to Beirut to reach more deeply into the region on behalf of our son," the Houston couple said.

Their statement details some family celebrations and journalistic honors awarded to Austin Tice since his disappearance. They asked all sides of the Syrian insurrection to "keep Austin in their minds" in peace talks.

The international community had hoped the two sides would start talks next month on a political transition. However, the opposition group, the Syrian National Coalition, said earlier Thursday that it would not attend a conference, linking the decision to a regime offensive on the western Syrian town of Qusair and claiming that hundreds of wounded people were trapped there.

Roberts says AG Holder should resign

Sen. Pat Roberts said Thursday, May 30, in Topeka, Kan., that U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder should resign over allegations that he knew of the gathering of journalists' telephone records and emails.

The Kansas Republican told The Associated Press by telephone that the resignation would be in the best interests of Holder and President Barack Obama.

"I think he would certainly be doing himself and the president a favor," Roberts said.

The Justice Department has been intensely criticized over its secret gathering of the phone records of AP reporters and the emails of a Fox Newsjournalist. Holder has testified that he had no knowledge that the records were sought after journalists reported on government activities.

Requests seeking comment from the Justice Department about Roberts' comments weren't immediately returned Thursday.

Roberts, who is a former newspaper reporter in southwest Kansas and Arizona, said Holder's resignation would be appropriate but would not make questions of First Amendment violations go away.

The senator said it made no sense for the administration to push for a national shield law for journalists, adding that any law would likely have an exemption for national security purposes that still would leave journalists vulnerable.

"We don't need a shield law. We already have one. It's called the First Amendment," Roberts said.

The senator said Holder and other Justice Department officials should try to work with journalists when newsbreaks about government activities. Roberts said instead of seeking phone records or emails the government should bring journalists up to speed about ongoing investigations or activities.

"This is like East Germany. This is not the appropriate action," Roberts said.

Holder is seeking to hold meetings with newsorganizations about guidelines governing regulations that involve reporters. The Associated Press and other organizations have objected to the Justice Department's desire to have the meetings be off the record.

Obama has asked Holder to report him on any recommend policy changes by July 12.

Chicago Sun-Times lays off photography staff

The Chicago Sun-Times laid off its entire full-time photography staff Thursday, May 30, including a Pulitzer Prize winner, in a move that the newspaper's management said resulted from a need to shift toward more online video.

The union representing many of the laid-off photographers plans to file a bad-faith bargaining charge with the National Labor Relations Board, a union leader said.

The Sun-Times Mediacompany didn't immediately comment on how many jobs were affected, but the national Newspaper Guild issued a statement saying 28 employees lost their jobs. The layoffs included photographers and editors at the Sun-Times' sister publications in the suburbs.

"I'm still in shock. I'm not angry right now. Maybe I will be later," said Steve Buyansky, a laid-off photo editor for three of the group's suburban newspapers.

Buyansky said about 30 photographers and photo editors were called to a mandatory meeting Thursday morning where Sun-Times editor Jim Kirk "talked for about 20 seconds" telling them the layoffs were a tough decision.

Buyansky said Pulitzer Prize-winning Sun-Times photographer John H. White was in the room and was among those who were laid off. "It's sad," said Buyansky, speaking from the Billy Goat tavern, a longtime watering hole for Chicago journalists, where about 10 laid-off photographers congregated after the meeting. "The Sun-Times had an amazing photo staff."

White took a well-known photo of now-imprisoned Gov. Rod Blagojevich leaving his home through a back alley, one day after he was arrested on federal corruption charges. The photo caught Blagojevich as he passed a bright yellow sign warning about rats.

"It captured everything that Rod Blagojevich and the state of Illinois exudes. It's a great photo because there's such great humor in it," said laid-off Sun-Times photo assignment editor Dom Najolia, who marked his 33rd year at the paper earlier this month.

Chicago is one of few U.S. cities to still have competing newspapers. The Sun-Times, a tabloid, competes with the Chicago Tribune.

Chicago Newspaper Guild Executive Director Craig Rosenbaum said an unfair labor practice charge will be filed in reaction to the company's announcement. The union is negotiating a newcontract and the company told the union at the bargaining table recently that no layoffs of photographers were planned, Rosenbaum said.

Sun-Times Mediareleased a statement Thursday to The Associated Press confirming the move: "Today, the Chicago Sun-Times has had to make the very difficult decision to eliminate the position of full-time photographer, as part of a multimedia staffing restructure." The statement noted that the "business is changing rapidly" and audiences are "seeking more video content with their news."

Like most major newspapers, the Sun-Times has been hard hit by the technological shift that has cause more people to rely on their personal computers and mobile devices to stay informed. As more readers have embraced digital alternatives, so have advertisers in a move that has been steadily siphoning away newspaper publishers' biggest source of revenue.

The Chicago Sun-Times ended September 2012 with a paid circulation of 263,292, according to the most recent statement filed with the Alliance for Audited Media. That contrasted with circulation of about 341,448 at the same time in 2006. Including satellite editions that operate under other names, the Sun-Times" circulation totaled 432,451 in September 2012.

Huffington Post, Civil Beat partner in Hawaii site

The Huffington Post and subscription-based newswebsite Honolulu Civil Beat announced Wednesday, May 29, that they plan to partner in a newsite dedicated to Hawaii news.

The online outlets said HuffPost Hawaii is expected to launch in the fall, with content from both Civil Beat and the Huffington Post.

Arianna Huffington, president and editor in chief of Huffington Post MediaGroup, says the site will share stories both about Hawaii as a destination to visit and as a place to live. She says the site will also be a platform for Hawaii residents to share their stories, part of the Huffington Post's mission.

"We want to bring that to Hawaii to encourage a robust conversation," Huffington said in a video posted to the Huffington Post website.

The site will cover everything from beaches to the state's economy, Huffington said.

"It's a little bit like our life, it's a mixture of everything," she said.

Civil Beat was created in 2010 by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar, who now serves as the site's CEO and publisher. Omidyar says Civil Beat will focus more deeply on public affairs and investigative journalism.

"It lets us focus on what we like to do best and we will be able to bring newforms of content to the Hawaii audience," Omidyar said.

Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, though Omidyar said in a post on Civil Beat that any partnership has to make financial sense for both parties.

Civil Beat runs on a subscription model, with access costing roughly $20 monthly.

Patti Epler, Civil Beat's editor, said Civil Beat plans to hire several journalists to staff HuffPost Hawaii. Civil Beat would stick to its formula and keep its journalists focused on the subscription site, she said, and take advantage of Huffington Post's distribution.

"We plan to bolster our in-depth enterprise reports as well as our analysis of developing stories," Epler said.

Epler said the partnership is similar to partnerships Huffington Post has with newsagencies Asahi Shimbun in Japan and Le Monde in France.

Cuban blogger returns home to unknown future

One of Cuba's most famous names is returning from a prolonged global tour, but don't expect well-wishers, flowers or marching bands.

Most islanders won't even know about it.

When Yoani Sanchez touches down on a flight from Madrid on Thursday, May 30, she will step into an unknown future that could bring the dissident blogger more influence — or significantly more trouble — on this Communist-led island that has never looked kindly on dissent.

"It is too early to know what it will bring, what impact it will have," Sanchez's husband and fellow dissident, Reinaldo Escobar, told The Associated Press of his wife's highly publicized travels. "What awaits her is a lot of work, a lot of responsibility and the possibility to realize her dreams."

In several tweets early Wednesday, Sanchez said she was returning to Cuba after a "never-ending trip" and that she was "happy, exhausted and full of ideas."

For those wondering why she would go back to an island that considers her a public enemy, Sanchez answered: "Because I am stubborn ... for me, life is nowhere but in Cuba."

Communist authorities allowed Sanchez and several lesser-known opposition figures to travel as part of landmark migration reforms that took effect in January, eliminating exit visa requirements for all Cubans.

She has taken advantage of the newfound freedom by visiting more than a dozen countries since her trip began Feb. 17, touring the White House, giving speeches before European and Latin American parliamentarians and exchanging ideas with luminaries as diverse as Polish politician Lech Walesa and Cuban-American musician Emilio Estefan.

Sanchez, who has won fame with searing social commentary in her Generation Y blog and in a steady stream of tweets, has said she wants to start an independent online newspaper when she returns.

That could put the 37-year-old on a collision course with the government of President Raul Castro. The island has never shied away from international opprobrium when it felt its security was at risk.

In 2003, Fidel Castro jailed 75 intellectuals, activists and social commentators in a notorious crackdown on dissent. But Raul, who took office in 2006, has freed them amid a slate of social and economic reforms.

Cuba considers all dissidents to be stooges paid by Washington and Miami to stir up trouble. It had no comment on Sanchez's imminent return.

Observers were divided on how Cuba would react, though they agreed the government would probably not come down too hard because Sanchez, like other dissidents, has a very small following on the island.

"International prominence offers her opportunities for future trips and protection against possible arrest," said Arturo Lopez-Levy, a Cuban analyst and lecturer at the University of Denver. "But none of that strengthens her capacity for internal organizing, which is still meager."

Dissidents complain the government controls all media, effectively shutting them out of public discourse, and say those who openly support them are harassed and ostracized. But it is also true that after more than half a century of one-party rule, many Cubans express cynicism about getting involved in political matters, and don't see the dissidents as a viable answer to their daily problems.

Of 20 Havana residents polled informally by The Associated Press this week, only seven said they had heard of Sanchez, and several of those weren't sure exactly who she was. Just three said they knew about her international trip.

"It's the first time I ever heard that name," said Irene Solis, 23.

"Who?" asked Rosa Suarez, 34.

Sanchez's obscurity back home is a far cry from the star treatment she got on the trip, her first off the island after years of being refused an exit visa.

Over three-plus months, Sanchez visited Brazil, Peru, Mexico, Spain, Italy, the Czech Republic, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Holland and the United States, where she met with senior members of President Barack Obama's staff.

She spoke to international human rights leaders, gave speeches at U.S. universities and toured the NewYork offices of Google and Twitter. In Miami, she received hearty ovations from Cuban exiles and marveled at encountering a "Cuba outside Cuba."

She strolled the sun-kissed beaches of Rio de Janeiro, tweeted a photo of a Picasso masterpiece at NewYork's Museum of Modern Art and stood at the site of the long-fallen Berlin Wall.

She also met with editors at mediaoutlets from NPR and the NewYork Times to Spain's El Pais, and told a regional journalism conference in Mexico that Cuban bloggers walk "a red line between liberty and jail" — comments that surely upset authorities.

Ted Henken, a Cuba expert who helped organize part of Sanchez's tour, said she had gained more than 100,000 Twitter followers since she left, bringing her total above half a million.

It will be a strange homecoming when Sanchez steps back into the simple apartment she shares with Escobar and their son.

But Sanchez's return also presents challenges for the government, since its treatment of her is sure to receive close scrutiny from journalists, foreign governments and human rights organizations.

"She's the tip of the iceberg of an emergent civil society," said Henken, though he also predicted Sanchez's fame would immunize her somewhat from arrest or detention.

Carlos Saladrigas, co-chairman of the U.S.-based Cuba Study Group, which advocates closer ties between America and Cuba, said Sanchez's trip marked a seminal moment for dissidency on the island — but that the government could also gain from showing a newtolerance for criticism.

"There is no return from this," he said. "They knew that dissidents would say overseas what they say in Cuba. They took that risk."

Added Henken: "It does give (the government) a quiver in their arsenal to say that this is change, and change is real: 'We have allowed this to happen, and we have taken the consequences.'"

Iran seeks tighter control of foreign journalists

Iran's culture minister is seeking to tighten rules to supervise visiting foreign journalists.

A report Wednesday, May 29, by the semi-official Mehr newsagency quotes Mohammad Hosseini as saying tighter measures are being sought after an Israeli journalist reported from Tehran about the 2009 presidential election for a European newsoutlet.

Postelection turmoil in 2009 led the government to restrict access for visiting foreign journalists, many of whom left the country ahead of schedule.

Hosseini did not elaborate. He said 200 foreign journalists have applied to cover June's presidential elections.

The ministry has a final say on issuing credentials for foreign journalists seeking coverage of Iran.

Some 120 foreign mediaoutlets maintain offices in Iran.

Singapore to require news websites to be licensed

Singapore's government says a newpolicy will require online newswebsites to be licensed, a move that is being criticized as a form of censorship in a country where mediaoutlets are already strictly controlled.

The policy will require websites that report regularly on Singapore newsand have at least 50,000 visitors a month to obtain annual licenses, the city-state's MediaDevelopment Authority said in a statement Tuesday. They also will be required to remove content found to be in breach of MDA standards within 24 hours of notification.

"This is censorship, plain and simple," said Lee Kin Mun, a Singaporean social and political blogger who is more popularly known by his Internet persona, "Mr. Brown."

"Trying to regulate the Internet is like trying to grab jelly; the tighter your grip on it, the faster it leaks out of your hand," he said.

The MDA said the newpolicy, which takes effect June 1, would place newswebsites "on a more consistent regulatory framework with traditional newsplatforms which are already individually licensed."

It said it would "impose financial penalties or suspend or revoke" the licenses of any websites that do not comply with any of the conditions.

The MDA singled out 10 websites, nine of which are state-owned, with the exception being Yahoo Singapore. It said the newpolicy also may be extended to netizen websites and foreign newssites covering Singapore news.

To receive a license, a website will have to post a performance bond of 50,000 Singapore dollars ($39,400). This is similar to current requirements for niche TV broadcasters in Singapore.

"Our mainstream mediaare subjected to rules. Why shouldn't the online mediabe part of that regulatory framework?" said Communications and Information Minister Yaacob Ibrahim. "I don't see this as a clamping down. If anything, it is regularizing what is already happening on the Internet and making sure that they are on par with our mainstream media."

But The Online Citizen, one of the bigger netizen alternative newswebsites in Singapore, said it may shut down if the newlicensing rules are imposed on it.

"In the event that the newlicensing rules are extended to TOC, we will have to reassess the viability of continuing the website in light of the significant financial and legal liability the newrules impose," it said in a statement.

Yahoo Singapore said it would wait to receive the license conditions before commenting on the newmeasures.

Mediais strictly controlled and regulated in Singapore, with lobby group Reporters Without Borders ranking the Southeast Asian city-state 149th globally in terms of press freedom.

News Corp shows logo of struggling publishing unit

NewsCorp. on Tuesday, May 28, unveiled a friendlier-looking logo for the publishing division as it prepared to split the struggling newspaper and book unit from its TV and movie business by the end of June.

The unveiling, at a one-day meeting with investors in NewYork, followed the company's recent disclosure to securities regulators that the publishing unit would book an impairment charge of up to $1.4 billion this quarter before being spun off as a separate, publicly traded company.

The logo, in cursive lettering, is based on the handwriting of founder Rupert Murdoch and his father. It replaces the striped globe of the current NewsCorp. brand.

Since the split was announced last June, NewsCorp.'s stock has climbed 65 percent. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index has risen 26 percent over the same period. Many investors believe the struggling newspaper company will no longer be a drag on growth of the entertainment businesses.

On Tuesday, the chief executive of the publishing group, which will continue to be called NewsCorp., touted the unit's future as a separate entity while acknowledging its difficulties as print advertising continues to decline across the industry.

"We're certainly not naive about the challenges facing some of our newspapers," said CEO Robert Thomson, former managing editor of The Wall Street Journal, which will be part of the newNewsCorp.

Murdoch did not hold out hope for an advertising turnaround for print newspapers, whose ad revenue has been siphoned off by Web-based companies like Google Inc. and Facebook Inc.

"We're being very realistic and not expecting any big expansion," he said. "There's no doubt the Internet has taken a lot of business."

The investor day was meant to reassure investors about the value of the newNewsCorp. It will contain the company's newspapers in the U.S., Britain and Australia; Dow Jones & Co., which owns The Wall Street Journal; its for-profit education business, Amplify; book publisher HarperCollins; and TV assets in Australia.

A separate company, to be called 21st Century Fox, will house its 20th Century Fox movie studio, TV channels such as Fox Newsand Fox Sports 1 and its investment in overseas TV providers like Sky Deutschland and Sky Italia. The entertainment company's logo, featuring Hollywood-style spotlights, was unveiled earlier this month.

The presentation followed a series of confidence-building announcements focused on the publishing spinoff.

NewsCorp. said in March the publishing unit would have $2.6 billion in cash and no debt, and on Friday it said the unit was authorized to buy back $500 million in shares, which is seen as buttressing its share price if there is a sell-off once existing shareholders are distributed newshares in the publishing company.

Analyst Todd Juenger of Bernstein Research said the stock market was putting little to no value on the publishing side, in a research note Tuesday. He valued 21st Century Fox at $34 per share— slightly higher than the $33.24 NewsCorp. shares closed at Tuesday — and $6 per share for the publishing unit.

Dow Jones CEO Lex Fenwick also talked about newproducts that take aim at Bloomberg's financial data and newsservices in Tuesday's presentation. A product called DJX will include a wire service that gives institutional subscribers a two-minute head start on newsbroken by The Wall Street Journal and Dow Jones reporters.

Fenwick said the newNewsCorp. has a "huge opportunity" if it can expand on its less than 1 percent market share of what he said was $40 billion in spending every year by financial institutions on such niche data and newsplatforms.

INDUSTRY NEWS 5-30-2013

AP Stylebook marks 60th anniversary with new print edition

The AP Stylebook is marking its 60th anniversary with the 2013 print edition, which includes more than 90 new or updated entriesand broadens the guidelines on social media.

At about 500 pages, the AP Stylebook is widely used in newsrooms, classrooms and corporate offices worldwide. More than a dozen of the new entries are in the sections on food (such as Benedictine and Grand Marnier, madeleine and upside-down cake) and fashion (chichi and froufrou).

The numerals entries have been updated and consolidated for easier understanding and searching. The four-page section adopts numerals as the preferred usage for all distances and dimensions and provides, alphabetically by topic, almost 200 examples of when to use figures and when to spell them out.

The new entry on mental illness gives guidelines on when references are relevant, particularly in stories involving violent crime, and how they should be reported. The entry on illegal immigration, widely reported when it was announced in April, prohibits use of the term illegal immigrant, except in direct quotations essential to a story. Use of the word illegal is limited to an action, not a person.

The section on social media has been expanded with additional terms and definitions, including circles, flash mob and Google Hangout. Also broadened is information on how to secure, authenticate, attribute and reference user-generated content for text, photo captions and video scripts.

The weapons section spells out differences between assault rifle and assault weapon, magazine and clip, and pistol and revolver, and adds entries on bolt-action and lever-action rifles.

Among other new and revised entries are: Advent, Alaska Native, Asperger’s syndrome, athletic trainers in Sports Guidelines, disabled/handicapped, doughnut, dumpster, ethnic cleansing, homicide/murder/manslaughter, moped, populist, rack/wrack, red carpet, swag, underway, wacky and wildfires.

The 2013 edition consolidates a number of changes made since the 2012 volume was published. Stylebook Online is updated throughout the year, as AP editors make additions or changes.

The AP Stylebook is available in print, online and on mobile.

New this year is a package of AP style quizzes written by AP Stylebook editors, with automated scoring and information on the relevant style rules. AP Style Quizzes will sell for $6.95 for one year of access, or $3.95 when purchased with any other Stylebook product on apstylebook.com.

Also new are two special offers for book customers: When you buy the 2013 Stylebook, you can get Stylebook Online at half price; and when you sign up for automatic delivery of the new book each spring, you save 20 percent off the list price. The subscription-based Stylebook Online includes all Stylebook listings, plus an Ask the Editor feature with more than twice as many entries as the Stylebook itself, a pronunciation guide with phonetic spellings and audio pronouncers, and topical style guides about news events such as the papal succession and U.S. elections. Users can add their own entries, make notes and get notifications throughout the year when AP’s editors add or update listings. Stylebook Online’s website uses responsive design to automatically adapt to the user’s computer, tablet or smartphone screen size.

Stylebook Mobile contains all the content from the spiral-bound Stylebook, with the ability to search, add personalized listings or notes and mark your favorite listings for easy reference. The universal iOS app is optimized for iPhone and iPad. The 2013 Stylebook Mobile app is expected to be available shortly after the book, in mid-June.

The new print edition and online subscriptions can be ordered online at http://www.apstylebook.com. Stylebook Mobile is sold via iTunes.

The new spiral-bound Stylebook costs $16.75 for member news organizations and college bookstores and $20.95 retail. Stylebook Online prices are $26 for individual subscribers for one year and $16 for news organizations that are AP members. Prices for Stylebook Online site licenses are based on the number of users.

None of the Stylebook product prices have increased this year.

AP works with two technology companies to provide electronic checking of AP style, and both products are being updated to reflect the latest guidance in the 2013 edition. Tansa offers an AP Stylebook module for its proofing tools, which work with newsroom production systems. StyleGuard, powered by Equiom Linguistic Labs, is a plug-in for Microsoft Word that reviews documents for AP style. StyleGuard works on both Mac and PC versions of Word.

Updated regularly since its initial publication in 1953, the AP Stylebook is a must-have reference for writers, editors, students and professionals. It provides fundamental guidelines for spelling, language, punctuation, usage and journalistic style. It is the definitive resource for journalists.

On the Web: http://www.apstylebook.com/

On Twitter: http://twitter.com/apstylebook

On Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/apstylebook
Contact
Erin Madigan White
Media Relations Manager
The Associated Press
212-621-7005
emadigan@ap.org

AP, others fight for details in Maine girl's death

Two newsorganizations last week challenged a judge's decision to keep the public from learning the details of a case against a man charged with killing a 15-year-old girl.

The Associated Press and MaineToday Media, owner of the Portland Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram, asked the judge to release a probable cause affidavit containing details from a state police investigation that support a murder charge filed against 20-year-old Kyle Dube, of Orono.

Dube's lawyer, Stephen Smith, requested the document be sealed, based on concerns that details could fuel newscoverage, tainting potential jurors and creating more anger toward his client, who has received death threats.

Justice William Anderson agreed to keep the information under seal until the grand jury considers the charge.

Dozens of law enforcement officers, using aircraft and dogs, and hundreds of civilian volunteers spent days searching for Nichole Cable, who lived in Glenburn. Her body was found in a wooded area in Old Town, just east of her hometown. Dube was charged with murder the following day in jail, where he was serving a sentence for an unrelated crime.

First Amendment lawyer Sigmund Schutz, who filed the motion on behalf of the newsorganizations, said that affidavits may be sealed only under rare circumstances that don't apply in this case.

"In the United States and in the state of Maine individuals are not put in jail for secret reasons; and the public has a right to know those reasons," he wrote.

The affidavit, which was reviewed by the judge, shows why police believe Dube is the killer and may answer questions about why or how the girl was killed.

"In cases of heightened public interest, like this one, the First Amendment interest in open proceedings is particularly compelling," Schutz said.

The attorney general's office took no position on the request to impound the affidavit.

It's a gray area because of the lack of case law in Maine. Some judges feel that they have the right to impound probable cause affidavits, while others don't think they have a right to do so, Deputy Attorney General Bill Stokes said.

Smith, Dube's lawyer, didn't immediately return a call seeking comment.

Dube has been placed in protective custody, segregated from other inmates, since being charged with killing the girl. He was serving a 90-day sentence for leading police on a chase at 100 mph on a motorcycle when he was charged in her death.

Prosecutors will seek to have bail revoked. A grand jury could consider the case as early as next week.

Schumer: Group of senators to look at media leaks

Sen. Chuck Schumer said Sunday, May 26, a group of eight senators will look at setting rules on how leaks about government secrets are investigated.

"We'll be announcing that we have four Democrats and four Republicans ... another Gang of Eight," Schumer said Sunday on CBS' "Face The Nation."

Schumer said in mid-May that he and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., will reintroduce the so-called mediashield bill pursued unsuccessfully four years ago.

The NewYork Democrat said Sunday that before the government asks a newsorganization to divulge sources it first must go to a judge. He says that judge would "impose a balancing test" to determine which is more important, the government's desire to find the information or the robust freedom of the press.

Back in 2009, after the House passed a mediashield bill, the action shifted to the Senate, leading to a compromise bill that would protect reporters' sources, but grant the government authority to override that in certain national security cases. The measure was never voted on by the full Senate.

In recent weeks, the administration has acknowledged secretly seizing portions of two months of phone records from The Associated Press. The AP received no advance warning. The seizure was part of an investigation into who leaked information to AP reporters for a May 7, 2012, story that disclosed details of a foiled plot in Yemen to bomb a U.S.-bound airliner, around the anniversary of the May 2, 2011, killing of Osama bin Laden.

The government also read the emails of Fox Newsreporter James Rosen in a separate investigation about the publication of government secrets. Rosen's emails were seized, with a judge's approval, as part of the prosecution of Stephen Kim, a State Department adviser who is accused of leaking secret information about North Korea.

Under intense pressure this week, President Barack Obama said the Justice Department would review the policy under which it obtains journalists' records in investigating leaks of government secrets.

The president said the government has to strike the right balance between security and an open society. He said Holder will meet with representatives of mediaorganizations and report back to him by July 12.

On the question of phone records, the Justice Department is guided by policy that first was written 40 years ago after the excesses of the Watergate era. Investigators are not supposed to consider a subpoena for journalists' phone records unless "all reasonable attempts" have been made to get the same information from other sources, the rules say.

Newsorganizations are supposed to get advance warning so that they can fight the subpoena in court, unless the notification could compromise an investigation.

The newproposal wouldn't provide blanket protection for a journalist from having to reveal whom he or she spoke to confidentially. But the government would have to convince a federal judge that the confidential source had compromised national security in speaking to the journalist.

The measure Schumer is proposing says that in civil and criminal cases, "a judge would have to conduct a balancing test that would weigh the public interest in the free flow of information against the needs of law enforcement," said Schumer spokesman Brian Fallon. He said that in national security cases, more deference is paid to the needs of law enforcement.

In national security leak cases, the bill would require a judge to determine that information being sought is necessary to prevent or mitigate national security harm, Fallon said. Mediawould need to be "notified in real time" that their records are being sought, he said.

Lafferty joins Pa.-based Impressions Media as GM

A veteran mediaexecutive has been named general manager and business development director for the parent company of The Times Leader newspaper in Wilkes-Barre, Pa.

The Times Leader (http://bit.ly/1105Kqt) reports that Walt Lafferty joins Impressions Media from GateHouse MediaInc., where he served as a publisher and group controller for several newspapers in Illinois.

Lafferty has held top management positions at several newspaper and mediagroups over the past 25 years. The 52-year-old executive is a native of Delaware County, outside Philadelphia.

Besides its flagship newspaper, Wilkes-Barre-based Impressions Mediaalso owns several other mediaproperties in northeastern Pennsylvania, including the Sunday Dispatch in Pittston and the NEPA Energy Journal.

Impressions is a unit of Civitas Media, a mediacompany that owns nearly 100 daily and weekly papers in 12 states.

Details on how News Corp. split will work

NewsCorp. is planning to split into two companies. One company will operate as a newspaper and book publisher and will retain the NewsCorp. name. The other will be an entertainment company, called 21st Century Fox.

Here's how the split will work:

— Newspapers, book publishing and information services such as Dow Jones Newswires will be part of the publishing company. The 20th Century Fox movie studio, the Fox broadcast TV network and the Fox NewsChannel will be part of the mediaand entertainment company.

— Current NewsCorp. shareholders will get shares in each company. Both companies will trade publicly, under different stock tickers. In the U.S., the entertainment company is tentatively planning to use "FOX" and "FOXA" for its two classes of shares, while NewsCorp. is likely to keep "NWS" and "NWSA."

— The newNewsCorp. company will be spun off and the existing NewsCorp. will be renamed 21st Century Fox. The newNewsCorp. will have $2.56 billion in cash and no debt. That amount is to include a payment of $1.82 billion from what will become 21st Century Fox. Another $741 million is already held in cash by the businesses to be spun off.

— The board has approved a program for the publishing business to buy back $500 million of shares after the split, providing a buttress to its share value. There's also a shareholder-rights plan, known as a poison bill, designed to prevent a hostile takeover of either company in the volatile trading period after the split is complete.

— Rupert Murdoch will be chairman of both companies and CEO of the mediaand entertainment company. Robert Thomson, former managing editor of The Wall Street Journal, will become CEO of the publishing company. Murdoch will end up controlling both companies through the nearly 40 percent of Class B voting shares he controls through a family trust. Murdoch's compensation package for the two companies combined could rise by as much as 15 percent if financial targets are met.

— NewsCorp.'s board has approved the split. It plans to hold a special meeting of its shareholders on June 11 in NewYork and expects the deal to be completed on June 28.

Philadelphia Website plan for columns by candidates draws fire

Philly.com, a website affiliated with Philadelphia's two major newspapers, is drawing criticism from politicians and journalists for its decision to publish columns by Gov. Tom Corbett and one of his prospective re-election challengers, U.S Rep. Allyson Schwartz.

In a Friday, May 26, story in The Philadelphia Inquirer, the parent company's top executive said the decision was based on a desire to draw readers and dismissed the suggestion that it is playing favorites in what is expected to be an intense 2014 gubernatorial campaign.

"There is no political bias or intent, other than providing content that is interesting to our readers," said Robert J. Hall, CEO of Interstate General Media, which owns Philly.com, the Inquirer, and the Philadelphia Daily News.

Corbett, a Republican, and Schwartz, a Democrat, were invited to be part of the "NewVoices of Philly.com," which also features a sexologist, a gay-rights leader, a pot-legalization advocate and renowned Flyers goalie Bernie Parent, who dispenses advice on relationships.

Hall said Philly.com is not a newspaper website and research shows readers do not consider it one, even though it publishes articles from both newspapers. Because it offers content from various mediasources, including blogs that express opinions, it is not bound by traditional newspaper conventions such as the need for a clear distinction between those who write the newsand those who make it, he said.

Journalism ethicists said offering free space to a political leader raises troubling questions.

"Obviously, there's a lot of room for confusion among your audience. You have split Philly.com and the newspaper, but the audience still sees it as the same site," said Kelly McBride, who teaches journalism ethics at the Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Fla. "What about The Inquirer's watchdog coverage of the governor? ... Or are you going to be partners with the sitting governor and carry his agenda?"

Gene Foreman, a former Inquirer managing editor and former Penn State University journalism professor who has written a book about journalistic ethics, considers the website a newsorganization and believes other readers do too.

"I think a newsorganization has to respond to a higher goal than simply conforming to a law or an FCC order — we're talking about innate fairness," he said.

Corbett's press secretary, Kevin Harley, said the governor is likely to take a multimedia approach that includes video as well as written columns.

Schwartz will work with her campaign staff to develop her messages, said Rachel Magnuson, the fifth-term congresswoman's chief of staff.

Other Democratic gubernatorial hopefuls expressed varying reactions.

"It would be nice if Governor Corbett spent as much time trying to fix Pennsylvania's economy as he does giving mediainterviews and writing op-eds about himself," said York businessman Tom Wolf, a former state revenue secretary.

John Hanger, a former state utility regulator and environmental protection secretary, said Corbett should not use state resources to prepare his columns.

As attorney general, "Corbett sent people to jail for campaigning with taxpayer funds," he said.

Bill would protect Calif. reporters' phone records

California state agencies would be required to give journalists five days' notice before they issue subpoenas to a third-party company for telephone records under legislation announced Thursday, May 25, by a state senator.

Democratic state Sen. Ted Lieu, of Torrance, said he would seek the measure to give greater protection for newsgathering operations.

He acted after it was disclosed that the U.S. Department of Justice had retrieved the logs from 20 business and personal telephone lines of journalists employed by The Associated Press. Lieu and other critics said the threat of such surveillance impedes journalists' ability to report the news, including their ability to gather information from government sources.

"It's my belief that our constitutional democracy relies on freedom of the press," Lieu said. "It's the press that keeps government honest, and we chill freedom of the press at our peril."

California has a strong shield law for journalists, which already requires that law enforcement agencies give five days' notice to newsorganizations for subpoenas served on the newsgathering organization or the reporter. However, Lieu said the Justice Department probe shows that investigators can bypass the shield law by secretly subpoenaing third-parties — including Internet, telephone or communications companies — for journalists' personal and work-related information.

"That exposes a glaring loophole in the shield law," Lieu said.

His measure would be unlikely to stop federal agencies, which could still seek the records through federal courts. However, Lieu noted that there are two proposals in Congress to provide greater protections for journalists.

Adding the early warning requirement to California's shield law would give journalists time to fight the subpoenas in court.

"It gives the newsgathering organization an opportunity to go before a neutral arbiter and have the law enforcement agency identify the compelling interest, and to ensure that the application for the subpoena is as narrow as possible," said Jim Ewert, general counsel of the California Newspaper Publishers Association. "The advantage would be to prevent someone from circumventing the shield law in California in much the same way the Justice Department did with AP, by going to a third party."

The association is sponsoring Lieu's proposal.

Lieu plans to amend an existing unrelated bill, SB558, to include his proposed notice requirement. SB558 passed the Senate and is awaiting consideration in the Assembly.

U.S. Justice Department spokesman Dean Boyd said his agency would not comment on pending legislation.

SF Chronicle gets new publisher, president

Newspaper veteran Jeffrey Johnson will be the newp ublisher of the San Francisco Chronicle and former Yahoo Inc. executive Joanne Bradford will be the publication's next president, Hearst Corp. announced Thursday, May 23.

The Chronicle's current president and publisher, Frank Vega, 64, is retiring but will remain as chairman through the transition. He has been at the Chronicle's helm since 2005.

The newpair, who assume their jobs June 3, will oversee the newspaper and its website, SFGate.com, and will report to Hearst Newspapers President Mark Aldam.

"They have deep publishing and newmediaexperience and believe in the power of great content with a valued brand," Hearst CEO Frank Bennack Jr. said in a newsrelease.

Johnson, 53, served as publisher and CEO of the Los Angeles Times from 2005-2006, and most recently was a partner at The Yucaipa Companies, focusing on mediainvestments. He also was senior vice president and general manager of the Times from 2000 to 2004, and earlier worked at the Chicago Tribune and Orlando Sentinel.

Bradford, 49, comes to the Chronicle from Demand Media, where she served as chief revenue and marketing officer since 2010. She previously was a vice president at Yahoo.

"It is a dynamic time for mediawhere newdistribution opportunities abound and we intend to make sure the Chronicle and SFGate remain the information leader in the Bay Area," Bradford said in a statement.

The Chronicle was founded in 1865. Hearst has owned it since 2000. SFGate.com was among the first websites for a major metropolitan daily, debuting in 1993.

WikiLeaks case file fight moves to federal court

The WikiLeaks organization and a handful of journalists asked a federal judge last week to order greater transparency in the court-martial of an Army private who has acknowledged sending reams of classified document to the WikiLeaks website.

The Center for Constitutional Rights, representing WikiLeaks and its founder Julian Assange, filed the petition in U.S. District Court in Baltimore. It seeks an order requiring public access to all documents in the court-martial of Pfc. Bradley Manning.

It also seeks to have the lawyers and military judge "reconstitute" in open court certain conferences they have held out of public view.

Shaunteh Kelly, a spokeswoman for the Military District of Washington, where Manning is being court-martialed, said the Army has a policy of not commenting on pending litigation.

Manning's 3-year-old espionage case is headed for trial next month at Fort Meade, near Baltimore. Many records of the pretrial proceedings remain secret because the military contends the First Amendment doesn't require it to provide prompt public access to court-martial documents.

Unlike civilian courts, where case files are readily available for public inspection in a clerk's office, there is no central repository for court-martial records. The military initially required reporters covering the Manning case to file federal Freedom of Information Act requests for documents, including the military judge's rulings. In February, it began releasing redacted versions of some court-martial records on a public website. In April, the judge, Army Col. Denise Lind, started releasing some of her written rulings to reporters the same day.

Still, the petition says, the public is being denied its First Amendment right to scrutinize the Manning case as it proceeds.

The other plaintiffs are Salon.com columnist Glenn Greenwald, The Nation columnist Jeremy Scahill, Democracy Now! broadcaster Amy Goodman, The American Conservative contributing editor Chase Madar, and Firedoglake.com writer Kevin Gosztola.

The same plaintiffs raised virtually identical issues in the military court system last year. The military's highest court rejected the transparency case in April and suggested it belonged in civilian court.

In the military courts, the transparency case was supported by a coalition of 30 news-gathering organizations, including The Associated Press, under the auspices of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. The Center for Constitutional Rights attached the Reporters Committee letter to one of its filings Wednesday in the federal case.

White House: Reporters shouldn't be prosecuted

President Barack Obama believes journalists shouldn't be prosecuted for doing their jobs, the White House said Tuesday, May 21, showing solidarity with First Amendment advocates alarmed by a pair of high-profile federal probes into national security leaks.

Although Obama believes leaking classified information violates the law, he also believes that a free press is critical — and that questions being raised about the proper balance between those two concerns are entirely appropriate, said White House spokesman Jay Carney.

"I can't comment on the specifics of any ongoing criminal matter," Carney said. "But if you're asking me whether the president believes that journalists should be prosecuted for doing their jobs, the answer is no."

That was a departure from the day before, when Carney declined to answer a question about whether it's appropriate for a reporter who published classified information to be treated as a potential criminal. "I understand the question and I appreciate it, but I cannot comment," Carney said.

Concerns about the Justice Department's efforts to unearth reporters' confidential sources in leak investigations have put the White House in a difficult position, unable to defend itself against claims that the administration is encroaching on press freedoms without commenting on pending investigations — a move the White House says would be wholly inappropriate. Making it tougher for Obama to weigh in is the fact that the Justice Department probes essentially amount to criminal investigations of officials within his own administration.

Shortly after The Associated Press reported last week that prosecutors had secretly subpoenaed phone records for its reporters, the White House endorsed the idea of reviving mediashield legislation in the Senate, a gesture designed to show it takes protections for journalists seriously even if it can't say whether its own Justice Department acted appropriately. But tensions over the issue were ratcheted up Monday after developments in another case revealed that an investigator had declared that a journalist who discloses leaked information is committing a crime.

In that case, prosecutors got a search warrant for the private emails of Fox Newsreporter James Rosen and used State Department building security records to track his movements as they sought to identify his source in a story about North Korea. That case led to the indictment of an official for revealing classified information, but prosecutors declined to arrest or seek an indictment of Rosen.

Fox Newswould not comment Tuesday on Carney's remarks, pointing instead to comments a day earlier from its executive vice president of news, Michael Clemente. He called the Rosen case "downright chilling" and vowed to "unequivocally defend his right to operate as a member of what up until now has always been a free press."

The White House Correspondents' Association said Tuesday that taken together, the two cases raise serious questions about whether the government has gotten too aggressive in tracking and monitoring reporters.

"We stand in strong solidarity with our colleagues who have been scrutinized. And in terms of the administration, ultimately what will matter more in all of these cases is action not words," the association said in a statement released by its board members and its president, Fox NewsChannel correspondent Ed Henry.

Judge: Juror committed contempt at murder trial

A Topeka, Kan., man who commented on a newspaper's website about an ongoing murder trial in which he was a juror must pay a $1,000 fine or spend three days in jail, a judge ruled.

Shawnee County District Judge Evelyn Wilson ruled Monday, May 20, that James Reeder put himself in indirect contempt of court by posting the comment on The Topeka Capital-Journal's website during last summer's murder trial of Anceo Stovall. Stovall was charged with killing a Topeka woman and wounding another in a July 2011 attack.

Wilson warned jurors throughout the trial not to "seek out and read any mediaaccounts" about the case. But Reeder posted a comment in a story about the trial under the pseudonym "BePrepared," the newspaper reported (http://bit.ly/117Sshq).

Reeder's attorney, Matt Works, said his client doesn't believe he caused any harm by posting the comment.

"It's an unfortunate situation," Works said. "I expect he will pay the fine" rather than go to jail. Reeder has 30 days in which to pay the fine.

Stovall's trial ended in a hung jury on nine counts, including the murder charge, an acquittal on one charge and a conviction on another.

Because of Reeder's misconduct, the robbery conviction later was overturned, Wilson said.

"Mr. Reeder couldn't wait two more days to talk about his experiences," Wilson said. "There is great harm when someone in Mr. Reeder's position of great trust violates in this way."

Stovall requested a newtrial based on juror misconduct, but the case ended when he accepted a plea agreement. He was sentenced to 109 months for reckless second-degree murder, 17 months for attempted aggravated battery and five months for a criminal threat, all to run consecutively.

Policy, discretion guide media sources probes

It was a rare moment in relations between the mediaand the government: In 2008, FBI Director Robert Mueller called the top editors at The NewYork Times and The Washington Post to apologize because the bureau had improperly obtained reporters' telephone records four years earlier.

The extraordinary call was an admission that the FBI's actions violated Justice Department policy about seeking journalists' phone records. But nothing about what the FBI did in 2004 appeared to run afoul of any law.

The Justice Department's latest effort to examine whom journalists are talking to — the secret subpoena of Associated Press phone records from April and May of last year — demonstrates how government investigators are guided more by policy and the judgments of high-ranking officials than by specific laws or, in this case, the need to satisfy an independent federal judge.

The AP case involves a criminal investigation into who gave information to the newscooperative's reporters about a foiled bomb plot in Yemen. The AP's May 7, 2012, story attributed details of the operation to unnamed government officials.

The government informed the AP 10 days ago that it had secretly obtained records for 21 phone numbers, including those of the reporters on the bomb plot story. The department's guidelines, first drafted in the wake of Watergate-era government abuses, call for newsorganizations to be informed before investigators ask phone companies for records unless doing so would compromise the investigation.

Attorney General Eric Holder said the story was the result of "a very serious leak, a very grave leak." AP President and Chief Executive Officer Gary Pruitt called the gathering of phone records a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into how newsorganizations gather the news.

Newdevelopments emerged Monday in another case that has led to the indictment of an official for revealing classified information. Federal prosecutors got a search warrant for the private emails of Fox Newsreporter James Rosen and used building security records at the State Department to track his movements as they sought to identify whom he had relied on for classified information in a story about North Korea.

The tension over balancing the government's duty to protect national security and the media'srole as public watchdog is long-standing. Take away protections for reporters' confidential sources and "the people who know what's happening become fearful, and they will not come forward with information the public may find very valuable," said Lucy Dalglish, dean of the University of Maryland's journalism school. "It's a classic chilling effect."

But neither, said George Washington University law professor Orin Kerr, does the public want a world of free disclosure by government workers with no opportunity for the government to investigate. "It requires a very delicate balance. We wouldn't want either extreme," Kerr said.

One possibility for compromise is a long-discussed federal mediashield law to go along with similar laws in most states. Even as President Barack Obama defended his administration's aggressive pursuit of leakers of government secrets, he also said Congress should consider a law that generally would protect journalists from government subpoenas and allow judges, in rare instances, to decide whether national security concerns trump press freedoms.

Sens. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said they would introduce a newversion of a mediashield bill that Congress last considered four years ago.

The congressional proposals — and there have been many over the years — are partly a response to a 1972 Supreme Court ruling that nothing in the First Amendment protects reporters from being called to testify before grand juries. Justice Byron White's majority opinion scoffed at the idea that it would dry up confidential sources. He said Congress was free to give journalists, or "newsmen" in that era's parlance, additional protection under federal law. That case arose in the context of the government's pursuit of Black Panthers and also drug users in Kentucky.

But the 5-4 ruling in Branzburg v. Hayes also has bedeviled generations of prosecutors, medialawyers and judges because one of the five justices in the majority, Lewis Powell, wrote a concurring opinion that suggested that maybe the court's holding was not as absolute as it sounded. Powell said courts would consider the competing claims of prosecutors and journalists case by case, and called judges to strike "a proper balance between freedom of the press and the obligation of all citizens to give relevant testimony with respect to criminal conduct."

At the time, Justice Potter Stewart charitably referred to Powell's opinion as "enigmatic" and hoped that it would lead to "a more flexible view in the future."

Last year, Judge Albert Diaz, a member of a federal appeals court panel that is weighing an effort to compel a reporter's testimony in an investigation of unauthorized disclosure, called the 1972 ruling "clear as mud." The panel of the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., has yet to rule on the attempt by NewYork Times journalist James Risen to avoid testifying at the trial of former CIA officer Jeffrey Sterling. Sterling is accused of leaking classified information about a botched covert operation in Iran.

Earlier, U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema, the trial judge handling Sterling's case, sided with Risen, saying, "A criminal trial subpoena is not a free pass for the government to rifle through a reporter's notebook."

Other courts, though, recently have rejected journalists' attempts to quash subpoenas for their testimony.

The rules governing how the government seeks other information such as emails haven't kept up with the pace of technology. When it comes to electronic records held by Internet service providers, technology companies and credit card companies, the rules "are not as strict as they are for newsmediatelephone toll records," said Alan Butler, appellate advocacy counsel for the Electronic Privacy Information Center.

The wide sweep of the subpoena — across AP bureaus in Washington, NewYork and Hartford, Conn. — and the lack of advance warning make the government's approach look "more like a dragnet" than the narrowly drafted request the Justice Department guidelines say is required, Dalglish said.

University of Chicago law professor Geoffrey Stone said Justice Department officials are aware that the broader they cast the net, the more questions they will face. "They reached as far as they did because it was the only way to get the information they needed," Stone said.

As for the lack of notice, he said, it was at least plausible to believe that the authorities "really want to catch this guy who leaked really bad information, from their perspective. They didn't want to do anything to scare him off."

Gov't presses ahead on another leak case

In another case of the Obama administration investigating classified information improperly disclosed to reporters, the government is prosecuting a State Department expert on North Korea in a probe that appears to step into uncharted territory — by declaring that a journalist is committing a crime in disclosing leaked information.

During the investigation of State Department adviser Stephen Kim, law enforcement officials obtained a search warrant for some private emails of James Rosen, the chief Washington correspondent for Fox News. Investigators also tracked Rosen's comings and goings from the State Department.

An FBI agent seeking the search warrant spelled out the government's view of the journalist's role, saying the reporter is a co-conspirator and that there is probable cause to believe that the reporter committed a violation of criminal law.

"We are outraged to learn today that James Rosen was named a criminal co-conspirator for simply doing his job as a reporter," said Michael Clemente, Fox's executive vice president for news. "In fact, it is downright chilling. We will unequivocally defend his right to operate as a member of what up until now has always been a free press."

Kim, who is awaiting trial, is accused of revealing secrets to the newsorganization, which is owned by NewsCorp. No charges have been filed against Rosen.

The Kim case is further along than a more recent leak probe in which prosecutors secretly subpoenaed Associated Press phone records. In the AP case, AP President and Chief Executive Gary Pruitt said the government's conduct has already had a chilling effect on newsgathering, a week after the AP subpoenas were revealed publicly.

In June 2009, Rosen reported that U.S. intelligence officials warned President Barack Obama and senior U.S. officials that North Korea would respond to a United Nations Security Council resolution condemning nuclear tests with another nuclear test.

The 2010 affidavit for a search warrant, first reported by The Washington Post, does not identify Rosen as "the reporter," but he wrote the story at issue, and Fox Newsconfirmed it was him on Monday.

The White House wouldn't comment about tracking Rosen, citing an ongoing criminal investigation. Instead, White House spokesman Jay Carney cited a mediashield law Obama supports as evidence of his commitment to journalistic freedom, reprising an argument the White House used a week earlier in declining to address the Justice Department's probe involving AP.

"The president believes it's important that we find a proper balance between a need — absolute need — to protect our secrets and to prevent leaks that can jeopardize the lives of Americans and can jeopardize our national security interests on the one hand, and the need to defend the First Amendment and protect the ability of reporters to pursue investigative journalism," Carney said.

In the Kim case, "based on the investigation and all of the facts known to date, no other individuals, including the reporter, have been charged since Mr. Kim was indicted nearly three years ago," said the U.S. Attorney's office in Washington, D.C., which is prosecuting the case.

The Justice Department said that improper disclosure of classified information to the press can pose a serious risk of harm to national security, and said it has followed the law and its policies to protect First Amendment rights.

The material at issue in the Kim case came from an intelligence report that had been communicated to officials in the intelligence community, including Kim, on the morning that Rosen's story was published, according to the affidavit for a search warrant by FBI agent Reginald Reyes. Between the time of that communication and when the story was published, someone with Kim's unique electronic profile and password accessed the report at least three times.

Citing telephone call records, the affidavit also said that multiple phone calls were made between the two that day, including two from Kim when someone with his profile was viewing the report. The FBI agent also cited multiple calls between Kim's cellphone and Rosen and his newsorganization.

The FBI went well beyond phone records to try to establish a connection between the two. The agent wrote that State Department security badge access records showed that Kim and Rosen, who had an office at the State Department at the time, left the building at nearly the same time that day, were gone for about 25 minutes, and returned around the same time. The FBI affidavit also said that when State Department Diplomatic Security personnel entered Kim's office space two months later, they found Rosen's article "lying in plain view" on Kim's desk.

The affidavit stated that the email communications, obtained by search warrants on Kim's Yahoo email accounts, show Rosen and Kim used aliases — "Alex" and "Leo," respectively. In one email, Rosen writes: "What I am interested in, as you might expect, is breaking newsahead of my competitors ... Let's break some news, and expose muddle-headed policy when we see it."

Rosen encouraged Kim to disclose sensitive U.S. internal documents and intelligence about North Korea (identified only as the "Foreign Country"), according to the affidavit.

"The reporter did not possess a security clearance and was not entitled to receive the information published in the June 2009 article," wrote Reyes, the FBI agent.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Alan Kay signed the warrant.

INDUSTRY NEWS 5-23-2013

AP CEO calls records seizure 'unconstitutional'

The Associated Press' president and chief executive says the government's secret seizure of two months of reporters' phone records has already had a chilling effect on newsgathering, a week after the subpoenas were revealed publicly.

Gary Pruitt on Sunday, May 19, called the Justice Department's actions "unconstitutional" and said the AP hasn't ruled out legal action.

In his first television interviews since the AP reported the Justice Department seizure, Pruitt said it has made sources less willing to talk to AP journalists and, in the long term, could limit Americans' information from all newsoutlets.

Pruitt told CBS' "Face the Nation" that the government has no business monitoring the AP's newsgathering activities.

"And if they restrict that apparatus ... the people of the United States will only know what the government wants them to know and that's not what the framers of the Constitution had in mind when they wrote the First Amendment," he said.

In a separate interview with the AP, Pruitt said, "It's too early to know if we'll take legal action but I can tell you we are positively displeased and we do feel that our constitutional rights have been violated."

He said President Barack Obama "should rein in that out-of-control investigation."

"They've been secretive, they've been overbroad and abusive — so much so that taken together, they are unconstitutional because they violate our First Amendment rights," he added.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky said the government needs to stop leaks by whatever means necessary.

"This is an investigation that needs to happen because national security leaks, of course, can get our agents overseas killed," he said.

Republican Sen. John Cornyn, a member of the Judiciary Committee, said the government should focus on those who leak sensitive national security matters and not on journalists who report on them. The Texas Republican said his committee should hold hearings on how the Justice Department obtained phone records from AP reporters and editors.

"What confuses me is the focus on the press, who have a constitutional right here and we depend on the press to get to the bottom of so many issues that we, as individuals, cannot," Cornyn said.

Cornyn said the Justice Department's actions were part of a pattern for Obama's administration to quiet its critics.

"It's a culture of cover-ups and intimidation that is giving the administration so much trouble," Cornyn said.

He also renewed his call for Attorney General Eric Holder to resign, citing the contempt citation the House of Representatives voted against him last year for refusing to turn over documents in a failed government gun smuggling sting.

White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer said the president "has complete faith in Attorney General Holder." He also insisted the White House was not involved in the decision to seek AP phone records.

"A cardinal rule is we don't get involved in independent investigations. And this is one of those," Pfeiffer said.

Although the Justice Department has not explained why it sought phone records from the AP, Pruitt pointed to a May 7, 2012, story that disclosed details of a successful CIA operation in Yemen to stop an airliner bomb plot around the one-year anniversary of the May 2, 2011, killing of Osama bin Laden.

The AP delayed publication of that story at the request of government officials who said it would jeopardize national security.

"We respected that, we acted responsibly, we held the story," Pruitt said.

Pruitt said the AP published the story only after officials from two government entities said the threat had passed. He said the administration still asked that the story be held until an official announcement the next day, a request the AP rejected.

The newsservice viewed the story as important because White House and Homeland Security Department officials were saying publicly there was no credible evidence of a terrorist threat to the U.S. around the one-year anniversary of bin Laden's death.

"So that was misleading to the American public. We felt the American public needed to know this story," Pruitt said.

The AP has seen an effect on its newsgathering since the disclosure of the Justice Department's subpoena, he said.

"Officials that would normally talk to us and people we talk to in the normal course of newsgathering are already saying to us that they're a little reluctant to talk to us," Pruitt said. "They fear that they will be monitored by the government."

The Justice Department secretly obtained two months of personal and work telephone records for several reporters and editors, as well as general AP office numbers in NewYork, Washington and Hartford, Conn., and for the main number for the AP in the House of Representatives press gallery.

"It was sweeping and broad and beyond what they needed to do," Pruitt said.

He objected to the "Justice Department acting on its own being the judge, jury and executioner in secret," saying the AP would not back down.

"We're not going to be intimidated by the abusive tactics of the Justice Department," he said.

McConnell and Pfeiffer were interviewed on NBC's "Meet the Press." Cornyn appeared on "Face the Nation."

Subpoena of AP records revives media shield bill

The controversy over the government's secret subpoena of Associated Press telephone records has revived legislation that protect journalists from having to reveal their sources to federal investigators — and the White House is endorsing the idea.

The proposal wouldn't provide blanket protection for a journalist from having to reveal who he or she spoke to confidentially. But the government would have to convince a federal judge that the confidential source had compromised national security in speaking to the journalist.

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., says he and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., will reintroduce the so-called mediashield bill pursued unsuccessfully four years ago. President Barack Obama said Thursday, May 16, that the point of a mediashield law was to strike the right balance between national security needs and a free press that "helps our democracy function."

"I think now's the time for us to go ahead and revisit that legislation," Obama said. "I think that's a worthy conversation to have, and I think that's important."

Back in 2009, after the House passed a mediashield bill, the action shifted to the Senate, where the Obama administration lobbied to add provisions aimed at protecting national security. That led to a compromise bill that would protect reporters' sources, but grant the government authority to override that in certain national security cases. Despite those concessions, the bill garnered the support of the American Society of Newspaper Editors.

In the AP case, the Justice Department secretly obtained telephone records of the newsorganization's reporters and editors for more than 20 separate telephone lines in April and May 2012. AP was not told of the seizure until after the fact, provoking angry responses this week from the company's president and CEO, other newsoutlets and members of Congress. The department hasn't said whether it got permission from a judge, but subpoenas are often issued by grand juries at the request of prosecutors.

Had a shield law been in effect, it might have forced the government to at least go through a federal judge to obtain the records.

The department collected the phone records in an attempt to find out sources for a May 7, 2012, AP story that disclosed details of a thwarted plot in Yemen to bomb a U.S.-bound airliner, around the anniversary of the killing of terrorist leader Osama bin Laden.

Under the shield bill, to get the information without notifying AP ahead of time, the government "would have had to show a judge that they needed this information, that they had an interest at stake that was valid, that they had evidence that notifying AP would really derail the investigation," said Gregg Leslie, legal defense director for the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press. "And I think that would have been hard to do."

The judge might have ordered the department to notify AP, Leslie said, which would have let the company go to court to fight the subpoena.

"And certainly, I would think with that kind of court hearing, the scope of this investigation would have been drastically narrowed," he said. The judge might have ordered that the records be turned over to him or her, so that the judge could limit the records that prosecutors had access to, Leslie said.

The 2009 compromise bill included a requirement that the journalist be given notice of the subpoena and an opportunity to be heard before the court, but with an exemption allowing judges to waive that for 45 days at a time if they determine the notice would pose a "substantial threat" to criminal or national security investigations, among other things.

The Senate Judiciary Committee sent the bill to the full Senate, but it was never voted on in the chamber. Leslie, of the Reporters Committee, said that was due in part to the WikiLeaks disclosure of classified documents in 2010.

The AP case has put newenergy into the bill, Schumer told reporters. He said that while it's unclear whether his bill would have changed the result in the case, "everyone would have felt a lot better had there been an independent arbiter as to whether any information should be required of the AP and how much, how broad the request should be."

Opposition remains, particularly from conservative Republicans and some in the intelligence community who believe a shield law could encourage improper disclosures and hamper the ability to track them down.

Also on Thursday two Democrats and two Republicans in the House introduced a bill that would prevent the federal government from getting Americans' phone records without a court order.

Syrian Group Claims Role In Newspaper Hacking

The website and several Twitter accounts belonging to The Financial Times were hacked Friday by the Syrian Electronic Army in an ongoing campaign that has targeted an array of mediaoutlets ranging from The Associated Press to the parody site The Onion, according to a claim by the so-called army.

The Syrian Electronic Army said it seized control of several FT Twitter accounts and amended a number of the site’s blog posts with the headline "Hacked by Syrian Electronic Army.” Hackers used their access to the FT’s Twitter feed to post messages, including one that said, "Syrian Electronic Army Was Here,” and another that linked to a YouTube video of an execution. Both messages were quickly removed.

The FT confirmed that it had been hacked through its Twitter feed, telling Twitter followers: "Various FT blogs and social mediaaccounts have been compromised by hackers and we are working to resolve the issue as quickly as possible.”

The attack follows dozens of other Syrian Electronic Army attacks on the social mediaaccounts of newsoutlets including The Guardian, the BBC, NPR, Reuters and The Associated Press. In The AP attack, the group used its access to the agency’s Twitter feed to plant a false story about explosions at the White House that sent the stock market into temporary free fall.

Researchers who have been conducting digital forensics on these attacks say they are done through so-called spearphishing, in which attackers send emails that contain a link to a fake newsarticle to employees at their target organization.

Once clicked, the link redirects employees to a fake Google or Microsoft mail site that asks the employee for their user name and password. The hackers then use that information to get inside employee’s inboxes, where they can send more emails to employees who have access to the organization’s social mediaaccounts, then use that access to reset the organization’s password to their Twitter account.

In the attack on The AP, a hacker who identifies himself as "Th3 Pr0” and a member of the Syrian Electronic Army said in an email that the group convinced 50 AP employees to hand over their login credentials.

Meanwhile, the Syrian Electronic Army itself became a hacking target this week. Anonymous, the loose hacking collective, took the group’s website offline in a type of digital attack called a distributed denial of service, or DDoS, in which they flood the site with traffic until it collapses under the load.

NBC hires news division chief from Britain

NBC has gone out of the company and out of the U.S. to find a president for its newsdivision, naming the first woman to hold the top job at its newsdivision.

Deborah Turness, former editor of ITV Newsin Britain, replaces Steve Capus, who resigned earlier this year, and will begin her newjob in August.

Turness will take over a newsdivision bruised by the "Today" show losing its long-held dominant position in the morning to ABC's "Good Morning America." NBC's flagship "Nightly News" broadcast still tops the evening newsratings, but its anchor Brian Williams recently saw his "Rock Center" newsmagazine abruptly cancelled earlier this month after less than two years on the air.

"It is quite simply the greatest imaginable honor to be named as the next president of NBC News," Turness said.

In NBC's newmanagement structure, she reports to Pat Fili-Krushel, head of the NBC Universal NewsGroup, as do MSNBC President Phil Griffin and CNBC President Mark Hoffman.

Fili-Krushel was not immediately available for comment. She said in a statement that Turness is "very familiar" with NBC Newsthrough a partnership the two networks have.

Turness, 46, became editor of ITV Newsin 2004, the first woman and youngest person to hold that job. Often overshadowed by the state-funded BBC, ITV is Britain's largest commercial television network. ITN, which is 40 percent owned by ITV, is Britain's top commercial newsproducer. Turness joined the company in 1988 as a newsproducer and worked for four years during the 1990s in the company's Washington bureau.

"Deborah epitomizes everything that is best about ITN, inspiring our newsrooms with her ideas, enthusiasm and energy," said John Hardie, CEO of ITN. As editor of ITV News, Turness was in charge of newscoverage and business operations.

The morning will no doubt be her top priority upon joining NBC. The decline of "Today" is a major blow to the company's pride and bottom line. Women dominate the show's viewership and the ham-fisted replacement of anchor Ann Curry with Savannah Guthrie last year tore at the show's popularity. It has not gone unnoticed that men supervised the show during its turnover.

Within the next two years, Turness will likely be responsible for choosing Matt Lauer's successor on "Today" should the long-running anchor decide to leave.

"Nightly News" still has a comfortable lead in evening newsratings over ABC and CBS. But Turness will probably face lingering morale issues related to the cancellation of "Rock Center" after being bounced around the network's prime-time schedule.

NC newspapers tout win over public notice bill

The North Carolina Press Association is claiming victory in a battle to maintain government notices in newspapers, but the war isn't yet over.

Two bills in the North Carolina House that would have chipped away at newspaper monopolies over notices of public meetings failed to meet a deadline for the two-year legislative session ending in 2014. But a Senate version of one bill wasn't subject to that deadline, which requires all bills that don't involve spending or taxing to clear at least one chamber.

The first House bill would allow 10 counties to use electronic notices instead of newspaper ads. Under the bill, local governments would have to mail or email notices to people who ask for them. Newspapers, which are currently the only game in town and collect revenue from the notices, would remain an option.

The Senate version of that bill applies to different counties but is largely the same.

Supporters have argued the current system isn't fit for a digital age in which newspapers are no longer the chief source of information. Opponents say removing the requirement ignores the technology gap that exists in many communities and deals a blow to the public's right to know.

The other House bill would replace newspaper notices with electronic notices for a number of state Department of Environment and Natural Resources announcements.

Rep. Marilyn Avila, R-Wake, successfully pushed for an amendment that replaced the whole bill with her own measure maintaining newspaper control but with discounted rates in cases of multiple notices and free Web publishing. The House voted 68-41 for her amendment, and House leadership pulled all three bills from consideration, effectively killing the two bills subject to the deadline.

Avila said the bills would have allowed government to shirk its responsibility of transparency to save money.

"When we pass taxes and laws and regulations, and we hear the private sector yell, 'It's too expensive!' our response is, 'That's your cost of doing business,' she said. "Well, members, our cost of doing business in public notifications to our citizens is a cost we should incur."

Avila's amendment was based on similar measures that passed unanimously in Florida and with near-total support in Tennessee, said John Bussian, attorney for the NC Press Association. He said he thinks the passage of the amendment will help put to bed an eight-year series of similar confrontations between the press and lawmakers, who have routinely pursued similar legislation.

"Sounds like there's a pretty strong consensus that this is the way this issue should be solved," he said.

But Rep. Chuck McGrady, R-Henderson, and the lead sponsor of the two bills, said what the press association is offering is no compromise.

"That's called a catfish," he said. "That's basically creating a monopoly with the press association. They called it a 'compromise,' and since they print papers by the dozens and thousands and millions they can keep calling it a compromise, but that's laughable."

He said he views the vote on the amendment as a reflection of pressure from local newspaper editors on lawmakers, but he has no plans to revive his bills using procedures sometimes pursued by legislators to circumvent deadlines. The Senate bill, which is still alive, is not meant to hasten the downfall of newspapers, he added.

"It's about how we best get notice out to the public, and my bill, if somebody wants notice, they're going to get first-class mail notice," McGrady said. "They don't get that now. There's a lot more options here. This is about money."

Santa Barbara newsroom employees cut Teamster ties

Newsroom employees at the Santa Barbara (Calif.) News-Press have voted to cut ties with the Teamsters, the union that has represented them through years of legal struggles with management over control of the newspaper.

News-Press Director of Operations Don Katich said Friday, May 17, the paper's lawyers notified the Graphic Communications Conference of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters that a majority of the small newsroom staff had signed a petition to withdraw the union's recognition.

Teamsters representatives had no immediate comment.

The newspaper scored a breakthrough in the long-running legal battle in December when a federal appeals court ruled in its favor and against reporters claiming they were fired over union activity. The court ruled that the publisher was within its rights to fire the employees.

A year after IPO, Facebook aims to be ad colossus

Facebook, the brainchild of a young CEO who sauntered into Wall Street meetings in a hoodie, was going to be bigger than Amazon, bigger than McDonald's, bigger than Coca-Cola. And it was all made possible by our friendships, photos and family ties.

Then came the initial public offering for the world's biggest online social network, and it flopped. Facebook's stock finished its first day of trading just 23 cents higher than its $38 IPO price. It hasn't been that high since.

Even amid the hype and excitement surrounding Facebook's stock market debut a year ago Saturday, May 18, there were looming doubts. Investors wondered whether the social network could increase advertising revenue without alienating users, especially those using smartphones and tablet computers.

The worries intensified just days before the IPO when General Motors said it would stop paying for advertisements on the site. The symbolic exit cast a shroud over Facebook that still exists. Facebook's market value is $63 billion, some two-thirds of what it was the morning it first began trading. At around $27 per share, the company's stock is down roughly 30 percent from its IPO price. Meanwhile, the Standard & Poor's 500 index is up 27 percent over the same period.

Despite its disappointing stock market performance, the company has delivered strong financial results. Net income increased 7 percent to $219 million in the most recent quarter, compared with the previous year, and revenue was up 38 percent to $1.46 billion.

Facebook has also kept growing to 1.1 billion users. Some 665 million people check in every day to share photos, comment on news articles and play games. Millions of people around the world who don't own a computer use Facebook, in Malawi, Malaysia and Martinique.

And much has changed at Facebook in a year. The company's executives and engineers have quietly addressed the very doubts that dogged the company for so long. Facebook began showing mobile advertisements for the first time last spring. It launched a search feature in January and unveiled a branded Facebook smartphone in April. The company also introduced ways for advertisers to gauge the effectiveness of their ads.

Even GM has returned as a paying advertiser.

Now, Facebook is looking to its next challenge: convincing big brand-name consumer companies that advertisements on a social network are as important — and as effective — as television spots.

"We aspire to have ads, to show ads that improve the content experience over time," Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg told analysts recently. "And if we continue making progress on this, then one day we can get there."

To achieve those aims, the company has rolled out tools to help advertisers target their messages more precisely than they can in print or on television. Companies can single out 18- to 24-year-old male Facebook users who are likely to buy a car in the next six months. They can target 30-year-old women who are researching Caribbean getaways.

Analytic tools like these weren't available a year ago. But last fall Facebook hired several companies that collect and analyze data related to people's online and offline behavior. Facebook's advertisers can now assess whether a Crest ad you saw on Facebook likely led you to buy of a tube of toothpaste in the drugstore. The services take what Facebook knows about you and what ads you saw and combine this with the information retailers have about you and what you've purchased through loyalty cards and the like.

Advertisers are also making use of Facebook's partnership with audience measurement firm Nielsen Co. Nielsen introduced a tool last fall that helps marketers discover "not only who saw their ad online and who saw their ad on TV, but also how these audiences match up," says David Wong, vice president at product leadership at Nielsen.

Sean Bruich, Facebook's head of measurement platforms and standards, believes the new tools are paying off.

"What we can see conclusively a year after the IPO is that ads on Facebook really do help drive people into the store and help them make purchasing decisions, help influence their purchasing decisions," he says.

A recent Nielsen analysis found that consumers are 55 percent more likely to recall "social ads" than traditional online ads.

So powerful is Facebook's new analytic arsenal that privacy advocates are growing concerned about the potential intrusiveness of merging consumers' online and offline experiences.

People "are getting served ads based on things they didn't put on Facebook and maybe wouldn't be comfortable putting on Facebook," says Rainey Reitman, activism director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit civil-liberties firm. Facebook says mechanisms are in place to protect privacy.

"We've never had anything like Facebook," Reitman says. "We've never had an entity that was able to collect so much information on so much of the world's population, ever."

Advertisers aren't complaining.

"Anywhere that more than a billion people spend time with their friends each month is extremely valuable to us," says Brad Ruffkess, connection strategist at Coca-Cola.

At Procter and Gamble, the world's biggest advertiser, "we saw almost from the start that social mediais the world's largest focus group," says Marc Pritchard, the company's global brand building officer.

Both companies are important advertisers on Facebook and members of the company's client council, a group of more than a dozen brands and ad agencies that have met regularly with Facebook executives since 2011 to talk about advertising and marketing on the site. Other members include Unilever, AT&T, Walmart and GroupM North America, a subsidiary of advertising agency giant WPP.

Still, some advertisers remain skeptical. Ryan Holiday, director of marketing at American Apparel, is critical of Facebook's "sponsored stories." These are messages from marketers that are interwoven into users' news feeds. He says the clothing company spends less than 10 percent of its online advertising budget with Facebook.

One thing is increasingly clear: The future belongs to mobile advertising. And just a year ago, Facebook warned investors it was behind in capturing this market. In response, Facebook retrained engineers and rebuilt its mobile applications, which users complained were clunky. Now, there's an explosion in the number of ads shoehorned in between status updates and cat photos.

"The transition to mobile happened even faster than we believed," says Carolyn Everson, vice president of global marketing solutions at Facebook.

In the first three months of 2013, Facebook generated $375 million in revenue from mobile ads, about 30 percent of its total ad revenue. That's impressive given that Facebook had no mobile ads at all just a year ago.

And there's room to grow. Research firm eMarketer estimates that U.S. mobile advertising spending will grow to $7.29 billion this year, up fivefold from 2011. Facebook is expected to capture some 13 percent of the market, a distant second behind Google at nearly 55 percent, according to eMarketer. By 2015, the mobile ad market is expected to hit $16.2 billion.

Facebook's stronger grasp of mobile advertising helped get General Motors back.

"Mobile was something GM was particularly passionate about," says Everson, who joined Facebook two years ago from Microsoft Corp., where she headed global ad sales.

Everson says she sees Facebook as a future advertising empire. The goal is to help companies achieve so-called cross-platform marketing and target people with ads wherever they might be — in front of smartphones, tablets or TV sets.

"A lot of people might argue that TV is the first screen and mobile is the companion screen," she says. Her take: Mobile is now the first screen. And Facebook's hope is that advertisers will soon see it this way, too.

"Your customer is walking around with the most personal device they've ever had every single day, checking it 12 to, you know, more than 24 times a day depending on the market," Everson says. "This is a mass medium."

At the end of last year, 87 percent of Americans owned a cellphone and nearly half owned a smartphone, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project. Worldwide, research firm Gartner puts the size of the mobile phone market at 4.4 billion, enough to give one phone for nearly two-thirds of the world's population.

Of course, television still accounts for the biggest slice of worldwide ad spending, and nearly 96 percent of American households own a TV set. ZenithOptimedia, a forecaster owned by the ad agency Publicis Groupe SA, says television accounted for 40 percent of worldwide ad spending, compared with the Internet's share of 18 percent. By 2015, the Internet is expected to grow its share to more than 23 percent, but largely at the expense of newspapers and magazines. TV is expected to hold steady.

"On any given day in the U.S. alone, you can reach 100 million people on mobile," Everson says. "Those numbers are not seen across any TV or print opportunity. I think it's going to take hold, this message."

NewsRight dismantles, transfers brand to Moreover

NewsRight, an organization created to turn unauthorized publishers of newspaper content on the Internet into licensed customers, said it is disbanding and transferring its operations to Moreover Technologies, which monitors how Moreover's clients are portrayed in the media.

NewsRight said that Moreover will get the NewsRight brand and will offer newcontracts to the organization's current customers.

Moreover is working with BurrellesLuce, another mediamonitoring company, to expand NewsRight's licensing efforts, NewsRight said.

NewsRight said its previous role of advocating for the protection of original newscontent will be assumed by the Newspaper Association of America.

NewsRight was launched in January 2012 to track the unpaid online use of content from The Associated Press and nearly 30 other newsorganizations. It provided publishers with licenses to content from leading newspublishers, including Hearst Newspapers, The E.W. Scripps Co., Lee Enterprises Inc., A.H. Belo Corp., the Tampa Bay Times and The Christian Science Monitor.

David Westin, who was previously president of ABC Newsfor 14 years, headed the organization until he stepped down last summer and became an adviser.

NewsRight grew out of efforts started by the AP and its partners in October 2010 to track the use of stories on websites, blogs and other Internet forums through what it called the NewsRegistry.

Before this month's announcement, Moreover already had a multiyear deal with NewsRight for the right to use content from hundreds of newspaper websites. In 2007, the AP sued Moreover for copyright infringement, alleging that the company continuously accessed and electronically published the AP's newsreports without authorization. The sides reached a settlement a year later, the terms of which were not disclosed.

Harvard's Nieman Foundation announces Class of '14

The Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University has announced its 24-member class of 2014.

The group includes reporters, editors, columnists and producers for print, broadcast and online who work around the globe and across mediaplatforms.

Nieman Foundation Curator Ann Marie Lipinski says the 12 U.S. and 12 international journalists are working to uphold the profession's highest standards while focused on innovations for radically shifting audiences, technologies and business models.

During their time on campus, the fellows study with some of the world's leading scholars and experts in disciplines ranging from business to law to public policy to the natural sciences. They also participate in a yearlong series of seminars, master classes and workshops and they work on collaborative projects with other fellows, Harvard faculty and others.

JPMorgan asks Bloomberg for privacy breach data

Lawyers for JPMorgan Chase & Co. are asking financial newsand data company Bloomberg LP to turn over any records it has of reporters looking up the log-in and usage data of JPMorgan employees.

A formal letter was sent last week, a person familiar with the matter said. The person wasn't authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

The letter seeks data going back to 2008 as the bank examines whether the seller of ubiquitous trading-data terminals was in breach of contract, the person said.

It comes after the revelation Friday that, until recently, Bloomberg reporters had special access to client usage data and sought to use it to break stories. On Monday, Bloomberg NewsEditor-in-Chief Matthew Winkler apologized for the practice, which he said had been going on since the 1990s. He said the special access for reporters had been cut off last month after Goldman Sachs complained.

A Bloomberg spokeswoman declined comment Wednesday.

JPMorgan's letter sought confirmation that inappropriate access by reporters had stopped; a description of the controls in place to prevent a recurrence; and logs of all Bloomberg staff and a description of their roles and what they were checking, the person said.

"Our legal department sent a formal request to Bloomberg to verify exactly what information reporters had access to and confirmation of their controls to prevent future breaches," JPMorgan said in a statement, without elaborating.

Bloomberg has acknowledged that reporters could see when specific clients had last logged in, their most frequently used commands on the terminal, and could even access transcripts of help-desk inquiries by users. But it said reporters weren't able to glean whether users looked at specific stocks or bonds and could not access their messages.

The Federal Reserve is also looking into whether Bloomberg journalists tracked data about terminal usage by top Fed officials.

Investment banks like JPMorgan and Goldman have chafed at the high price of Bloomberg terminals — which cost $20,000 a year — and what they view as its growing incursion into their business.

Since 1996, Bloomberg has operated a division called Bloomberg Tradebook that acts as a broker dealer, facilitating the trade of equities in the U.S. The company is also applying to the government to be certified to facilitate trades of complex derivatives like credit default swaps.

Despite concerns about inappropriate access to sensitive client data, many market participants are loathe to abandon Bloomberg terminals — of which there are 315,000 installed — because of their widespread use especially in specialized markets such as Bloomberg's specialty, bonds.

Bloomberg LP is a private company controlled by NewYork Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who is reported to own about an 85 percent share. The mayor is not involved in day-to-day decision-making at the company.

In Bloomberg uproar, ethics flags for new media

Launching his namesake company's newsdivision in the 1990s, Michael Bloomberg largely rejected long-held rules of the journalism trade that insist on keeping thick firewalls between reporters and the profit-making workings of their companies.

Now, a byproduct of Bloomberg's widely admired and novel business model has ensnared his company in a problem of its own making. But the uproar — revolving around specialized computer terminals unknown to most newsconsumers, and the reporters who tapped into data showing how high-powered Wall Street customers were using them — is potentially about much more than Bloomberg.

Instead, experts say, it highlights the uncertain and rapidly changing ethical landscape facing companies that, like Bloomberg, are reinventing the newsbusiness. And it raises key questions for people who watch the media, most notably this one: As the newsbusiness gets reconfigured around advances in technology, what does that mean for the old rules and the people who follow them?

Such tensions are evident in the way Michael Bloomberg himself laid out his company's ethos. "Most newsorganizations never connect reporters and commerce. At Bloomberg, they're as close to seamless as it can get," the billionaire entrepreneur and current NewYork City mayor wrote in his 1997 autobiography, penned with the "invaluable help" of the newsdivision's founding editor-in-chief.

That meant, Bloomberg wrote, that a key part of his reporters' jobs was to keep tabs on what customers wanted and needed in order to provide it.

In practice, it has become clear, that meant giving Bloomberg journalists access to data about individual customers' terminal usage, a practice that progressed from mere service-mindedness to keeping tabs on clients' habits for reporting purposes.

Bloomberg LP, which started as a provider of sophisticated financial data to bond traders and only later expanded to include a journalistic enterprise, has few direct parallels in media. But it echoes many newventures in its determination to bypass old journalistic models that depended on well-defined — some would say outdated — relationships with readers and advertisers, to forge newkinds of ties with newtypes of audiences.

"Many more journalism companies will face the type of competing values that the journalists at Bloomberg faced because, as the economic model for journalism changes, more companies, if they're successful, are going to look like Bloomberg," said Kelly McBride, who teaches journalism ethics at The Poynter Institute.

Today's technology gives many types of newsorganizations access to information about consumers' preferences for certain types of content, without clearly settled understandings of how that information should be used. Technology also has made it easier for reporters, and everybody else, to snoop.

"In a digital world in which everything online at some level, if you have the expertise, is probably available, this is simply reality," said Alex S. Jones, director of the Shorenstein Center on the Press, Politics and Public Policy at Harvard University.

At the same time, newtypes of journalism ventures are relying on different constituencies, often without clear rules for engagement, McBride said. Non-profit newsorganizations rely on donors, rather than advertisers. Others rely on advertisers who pay to sponsor content.

All together, the uncertainties of those newrelationships will force mediaorganizations to grapple with tough questions, McBride says.

"These types of breaches are about your loyalty to an individual or organization that you've created a relationship with over something other than journalism," she says.

In an open letter published Monday on Bloomberg's website, Matthew Winkler, who was the founding editor-in-chief of the company's newsdivision and remains at its helm, alluded to those allegiances to explain the lapses.

"Why did reporters have access to this (customer data) in the first place? The recent complaints go to practices that are almost as old as Bloomberg News," Winkler wrote. "Understanding how our clients used the terminal was more important then."

But Winkler said the practice was clearly a mistake.

"Our client is right. Our reporters should not have access to any data considered proprietary. I am sorry they did. The error is inexcusable," he wrote.

Thus far, the Bloomberg eruption has been defined by the arcane: reporters punching keys to track the minutiae of customer behavior that may have been newsworthy, but appears to have been anything but scandalous.

In his letter, Winkler said that Bloomberg journalists had been able to see individual clients' terminal log-in histories and categories of functions those customers used. Until last month, when the company said it restricted reporters' access to the information, they could see individual users' most frequently used commands over the past week, as well as details of customer inquiries to the company help desk.

The practice became an issue when a Bloomberg reporter told Goldman Sachs managers she had used log-in data to investigate whether a Goldman employee had departed. Goldman Sachs complained, and now the Federal Reserve is examining whether Bloomberg journalists tracked terminal usage by top Fed officials.

It's hard to overstate the role that the pricey Bloomberg terminals have come to occupy at Wall Street firms, where they are prized as windows to information that can help brokers keep or lose fortunes, while communicating via instant-messaging and executing trades. More than 315,000 clients pay roughly $20,000 a year each for their use.

Last year, the terminal business provided about 85 percent of the company's $7.9 billion in revenue, giving it claim to about a 30 percent share of the $25.5 billion market for financial data and investment services, roughly the same as rival Thomson Reuters Corp. Analysts who follow the industry have said they expect little fallout for Bloomberg because clients consider its services vital and are locked into long-term contracts.

But its missteps nevertheless revive questions about the methods reporters use to get at hidden secrets about powerful interests, said Peter Hart, a mediaanalyst with the watchdog group Fairness & Accuracy in Reporting.

While the nature of the lapses are unique, Hart said they remind him of the 1998 scandal at The Cincinnati Enquirer, which was forced to retract an 18-page exposé of Chiquita International's business practices when it became clear a reporter had hacked into the banana giant's phone system to obtain information.

Breaking into another company's technical infrastructure was clearly an ethical and legal violation. But, Hart asks, how much more acceptable is it for reporters to use their parent company's own technology to gather information on the sly?

Ben Smith, editor-in-chief of BuzzFeed, a rapidly growing newssite that uses technological feedback to tailor content, called the Bloomberg lapses unique. But he said they show how technology allows journalists from newand old mediato venture into places that previously would have been outside ethical bounds.

"Everybody knows the rules," Smith said, "but a lot of the lines are a lot easier to cross than they used to be, when you used to have to walk through somebody's locked doors and pick up a piece of paper from their desk."

Hart expects most of the company's well-heeled customers to decide that it is better to handle their displeasure with the company privately rather than in public.

"But in the world of journalistic ethics, I think a story like this is going to raise some pretty profound and potentially disturbing questions about journalists snooping on their sources," he said. "Some battles are waged in private, and I think this is probably going to be one of them."

Jones, the mediaexpert at Harvard, said he was willing to accept the company's assertion that the snooping was a mistake. But he called it indicative of a culture where privacy is disrespected, and not just at Bloomberg.

"I think if I were one of Bloomberg's terminal customers I would be reassured, to a point, by their telling me that this is a mistake and it wouldn't happen again," he said. "But I think you'd have to be very naive to think it couldn't happen again ... anywhere."

Rhett Long named publisher of St. George newspaper

The Spectrum newspaper in St. George, Utah, has named Utah native Rhett Long its newpublisher.

Gannett Co. announced the appointment. This will be Long's second stint with Gannett. He was previously the vice president of operations for the company's pacific publications.

Long's most recent job was at Chicago-based printing services company, InnerWorkings, where he was vice president of national accounts.

Gannett says Long has spent more than a decade working in publishing. He has also worked in the travel and hospitality industry, including as a manager at convention centers and hotels.

Long succeeds Donnie Welch, who left in March after seven years in the position. He planned to stay in southern Utah and open a newbusiness.

Long has lived before in St. George.

Newspaper CEO named chairman of Pulitzer Board

The chairman and CEO of the Tampa Bay Times has been elected chairman of the Pulitzer Prize Board.

Columbia University, which administers the Pulitzer prizes, announced Wednesday, May 15, that Paul Tash is the board's newchairman.

He succeeds co-chairmen Gregory Moore, editor of the Denver Post, and Thomas L. Friedman, foreign affairs columnist for the NewYork Times.

Tash joined the Times in 1978 as a local newsreporter. He later covered state government in Tallahassee and worked as a local newseditor before becoming Washington bureau chief and then the paper's editor.

Tash is also chairman of the Poynter Institute for MediaStudies, a school for journalists and medialeaders, which owns Times Publishing. In addition, he serves on the board of The Associated Press.

Pa. newspaper to cut publication to 3 days a week

The daily newspaper in Hanover, Pa., is cutting back its publication to three days a week.

Sara Glines, publisher of The Evening Sun, said Wednesday, May 15, the change will take effect Jan. 1.

The move will allow the company to focus on its website, which will continue to be updated with newsdevelopments as they occur, and no staff reductions are planned at this time, she said.

Glines said the newspaper, owned by the Denver-based MediaNews Group, will continue to publish on Sundays, and the other two publication days will be picked based on the preference of readers and advertisers.

"By giving up four days of print, we will be able to give our readers weekday newspapers that will be bigger than the weekday newspapers they are getting today," she said, adding that print editions would include seven days of comics, puzzles and TV listings.

The Sun has a circulation of more than 13,400 Monday through Saturday, with nearly 17,000 on Sunday, and the website draws 175,000 unique visitors per month, said Marc Charisse, its editor in chief.

It is the second Pennsylvania newspaper to reduce its days of publication.

At the beginning of this year, The Patriot-News, which serves the Harrisburg area, cut back to a three-day publication schedule as part of a corporate reorganization that expanded online newscoverage on its PennLive website and provided an electronic edition for subscribers to the newspaper. The printed edition is published on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.

INDUSTRY NEWS 5-16-2013

Govt obtains wide AP phone records in probe

The Justice Department secretly obtained two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated Press in what the news cooperative's top executive called a "massive and unprecedented intrusion" into how news organizations gather the news.

The records obtained by the Justice Department listed incoming and outgoing calls, and the duration of each call, for the work and personal phone numbers of individual reporters, general AP office numbers in New York, Washington and Hartford, Conn., and the main number for AP reporters in the House of Representatives press gallery, according to attorneys for the AP.

In all, the government seized those records for more than 20 separate telephone lines assigned to AP and its journalists in April and May of 2012. The exact number of journalists who used the phone lines during that period is unknown but more than 100 journalists work in the offices whose phone records were targeted on a wide array of stories about government and other matters.

In a letter of protest sent to Attorney General Eric Holder on Monday, May 13, AP President and Chief Executive Officer Gary Pruitt said the government sought and obtained information far beyond anything that could be justified by any specific investigation. He demanded the return of the phone records and destruction of all copies.

"There can be no possible justification for such an overbroad collection of the telephone communications of The Associated Press and its reporters. These records potentially reveal communications with confidential sources across all of the newsgathering activities undertaken by the AP during a two-month period, provide a road map to AP's newsgathering operations, and disclose information about AP's activities and operations that the government has no conceivable right to know," Pruitt said.

The government would not say why it sought the records. U.S. officials have previously said in public testimony that the U.S. attorney in Washington is conducting a criminal investigation into who may have leaked information contained in a May 7, 2012, AP story about a foiled terror plot. The story disclosed details of a CIA operation in Yemen that stopped an al-Qaida plot in the spring of 2012 to detonate a bomb on an airplane bound for the United States.

In testimony in February, CIA Director John Brennan noted that the FBI had questioned him about whether he was AP's source, which he denied. He called the release of the information to the media about the terror plot an "unauthorized and dangerous disclosure of classified information."

Prosecutors have sought phone records from reporters before, but the seizure of records from such a wide array of AP offices, including general AP switchboards numbers and an office-wide shared fax line, is unusual and largely unprecedented.

In the letter notifying the AP received Friday, the Justice Department offered no explanation for the seizure, according to Pruitt's letter and attorneys for the AP. The records were presumably obtained from phone companies earlier this year although the government letter did not explain that. None of the information provided by the government to the AP suggested the actual phone conversations were monitored.

Among those whose phone numbers were obtained were five reporters and an editor who were involved in the May 7, 2012 story.

The Obama administration has aggressively investigated disclosures of classified information to the media and has brought six cases against people suspected of leaking classified information, more than under all previous presidents combined.

Justice Department published rules require that subpoenas of records from news organizations must be personally approved by the attorney general but it was not known if that happened in this case. The letter notifying AP that its phone records had been obtained though subpoenas was sent Friday by Ronald Machen, the U.S. attorney in Washington.

Spokesmen in Machen's office and at the Justice Department had no immediate comment on Monday.

The Justice Department lays out strict rules for efforts to get phone records from news organizations. A subpoena can only be considered after "all reasonable attempts" have been made to get the same information from other sources, the rules say. It was unclear what other steps, in total, the Justice Department has taken to get information in the case.

A subpoena to the media must be "as narrowly drawn as possible" and "should be directed at relevant information regarding a limited subject matter and should cover a reasonably limited time period," according to the rules.

The reason for these constraints, the department says, is to avoid actions that "might impair the news gathering function" because the government recognizes that "freedom of the press can be no broader than the freedom of reporters to investigate and report the news."

News organizations normally are notified in advance that the government wants phone records and enter into negotiations over the desired information. In this case, however, the government, in its letter to the AP, cited an exemption to those rules that holds that prior notification can be waived if such notice, in the exemption's wording, might "pose a substantial threat to the integrity of the investigation."

It is unknown whether a judge or a grand jury signed off on the subpoenas.

The May 7, 2012, AP story that disclosed details of the CIA operation in Yemen to stop an airliner bomb plot occurred around the one-year anniversary of the May 2, 2011, killing of Osama bin Laden.

The plot was significant because the White House had told the public it had "no credible information that terrorist organizations, including al-Qaida, are plotting attacks in the U.S. to coincide with the (May 2) anniversary of bin Laden's death."

The AP delayed reporting the story at the request of government officials who said it would jeopardize national security. Once government officials said those concerns were allayed, the AP disclosed the plot because officials said it no longer endangered national security. The Obama administration, however, continued to request that the story be held until the administration could make an official announcement.

The May 7 story was written by reporters Matt Apuzzo and Adam Goldman with contributions from reporters Kimberly Dozier, Eileen Sullivan and Alan Fram. They and their editor, Ted Bridis, were among the journalists whose April-May 2012 phone records were seized by the government.

Brennan talked about the AP story and leaks investigation in written testimony to the Senate. "The irresponsible and damaging leak of classified information was made ... when someone informed the Associated Press that the U.S. Government had intercepted an IED (improvised explosive device) that was supposed to be used in an attack and that the U.S. Government currently had that IED in its possession and was analyzing it," he said.

He also defended the White House's plan to discuss the plot immediately afterward. "Once someone leaked information about interdiction of the IED and that the IED was actually in our possession, it was imperative to inform the American people consistent with Government policy that there was never any danger to the American people associated with this al-Qa'ida plot," Brennan told senators.

Fla. newspaper carrier shoots suspected attacker

A newspaper deliveryman in central Florida shot and wounded a man he says shot at him first.

Winter Haven police say a man and woman were delivering copies of the Ledger around 3 a.m. Sunday, May 12, when they noticed a car following them.

When the carriers stopped their truck, police say the car's driver, 23-year-old by Brian Scott Dickey II, approached and fired four shots. When Dickey began banging on the window with his gun, the deliveryman pulled his registered gun and fired through the window.

Police say Dickey fled the scene, but rescuers were soon called to his home nearby. He is recovering at a hospital and police say once he's released, he will be charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon and discharging a firearm in public.

It wasn't clear if he had an attorney.

Newseum reconsiders honor for 2 linked to Hamas

The Newseum is re-evaluating plans to include two people who worked for a network connected to Hamas on its Journalists Memorial honoring journalists who died last year while covering the news.

Several groups, including the Anti-Defamation League, B'nai B'rith International and the American Jewish Committee, have objected to the inclusion of two people who worked for Al-Aqsa Television in the Gaza Strip because it is linked to the Palestinian Islamist group. The U.S., European Union and Israel have labeled Hamas a terror group.

On Monday, the Washington museum about journalism and the First Amendment rededicated its Journalists Memorial, adding the names of 82 other journalists who died covering the news in 2012 and six killed in previous years.

But the Newseum said it was re-evaluating its decision to include Hussam Salama and Mahmoud Al-Kumi of Al-Aqsa TV. Their names won't be added to the wall Monday, May 13 "Serious questions have been raised as to whether two of the individuals included on our initial list of journalists who died covering the news this past year were truly journalists or whether they were engaged in terrorist activities," the Newseum said in a statement. "Terrorism has altered the landscape in many areas, including the rules of war and engagement, law, investigative and interrogation techniques, and the detention of enemy combatants. Journalism is no exception."

On Friday, May 10, the Newseum defended its decision to include the two cameramen, saying they were killed in a car that was clearly marked "TV." The Newseum said the Committee to Protect Journalists, Reporters Without Borders and The World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers all consider these men journalists killed in the line duty.

The Anti-Defamation League and other groups said the men were working for a propaganda outlet, not a legitimate news organization, and they pressed the Newseum to reverse course.

Bloomberg bars reporters from client log-in data

Financial data and news company Bloomberg LP said Friday, May 10, that it had corrected a "mistake" in its newsgathering policies and cut off its journalists' special access to client log-in data on the company's ubiquitous trading information terminals after Goldman Sachs complained about the matter last month.

A person familiar with the matter said Goldman Sachs became concerned about outside access after a Bloomberg reporter, investigating what she thought was the departure of a Goldman employee, told the securities firm that the employee had not logged into a Bloomberg terminal for a number of weeks.

The person was not authorized to speak publicly and did so on condition of anonymity.

In a memo sent to staff Friday, Bloomberg CEO Daniel Doctoroff said the company had "long made limited customer relationship data available to our journalists," but added, "we realize this was a mistake."

After the complaint last month, Bloomberg "immediately" turned off its journalists' special access and limited it to what clients can see themselves, he said.

The dispute was earlier reported by The Wall Street Journal.

Bloomberg News reporters had been able to see when any of the company's 315,000 paying subscribers, mostly stock and bond traders, had last logged into the service. They could also view the types of functions individual subscribers were accessing.

Doctoroff said in his memo that access did not extend to "trading, portfolio, monitor, blotter or other related systems or our clients' messages. Moreover, reporters could not see news stories that clients read, or the securities they viewed."

He said senior executive Steve Ross had been appointed to the new position of client data compliance officer to review Bloomberg's policies.

Although Goldman's concerns caused the change, JPMorgan Chase & Co. had also expressed concerns about Bloomberg journalists' access to sensitive data.

A person familiar with the matter at JPMorgan said multiple Bloomberg reporters had used the data to try to break news in the last several years. The person said Bloomberg journalists used their access attempting to find out whether disciplinary action had been taken against Bruno Iksil, a JPMorgan trader nicknamed the "London whale" who was blamed for a $6 billion trading loss last year.

One reporter knew details about the log-in times of multiple traders on a single desk and called daily to ask about potential layoffs, the person said. JPMorgan complained to the reporters about the technique but Bloomberg managers weren't made aware of a formal complaint.

The person was not authorized to speak publicly about the matter and requested anonymity.

Bloomberg reporters are renowned for aggressive techniques in a competitive field.

In November 2010, the news service reported on the earnings of The Walt Disney Co. and NetApp Inc. well before the companies' scheduled releases by guessing the unprotected website addresses of the press releases before they were made public.

The public relations gaffes, which resulted in immediate but fleeting dips in the stock prices of both companies, resulted in the companies taking action to prevent a recurrence.

Bloomberg editor apologizes on information access

The editor-in-chief of Bloomberg News is apologizing for the financial news service's practice of accessing private information on clients through their Bloomberg terminals.

In an online posting, Matthew Winkler says "the error is inexcusable."

As reported Friday, May 10, journalists at Bloomberg News could see when clients last accessed their terminals and what broad categories of functions they used. Goldman Sachs had complained that a Bloomberg reporter was using the information to investigate if a Goldman employee had departed.

In the posting Monday, May 13, Winkler draws a distinction between this type of data and "important" customer data, which he says has not been compromised.

The Federal Reserve is looking into whether Bloomberg journalists tracked data about terminal usage by top Fed officials. The European Central Bank says it's in close contact with Bloomberg.

News-Sun's editor promoted to publisher

Daniel Russell, editor of the Hobbs (N.M.) Sun-News, has been promoted to be the newspaper's publisher.

The Shearman Corp. announced last week that Russell was being promoted to take the place of Judy Hanna, who is stepping down to move to Texas.

The Albuquerque-raised Russell has been with the News-Sun since 1995 and has served in a variety of different positions with the newspaper. In addition to serving as editor, Russell was the News-Sun's managing editor, advertising manager and business reporter.

He also has worked at the Artesia Daily Press and Plainview Daily Herald.

The Lake Charles, La.-based Shearman Corp. also owns the Lake Charles American Press and the Trinidad Chronicle News in Colorado.

Pakistan expels NY Times reporter before elections

Pakistan is expelling The New York Times' Islamabad bureau chief on the eve of national elections, accusing him of unspecified "undesirable activities," the newspaper said Friday, May 10.

Declan Walsh, a longtime foreign correspondent who has been covering the country for the Times since January 2012, was handed a two-sentence letter early Thursday ordering him to leave, the newspaper said.

Times Executive Editor Jill Abramson protested the expulsion in a letter to Pakistan's interior minister, Malik Muhammad Habib Khan. Abramson described Walsh as a "reporter of integrity who has at all times offered balanced, nuanced and factual reporting on Pakistan."

Abramson wrote that the accusation of "undesirable activities" was "vague and unsupported, and Mr. Walsh has received no further explanation of any alleged wrongdoing."

"On eve of Pakistani elections, been asked to leave," Walsh, 39, wrote on Twitter.

Walsh, who worked for The Guardian newspaper of Britain prior to joining the Times, was quoted as saying that his expulsion was "a complete bolt from the blue. I had no inclination that anything of this sort was coming." He has lived and worked in Pakistan for the past nine years.

In recent days, Walsh reported on political patronage in Pakistan and the fatal shooting of the prosecutor who was investigating the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.

Saturday's vote would be the first time in Pakistan's 65-year history that a civilian government has completed its full term and handed over power in democratic elections. Previous governments have been toppled by military coups or sacked by presidents allied with the powerful army.

News Corp 3Q beats Street on pay TV, 'Pi'

News Corp. beat Wall Street's forecast for the January-March quarter, helped by growing revenue from pay TV networks including Fox News Channel and FX, and the hit 20th Century Fox movie "Life of Pi."

The New York-based company controlled by billionaire Rupert Murdoch also said Wednesday, May 8, that it benefited from raising its stake in satellite TV company Sky Deutschland. It now holds a majority stake.

News Corp.'s net income jumped to $2.85 billion, or $1.22 per share, from $937 million, or 38 cents per share, a year ago.

Excluding items such as the one-time $2.1 billion profit related to Sky Deutschland, adjusted earnings came to 36 cents per share, a penny better than expected by analysts surveyed by FactSet.

Revenue rose 14 percent to $9.54 billion, also better than the $9.14 billion expected by analysts.

Some of the revenue came from adding the results of companies in which News Corp. now has a majority stake, like Sky Deutschland. Excluding that accounting benefit, revenue would have risen 7 percent to $9 billion.

The company's stock rose $1.06, or 3.3 percent, to $32.92 in after-hours trading after the results were released.

News Corp. is at a turning point in its history, which traces back to a small newspaper company in Australia started in 1923, and bought into by Murdoch's father. It plans to split into two publicly traded companies by the end of June — one company holding its TV and movie properties to be known as 21st Century Fox, and a smaller entity focused on newspapers and publishing that will keep the name News Corp.

At the same time, it is launching a new national sports channel in the U.S. on Aug. 17 called Fox Sports 1, which it hopes to build into a competitor to The Walt Disney Co.'s ESPN. It also plans to launch in September FXX, another pay TV channel under its FX brand aimed at 18 to 34 year olds.

Addressing analysts' concerns about the cost of those initiatives, News Corp. Chief Operating Officer Chase Carey said the expense of launching the networks, plus some international channels, would be "a couple hundred million (dollars) and change" in their first year of operation.

As the company nears the split, investors are awaiting news of the strategies for operating both.

Carey said the company will hold an investor day in New York on May 28 to detail plans for the publishing company, while an investor day for the entertainment company is planned for early August.

"Our separation is our top priority," Carey said.

Investors have long hankered for the split, as most see the publishing unit as a drag on earnings and revenues. Since the split was announced last June, News Corp.'s stock is up about 50 percent.

Investors remain concerned about how the company uses its cash, which stood at $9.3 billion at the end of March. The publishing company will have $2.6 billion in cash and no debt when it is spun off.

Carey said Wednesday that the company is suspending the buyback of $10 billion in stock until after the split is complete. News Corp. has bought back $6.6 billion since the buyback program began two years ago.

"The big question at investor day is going to center on capital allocation," said Brett Harriss, an analyst with research brokerage Gabelli & Co.

The publishing company is seen as a possible bidder for Tribune Co. newspapers including the Los Angeles Times, and it also continues to pour money into its fledgling for-profit education venture called Amplify.

News Corp. also continued to deal with ongoing probes in the U.K. over phone hacking and bribes by employees of its newspapers. The January-March quarter included $42 million in costs related to the investigations, bringing the total spent on them to $388 million since the scandal broke in the summer of 2011.

INDUSTRY NEWS 5-9-2013

Whistler gets Canadian Journalists’ Code of Silence Award

The town of Whistler, B.C., is the winner of this year's Code of Silence Award from the Canadian Association of Journalists.

The annual award meant to highlight Canada's most secretive government or publicly funded agency. It was handed out Saturday night, May 4, at the CAJ's annual gala in Ottawa.

The association says that since the 2010 Olympics, municipal officials in the resort community have virtually stifled communications with the media.

It says that according to official policy only three people — the mayor, municipal administrator and public information officer — can speak for Whistler.

The association says the control over information exercised in Whistler now rivals that of certain federal departments and PR at the most secretive private corporations.

Other nominees for this year's award included the Library and Archives Canada for its code of conduct that keeps staff members from speaking at conventions, and the muzzling of government scientists by their political masters.

Vicksburg newspaper bought by company with Natchez ties

Vicksburg Newsmedia, LLC, an affiliate of Boone Newspapers, Inc. (BNI), with offices in Natchez and Tuscaloosa, Ala., completed its purchase of The Vicksburg Post, its affiliate publications and websites and related businesses Speedi Print and Signs First on Thursday, May 2.

The sale ends 130 years of ownership and operation of The Vicksburg Post for the Vicksburg community by the Cashman family. John Gordon Cashman founded the newspaper in 1883 and it has been in the Cashman family since. Louis P. "Pat” Cashman III, a longtime friend of BNI and its leadership team, and majority owner of the Vicksburg Printing and Publishing Company, met with employees.

Majority owners of the newly formed company are BNI, Carpenter Media, LLC (CML), a company owned by BNI’s president and chief operating officer, Todd H. Carpenter of Natchez. A Natchez investment group led by businessmen A. Vidal Davis and Jimmy Smith holds minority ownership.

BNI owns and manages 45 newspapers, 26 community magazines and related websites in similar-sized communities in Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, North Carolina, Virginia, Minnesota, Ohio and Michigan, including The Natchez Democrat and The (Brookhaven) Daily Leader in Mississippi. James B. Boone, Jr., of Tuscaloosa, is BNI’s chairman and chief executive officer.

"It is a bittersweet moment,” Cashman said. "I obviously would retire some time, but I think the time is right now.

"We’ve had a lot of offers since my sister Mary Louise died in 1987, but the time wasn’t right until now,” he said. "The Boone group has a record of keeping strong community newspapers and that is why we chose them. That’s key for the development of the city.”

Publisher resigns from Helena, Butte newspapers

The regional publisher of the Independent Record and the Montana Standard announced his resignation Friday, May 3.

Randy Rickman's last day as publisher of the Helena and Butte newspapers will be May 31, the Independent Record reported (http://bit.ly/1381JV0).

Rickman said he decided to make a change in his career but did not detail his plans.

"This wasn't an easy decision to make because I feel very loyal to the papers and to the community," Rickman said. "We've all worked hard in order to serve our customers and community. Thank you for letting me and my family be a part of these papers and your family over the last four years."

General manager Lynn Lloyd and Lee group publisher Nathan Bekke will fill in while a search for Rickman's replacement is underway, Independent Record editor Holly Michels said.

Rickman, 51, has been the regional publisher of Lee Enterprise-owned newspapers and the Mini Nickel in Bozeman since 2009.

He worked for the Hartford Sentinel newspaper in California from 2003 to 2009.

Before that, he worked for Lee Enterprises for nearly 20 years.

Britain holding off on media regulation plans

British officials are holding off on plans for a state-backed media watchdog, the first sign that opposition from the newspaper industry is slowing down efforts to more closely regulate the country's scandal-tainted press.

Prime Minister David Cameron's office said Friday, May 3, it was temporarily delaying the presentation of its plan for a new, government-backed regulator to give officials more time to examine an alternative proposal being floated by Britain's newspaper industry.

The question of how best to police the U.K. press has been debated since the phone hacking scandal erupted in 2011, exposing a culture of breaking laws, corruption and cover-up at the highest levels of British journalism.

Politicians have endorsed tighter regulation, but newspapers are resisting it by promoting their own, more media-friendly plan.

Washington Post Co. 1Q profit down 85%

The Washington Post Co. said Friday, May 4, that earnings fell 85 percent in the first three months of the year, mainly because of the cost of shutting down some college campuses run by its Kaplan education division and for an early retirement program at its flagship newspaper.

The company's first-quarter net income was $4.7 million, or 64 cents per share. That compares with earnings of $31 million, or $4.07 per share, in the same quarter a year ago. Profits from cable and broadcast TV offset losses in education and in publishing.

Excluding one-time items such as restructuring costs at Kaplan and the newspaper and losses from sold-off operations, the company said it would have earned $25.2 million, or $3.46 per share, compared with $9.3 million, or $1.18 per share, a year earlier.

Revenue was up slightly at $959 billion, from $956 billion a year ago.

The company's stock fell $2.80, or less than 1 percent, to $449.71 in afternoon trading Friday, after the release of the results.

Like other newspapers, The Washington Post has seen a decline in print advertising. For a while, the success of Kaplan's schools and test preparation services helped bolster the company's results.

But tougher federal regulations in recent years forced Kaplan to change its admissions standards. Kaplan is now required to ensure that students don't take on a lot of debt to attend the for-profit school unless there is a realistic chance they can graduate. The company has made it tougher for students to be admitted into its schools and revised its recruitment programs.

Kaplan's enrollment was 67,196 students at the end of March, a decline of 12 percent from the previous year. First-quarter revenue in the education division fell 3 percent to $528 million. The company is shutting down some campuses to reduce expenses.

Revenue at the company's newspaper publishing division fell 4 percent to $127 million, propelled by an 8 percent, or $4.1 million, decline in print advertising revenue. Revenue from online publishing activities grew 8 percent, or $1.9 million, but the amount wasn't enough to offset what was lost in print. To cut costs, the Post announced a voluntary early retirement program in February.

Cable-TV revenue rose 5 percent to $200 million. Revenue from broadcast-TV stations also went up 5 percent, to $85.3 million.

US calls on Guyana to revoke radio frequencies

The U.S. government has joined a growing list of international agencies calling on authorities in Guyana to immediately revoke radio frequencies issued to those closely connected to the South American country's ruling party.

Last month, legislators forced Prime Minister Samuel Hinds to release the list of those frequencies allocated in 2011. It showed the governing party gave itself five frequencies, five to the sister of Cabinet Minister Robert Persaud and five to the best friend of former President Bharrat Jagdeo.

U.S. Ambassador Brent Hardt said Guyana should "promptly review and approve" pending requests from those qualified to operate radio stations. Some requests date back to the late 1990s.

Hardt made the request late Thursday, May 2, and joined others who have voiced similar concerns, including the Vienna-based International Press Institute.

NH family: Missing US journalist in Syrian prison

The New Hampshire-based family of a journalist missing for five months now believe "with a very high degree of confidence" that he is being held in a Syrian prison.

James Foley was last seen on Nov. 22 in northwest Syria, where he was contributing videos to Agence France-Press for the media company GlobalPost. His family in Rochester, N.H., says he was kidnapped by unknown gunmen.

GlobalPost CEO Philip Balboni said Friday, May 3, that an exhaustive investigation has determined that Foley was likely abducted by a pro-Syrian government military group. Investigators believe he is being held with one or more Western journalists in a detention facility near Damascus.

"We're very confident that Jim is well and being well cared for," Balboni said, adding that he had "very specific" intelligence on Foley's location, including the name of the detention facility, but declined to release that information publicly.

He confirmed that GlobalPost and the Foley family were in touch with the U.S. State Department, in addition to foreign governments near Syria, but that investigators are trying to work through diplomatic channels "out of the public eye."

The comments came during a Boston forum celebrating "World Press Freedom Day," which is held each year to raise awareness about journalists around the world who are censored, arrested, attacked and even murdered because of their work.

There were 70 journalists killed worldwide in 2012 and 17 have been killed so far in 2013, according to event organizers.

James Foley, 39, is the oldest of five children. His father, John Foley, said the family was "terrified," but also optimistic that his son would be released unharmed.

"We're appealing to the humanitarian sentiments of his captors," he said.

James Foley was also captured by Libyan forces in 2011. His captors at that time allowed him to make a phone call to confirm he was alive, but the family has had no contact with him since his Thanksgiving Day abduction, according to his father.

"We believe he is alive and well," John Foley said of his son. "We believed that from the first day. We have to have hope."

Journal Communications earnings rise 30 percent

Journal Communications Inc., of Milwaukee, says its earnings rose 30 percent in the most recent quarter, boosted in part by its acquisition of a Tennessee television station.

The company on Thursday, May 2, reported first-quarter income of $3.8 million, or 8 cents per share. That's up from $2.9 million, or 5 cents per share, in the same quarter last year.

Total revenue increased 15 percent to $94.7 million. The growth was driven by the company's broadcasting segment, which saw revenue rise 31 percent to $58.2 million.

The company acquired NewsChannel 5 in Nashville in December, which helped drive up total revenue.

Journal Communications owns 15 television stations and 34 radio stations in 12 states. It also publishes the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Wisconsin's largest newspaper.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch names publisher

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch has named Ray Farris as the newspaper's new publisher.

Lee Enterprises Inc. said Thursday, May 2, that Farris, who is also vice president of sales for Lee's St. Louis operations, replaces Publisher Kevin D. Mowbray.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports (http://bit.ly/105ApSP) that Mowbray, 51, was promoted to vice president and chief operating officer for Lee Enterprises, based in Davenport, Iowa.

As publisher, Farris, 57, will oversee Lee's operations in St. Louis, including the Post-Dispatch, stltoday.com, Suburban Journals of Greater St. Louis and STL Distribution.

Farris joined the Post-Dispatch in 2006 as vice president of classified advertising. He became vice president of advertising in 2009 and general manager in 2010.

Mowbray, publisher of the Post-Dispatch since 2006, will oversee the company's newspapers and digital operations in 22 states.

Tennessean announces new president and publisher

The Tennessean has announced that Laura Hollingsworth has been named its new president and publisher.

According to the paper (http://tnne.ws/10vaiEP), Hollingsworth comes to Nashville from The Des Moines Register, where she has been president and publisher since 2007.

She also serves as the Gannett Co. Inc.'s U.S. Community Publishing group president for the Central Group, overseeing 25 markets in the central region.

U.S. Community Publishing President Robert Dickey said Hollingsworth has a deep commitment to community journalism. She also is expected to expand The Tennessean's digital capabilities.

Hollingsworth replaces Carol Hudler, who has been named as a special assistant to Dickey.

Masterson leaving Times Media Co. to join Berkshire Hathaway

Times Media Co. Publisher Bill Masterson Jr. has been named vice president at Berkshire Hathaway Media, the Munster, Ind., media company announced Thursday, May 2.

Lisa Daugherty, Times advertising director and general manager of the company's Crown Point office, has been named interim publisher. Daugherty also is corporate director of classified sales for Lee Enterprises Inc., The Times' parent company.

Masterson will work at The Times until May 17. He will then start his job at Berkshire Hathaway Media, a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., the company founded and headed by famed investor Warren Buffett.

During Masterson's stint at The Times, he has earned numerous honors, including the Publisher of the Year award last year from Editor & Publisher magazine. The magazine also named The Times as one of 10 newspapers in the country that "Do It Right" for its work in 2010.

Masterson was promoted in September to vice president of publishing for Lee Enterprises while remaining publisher of The Times. The 52-year-old Porter County resident has been publisher of The Times since 2006 and has worked 25 years as a newspaper publisher.

While at The Times, Masterson involved the media company in initiatives such as One Region and the effort to build the John W. Anderson Boys & Girls Club at the former Tolleston School site in Gary.

Both those efforts will continue, with Daugherty taking on Masterson's role in keeping both projects moving forward.

Hawaii news coalition: Senate killed shield law

A coalition of Hawaii news media is blaming the state Senate for failing to extend a journalism shield law past its expiration on June 30.

In particular, they're blaming Sen. Clayton Hee.

"The way one man — one man — could dictate the demise of the shield law is something that should concern the entire public," Jeff Portnoy, an attorney representing the Hawaii Shield Law Coalition, said at a press conference on Wednesday. The group includes more than 20 organizations including the Society of Professional Journalists and The Associated Press. "It may be the shield law this time, but it could be another important piece of legislation the next time."

The senator from Kaneohe was not immediately available for comment.

The law protecting journalists from revealing their sources and notes became the subject of a political showdown this week after lawmakers disagreed about proposed changes.

A bill to extend the law but limit its scope was up for a vote in both chambers on Tuesday. At the last minute, the House adopted an amendment that deleted the changes both chambers negotiated last week.

Hee, chairman of the powerful Senate Judiciary and Labor Committee, was the man behind the changes. He wanted to limit protections for all journalists and exclude those who work for digital newspapers and free publications.

Hee has previously said that he wants to clarify the existing law. He said his changes are based on advice from the attorney general's office. The senator has also criticized online media for false and mean-spirited reporting, and in one hearing distributed copies of the 1948 Chicago Tribune front-page headline "Dewey Defeats Truman," referencing one of journalism's most famous instances of getting the news wrong.

Hee's suggestions were harshly criticized by Hawaii's news media leaders. Stirling Morita, president of the Society of Professional Journalists in Hawaii, said Wednesday that Hee's revisions "afforded no protection for reality" given the changing media landscape.

Rather than go along with Hee's changes, the House amended the bill Tuesday to extend the shield law for two more years, promising to study the issue further with a task force.

House Majority Leader Scott Saiki told The Associated Press that the amendment was a last-minute decision but he had hoped the Senate would follow suit.

Hours later, a divided Senate passed its version of the bill without responding to the House amendment.

Saiki said Wednesday, May 1, that the bill is dead because of the House and Senate disagreement.

Senate Majority Leader Brickwood Galuteria said in a statement late Wednesday afternoon that the House is responsible for the bill's death. He says the House changed the bill significantly by proposing to extend the law by two years rather than make it permanent.

"To introduce such a substantive change, moments before the Senate began its floor session, lacked the transparency and openness that the public expects and deserves," Galuteria said.

Portnoy says the news media coalition favored making the current law permanent without any changes beyond removing a sunset provision. It also preferred the two-year House extension over the Senate version.

Sen. Les Ihara was one of nine senators who voted against the Senate proposal. He said he supports the existing shield law but he didn't have enough votes to introduce an amendment.

Ihara agreed with Galuteria that the House killed the bill by introducing an amendment without coordinating with the Senate.

Sen. Sam Slom says it's possible the measure could be revived before the Legislature ends its 2013 session on Thursday.

"It's not over until it's over," he said.

But with one day left, the prospect looks unlikely. Saiki says he hopes the bill's death will allow the Legislature go back to the drawing board and come up with a proposal everyone can support. But Portnoy said he doesn't see the point of returning to the Legislature next year to advocate for the bill if Hee remains in power.

"When the Senate chair holds up 'Dewey Defeats Truman' as an example of what journalism is, you know that you don't have a chance," he said.

Baton Rouge paper's new owner to beef up New Orleans edition

The new owner of Baton Rouge's daily newspaper vowed Wednesday, May 1, to keep publishing daily and to beef up coverage in New Orleans — escalating competition with The Times-Picayune, which angered some readers and community leaders last fall when it pared print editions to three days a week.

New Orleans businessman John Georges held a news conference in Baton Rouge on Wednesday, a day after his purchase of The Advocate from the Manship family was completed. It was also a day after The Times-Picayune announced a return to seven-day-a-week publishing with a tabloid edition to be available at stores and newsstands on days when the full paper isn't printed.

Gov. Bobby Jindal, New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu, Baton Rouge mayor Kip Holden and members of the Manship family also attended, along with two former Times-Picayune editors who will hold key posts at The Advocate.

The Times-Picayune was never mentioned by name. However, the decision of its parent company, privately held Advance Publications Inc., to reduce publication to three-days a week was alluded to by speakers who praised continued local ownership for the Advocate and George's commitment to daily publishing.

"John believes in Louisiana and knows the Advocate can fuel its growth, not a three-day-a-week paper, but a seven-day-a-week paper," said Richard Manship, president of the family publishing company.

"I agree, it's hard to know how we're going to get our news going forward, but the print media is still alive and well and the morning Advocate has indicated a willingness to continue for a very long time," Landrieu said.

The shake-up on the New Orleans media scene began last June when Advance and a new subsidiary, Nola Media Group, announced the paper would lay off 200 employees and shift its focus to the free nola.com site. Advance has pursued similar three-times-a-week strategies — printing Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays — with several other newspapers in the chain.

The decision met with harsh protests in New Orleans. The Manships responded by opening a small New Orleans bureau with about a half-dozen people while pushing home subscriptions for a new New Orleans edition. The Advocate says the New Orleans area accounts for about a fifth of its weekday circulation of 98,000.

"As far as we're concerned the best thing that we can continue to do is serve the readers and serve our advertisers," Times-Picayune publisher Ricky Mathews said Wednesday when asked about competition from The Advocate. "And, so far, that has been a very successful journey for us."

Mathews said the plan to launch a new tabloid edition and, an accompanying e-edition, arose from feedback from readers who wanted a "front-to-back experience" with the newspaper.

"We have an extraordinarily well thought out plan. And we're executing on that plan," Mathews said. "But it doesn't mean that we aren't going to still be nimble and listen to the market and make changes along the way."

At a time when newspapers are in decline, Georges' vocal commitment to print and the Times-Picayune's tabloid announcement are reminiscent of the days when papers were profitable and competition was fierce, said Michael Giusti, a journalism professor at Loyola University. "Watching two newspapers go toe-to-toe is exciting in this decade," he said.

Still, The Advocate's ability to more fully compete in the New Orleans market remains an open question. Much will depend on how much Georges and his team invest in expanded coverage, Giusti said. He noted that The Times-Picayune and nola.com maintain a much larger staff, even after last year's layoffs. Times-Picayune editor Jim Amoss said there are more than 150 employees still involved in newsgathering, photography, video, graphics and other aspects of news content.

"The truth is we have far more stories and content than can fit into any conceivable newspaper print budget, of any newspaper, of any size," Amoss said.

The newly announced New Orleans tabloid, TPStreet, will sell for 75 cents on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays. It won't' be available for home delivery, like the full Wednesday, Friday and Sunday editions. (There is also a full early Sunday edition that is sold on Saturday afternoons.) The new electronic versions of the tabloids and full papers will be available to subscribers.

"Competition is good and it's kind of exciting to watch this," Giusti said. "My guess is that the Times-Picayune is really entrenched and he (Georges) has got an uphill battle to wage."

Georges said he is deferring editorial decisions, including expanding news coverage, to General Manager Dan Shea and Editor Peter Kovacs, both former long-time editors at The Times-Picayune who were laid off amid last year's changes.

All three said Wednesday that Baton Rouge will continue to be a focus and a priority for the paper, even as they look to expand coverage in the New Orleans area.

Texas House OKs mitigating defamation lawsuits

The Texas House has passed a bill allowing publishers to mitigate the effects of libel lawsuits if the party affected by a mistake doesn't request a correction or retraction.

Approved by a voice vote Wednesday, May 1, the measure says corrections or retractions must be published in a timely manner, and one similarly prominent to how the original information was presented.

But it limits damages the affected party can collect from a publisher that makes non-malicious errors. It also limits a person or business from collecting punitive damages if they don't seek a retraction within 90 days.

The bill is supported by the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas and publishers. They say it may prevent libel lawsuits by requiring swift, prominent corrections.

The measure must still pass the state Senate.

Yuma Sun sold to Rhode Island Suburban Newspapers

The Yuma (Ariz.) Sun has been sold to a privately owned publisher of several daily and weekly newspapers in Rhode Island.

Officials with the Sun announced the deal Tuesday, April 30, with Rhode Island Suburban Newspapers Inc., which is a part of Horizon Publications. Horizon publishes newspapers across the U.S. and Canada.

The Sun reported (http://bit.ly/15XRMgI) that it was purchased along with its sister property, the Porterville Recorder in Porterville, Calif., from Freedom Communications for an undisclosed sum.

Sun Publisher Joni Brooks says the newspaper doesn't anticipate any personnel changes after the sale, which becomes effective Wednesday, May 1.

The newspaper in southwestern Arizona published its first issue in April 1896.

US regulators looking at dealing with social media

A week after hackers broke into The Associated Press' Twitter feed and roiled financial markets, federal regulators say they need to find ways to deal with the impact of social media.

Members of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission didn't outline immediate action Tuesday, April 30. CFTC Commissioner Bart Chilton suggested they consider imposing tougher cybersecurity rules for investment firms and others that trade. Firms could be held accountable and sanctioned if their security systems were inadequate to prevent a breech.

At a meeting of an advisory panel, Commissioner Scott O'Malia said regulators need to begin figuring out how to respond to social media.

The false tweet reporting explosions at the White House sent the stock market on a brief plunge. The CFTC, FBI and the Securities and Exchange Commission are investigating.

Digital fees pay off for 2 top-selling newspapers

The Wall Street Journal remains the top-selling U.S. daily newspaper, but The New York Times has surpassed USA Today for second, thanks to an expansion into digital subscriptions, according to a report released Tuesday, April 30, by an industry group.

The Journal's weekday circulation averaged 2.38 million from October through March, the period covered by the report from the Alliance for Audited Media. That was a 12 percent increase from the same period a year ago, the AAM said. Most of the growth came in digital subscriptions, which accounted for nearly 900,000, or 40 percent, of the total circulation at the newspaper, which is owned by News Corp.

The New York Times began charging for unlimited access to its heavily trafficked website two years ago. The move has helped boost its paid circulation by reeling in more subscribers who are willing to pay for unlimited digital access the newspaper's content. The Times' weekday circulation averaged 1.87 million during the latest period, an 18 percent increase from last year. The figure included digital circulation of 1.13 million, a 32 percent increase from last year.

AAM's rules allow publications to count as multiple subscriptions the same person's paid usage on multiple outlets, such as a paper newspaper, a website and a tablet computer.

Digital subscriptions now account for 19 percent of average U.S. daily newspaper circulation, up from 14 percent last year, the AAM said.

Overall, the average daily circulation at the 593 U.S. newspapers that submitted figures to AAM declined by 0.7 percent from March 2012. The AAM cautioned against comparing the industry's overall numbers with the previous year because of the different ways newspapers have been delivering and selling editions. Some newspapers, for instance, have reduced the number of weekdays that they deliver print editions. Other newspapers are listing branded editions that weren't counted in past years, according to the AAM.

In what was then a break from the industry's practice, The Wall Street Journal began charging for online access to its business-oriented newspaper during the 1990s. That move helped The Journal leapfrog USA Today as the largest U.S. newspaper in 2009.

The New York Times remained the largest Sunday newspaper with an average circulation of 2.32 million, a 16 percent increase from last year. Neither The Journal nor USA Today publishes a print edition on Sunday.

USA Today's weekday circulation fell 8 percent from last year to 1.67 million. The newspaper, owned by Gannett Co., still offers free access to its website. Even so, USA Today delivers a digital version that had nearly 250,000 paying subscribers during the latest period, according to AAM.

Newsstand tab to make Orleans paper daily again

Months after cutting its print edition to three days a week, The Times-Picayune of New Orleans has announced plans for a three-day-a-week tabloid called TPStreet available in stores and newsstands on days when the full paper isn't printed.

Editor Jim Amoss announced the 75-cent tabloid Tuesday, April 30, on the newspaper's website, nola.com. He said the new publication will be published Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays beginning this summer (http://bit.ly/13JgNbd) and that the publication won't be available via home delivery.

Home subscribers will be able to get an electronic replica of TPStreet on the days it is published, in addition to an electronic version of the full Times-Picayune editions published Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays (including an early Sunday edition published Saturday afternoons.)

"It will allow our readers every day to zoom in on content as they browse through the e-edition's pages on their laptops, tablets and desktop computers," Amoss wrote.

In June of last year, The Times-Picayune's owner, privately held Advance Publications Inc., and a new subsidiary, Nola Media Group, announced the paper would lay off 200 employees and shift its focus to the free nola.com site. Advance has pursued similar three-times-a-week strategies with several other newspapers in the chain.

The decision met with harsh protests in tradition-bound New Orleans, where readers had a tight bond with the 175-year-old Pulitzer-winning paper, especially after Hurricane Katrina devastated the city in 2005.

The Advocate, a family owned daily in Baton Rouge, reacted by offering daily news coverage and subscriptions in New Orleans.

New Orleans businessman John Georges has since agreed to buy The Advocate and was expected to close on his purchase by June 1. Georges did not immediately return a phone call for comment Tuesday. He has declined comment on the sale in the past, citing a confidentiality agreement.

Vt. Senate keeps newspaper carriers independent

The Vermont Senate approved a measure Tuesday, April 30, that would exempt newspapers from paying unemployment insurance for people who deliver those newspapers.

The 18-10 vote Tuesday goes against a proposed state Labor Department rule that would require newspapers to collect unemployment insurance on carriers. The department has until June 1 to decide whether to implement it.

The delay in the rule's implementation gave lawmakers time to enact a provision that would overrule the rule, the Burlington Free Press reports (http://bfpne.ws/ZxZb2h).

"Newspaper carriers always have been and still are independent contractors," said Sen. Kevin Mullin, a Rutland Republican who sponsored the amendment.

But Senate Finance Chairman Tim Ashe, a Democrat and Progressive from Chittenden County, argued the Legislature shouldn't write exemptions for specific industries. "We should create broad direction in statute," he said.

Publishers have argued that carriers are "direct sellers" with whom newspapers contract to market and deliver their papers.

The provision about newspaper carriers was part of a bill that would give employers a break on increased rates if they were forced to lay off workers because of a natural disaster, such as Tropical Storm Irene.

The House will still have to approve the measure before it can become law.

INDUSTRY NEWS 5-2-13

AP wins 3 prizes at Overseas Press Club Awards

The Associated Press and National Geographic have each won three awards for international coverage from the Overseas Press Club.

The AP's Alberto Arce won for best reporting on Latin America at the awards ceremony April 24 in New York.

AP photographer Bernat Armangue was honored for images of the conflict in Gaza.

The AP's Oded Balilty won the feature photography award for pictures of an ultra-Orthodox wedding.

National Geographic won three of four magazine awards.

Winners also include The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and Bloomberg Businessweek. They also include the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, CNN, Harper's, CBS News, WGBH, WBEZ, Bloomberg News and Agence France-Presse.

Former NBC anchor Tom Brokaw received a lifetime achievement award.

Veteran journalist new FOI Foundation director

Kelley Shannon, a longtime Texas journalist, has been named executive director of the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas.

Dale Leach, president of the foundation board of directors, said Shannon replaces Keith Elkins, who resigned in January to accept a position with an Austin television station.

Shannon's journalism career includes more than 20 years as a correspondent with The Associated Press, as well as reporting assignments for The Dallas Morning News, the Savannah (Ga.) News-Press and the Palestine Herald-Press. She also has done extensive freelance reporting and has been an adjunct journalism instructor for news reporting and writing at the University of Texas in Austin.

"We are delighted to have someone of Kelley Shannon's reputation and stature leading our organization," Leach said. "Kelley's career has been marked by fair and accurate reporting of the workings of state and local governments and, more importantly, how government actions affect Texas citizens.

"In her new role, she will work to help ensure that the public's business is conducted in the open and to protect the individual liberties guaranteed by the First Amendment."

The Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas was formed in 1978 to champion openness in government at all levels. It is governed by a 30-member volunteer board of directors and provides a number of services, including a hotline for citizens with questions related to government transparency and educational open-government seminars by request.

Its annual conference is set for Aug. 9 in Austin.

Pa. sheriff faces hearing on reporter threat claim

A preliminary hearing was set in Beaver, Pa., for a western Pennsylvania county sheriff charged with threatening to cut off the hands of a political campaign worker and allegedly pulling a gun and threatening to shoot an online news reporter.

Sixty-five-year-old Beaver County Sheriff George David has denied the charges and remains in office because county officials are powerless to remove him and state legislators haven't made an effort to do so.

David was arrested last month on charges including terroristic threats, witness intimidation and obstructing an investigation.

The charges stem from alleged encounters since November 2011 that were investigated by a state grand jury.

An out-of-county district judge was scheduled to preside Monday (April 29) at a preliminary hearing on the charges at the Beaver County Courthouse.

O.C. Register weekly newspaper goes daily May 6

The Current, a weekly California newspaper in Newport Beach and Costa Mesa owned by the Orange County Register, will expand to become a Monday-to-Friday daily beginning May 6, the company announced today.

The new daily will be inserted in the Register for all subscribers in those two communities. Select retail locations also will carry The Current and, for a limited time, the newspaper will be available inside the Register at news racks in both cities.

Non-subscribers will have a chance to sample the new Current for a five-day period in late May when the paper will be delivered to Newport Beach and Costa Mesa households with invitations to subscribe.

"We care deeply about Orange County's communities, and the best way to help them grow and connect the people of each city to one another is to cover them with greater depth and frequency," said Aaron Kushner, owner and publisher of the Register.

"As we expand coverage around inspiring people, city government, schools, businesses, faith and values, and other topics the community is passionate about, we believe The Current will become an even more important institution and extension of the neighborhoods, homes and businesses within Newport Beach and Costa Mesa."

The Current will be the second daily newspaper focused solely on Costa Mesa and Newport Beach. The Daily Pilot, which is owned by the Los Angeles Times, publishes Wednesday through Sunday and is delivered to Times subscribers and distributed at news racks in the area.

Leaders at family-owned NY newspapers step aside

Leadership changes have been announced at two of upstate New York's largest family-owned newspaper companies.

In Schenectady, John E.N. "Jack" Hume III will retire this summer after 23 years as publisher of The Daily Gazette, where he'd worked in a variety of jobs since 1966. And in Watertown, John B. Johnson Jr. says he's stepping aside as CEO of Johnson Newspapers and editor and co-publisher of the Watertown Daily Times.

Both companies say they'll remain in family hands.

Johnson will remain as chairman of the board. He says his son John will take over as CEO and as co-publisher with his brother, Harold, who will become vice-chairman and continue as company president.

Daily Gazette Co. President Betsie Hume Lind, one of Hume's three cousins involved with the business, says a national search has been launched for a new publisher.

Wyo. prosecutors drop subpoena against reporter

Federal prosecutors have dropped their request to force a Wyoming newspaper reporter to testify about her interview with a bank robbery suspect.

Prosecutors had subpoenaed Jackson Hole News & Guide reporter Emma Breysse to testify about her interview with Corey Allan Donaldson.

Donaldson is a 39-year-old Australian accused of taking $140,000 from a bank in Jackson on New Year's Eve.

Breysse reported that Donaldson told her in an interview from jail following his arrest in Utah that he robbed the bank to give money to the homeless.

The newspaper this week asked U.S. District Judge Alan B. Johnson to quash Breysse's subpoena, saying forcing her to testify for the government would have a chilling effect on its newsgathering.

Prosecutor Todd Shugart told Johnson April 26 he no longer wanted to call Breysse as a witness. John Powell, spokesman for the U.S. Attorney's Office, declined comment after the hearing on the decision to drop the subpoena.

"We felt that requiring her to testify would be tantamount to making her an 'unofficial investigator' for the government," Kevin Olson, publisher of the News & Guide, said.

Donaldson has written to news organizations, including The Associated Press, from jail, likening himself to Robin Hood. He maintains the federal government lacks standing to prosecute him because its bank-bailout policies hurt the poor.

Johnson ruled he won't allow Donaldson to argue at trial that he was justified in robbing the bank. The judge also declined to issue subpoenas for homeless people Donaldson said could verify that they would have frozen to death on the streets but for the money he gave them.

Johnson said Donaldson had other options aside from robbing the bank but that Donaldson "chose to go forward on this Quixotic episode that took him across many states."

Prosecutors allege Donaldson persuaded the bank manager to turn over the cash after saying that members of a Mexican cartel were prepared to blow up the bank otherwise.

Donaldson told Johnson last week that the security in the bank was so bad that he spent an hour and a half inside before the manager turned over the money. He said he believes security was poor because banks aren't concerned about losing money when the federal government stands ready to reimburse them for losses.

Donaldson, a large man with a thick Australian accent, is acting as his own attorney.

Donaldson told Johnson that his decision forbidding him from arguing that he was justified in robbing the bank, "is a kick in the guts to the homeless people."

Johnson appointed James Barrett, a veteran assistant federal public defender, to assist Donaldson.

Asked what sort of defense Donaldson has after the judge's ruling, Barrett said, "What he believes he has left, I don't know. He may believe he has something."

New Hawaii shield law draft cuts out free media

A panel of Hawaii lawmakers approved a new draft of the state shield law last week that removes protections for free newspapers and magazines and requires that newspapers must be printed in order to be covered.

Hawaii's shield law, which protects journalists from revealing sources and notes in court proceedings, is set to expire in June. The proposal, approved by a committee of negotiators, would make the law permanent but also drastically limit its scope.

The bill now goes to the House and Senate floors for a vote.

Sen. Clayton Hee, chairman of the Senate Judiciary and Labor Committee, has been pushing to change the law, saying the language is too vague. He has also criticized Hawaii's media for making mistakes and said some online media is mean-spirited.

Hee added the bill amendments that cut protections for free newspapers and magazines and the requirement that newspapers must be printed, not digital.

Rep. Karl Rhoads said he disagreed with those changes but thought that the latest draft was better than no shield law at all.

"It's not my favorite bill," he said. "I can't say I'm really happy, it's just — that's the nature of compromise."

News media advocates say the shield law encourages investigative journalism and allows whistleblowers to come forward. But the state attorney general agreed with Hee and said that Hawaii's law is too broad because it gives protections to non-traditional journalists.

The current law has some exceptions, including in felony and defamation cases. The new proposal extends the exceptions to include civil cases, potential felonies and serious crimes when someone is unlawfully injured.

Rep. Cynthia Thielen, the only committee member to vote against the proposal, said she supports simply making the current law permanent rather than changing it.

"We have the best shield law in the nation and we recognize that the media has changed," she said. "This bill is almost punitive."

McClatchy has 1Q loss on debt payment, ad decline

The McClatchy Co. said April 25 that its first-quarter loss widened, as the newspaper publisher paid off part of its debt ahead of schedule and advertising revenue declined.

McClatchy lost $12.7 million, or 15 cents per share, compared with a loss of $2.1 million, or 2 cents per share, during the same period a year ago. In the most recent quarter, McClatchy booked an after-tax loss of $8.1 million as part of a refinancing that repaid nearly $84 million in debt. McClatchy ended the quarter with debt of $1.57 billion, compared with $1.71 billion at the end of last year.

Revenue fell 4 percent to $277 million, from $288 million. That was modest progress from the first quarter of 2012, when revenue decreased 5 percent from the prior year.

McClatchy, which publishes The Sacramento (Calif.) Bee, The Miami Herald and 28 other daily newspapers, is trying to bring in more money from digital products by requiring paid subscriptions to previously free websites. That started last September and helped boost circulation revenue in the first quarter to $67.5 million, an increase of nearly 2 percent from a year earlier. McClatchy ended the quarter with 22,000 digital-only subscribers.

But McClatchy is still being hurt as advertisers curtail their spending on print. The company's print advertising revenue fell by 8 percent, or $13.3 million, to $150 million, while digital advertising revenue increased by less than 2 percent, or $705,000, to $47 million.

The results were the latest reminder of the challenges that newspaper companies face as readers and advertisers shift away from print publications to digital alternatives on desktop computers, smartphones and tablets. Newspapers are still reaching large audiences on their websites and mobile apps, but they aren't yet bringing in nearly enough digital revenue to make up for what they have lost in print.

Like many other publishers, McClatchy has tried make up for declines in revenue by cutting staff and other expenses. Some of those cost-cutting measures, including moving The Miami Herald to a less expensive location, resulted in one-time charges that added to the first-quarter loss.

Excluding those charges and the debt-related loss, McClatchy would have lost $663,000, or 1 cent per share, compared with an adjusted loss of $2.5 million, or 3 cents per share, a year earlier.

Without providing a specific number, CEO Pat Talamantes said he expects the current quarter to show further signs of the revenue slump easing, in part because of the digital subscriptions.

New York Times posts sharp 1Q profit decline

The New York Times Co. reported a sharp decline in its first-quarter earnings April 25 mainly because businesses it sold last year were not included in the latest results.

The company earned $3.1 million, or 2 cents per share, in the January-March period. That's down 93 percent from $42.1 million, or 28 cents per share, in the same period a year ago.

Excluding severance costs and the results of businesses the company has sold, earnings were 4 cents per share in the latest quarter, matching Wall Street's expectations but down from 5 cents per share in the first quarter of 2012.

Revenue fell 2 percent to $465.9 million from $475.4 million.

Analysts, on average, were expecting revenue of $469.1 million, according to a poll by FactSet.

Advertising revenue dropped 11 percent to $191.1 million from $215.2 million.

Circulation revenue rose 7 percent to $241.8 million from $227 million, as the company attracted more people who signed up for digital and print subscriptions. It ended the quarter with 708,000 digital-only subscription accounts, up 45 percent from a year ago.

The Times Co.'s stock rose 21 cents, or 2.3 percent, to $9.21 in afternoon trading. The company's stock is up nearly 8 percent in 2013.

The company announced new products aimed at growing revenue. Its plans include lower-priced subscriptions as well as premium subscriptions, e-commerce and enhanced video.

"We mean to grow our business by launching new products and services based on the unique strengths of Times journalism and by investing in the rapid expansion of existing operations — video and live events are examples — where we're already seeing strong growth," said Times Co. president and CEO Mark Thompson, in a statement.

Games are another area of interest for the Times Co. Last year, the company expanded its famous crossword franchise with increased marketing of its Web and mobile crossword products. As a result, it added "a sizable number" of subscribers to those products, said Thompson on a conference call with analysts.

"Based on this experience and market indicators —which point to healthy growth of casual gaming users, especially in mobile— we believe there is an opportunity to expand our footprint in this market," Thompson said.

The company said it expects circulation revenue to increase in the mid-single digits in the second quarter compared with a year ago. It anticipates advertising revenue trends will be "somewhat better" than they were in the first quarter.

Ex-Washington Post editor to lead Duke center

Duke University is making a professor and managing editor of the PBS television program "Frontline" the director of an academic center dedicated to improving modern journalism.

Duke said April 25 that public policy professor Philip Bennett will become director of the DeWitt Wallace Center for Media and Democracy at Duke University in July. He joined Duke's faculty in 2009 after a four-year stint as managing editor of The Washington Post, a period during which the newspaper won 10 Pulitzer Prizes.

Bennett said he wants the academic center to deepen support for accountability journalism by contributing ideas and research.

He replaces Jay Hamilton, who is going to Stanford University after leading the Duke center's efforts to find new economic models for news and new ways to lower the cost of investigative reporting.

UK newspapers reject press regulation plans

British newspaper publishers including major players like Rupert Murdoch's News International have rejected the government's proposals for curbing media abuses, saying the plans for regulation would give politicians "an unacceptable degree of interference" in press freedom.

The Newspaper Society, which represents thousands of national and local publications, said April 25 the British press has put out its own plans for independent self-regulation to rival those agreed by politicians. The group said that unlike the government's proposals, the industry version enjoys the support of all four trade associations and all national papers.

Dominic Mohan, the editor of The Sun tabloid — a popular Murdoch property — said his readers "expect journalists to behave responsibly, but don't want them censored by a state-sponsored 'Ministry of Truth.'"

The revolt was a blow to Prime Minister David Cameron, who closed a deal between all three major political parties after months of wrangling over how best to introduce tougher rules to police Britain's media after the phone hacking scandal plunged the industry into crisis.

Revelations that journalists illegally tapped people's phones and committed other crimes in pursuit of scoops have shut down Murdoch's News of the World tabloid and ignited a heated debate about press ethics in Britain. While many wanted better media practices, some —not least those running newspapers — oppose any measures that could infringe on the independence of the country's press.

Politicians said last month that an independent watchdog would be set up with powers to issue fines and demand apologies, but many newspapers complained they had no say in the final decision.

The alternative regulatory plans they proposed April 25 remove parliament's power to block or approve future changes to media regulation. The industry version also removes a ban on former editors sitting on the panel of the regulating body.

News International chief executive Mike Darcey said the industry's system "will mean that the press will not be at the mercy of the politicians that we are seeking to hold to account."

But Hacked Off, a group that represented some phone hacking victims, criticized the move as proof that most of the industry has learned no lessons from the scandal. The proposed self-regulation regime will only be an "industry poodle" that puts the interests of editors first, the group said.

Google agrees to change search display in Europe

Google has agreed to change how it displays search results in Europe — including a better labeling of its promoted content and displaying links to competitors — to appease concerns it might be abusing its dominant market position, the European Union's antitrust body said April 25.

Google's search engine, which is the world's most influential gateway to online information and commerce, enjoys a near-monopoly in Europe. The EU Commission, which acts as the 27-nation bloc's antitrust authority, has since 2010 been investigating whether the company is unfairly stifling competition. It pointed out several areas of concern that Google is now trying to address through the proposed concessions.

Google has offered to more clearly label search results stemming from its own services such as Google News, Google Maps or its shopping and flight search functions. That would allow users to distinguish between natural search results and others promoted by Google. It also agreed to display some search results from its competitors and links to their services, the EU Commission said.

The Commission has often taken a harder line with U.S. tech companies than its American counterparts, the Federal Trade Commission and the Justice Department. Google, which is based in Mountain View, California, was able to settle a similar antitrust complaint on its search business with the FTC in January without making any major concessions on how it runs its search engine.

The EU Commission is now proposing a market test of the concessions for a month. That would give competitors the chance to say whether they deem them sufficient.

"The objective of this process is to try to see if we can achieve a settled outcome in this antitrust investigation," said Commission spokesman Antoine Colombani.

A group of 17 companies competing with Google — including tech giants and internet companies such as Microsoft, Nokia Expedia and TripAdvisor — vowed to carefully study the concessions proposed by Google.

"The most important remedy to Google's abuse of dominance is to require the search monopoly (...) to subject its own products and services to the same policy it uses to rank and display all other websites," said the group, collectively called FairSearch.

Once the Commission accepts the concessions — revised or not — they become legally binding for the company for the next five years. If the deal is accepted, Google would avoid a fine and a finding of wrongdoing.

If Google were then to break its commitments, the Commission could impose a fine of up to 10 percent of its annual worldwide revenue — that would be close to a whopping $5 billion in Google's case.

The Commission said Google will "clearly separate promoted links from other web search results by clear graphical features" and "display links to three rival specialized search services close to its own services, in a place that is clearly visible to users."

Google will also give all websites the option to keep their content from being used in Google's specialized search services, "while ensuring that any opt-out does not unduly affect the ranking of those web sites in Google's general web search results," it said.

In addition, the proposed remedies will give newspaper publishers greater control over what appears in Google's news aggregator, Google News. Google is also giving marketers greater ability to buy ads on rival networks — one of several concessions aimed at appeasing fears it is abusing its dominance of the online advertising market.

To normal users in Europe, the changes in the display of search results will only be visible once the Commission accepts the settlement, most likely later this year.

However, Google's algorithm — the unique mathematical formula that ranks its search results — will remain unchanged. That means the company retains the power to decide what search results are displayed most prominently.

The Commission's investigation was initially triggered by complaints from Google's rivals.

One of them, British comparison-shopping site Foundem, said that at first glance the proposed concessions "fall far short" of ensuring a level playing field in the search results market.

"Instead of promising to end its abusive practices, Google's proposal seems to offer a half-hearted attempt to dilute their anti-competitive effects, by labeling Google's own services and throwing in some token links to competitors' services alongside them," the company said. The measures won't "make a dent in Google's ability to hijack the traffic and revenues of its rivals," it added.

Google worked closely with the Commission on the concessions' design until formally submitting them earlier this month.

"We continue to work cooperatively with the European Commission", Google spokesman Al Verney said Thursday.

Google's web search service has a market share of over 90 percent in the EU, a bloc of over 500 million people that makes up the world's largest economy. In the U.S., competitors Bing and Yahoo have a share of about 30 percent of the search market.

Separately, major tech companies led by Microsoft Corp. this month also filed another EU antitrust complaint against Google, alleging the company uses the dominant position of its Android smartphone operating system to illegitimately promote its own array of internet services.

Microsoft, which has been a leading player in the complaints against Google, has had its own protracted run-ins with the EU Commission. The company from Redmond, Washington, has paid 2.2 billion euros in various fines since investigations began in 1998.

Maine newspaper ex-CEO accused of misusing funds

The parent company of the Portland Press Herald and two other Maine daily newspapers accused its former CEO on April 24 of misappropriating more than half a million dollars of company money on vacations, a $36,000 vehicle for his son and other expenses.

In a letter to employees, MaineToday Media publisher Lisa DeSisto said the company had received a $488,000 check from its insurance company under its employee theft policy for funds that former CEO Richard Connor allegedly took for personal use from June 2009 to October 2011.

DeSisto said the unauthorized spending totaled $538,000, including $287,000 in salary increases and bonuses, $90,000 in personal expenses charged to company credit cards, $70,000 for payments of personal credit card bills, $36,000 for a vehicle for his son, and $22,000 for vacation rentals in Camden.

DeSisto wrote that the company's been advised that more action is possible. She didn't specify what it might be.

Connor told the Portland Press Herald that most of the charges were legitimate and that he's prepared to work with Travelers to sort things out. Connor is now the CEO of Foster's Daily Democrat in Dover, N.H.

His attorney, Peter Bennett, said the insurance company never asked Connor about his side of the story. "There are two sides to this issue. Someday it'll all be sorted out. Connor should feel vindicated when that happens," Bennett said.

During Connor's tenure, MaineToday Media made deep staff cuts and was unable to pay some of its creditors.

News groups want gag order lifted in cheating case

A newspaper and a television station are asking a judge to lift a gag order that prevents defendants in Atlanta's school cheating scandal from discussing the case.

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports that Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard required the defendants to agree to silence in exchange for lower bond.

Such restrictions are typically issued by a judge, but in this case it was arranged by the prosecutor's office.

The newspaper and WSB-TV have asked a Fulton County judge to lift the restriction. It bars the defendants from commenting, but it doesn't apply to their attorneys or the prosecutor and his staff.

Howard should not be allowed to interfere with the defendants' right "to defend themselves in the court of public opinion," said attorney Tom Clyde, who filed the motion on behalf of the newspaper and television station that are both owned by Cox Media Group.

"A person's First Amendment rights do not go away when they are accused of a crime," Clyde told the newspaper. "They have the right to speak themselves, not just through counsel."

Howard declined to comment.

A Fulton County grand jury last month indicted 35 educators, including the former superintendent, accusing them of involvement in a broad conspiracy to cheat, conceal cheating or retaliate against whistleblowers. Prosecutors say the educators were driven at least in part by bonuses for improved student performance.

A grand jury recommended millions of dollars in cash bonds for some defendants, but Howard agreed to lesser amounts as long as the defendants — but not their lawyers — agreed not to talk to reporters.

Cox Enterprises announces leadership changes

Cox Enterprises Inc. has announced upcoming changes to its executive leadership team.

In a statement April 23, officials said President and CEO Jimmy Hayes will retire next April after 33 years of service.

John Dyer, a 36-year company veteran, will be named CEO in May and will replace Hayes after his retirement.

Doug Franklin, president of Cox Media Group, will succeed Dyer as executive vice president and chief financial officer, and Bill Hoffman, who oversees most of the company's broadcast operations, will follow Franklin as Cox Media Group president.

Cox Enterprises is a media and automotive services company employing more than 50,000 people. Subsidiaries include Cox Communications, AutoTrader.com and Cox Media Group, which operates 19 TV stations, 88 radio stations and eight newspapers, including the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and WSB-TV in Atlanta.

INDUSTRY NEWS 4-25-13

Media frenzy on marathon investigation

For about an hour Wednesday afternoon (April 17), people could flip through different television channels and hear completely different accounts of the investigation into the Boston Marathon explosions: Some news organizations reported the arrest of a suspect and then took those claims back.

CNN and the Fox News Channel reported that a suspect in Monday's bombing (April 15) had been arrested. The Associated Press and the Boston Globe said a suspect had been taken into custody. Within an hour, the FBI denied that a suspect had been captured, leading the three news organizations that had reported the arrest to back down from those claims.

The AP, while reporting the federal denial, said that its original source was standing by its claim that a suspect had been taken into custody. The news cooperative said its source was a law enforcement official speaking on condition of anonymity. By nightfall, with no evidence that anyone was in custody, the original source was unable to further explain what was going on.

ABC, CBS and NBC all broke into their regular programming to report progress in the case, but did not say there was an arrest or someone brought into custody.

The frantic afternoon presented another example of news organizations being embarrassed by a race to report information under intense competitive pressure. It was reminiscent of the day last year that the Supreme Court handed down its decision on President Obama's health care plan, when both CNN and Fox initially got the ruling wrong in their haste to report it.

In Wednesday's scenario, CNN's John King had jumped out early around lunchtime, saying that a department store's surveillance camera had helped law enforcement spot a person dropping a container on the street that was believed to be the second of two bombs that detonated near the race's finish line.

King reported at 1:45 p.m. that an arrest had been made. The Globe tweeted the same thing at 1:53, without attribution. Six minutes later the Globe sent out a second tweet, saying CNN was the source of its arrest report. Fox News Channel's Megyn Kelly said at 1:55 that the network had been told of an arrest.

The Associated Press sent out a NewsAlert at 1:41 p.m. saying that an arrest was imminent. At 2:02, the AP said a suspect had been taken into custody, but did not say there was an arrest. The Globe also followed with its own report that a suspect was in custody, citing an unnamed official familiar with the investigation.

The three biggest broadcast networks jumped into the story with cautious reports of progress within five minutes of each other shortly before 2 p.m. NBC reporter Pete Williams was insistent that news organizations reporting an arrest had jumped the gun.

"From the beginning of this, this has been the hallmark of this story — information going in totally different directions coming from normally very reliable sources," Williams said. "We can't just flip a coin on this."

At 2:15 on MSNBC, Williams said that "at the end of the day, somebody is going to be right, because every news organization is reporting something different."

King's exclusive then began to be shot down by three different CNN reporters giving their own on-air reports: Fran Townsend, Joe Johns and Tom Fuentes.

As Chris Cuomo was saying on the air that "we don't know what's right or not right at this point," the onscreen crawl was still reporting that an arrest had been made.

CNN spokeswoman Barbara Levin noted that the network had three credible sources on the local and federal levels for King's initial report. "Based on this information, we reported our findings," she said. "As soon as our sources came to us with new information, we adjusted our reporting."

On Fox, Kelly was dialing back that network's arrest claim, noting the conflicting reports. At 2:15, Kelly told viewers that two law enforcement officials had told Fox there had been an arrest.

"Other news outlets — some are reporting that an arrest has been made and some are reporting that that is not the case," she said. "Here's the truth: We don't know ... We just want to be transparent with you on the information that is coming in a breaking news situation that seems to be anything but clear at this moment."

The Globe at 2:40 p.m. reported that both the United States attorney and Boston police said there was no arrest. The Globe reported late Wednesday night that "after further reporting, the Globe is no longer convinced that its previously reliable source had accurate information."

The FBI statement denying the arrest, which was transmitted on the AP wire at 2:59, quieted the television chatter about whether a suspect had been captured.

During his initial reporting, King had said that law enforcement officials had told him that a "dark-skinned male" had been spotted leaving the package believed to be a bomb. King said he was reluctant to give that description, which can inflame racial sensitivities. An hour later CBS News contradicted him, tweeting that authorities are seeking a "white male" as a bombing suspect.

None of the news organizations named the officials that they were speaking to during their reporting.

Amid the confusion, the Columbia Journalism Review offered a one-word tweet: "Sigh."

How a phony tweet and computer trades sank stocks

For a few surreal minutes, a mere 12 words on Twitter caused the world's mightiest stock market to tremble.

Tennessee must release information in 50 child deaths

Tennessee’s state Department of Children's Services was ordered Wednesday, April 17, to give the media records from the case files of 50 children who died or nearly died after the agency became involved with them.

Davidson County Chancellor Carol McCoy also ordered the state to bear the cost of redacting identifying information from the records. The media organizations will pay the cost of making copies.

In September, The Tennessean requested the records of all the children involved with DCS who had died or nearly died between 2009 and mid-2012. The state produced only bare-bones summaries and later acknowledged it did not know how many children had died during that period.

In December a group of media organizations, led by The Tennessean and including The Associated Press, sued for access to the records. McCoy in January ordered the state to redact and turn over records from four cases and to produce an estimate of the cost to redact records in the remaining 200-or-so cases.

The state first said it would cost more than $55,000 to produce the remaining records, but later reduced that to a little over $34,000.

At the Wednesday hearing, the media groups asked McCoy to expand which records the department has to turn over and to order DCS to waive the fee.

Although DCS is required to make records public that are pertinent to a fatality or near fatality, there was disagreement over what is considered pertinent.

Attorney Robb Harvey, who represented the media organizations, argued that prior DCS investigations of abuse allegations might be pertinent.

"It has some bearing that a child has been under DCS' watch or searchlight for three years or five years," Harvey said. "It's important for the public to see how long someone who has been killed has been under the state's searchlight."

The chancellor said she had to balance the public's right to know what its government is doing with the privacy rights of the victims and their families.

"The legislature set up DCS to take care of children in need, children who've been abused and neglected, and of course we need reports," she said, "but they also recognized that a lot of this information has consequences."

McCoy also said that some of the answers the press is looking for may not be available in the records.

"There were lots of errors in the files I reviewed," McCoy said.

McCoy did grant a partial expansion of the records request and ordered that the media groups must pay only a 50-cent-per-page copying cost. She told DCS to produce records from the 50 most recent files for her review by May 3.

Reuters editor charged with hacking: I was fired

A Reuters deputy social media editor accused of conspiring with hackers to deface a Los Angeles Times story said Monday, April 22, he was fired.

Federal prosecutors say 26-year-old Matthew Keys provided the hacking group Anonymous with login information to access the computer system of The Tribune Co., the Times' parent company.

According to a federal indictment handed down last month, a hacker identified only as "Sharpie" used information Keys supplied in an Internet chat room and altered a headline on a December 2010 Times story to reference another hacking group

Tribune also owns a Sacramento television station Keys had been fired from months earlier.

Reuters hired him in 2012 and suspended him from his New York social media job on March 14. Thomson Reuters spokesman David Girardin declined to elaborate on why Keys was no longer employed.

Keys did not immediately respond to a telephone message, but tweeted his union would be filing a grievance.

"Just got off the phone. Reuters has fired me, effective today. Our union will be filing a grievance. More soon," he posted.

He elaborated on his Facebook page, saying "contrary to some speculative tweets, Reuters did not state the indictment as their basis for the termination of my employment."

His attorney Tor Ekeland said he would not comment on the firing because the Newspaper Guild was representing him on the matter.

New publisher at Telegraph in Nashua, NH

The Telegraph of Nashua, N.H., has a new publisher.

Gregory J. Pohl, formerly a regional manager for Ogden Newspapers, assumed the publisher position Monday, April 22.

Pohl's start comes with a formal change in ownership for The Telegraph. The Ogden Newspapers Inc., a family-owned company, acquired the paper from Independent Publications Inc., which owned The Telegraph since 1977.

Pohl, a Chicago native, began his career in newspapers in 1968 as a copyboy at the Chicago Tribune. Following a stint in the Navy, he returned to the Tribune in 1973, working in the research, advertising, marketing and circulation departments.

The Telegraph reports (http://bit.ly/ZIJwIS) Pohl joined Ogden nearly 10 years ago, where he has led the company's circulation and distribution departments.

He succeeds Terrence Williams, who was publisher for 19 years.

Hawaii House counters Senate limits to shield law

Hawaii House lawmakers are proposing a new draft of the state shield law that would limit the law's scope but maintain protections for free, online publications. The proposal is part of ongoing negotiations about whether to extend the legislation that protects journalists from having to reveal their sources.

Hawaii state Sen. Clayton Hee has been pushing to revise the law to redefine its scope and curb what he sees as irresponsible journalism.

The senator from Kaneohe has caused an uproar in Hawaii's news media community for seeking to remove protections for free newspapers and magazines and limiting the definition of a newspaper to print publications.

Rep. Karl Rhoads, the lead House negotiator on the bill, announced the new draft Thursday, April 18. The bill keeps protections for digital newspapers and free publications.

But it accepts some of Hee's amendments by making unpublished notes vulnerable to subpoenas and allowing a defendant in a criminal case to obtain some information if it's necessary to ensure his fair trial.

Rhoads has said that Hee's proposed changes to the shield law go too far. The Democrat says the new draft is a compromise and the committee will revisit the issue on Monday, April 22.

Hawaii's current shield law guards journalists from having to reveal anonymous sources or give up unpublished notes in court proceedings. As in other states, the purpose of the law is to encourage whistleblowers to come forward without fear that journalists would be required to reveal who they are. The law has some exceptions, such as when the information is needed to investigate felony or defamation cases.

Hee has been pushing for limits to the law, saying that the First Amendment provides ample protection for sources to speak to reporters. He says his definitions cutting out free, online media would provide needed guidelines for judges.

The senator has the backing of Hawaii Attorney General David Louie, who says the current law is vague. Louie's office suggested several of the changes in Hee's proposal, which the Senate passed earlier this month.

Hee also suggests there is a link between the current shield law and media getting stories wrong. At a hearing on the bill earlier this session, he handed out examples of media errors, including an image of the "Dewey Defeats Truman" 1948 Chicago Tribune headline.

"I am certain that those kinds of irresponsible reporting would not be protected by the Senate's version of the shield law," he told The Associated Press.

The senator also criticized Hawaii's online media, saying there are some "very mean-spirited" articles and comments.

At the same time, he said he can't imagine a case in which the shield law would be needed in Hawaii.

The Democrat, who leads the powerful Judiciary and Labor Committee, said there has been only one court case regarding Hawaii's shield law since it was created five years ago.

"I'm not sure why if it's just one case in five years, those people who have a self-serving interest have behaved in a manner as if the sky was falling," he said. "If there was only one court case, maybe the law is not necessary."

Journalism advocates, including a coalition of media organizations including The Associated Press, Hawaii News Now and the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, say the lack of cases shows the law is clear and effective. They hoped to make the law permanent this year with no changes.

Gregg Leslie, legal defense director for the national group Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, said Hee's initiative bucks the national trend because more states are recognizing that journalism no longer is limited to print and broadcast.

"It counters the trend to see a Legislature deciding to narrow who it will consider a journalist," Leslie said. He said if the Senate version is passed, Hawaii's shield law would go from one of the best in the nation to one of the worst.

Another Huse becomes publisher of Nebraska paper

Another member of the Huse (hyooz) family has become publisher of the Norfolk (Neb.) Daily News.

Jerry Huse announced Wednesday. April 20, (http://bit.ly/12sh9DY) that he has stepped down in favor of his son, Bill. Jerry Huse will remain president of the Daily News.

Bill Huse's great-great-grandfather, William Huse, in 1888 became publisher and owner of the Daily News in partnership with his son, W.N. Huse. W.N. Huse followed as publisher until he died in 1913. His son, Gene Huse, took over until 1956, when Jerry Huse became publisher.

Bill Huse and his family live in Atlanta, where they are active with a missionary organization. He says technology and an easy ability to travel to Norfolk will let him be publisher of the Daily News even though he won't be living in Norfolk.

Israel school opens Daniel Pearl journalism center

An Israeli college has established a journalism center named for a Wall Street Journal reporter who was kidnapped and killed in Pakistan.

The Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya launched the Daniel Pearl International Journalism Institute on Wednesday, April 17.

Pearl was on his way to an interview in Pakistan in 2002 when he was abducted and later beheaded. His last words were, "I am Jewish."

Pearl's widow, Mariane, wrote a memoir that was turned into a movie starring Angelina Jolie.

The institute aims to advance quality journalism in the Middle East and promote balanced reporting from the region. It will offer fellowships to outstanding journalists and immersion programs for visiting reporters.

Pearl's father, Judea, said he hoped the institute would be a "towering contribution to Danny's legacy, his life, his mission and his dreams."

INDUSTRY NEWS 4-18-2013

AP Board of Directors

Three new members and five incumbents were elected to the AP board of directors in results announced, Monday, April 15, at the annual meeting in Orlando, Fla.

Re-elected to three-year terms were Michael Golden, vice chairman of The New York Times Company; Mary E. Junck, chairman, president and chief executive officer of Lee Enterprises; Charles V. Pittman, senior vice president-newspapers at Schurz Communications, Inc.; and Katharine Weymouth, chief executive officer of Washington Post Media. William O. Nutting, vice president of The Ogden Newspapers Inc., moved to a new seat filling a two-year term.

New members, Robert Brown, president of Swift Communications, and Gracia C. Martore, president and chief executive officer of Gannett Co., Inc., were both elected to three-year terms. Terry J. Kroeger, president and chief executive officer of BH Media Group, will serve one year in the seat vacated by Nutting.

Two directors have completed their service: Steven O. Newhouse, chairman of Advance.net, and R. Jack Fishman, president of Lakeway Publishers, Inc.

The new AP board has 19 directors. Directors are elected annually to three-year terms by AP members. Each director is eligible to serve up to a total of nine years, although the chairman is exempt from that rule.

The Pulitzers: Online nonprofit winner reflects media change

In a sign of a rapidly changing media world, a relatively unknown New York-based online nonprofit news site joined some of the country's most well-known media outlets in claiming a Pulitzer Prize, the highest honor in journalism.

InsideClimate News won the Pulitzer Monday for national reporting for its reports on problems in the regulation of the nation's oil pipelines. Founded five years ago, InsideClimateNews reports on energy and the environment. Writers Lisa Song, Elizabeth McGowan and David Hasemyer were recognized for a project that began with an investigation into a million-gallon spill of Canadian tar sands oil into the Kalamazoo River in Michigan in 2010. The reporters went on to look more broadly at pipeline safety and the particular hazards of a form of oil called diluted bitumen, or "dilbit."

"I think it's a very hopeful sign. I think it really shows the way the journalism ethos reconfigures itself as times change," said Sig Gissler, the administrator of the prizes.

"This is a different way for journalists to practice their trade and make a contribution," McGowan said. "The fourth estate has lost a lot. This is a way we're making a gain."

The Pulitzers, journalism's highest honor, are given out each year by Columbia University on the recommendation of a board of journalists and others. Each award carries a $10,000 prize except for the public service award, which is a gold medal.

The Associated Press received the award in breaking news photography for its coverage of the civil war in Syria.

The Sun Sentinel of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, received the public service award for an investigation of off-duty police officers' reckless driving, and longtime Pulitzer powerhouses The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post were recognized for commentary and criticism, respectively.

The Star-Tribune of Minneapolis captured two awards, for local reporting and editorial cartooning.

Cheers erupted in the Denver Post's newsroom when word came that the newspaper had won the Pulitzer in the breaking news category for its coverage — via text, social media and video — of the movie theater massacre in Aurora, Colo., that killed 12 people during a midnight showing of a new Batman movie last summer.

The honor was bittersweet for some, and people teared up and shared hugs.

"We are part of this community. The tragedy touches us, but we have a job to do," said Kevin Dale, the Post's news director.

The New York Times' David Barstow and Alejandra Xanic von Bertrab won the investigative reporting award for stories that detailed how Wal-Mart Stores Inc. systematically bribed Mexican officials with millions of dollars to get permission to build several stores across the country. The Times' reporting spurred federal investigations.

The Times' David Barboza received the international reporting award for his look at a how a "Red Nobility," made up of relatives of top Chinese officials, has made fortunes in businesses closely tied to the government.

The Times staff won the explanatory reporting award for looking at the business practices of Apple Inc. and other technology companies and illustrating "the darker side of a changing global economy for workers and consumers," the judges said.

In the feature writing category, John Branch of the Times won for a gripping narrative of an avalanche that trapped 16 skiers and snowboarders in the Cascade Mountains of Washington state. Told through photos, video, graphics and magazine-style text, the piece was lauded in the industry as setting a new standard for multimedia journalism.

The paper's editors "view the wonderful bounty of prizes as a real tribute to the newsroom's excellence and dedication," Executive Editor Jill Abramson told the staff.

The AP's Rodrigo Abd, Manu Brabo, Narciso Contreras, Khalil Hamra and Muhammed Muheisen were recognized for "producing memorable images under extreme hazard" while covering the Syrian war, the judges wrote.

Their images depict the dazed and weeping wounded; a heartbroken man cradling the body of his bloodied, barefoot son; a sobbing, fatherless child; an 11-year-old aiming a toy rocket-propelled grenade.

AP Director of Photography Santiago Lyon called the winners "some of the bravest and most talented photographers in the world."

The same conflict was the subject of the winning entry in feature photography. Javier Manzano, a freelance photographer, won for an image of two rebel soldiers guarding their position as light streams through bullet holes in a nearby wall. The photograph was distributed by Agence France-Presse.

At the Sun Sentinel, reporters explored speeding by off-duty officers. The reporting led to suspensions, firings and police policy changes.

"It feels great to win for that story because it really changed things here for the better," Editor Howard Saltz said.

At the Star Tribune, Brad Schrade, Jeremy Olson and Glenn Howatt captured the Pulitzer for local reporting for examining a sharp rise in in infant deaths at day-care centers, reporting that spurred stronger regulation. Minnesota authorities reported last week that day care deaths have dropped significantly.

It was "really satisfying we had an impact," Schrade said.

Steve Sack, who has been at the paper for 35 years, won for editorial cartooning.

In opinion writing categories, Bret Stephens of The Wall Street Journal received the commentary award for columns on American foreign policy and domestic politics.

The Washington Post's chief art critic, Philip Kennicott, was honored for writing on the sociology of images. In one case, he focused on a picture of President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama hugging, calling it a portrait of a modern marriage.

The editorial writing award went to Tim Nickens and Daniel Ruth of the Tampa Bay Times for a series of editorials that helped reverse a decision to end fluoridation of the water supply in Pinellas County, home to 700,000 people. Formerly the St. Petersburg Times, the newspaper is owned by the nonprofit Poynter Institute.

Adam Johnson's "The Orphan Master's Son," about a man's travails in North Korea, won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction.

Other arts winners included Ayad Akhtar winning the drama prize for "Disgraced," a play about a successful Pakistani-American lawyer whose dinner party spins out of control amid a heated discussion of identity and religion.

The history prize went to Frederik Logevall for "Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America's Vietnam," about Vietnam under the French.

Tom Reiss won the biography prize for "The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal and the Real Count of Monte Cristo." He learned he won the Pulitzer while visiting the dentist, who waived the usual fee.

Sharon Olds' chronicling of her divorces in her 12th poetry collection, "Stag's Leap," won her the Poetry prize. "I'm in shock," she said Monday when reached by phone, adding that she was trembling and a "little weepy.

"And my eyes are very open and sticky."

The general nonfiction Pulitzer went to Gilbert King for "Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America." The book tells the story of a 1949 case, in which four black men were falsely accused of rape, and their attorney was Thurgood Marshall.

Caroline Shaw's composition "Partita for 8 Voices" took the music prize. The 30-year-old graduate student at Princeton University is also a violinist and a vocalist.

Details and reaction on the winners of the 2013 Pulitzer Prizes:

PUBLIC SERVICE: The Sun Sentinel, Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

The Sun Sentinel won for its investigation of off-duty police officers who recklessly sped and endangered lives. The investigation led to suspensions, firings and significant policy changes at several South Florida police agencies.

Editor Howard Saltz said he was especially proud to win for this story.

"It really changed things here for the better," Saltz said.

"This type of journalism made the community safer, and it made certain people behave in a more appropriate and just way," Saltz said. "And that's really what journalism is all about."

BREAKING NEWS REPORTING: The Denver Post staff.

A quick cheer erupted in the newsroom when word came that the newspaper had won, though there was a moment of confusion about the category.

More cheers followed when it became clear the award was in breaking news reporting for the Post's coverage of the mass shooting at a movie theater in suburban Aurora last summer, which left 12 people dead.

At the announcement, some in the newsroom teared up and others shared hugs and handshakes.

News Director Kevin Dale said the newspaper would rather win for a less tragic story.

"We are part of this community. The tragedy touches us, but we have a job to do," he said. "It's a matter of balance."

The award citation said the newspaper had used Twitter, Facebook, video and written reports to capture the story and provide context.

INVESTIGATIVE REPORTING: David Barstow and Alejandra Xanic von Bertrab of The New York Times.

EXPLANATORY REPORTING: The New York Times staff.

INTERNATIONAL REPORTING: David Barboza of The New York Times.

FEATURE WRITING: John Branch of The New York Times.

Times spokeswoman Eileen Murphy said Executive Editor Jill Abramson announced the awards to the staff, saying she and Managing Editor Dean Baquet "view the wonderful bounty of prizes as a real tribute to the newsroom's excellence and dedication."

Murphy added, "We are proud to have broken new ground in multimedia storytelling and global investigative journalism."

The investigative reporting award was for reports that detailed how Wal-Mart used bribery to expand in Mexico. The explanatory reporting was for a look at the business practices of Apple and other technology companies. The international reporting award was for detailing the wealth of relatives of top officials in China's communist party. The feature writing award was for an account of skiers killed in an avalanche in Washington state.

LOCAL REPORTING: Brad Schrade, Jeremy Olson and Glenn Howatt of the Star Tribune, Minneapolis.

The winning coverage was an increase in infant deaths at day-care homes in Minnesota. The state Department of Human Services has since called for more training of home day care providers.

"I hope what we wrote ends up making an impact on the quality of child care," said Olson, 39, the father of two.

The Star Tribune devoted nine months to the project, Editor Nancy Barnes said.

With a second Pulitzer, for editorial cartooning, "it's a great day for our newsroom," she said. "Everyone has worked so hard."

NATIONAL REPORTING: InsideClimate News.

A 5-year-old nonprofit won for a series on the environmental hazards of diluted bitumen after a million-gallon spill of Canadian tar sands oil into the Kalamazoo River in Michigan in 2010.

The series began as a three-part narrative, and then reporters Lisa Song, Elizabeth McGowan and David Hasemyer published seven more stories about the spill, its environmental impact and pipeline safety issues.

The series was called "Dilbit Disaster: Inside the Biggest Oil Spill You've Never Heard Of."

"We've introduced the word dilbit (for diluted bitumen) into the national conversation about energy," said David Sassoon, publisher of the Brooklyn-based InsideClimate. "It really is a very important word because it's a very different type of oil with implications about energy policies and climate change."

COMMENTARY: Bret Stephens of The Wall Street Journal.

The Pulitzer citation said Stephens' columns on American foreign policy and politics are incisive and "often enlivened by a contrarian twist."

Editorial Page Editor Paul Gigot said in a statement, "We're delighted to see our colleague Bret Stephens recognized for his influential and popular columns on foreign affairs and politics."

CRITICISM: Philip Kennicott, The Washington Post.

Kennicott has been a Pulitzer finalist in the past and said Monday that "it's much more fun to actually win it."

His writings included a piece about a photograph of President Barack Obama and Michelle Obama hugging that went viral online. The piece was entitled "Snapshot of an equal, modern marriage."

Kennicott said he was trying to offer his sense of what the picture meant.

His favorite piece, though, was delving into why people are drawn to images of horror, in particular the picture published by the New York Post of a man standing in front of a subway train after he had been pushed onto the tracks.

"It essentially was an essay about ugliness and the way that ugliness circulates," he said.

EDITORIAL WRITING: Tim Nickens and Daniel Ruth of the Tampa Bay Times.

Nickens and Ruth wrote on issues ranging from public health to voter suppression to state politics.

The pair composed "clear and forceful editorials," Tampa Bay Times Editor Neil Brown said.

"Tim Nickens and Dan Ruth went to bat for hundreds of thousands of people, many of them poor, who were being deprived a chance at better health," Brown said in a statement. "If we don't do this work, if the Times doesn't speak up, who will?"

EDITORIAL CARTOONING: Steve Sack of the Star Tribune, Minneapolis.

When Sack, 59, walked into the newsroom Monday, he was carrying a bottle of sparkling wine. Co-workers greeted him with applause.

A 35-year veteran at the Star Tribune and a previous Pulitzer finalist, he said he was humbled to win.

The Pulitzer citation said he has "an original style and clever ideas."

"I come home happy and proud" every day, he said.

BREAKING NEWS PHOTOGRAPHY: Rodrigo Abd, Manu Brabo, Narciso Contreras, Khalil Hamra and Muhammed Muheisen of The Associated Press.

The quintet was honored for photographs of the civil war in Syria that included the dazed and weeping wounded; a heartbroken man cradling the body of his bloodied, barefoot son; a sobbing, fatherless child; an 11-year-old aiming a toy rocket propelled grenade.

AP Director of Photography Santiago Lyon called the winners "some of the bravest and most talented photographers in the world."

"I am immensely proud of them for this tremendous and well-deserved recognition of their work covering the tragic and dangerous story of Syria," Lyon said.

He also praised Manoocher Deghati, Middle East photo editor.

FEATURE PHOTOGRAPHY: Freelance photographer Javier Manzano.

Manzano's picture, distributed by Agence France-Presse, showed two Syrian rebel soldiers guarding their position as beams of light stream through bullet holes in a nearby wall.

Hasan Mroue, AFP's deputy photo editor for the Middle East and North Africa, said in an email that all Manzano's pictures from Syria were "of such high caliber that we felt privileged to have them on our wire."

AFP said the photo was taken in October in Aleppo and that Manzano was born in Mexico and is based in Istanbul.

___

ARTS

FICTION: Adam Johnson's "The Orphan Master's Son."

The book delighted and occasionally confused critics and readers with its dark and strange story of an ordinary man's travails in North Korea.

Johnson, 45, a teacher of creative writing at Stanford University, has said he was inspired to write the book after sensing a link between the North Korean dictatorship and the administration of President George W. Bush.

He believed both governments made extensive use of propaganda and he even spent a few days in North Korea to find out for himself, where he was disturbed but inspired by the government policy of not letting citizens talk to foreigners.

A native of South Dakota, Johnson is the author of two other well-regarded books, the story collection "Emporium" and the novel "Parasites Like Us."

DRAMA: Ayad Akhtar's "Disgraced."

The play is about a successful Pakistani-American lawyer whose dinner party spins out of control amid a heated discussion of identity and religion.

"I really wanted to write a play that was going to have a legitimately tragic dimension for a contemporary audience," Akhtar said Monday. "I wanted the play to have immediacy and aliveness of engagement that harkened back to a tragic form but a mass form, something that would have audiences gasping."

Akhtar, a 42-year-old New Yorker, also wrote the novel "American Dervish" and co-wrote and played the lead in the film "The War Within."

"Disgraced" had its world premiere at Chicago's American Theater Company in 2012 and then ran at Lincoln Center Theater's Claire Tow Theater. There, the lead character was played by Aasif Mandvi, the very funny correspondent on Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show."

HISTORY: Frederik Logevall for "Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America's Vietnam."

Logevall, 50, spent much of his 40s on the book, about Vietnam under French rule. Born in Sweden and educated in Canada, he teaches history at Cornell University.

Logevall regards "Embers of War" as a prequel to a 2001 release, "Choosing War," which tells of the U.S. decision in the 1960s to commit ground troops to Vietnam.

BIOGRAPHY: Tom Reiss for "The Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal and the Real Count of Monte Cristo."

Reiss, 48, has a lifelong fascination with 19th-century French author Alexandre Dumas, one that can be traced to his French-born mother. He loved reading "The Three Musketeers" as a kid and was amazed to learn those fabulous characters were based on real people.

He learned he won the Pulitzer while visiting the dentist. Not only does he receive a $10,000 prize, but his dentist waived the fee and promised to do so again should he win another Pulitzer.

POETRY: "Stag's Leap," by Sharon Olds.

Olds chronicles her divorce in the collection, her 12th.

"I'm in shock," she said Monday when reached by phone, adding that she was trembling and a "little weepy.

"And my eyes are very open and sticky."

Olds wrote most of the "Stag's Head" poems in the late 1990s when her marriage of 32 years was ending. She waited to publish them until more than a decade had passed out of respect for her grown children.

"Writing lots and lots of poems has been the way I've lived my life since I was a teenager, really," said Olds.

GENERAL NONFICTION: Gilbert King for "Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America."

Doing research in the Library of Congress, King came across a dramatic case of four black men falsely accused of rape from 1949 that was little remembered despite its famous attorney, Thurgood Marshall. Bringing justice to the case would be one of Marshall's greatest, most trying accomplishments before the landmark suit Brown v. Board of Education.

The New York-based King, a journalist and author of a similarly themed book, "The Execution of Willie Francis," was on a book tour in Florida's Lake County, the setting of his book, when the Pulitzers were announced.

"It's sort of a 'To Kill a Mockingbird' — almost exactly like that," he said, "except you have an African American lawyer instead of Atticus Finch trying the case in the Jim Crow South."

MUSIC: Caroline Shaw for "Partita for 8 Voices."

Shaw, a violinist and vocalist, is 30 and a graduate student at Princeton University.

The winning composition was an a cappella piece, written for her vocal octet Roomful of Teeth, that is both modern and steeped in the Baroque tradition. It was released on Roomful of Teeth's self-titled debut album last October on New Amsterdam Records.

Shaw believes she is part of a new guard of contemporary classical musicians. "We're developing a language of music that comes with a lot of different styles, different kinds of work," she said.

The Pulitzer committee wrote of Shaw's work: "a highly polished and inventive a cappella work uniquely embracing speech, whispers, sighs, murmurs, wordless melodies and novel vocal effects."

AP’s Ed Kennedy Passed Over for Special Pulitzer

An effort to honor Ed Kennedy, former editor and associate publisher of The Herald, with a posthumous Pulitzer Prize fell short.

Kennedy, the war correspondent who broke the news of the German surrender in World War II, was not on the list of this year's award winners.

Sig Gissler, administrator of the Pulitzer Prize, said in an email that the selection committee does not issue statements or comments when no action is taken on a request for a special citation.

"I can say that requests are duly considered," Gissler said in an email, "and that special citations are rarely bestowed."

A powerhouse committee of journalists, including four Pulitzer Prize-winners, applied for a special award to honor the former war correspondent Kennedy, who happened upon the scoop of a lifetime only to be shunned by both the U.S. government and his professional peers.

Kennedy famously broke the story of the of Germany's surrender near the end of World War II, while serving as the Associated Press bureau chief in Paris. The story broke a military embargo and incensed General Dwight D. Eisenhower, among other top military officials.

Soon after the story ran, Kennedy's credentials were revoked. He was eventually fired by the AP.

A committee dubbing itself The Ed Kennedy Project and led by former Herald reporter Ray March applied to the Pulitzer Prize selection committee, seeking a recognition of Kennedy's work.

The committee was formed on the heels of the release of Kennedy's memoir, "Ed Kennedy's War: V-E Day, Censorship, & The Associated Press." His daughter Julia Kennedy Cochran edited the book.

"Obviously I'm disappointed, but it doesn't diminish what he did," said Cochran from her home in Bend, Oregon.

March said the Ed Kennedy Project will seek some sort of response from the Pulitzer selection committee as to why the war correspondent was not recognized.

AP sees slight revenue decline in 2012

The Associated Press said Monday, April 15, that its revenue declined slightly in 2012 because U.S. elections and the Olympics drew less interest than expected, but it was largely successful in replacing lost revenue with increased sales of video and photos.

Revenue dropped 0.8 percent to $622.2 million last year from $627.6 million in 2011, the not-for-profit news cooperative said at its annual meeting on Monday.

The AP had a net loss of $25.6 million for 2012, down from a loss of $193.3 million the year before. The 2011 loss was mostly due to a non-cash charge of $168 million that was taken as a reserve against future tax benefits.

The AP is owned by 1,400 U.S. newspapers and is largely a wholesaler of news. It sells the content it gathers and produces to newspapers, commercial websites and radio and TV stations.

The AP expected revenue to rise as much as 2 percent in 2012 with help from the elections and the Summer Olympics in London, but Chief Financial Officer Ken Dale said the demand for news from these events was lower than in 2008. Barack Obama's second presidential campaign was not as dramatic as his first, and the London Olympics were easier for news outlets to cover than the 2008 games in Beijing, which meant many AP customers relied less on its services.

It was the fourth straight year of declining revenue for the AP, but the rate of decline has slowed sharply the last two years. The U.S. newspaper industry, which accounts for about 20 percent of AP revenue, has suffered from a loss of advertising dollars to online media. AP has cut the fees it charges newspapers for its content, but it hasn't been enough for some. A number of newspapers have ended their contracts with the AP, including the Chicago Tribune and six other newspapers owned by Tribune Co.

The big news events of 2012 saddled AP with extra costs at the same time it was upgrading its video equipment to high definition, forcing it to borrow. Paying off $19 million in debt is AP's highest priority, Dale said.

Still, cost controls helped keep the operating loss to $25.7 million in 2012, compared with $34.2 million in 2011.

Most of the expense decline was due to payroll savings through attrition and a freeze of defined benefit pension plans. The AP ended the year with 3,259 employees, down 6 percent from 3,473 a year earlier.

Dale said he expects revenue to decline again in 2013 because of the absence of elections and Olympics. He also said he expects costs to keep declining, leading to a big reduction in the 2013 operating loss.

The AP is offsetting the drop-off in newspaper revenue with new online customers and strong demand for images and video.

"We're pretty much backfilling any erosion we're seeing in newspapers," Dale said.

Also at the meeting on Tuesday, the AP board added three members, re-elected five and saw two leave. It now has 19 board members.

The new board members are Robert Brown, president of Swift Communications Inc.; Gracia C. Martore, president and CEO of Gannett Co.; and Terry J. Kroeger, president and CEO of BH Media Group, a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Inc.

Last year also saw a change in AP's executive leadership. Tom Curley left the post of CEO in July after nine years and was replaced by Gary Pruitt, who had been CEO of The McClatchy Co.

AP: Court decision is victory for media

A recent court ruling that an Internet news clipping service infringed on the use of Associated Press content is a victory not only for the media but for the public, the news cooperative's CEO said Monday, April 15, at the AP's annual meeting.

A federal judge in New York ruled last month that Meltwater News had infringed on AP's copyright by using unlicensed AP content verbatim to produce a service for paying customers. The judge granted AP's motion for summary judgment. Meltwater has vowed to file an appeal.

"The judge's decision in Meltwater vindicated our position that what all of us here do has value, and deserves protection from free-riders and those who take our hard-earned content without compensating us for it," Gary Pruitt said at the AP meeting in Orlando.

In her decision, U.S. District Judge Denise Cote said that news reporting is expensive and that copyright law is what allows journalists to support their work.

"That is what we do," Pruitt said. "And what we must continue to do for a public faced with so much misinformation in this age of information overload."

Mary Junck, chairman of AP's board of directors and CEO of Lee Enterprises Inc., reported that AP strengthened its financial health in 2012, growing operating cash flow for the first time in five years.

"Although revenue declined in 2012, the AP team reduced expenses much more," Junck said. "We have tackled costs the same way you have â€" with a sharp pencil and an ongoing process of transforming the way we do business, including dramatically reduced rates for members."

"At the same time, AP is working harder to provide you with a stronger, more relevant news report, including in-depth coverage of significant issues, such as our extensive examination of the Affordable Care Act," she said.

The annual meeting included a live appearance by Seoul Bureau Chief Jean Lee via satellite from the North Korean capital of Pyongyang and an in-person presentation from West Africa Bureau Chief Rukmini Callimachi and West Africa chief photographer Rebecca Blackwell.

The luncheon speaker was Erskine Bowles, a former chief of staff under President Clinton who co-founded The Campaign to Fix the Debt with former U.S. Sen. Alan Simpson. Bowles urged the publishers and editors in the audience to recognize the risks of the U.S. maintaining its budget deficit.

Bowles said he would announce with Simpson on Friday a new plan to reduce the deficit by an additional $2.5 trillion over the next decade, in addition to the $2.7 trillion in savings already enacted by Congress and the White House. The new plan makes deeper cuts to Medicare and the Pentagon than what President Obama is proposing. Bowles said Obama's plan doesn't go far enough to curb the growth of the government's debt.

"We believe it will also solve our nation's long-term fiscal problem and do so without disrupting our very fragile economic recovery," Bowles said. "This plan isn't perfect. It's really tough. The problem is real. The solutions are painful. There is no easy way out."

The AP is owned by 1,400 U.S. newspapers and is largely a wholesaler of news. It sells the content it gathers and produces to newspapers, commercial websites and radio and TV stations.

News Corp. entertainment company is 21st Century Fox

News Corp. says the name of the entertainment company that will survive when its newspapers are spun off into a different company will be 21st Century Fox.

That plays off its movie studio, 20th Century Fox, for the current century. Previously News Corp. planned to call the movie and TV show company Fox Group.

CEO Rupert Murdoch said the new name draws on the rich heritage of the movie studio while hinting at the innovation and dynamism of its properties.

21st Century Fox will hold pay TV channels like FX and Fox News Channel, the Fox broadcast TV network, movie and TV studios under the 20th Century Fox umbrella and European pay TV providers such as Sky Italia.

The publishing company will still be called News Corp.

Details on how News Corp. split will work

News Corp. is planning to split into two companies. One company will operate as a newspaper and book publisher and will retain the name News Corp. The other will be an entertainment company, called 21st Century Fox.

Here's how the split will work:

— Newspapers, book publishing and information services such as Dow Jones Newswires will be part of the publishing company. The 20th Century Fox movie studio, the Fox broadcast TV network and the Fox News Channel will be part of the media and entertainment company.

— Current News Corp. shareholders will get shares in each company, but how many shares and how much each entity will be worth have yet to be determined. Both companies will trade publicly, under different stock tickers.

— The new News Corp. company will be spun off and the existing News Corp. will be renamed 21st Century Fox. The new News Corp. will have $2.56 billion in cash and no debt. That amount is to include a payment of $1.82 billion from what will become 21st Century Fox. Another $741 million is already held in cash by the businesses to be spun off.

— Rupert Murdoch will be chairman of both companies and CEO of the media and entertainment company. Robert Thomson, former managing editor of The Wall Street Journal, will become CEO of the publishing company. Murdoch will end up controlling both companies through the nearly 40 percent of Class B voting shares he controls through a family trust.

— News Corp.'s board unanimously approved the split, but it will need to approve a more formal proposal. The deal is also subject to shareholder and numerous regulatory approvals.

— News Corp. plans to hold a special meeting of its shareholders in the first half of 2013 and expects the deal to be completed in mid-2013.

Attorneys: Mississippi DMR Wrong To Withhold Financial Records From Public

The Mississippi Department of Marine Resources is citing a state auditor's investigation to deny the Sun Herald access to DMR financial records -- a move open-government specialists say is wrong.

DMR attorney Sandy Chesnut, assigned to represent the agency by the Attorney General's Office, claims the financial records fall under the criminal investigations exemption to the state Public Records Act.

Not so, say attorneys Henry Laird of Gulfport and Charlie Mitchell, assistant dean of journalism at the University of Mississippi.

"These are clearly public records," Laird said. "The Department of Marine Resources is not a criminal investigation agency that can avail itself of this exemption to the Public Records Act.

"These records were not generated in pursuing a criminal investigation. They were not generated by a criminal investigatory agency. So their claim that they are exempt from the Public Records Act is not true. Even if it were, the records were not generated to further an investigation.

"The objection to furnishing these public records is not well-reasoned. It is wrong."

Records requests denied

The Sun Herald has requested records related to DMR's artificial reef and disaster relief accounts. Records given to the Sun Herald by sources show a $115,000 check that was supposed to go to DMR for maintenance of an artificial reef instead went to a foundation Walker manages.

The Sun Herald also has reported, again based on records independently obtained, that more than $1.4 million in public money from the Rigs to Reefs program went to upgrade and maintain two boats the private foundation leased to DMR.

The Sun Herald requested artificial reef records Dec. 27. Chesnut responded by email Jan. 9, saying, in part: " … the Mississippi Department of Marine Resources (MDMR) has received a subpoena from the Mississippi State Auditor's Office for the requested information and therefore, the MDMR is prohibited from releasing this information … " Chesnut was asked if she would at least supply fund balances for the account, from 2008 forward. She said no.

'No comment'

David Huggins, director of the auditor's Investigative Audit Division, said: "The auditor's office has no comment in relationship to that topic. I can't comment about what DMR does or does not do. That's an issue you need to take up with DMR."

The Auditor's Office served DMR with a subpoena for the records Jan. 8 -- the day before Chesnut responded to the Sun Herald's written request.

Also, a Sun Herald reporter visited Chesnut's office Jan. 8 to review disaster-relief account records DMR had cleared the Sun Herald to see in November. At the time, DMR said the Sun Herald could buy copies of 4,325 pages of disaster relief account and related records at a cost of $1,081.25. Labor would have been an additional $312.50.

Chesnut was no longer willing to turn over those records Wednesday. "When those records are subpoenaed, it says in the subpoena that they cannot be released to any other entity besides the State Auditor's Office," she said. "So I can't release anything to anybody. Anything they subpoenaed."

DMR estimated the cost of records requested back in November at $4,661 for thousands of pages, some of which the Sun Herald paid for and reviewed. The Sun Herald did not look at the disaster-relief records then.

Normal, routine request

Based on a federal audit, the newspaper has reported Walker approved using money from the disaster-relief account to buy a vacant lot his son owned. The newspaper also has learned some contract workers -- hired by DMR without advertisement -- were paid from the disaster-relief account. Seven of those contract workers are or were Walker's neighbors.

"Your request was to be able to tell the public how their money had been spent," attorney Mitchell said. "This is normal, even routine. But the reply says the public can't know how the money was spent because someone is checking, apparently, to see if any of it was misspent.

"All transactions of public money are audited to see that spending has been proper. Fact is, it is often public disclosure of apparent misspending that encourages accountability. It's not at all clear how disclosure would impede any investigation."

Karen Nelson, Sun Herald staff writer, contributed to this report.

Chief Justice Roberts’ visit to college sparks press controversy

Don't blame Anthony Ruiz because this week's edition of The Pioneer Log does not have the story of Chief Justice John Roberts' recent visit to the law school at Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Ore. The student journalist met his deadline, but the article failed to make it into the paper because officials at the small Portland college said it had to first be screened by the Supreme Court's press office. The Pioneer Log did not receive that clearance by its Wednesday deadline, so the story is absent from Friday's edition.

Ruiz and his editor strongly protested the decision to let the Supreme Court press office have prior review, since it's unconstitutional for the government to stop publication of a news article.

"My gut was telling me it was wrong," Ruiz, a senior, told The Oregonian newspaper (http://is.gd/RkYjWb). "I did some research, and quickly found out that the Supreme Court, very simply, cannot do that."

College and Supreme Court officials acknowledge that Ruiz was correct, and say it was all a misunderstanding — not censorship.

Kathleen Arberg, the court's director of public information, said the college misinterpreted the press office's directives regarding the visit.

"We do coordinate with organizations hosting a justice by reviewing drafts of promotional materials," Arberg said. "But we do not ask to review news coverage."

Law School Dean Robert Klonoff, who sent the story to Supreme Court press officials, said the Supreme Court office's review of other school-generated material about the event led him to believe it wanted to check for correct titles and other small details in the article.

He said he regrets what he did, and it is sorry the paper missed its deadline.

"The last thing in the world I would ever want to do is censor a student paper or exercise any sort of substantive review over what the students had written," he said. "I believe firmly in the First Amendment, and I know the Supreme Court does as well."

The article, which has been published online, will appear in next Friday's print edition, as will a story about the controversy.

With sale, NH newspaper publisher to step down

The Nashua Telegraph, of Hudson, N.H.,says it will have a new publisher later this month for the first time in nearly 19 years.

Publisher Terrence Williams will not return to the newspaper when it formally transfers ownership to Ogden Newspapers, a family-owned company with about 40 daily papers in 13 states.

The Telegraph (http://bit.ly/112AbOT) says the ownership change will formally take effect April 22.

Williams, a Vermont native, arrived in Nashua in 1988. After reporting and editing stints at Foster's Daily Democrat and the Lowell Sun, he initially joined The Telegraph as assistant metro editor.

Kansas paid $13 million in overtime last year

The state of Kansas spent more than $13 million in overtime pay last year, with half of that amount going to employees of mental health and correctional facilities, according to data provided by the state to the Topeka Capital-Journal.

Employees at the state's four mental health facilities and 11 correctional facilities were paid $6.2 million in overtime last year, according to data received in response to an open records request (http://bit.ly/11gJ737).

The overtime data does not include employees at the state's universities.

Larned State Hospital paid $2.4 million in overtime — about $300,000 less than the combined total of overtime costs at the 11 correctional facilities.

The Kansas Juvenile Corrections Complex in Topeka had the highest overtime among correctional facilities, with more than $750,000. But it lowered its overtime costs from a high of 1,831 hours in October to 301 hours in March, said Jeremy Barclay, spokesman for the Kansas Department of Corrections.

"Generally, we have overtime costs at our correctional facilities just because it's a 24-hour operation," Barclay said. "We are aware of those overtime costs, and we've actually been able to reduce them."

Among mental institutions, Larned State Hospital reduced its overtime hours by 16 percent compared with last year and those figures continue to decline, said Angela de Rocha, spokeswoman for Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services.

Both attributed the declines to $11.4 million in under market salary adjustments initiated by Gov. Sam Brownback for state workers who were paid significantly less than their counterparts in private industry. They also cited increased efforts to recruit and retain employees.

But staffing continues to be a problem for corrections and mental health operations.

For example, Larned State Hospital, the largest psychiatric facility in the state, paid nearly 40 percent of the overtime expenses at mental health operations. De Rocha said vacancy rates of 19.6 percent are the main cause of overtime because the 24-hour service at the centers creates a demanding schedule for the staff.

"I completely understand why people would be unhappy with that," de Rocha said. "Vacancies cause the overtime problems, so we're focused on recruitment and training."

Department heads got big raises in Augusta merger

The merger of two Augusta colleges resulted in big pay raises for some department heads of the new Georgia Regents University.

The Augusta Chronicle reports an analysis of salary data obtained under the state Open Records Act shows overall spending on administration declined 2 percent when Augusta State University and Georgia Health Sciences University merged this year. However, many department chairs received raises totaling more than $900,000.

One big recipient was Dr. Alvin Head, chairman of the Department of Anesthesiology and Perioperative Medicine, who got a $71,000 raise. Dr. David Fulton, director of the Vascular Biology Center, got a raise of $53,000.

Susan Norton, the school's vice president for human resources, says raises were given to match market salaries for some administrators and to reward others for increased productivity.

Ruling in N.J. asserts blogger’s rights as journalist

In a decision that could impact bloggers across New Jersey, a Superior Court judge ruled Friday, April 12, that a self-declared citizen watchdog who writes stinging critiques of Union County government has the same legal protections as a professional journalist. While questioning the quality and tone of the writing in Tina Renna’s blog posts, Judge Karen Cassidy concluded Renna "obtained material in the course of professional newsgathering activities” with the aim of disseminating it over the internet. As such, Cassidy wrote in her opinion, Renna should be covered by the state’s shield law. Under that law, one of the most powerful of its kind in the country, journalists generally cannot be forced to reveal their sources or other sensitive information to law enforcement or grand juries. The judge’s ruling quashed a subpoena served on Renna by the Union County Prosecutor’s Office, which wanted the names of 16 county employees Renna claimed had improperly used county-owned portable generators after Hurricane Sandy. Renna made the allegation in a December blog post but did not name the employees.

Read more:

http://www.nj.com/union/index.ssf/2013/04/union_county_blogger_scores_vi.html

Scripps heir convicted in $3.6M swindle of mother, uncle; spent on playboy lifestyle

A Scripps family heir was convicted Friday, April 12, of stealing $3.6 million from his mother and a disabled uncle.

Michael Scripps, 36, who lives in a Detroit suburb, spent the money on cars, jewelry and women, including a stripper and porn star, according to testimony at the two-week trial in Philadelphia. He faces more than seven years in prison at sentencing.

His mother, Melissa Scripps, told jurors that she received $11 million from the 1980s-era sale of some family holdings, while her brother, David, received more, according to The Philadelphia Inquirer (http://bit.ly/16SISij).

Her son had a six-figure trust fund, along with a $3,900 monthly stipend she provided, she said. Yet he persuaded her to steer money to his friend, a financial adviser in the Philadelphia suburbs, then proceeded to raid the accounts, she said.

"I don't want anyone else to go through what we've been through as a family," Melissa Scripps testified.

Michael Scripps is heir to the fortune of James E. Scripps, who founded The Detroit News and built the Evening News Association. He has no ties to E.W. Scripps Co., a conglomerate that owns newspapers and television stations. E.W. Scripps was James Scripps' half brother.

Melissa Scripps, 62, acknowledged that she has gone through much of the fortune. She spent more than $1 million on family cruises, flew her dogs to her second home on St. Maarten, and purchased two of Princess Diana's dresses and a Napoleonic tiara. She said she smokes marijuana daily and has been married four times.

"Michael thought his mom was spending too much money, she was spending his inheritance," Assistant U.S. Attorney Linwood C. Wright said Wednesday in closing arguments.

U.S. District Judge Legrome D. Davis reminded jurors that they had to decide if a crime occurred, not if people had "squandered, in a profound way, their lives."

The 1980s sale was valued at more than $700 million. The defense maintained that Melissa Scripps received more than $100 million.

Michael Scripps did not testify, but his lawyer argued that he had his mother's permission to use whatever funds he needed.

After the verdict, the judge denied a defense bid to have Scripps remain free on bail until his July 15 sentencing.

"I have absolutely no comfort with how your client behaved," Davis said.

INDUSTRY NEWS 4-11-2013

Newspaper revenue fell 2 pct to $38.6B in 2012

The U.S. newspaper industry's revenue declined at its slowest pace in six years, as publishers turned to new businesses and raised more money from online subscriptions.

The industry's total revenue in 2012 fell 2 percent to $38.6 billion from $39.5 billion in 2011, according to the Newspaper Association of America.

Online subscriptions helped circulation revenue rise by 5 percent to $10.4 billion. It was the first gain since 2003.

The association's figures are projections based on a survey of 17 companies that represent about half of the industry's revenue. Publishers provided a detailed breakdown of their revenue on condition of anonymity.

For the first time, the NAA data incorporated new sources of revenue that virtually didn't exist for the industry a decade ago, including e-commerce, event hosting and providing advertising agency-like services to local companies. These categories accounted for $3 billion in revenue in 2012. The NAA also began counting for the first time ad revenue from niche publications and such things as flyers sent to non-subscribers. Those segments generated $2.9 billion.

If the new categories were not included, revenue would have fallen 3 percent in 2012, to $32.7 billion, still the most modest decline since 2006. In 2011, revenue not counting the new categories fell 5 percent to $33.9 billion. Revenue peaked at $60.2 billion in 2005.

"This does not look like an industry that's just rolling over," said Caroline Little, president of the NAA.

Little said the association's new way of compiling data tells a more optimistic story of an industry coping with an advertising shift away from print by generating new sources of revenue and selling news online and through mobile devices.

Among the industry's most positive developments is the growth in circulation revenue. Some 400 U.S. newspapers now charge readers for online access. In some cases, online subscriptions are bundled with print subscriptions. As a result, the industry's 2012 circulation revenue returned to slightly above the 2007 level of $10.3 billion. It was still below 2003's peak of $11.2 billion.

Lawmakers effort to halt newspaper notices stalls

What's become a yearly effort at the Arizona Legislature to end a requirement for governments to publish notices in newspapers has hit a major snag in the Senate.

A House bill by Republican Rep. Warren Petersen of Gilbert that would allow large cities and towns and all counties to instead post public notices online didn't get a Senate committee hearing by a March 21 deadline, and an effort to include the language in a bill to be heard by another committee the following week was foiled.

Appropriations committee chairman Sen. Don Shooter, a Republican from Yuma, said he held the bill because it would damage newspapers.

"I just think my basic world view is that a free press is an important thing," Shooter said. "You don't mess with the press, you don't mess with religion, those are things that we just shouldn't do."

The lack of a hearing signals the bill is probably not moving this year, but it's always possible it could be revived. Senate President Andy Biggs has supported the publication changes.

A second bill that would have that would have limited the publication mandate and established a maximum rate for the cost of the notices failed to pass the House. It also would have required governments to post the notices in the local newspaper with the greatest circulation.

That bill began as a generic effort by Republican Rep. David Stevens of Sierra Vista to change the definition of publication to eliminate the term newspapers. The voluminous legislation eliminated the reference in dozens of statures that required public notices in legal disputes and other areas. Stevens said it was intended to lay the groundwork for the eventual elimination of all newspaper publication requirements, including those for civil suits and other business notices.

"There's always next year," Stevens said.

Both bills were fiercely opposed by the newspaper industry. Smaller newspapers could face steep revenue losses if the measures became law, prompting job losses and some publications to fold. Newspapers also argued that governments can't be trusted to make sure the public can find notices of important actions and the practice government transparency.

"Keeping public notice in newspapers is really more of a policy issue," said Paula Casey, executive director of the Arizona Newspapers Association. "If you ask newspapers in general, of course revenue is important, but the overriding policy of notifying the public is much, much more important than the revenue issue for newspapers."

No other state has gone to a completely online system for notices, she said.

Stevens and Petersen said the newspaper group's lobbying efforts, led by John Moody, were impressive.

"I was really impressed with Moody's skills, to bring seven lobbyists into the government (committee) hearing, that was impressive," Petersen said.

Moody simply said "I appreciate the compliment."

Because there's always a chance Petersen's bill could be revived, Casey said she's still concerned.

"I'm still holding my breath until the session's out," she said Friday. "I think there's still room for mischief."

Ogden Newspapers to acquire Nashua, NH, Telegraph

The Telegraph of Nashua, N.H., is getting a new owner.

Publisher Terrence Williams said Monday, April 8, The Ogden Newspapers, Inc., a family-owned company with 40 daily newspapers in 40 states, has agreed to acquire The Telegraph.

Independent Publications, Inc., which has owned The Telegraph since 1977, announced in December that it would sell the newspaper and associated weeklies and websites. Included in the sale are the Cabinet newspapers: the Milford Cabinet, Merrimack Journal, Bedford Journal and the Hollis/Brookline Journal.

The ownership change will take place on April 22, Williams said.

"My family is proud to become the successor publisher of The Telegraph," Ogden President CEO Robert Nutting told the newspaper (http://bit.ly/14S706b). "We are committed to continuing the proud history of a paper which has dutifully served its community for 181 years. We look forward to taking The Telegraph into the future, and continue its award-winning tradition."

Nutting is incoming chairman of the Newspaper Association of America. His brother, William Nutting, is a member of the Board of Directors of The Associated Press.

Ogden Newspapers was founded in 1890 when H.C. Ogden first published a newspaper in Wheeling, W.Va. Today, Ogden Newspapers also has holdings in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Minnesota, Indiana, Iowa, North Dakota, Florida, Hawaii, New York, Virginia and now New Hampshire.

New editor-publisher named in Greenville

Jon Alverson has been named editor and publisher of the Delta Democrat Times in Greenville, Miss.

The newspaper (http://bit.ly/Z8Ndr7) made the announcement last week.

Alverson, a native of Mobile, Ala., graduated from the University of Florida in 1998.

Alverson has more than 15 years of newspaper experience including stops in Alabama, North Carolina, Pennsylvania and Mississippi.

Though Alverson is new to the Delta, he knows the area well from being good friends with the two former publishers of the DDT, John Clark and Matt Guthrie.

Juneau Empire publisher resigns

The Juneau (Alaska) Empire's publisher since 2009 has resigned to pursue other opportunities.

The newspaper reported last week (http://is.gd/OwGLhs) that Mark Bryan's resignation was effective immediately.

Before coming to Juneau, Bryan was publisher of the Newport News-Times in Newport, Ore.

A graduate of the University of Idaho at Moscow, he's worked at newspapers in Idaho, Wyoming and Washington during more than 25 years in the industry. He also spent time at the Anchorage Times and Anchorage Daily News in circulation management.

The newspaper says Ronnie J. Hughes will serve as interim publisher during the search for Bryan's replacement. Hughes is the former publisher of the Peninsula Clarion in Kenai.

The Juneau Empire is owned by Morris Publishing Group, an Augusta, Ga.-based media company.

Parents talk about U.S. journalist kidnapped in Syria

The parents of an American journalist kidnapped in Syria more than four months ago said Thursday that his latest disappearance is more upsetting than an earlier one in Libya because they don't know who is holding him.

James Foley, 39, was working in northwest Syria with another journalist when they were kidnapped by unknown gunmen on Nov. 22, his parents said. Foley had been working in Syria for about a year and was contributing videos to Agence France-Press, which has vowed to help secure his release.

It's unclear whether he's being held by the government, a rebel group or a criminal gang, said his mother, Diane Foley.

"We don't know who to direct our plea to," she said. "We don't know who is holding him or why."

Foley was held for six weeks by the Libyan government in 2011, but his parents said that situation was very different because the U.S. government worked with the Libyan government to secure his release and provided them with regular updates.

The U.S. does not currently have a formal relationship with Syria and there has been no regular or reliable information about Foley, his parents said. Though they have been in touch with federal officials, they said the most they've received are rumors of their son's whereabouts.

"I joked a while ago that it would be nice to hear from a terrorist asking for $10 million just so we know he's alive," said his father, John Foley.

The Foleys traveled to Milwaukee from their home in Rochester, N.H., for a Friday night vigil for their son at Marquette University, where he studied history. He taught in Arizona, Massachusetts and Chicago before switching careers to become a journalist.

He had been working in war zones for about five years when he was taken captive in Libya while covering that country's civil war. Another journalist — South African photographer Anton Hammerl — was shot during their capture and left to die in the desert. Foley and another journalist were released.

"I'll regret that day for the rest of my life," Foley told The Associated Press in 2011. "I'll regret what happened to Anton."

Friday is the two-year anniversary of his capture in Libya. If he had doubt about going back to a war zone, his parents said he didn't share it with them.

His father said he doesn't feel his son was reckless. Any journalist committed to covering conflict and war takes some risk, he said.

"It's just the nature of the occupation and the environment," John Foley said. He added, "He wanted to tell stories about people that were truthful and that would help them."

Twenty-eight journalists were killed in Syria in 2012, prompting the Committee to Protect Journalists to name it the most dangerous country in the world to work in last year.

Those who lost their lives include award-winning French TV reporter Gilles Jacquier, photographer Remi Ochlik and Britain's Sunday Times correspondent Marie Colvin. Also, Anthony Shadid, a correspondent for The New York Times, died after an apparent asthma attack while on assignment in Syria.

Foley had agreed to text his mother about every 48 hours so that she wouldn't worry, and he had a video conference with his parents once a week. They learned about his disappearance in a phone call from Clare Morgana Gillis, the journalist held captive with him in Libya.

His parents said federal officials have advised them to keep quiet, and they did for more than a month. Diane Foley said they decided to speak out because publicity seemed to help secure their son's release in 2011. Still, they second-guess themselves.

"Are we going to make him too valuable?" John Foley asked. "If we don't say anything, is he not valuable enough?"

Cleveland newspaper to be delivered 3 days a week

The Plain Dealer in Cleveland announced last week that it is cutting back home delivery of the newspaper to three days a week.

The Plain Dealer, Ohio's largest daily, will be delivered on Sunday and two other still unspecified days of the week beginning in late summer, publisher Terry Egger said in a news release. The newspaper will still be printed every day and be available for purchase at thousands of outlets in northeast Ohio.

A new digitally focused media company called Northeast Ohio Media Group will be started this summer, the news release said. The organization will be responsible for all ad sales and marketing for The Plain Dealer and oversee the operation of Cleveland.com website and Sun News, a chain of weekly newspapers.

The Northeast Ohio Media Group and The Plain Dealer Publishing Company will provide content for all print and digital platforms.

"These actions are aimed at driving innovation, capitalizing on the tremendous strengths of our existing organizations, preserving high-quality journalism and marketing solutions, and providing greater efficiency and flexibility in serving Northeast Ohio through print and digital applications," Egger said in the release.

The newspaper, which has a weekday circulation of about 286,400, is owned by New York-based Advance Publications Inc. Other Advance papers, such as the Times-Picayune in New Orleans and The Birmingham News in Alabama, have cut back their publishing schedules to three days a week.

INDUSTRY NEWS 4-4-2013

AP Opens Full News Bureau in Myanmar

YANGON, Myanmar (AP) _ The Associated Press has become the first international news agency to open a bureau in Myanmar since a reformist government took power two years ago and began relaxing restrictions on the media for the first time in decades.

The opening paves the way for AP to expand its coverage of the unfolding transition in Myanmar, which is still emerging from nearly half a century of military rule, for its members and customers around the world.

Six multi-format journalists will staff the new AP bureau full time. Among them is award-winning correspondent Aye Aye Win, who has reported from her native country for the AP since 1989 and was honored for courage in 2008 by the International Women's Media Foundation. She succeeded another AP veteran in Yangon -- her father, Sein Win, who covered the nation also known as Burma for AP for 20 years and was imprisoned several times, including during the failed pro-democracy uprising in 1988.

"AP has a proud history of reportage from Myanmar, and the new multimedia bureau marks the beginning of an even more robust commitment," said AP President and CEO Gary Pruitt. "We hope to build on our efforts and cover the important changes there for many years to come."

Senior Vice President and Executive Editor Kathleen Carroll said: "We take great pride in our independent and impartial reporting, and coverage of Myanmar has been a priority for many years. A full-time, multimedia bureau staffed by talented local and international journalists will enable AP to provide even more coverage of the historic changes under way in Myanmar."

The Information Ministry informed the AP on Saturday it had granted the news agency permission to open a full-fledged office in the main city, Yangon. Japanese broadcaster NHK was also granted permission.

Although the AP has deployed visiting foreign staff regularly to Myanmar since the nation began opening up two years ago, it had previously been prohibited from basing international journalists permanently in the country. Today, there are several dozen journalists working in Myanmar for various international news outlets. Under the previous military regime, China's Xinhua News Agency and Guangming Daily were the only foreign news outlets allowed to have their nationals as resident correspondents.

The reform process under President Thein Sein, who took office two years ago this month, has included the abolition of direct censorship of local media. On Monday, independent daily newspapers published for the first time since 1964.

The opening of AP's bureau in Myanmar follows by a little more than a year the opening of a bureau providing text stories and photos from Pyongyang, North Korea, which made AP the first Western news organization to operate fully in all media time in the mostly shrouded state. AP previously had a video news office in the country since 2006.

Founded in 1846 and headquartered in New York City, the AP provides news in print, photos, video, mobile and online. It is an independent, not-for-profit news cooperative owned by member newspapers and broadcasters in the United States and operating from 280 locations in 110 countries around the world.

Conn. newspaper association to launch ad campaign

The Connecticut Daily Newspaper Association is unveiling an ad campaign, attempting to fight efforts in the General Assembly to condense public and legal notices in state newspapers.

The association of 16 newspapers plans to run the first full-page advertisements on April 1.

Lawmakers are considering a bill that allows municipalities to place the ads, for matters such as public meetings and construction bid announcements, on their government websites to save money. The newspapers would only be allowed to provide a portion of the notice and a reference to the city or town's website.

The Connecticut Council of Small Towns estimates its members spend between $5,000 and $35,000 each year to publish the ads in local newspapers, as required by state law.

Newspaper executives say they're providing a reliable public service.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette to invest in new press

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette is buying new high-capacity color printing press equipment and considering a move.

The paper says in a release Wednesday, March 27, (http://bit.ly/10kuXxd) that it hasn't decided were the new press will be located, or if news operations will be in the same building. The Post-Gazette is located in downtown Pittsburgh and owned by Toledo, Ohio-based Block Communications Inc.

The paper says the new equipment and possible relocation mark a dramatic change for the 226-year-old company. News organizations across the country have opted for new locations as the industry shifts toward digital content.

Post-Gazette executives say they will need to modify existing labor contracts to justify the investment the owners are making in the new technology.

Negotiations with the newsroom Guild and other building unions are just beginning.

Man accused of selling bogus newspaper ads

A 61-year-old Minden, La., man faces charges in at least six parishes and one Texas county in connection with an alleged scam that involved selling bogus newspaper ads.

Caddo Parish Sheriff Steve Prator says David Edward Dix is accused of going into several Caddo businesses and stating that he works for a local newspaper.

Prator says Dix sold ads and told the businesses their ads would appear in the June edition of the paper. When the ads did not appear, the businesses contacted the paper and discovered Dix never had worked for it.

Dix was booked into Caddo Correctional Center this week on two counts of theft and one count of forgery.

Dix is also wanted in Bossier, Claiborne, DeSoto, Jackson and Bienville parishes and Harrison County, Texas.

Privately owned daily newspapers return to Myanmar after 50 years

The newspaper industry might be shrinking in the rest of the world but it expanded Monday, April 1, in Myanmar, when privately run daily newspapers hit newsstands for the first time in 50 years.

For many people, the rebirth of daily papers is a novelty: Many weren't even born when the late dictator Ne Win imposed a state monopoly on the daily press in the 1960s.

But for 81-year-old Khin Maung Lay, it's like a second lease on life. He is chief editor of Golden Fresh Land, one of four dailies that went on sale Monday as Myanmar takes another step in its march toward democracy.

"We've been waiting half a century for this day," said the veteran editor, adding that the paper's initial print run of 80,000 copies was sold out by late morning. "It shows how much people long for private daily newspapers. This morning, I was in tears seeing this."

He's old enough to recall there once had been a big and vibrant daily press in the Burmese, English, Indian and Chinese languages in the period of parliamentary democracy after Myanmar, known then as Burma, won independence from Britain in 1948.

Khin Maung Lay worked as a senior newsman at the Burmese language Mogyo daily before it was driven out of business by government pressure in 1964.

Now as chief editor of Golden Fresh Land — the name sounds less awkward in the original Burmese — he heads a team of young journalists he recruited from various weeklies, journalists who have only the briefest of acquaintances with the concept of a free press, having grown up under the military government that ruled for five decades. They are up against some media behemoths and papers belonging to the country's top political parties.

The ruling USDP party launched a daily called The Union, and the well-established weekly The Voice is converting itself into the Voice Daily. The other newcomer is The Standard Time Daily. All four newspapers are in Burmese, ranging in price from 150 kyat-200 kyat (US20 cents- 25 cents).

Khin Maung Lay acknowledges there are innumerable challenges ahead, but said he is ready to face them "in the name of freedom of press." He's well acquainted with the cutting edge of the concept — he went to jail three times under Ne Win, including a three-year stretch in "protective custody," a catch-all phrase the military regime used when imprisoning critics.

"I foresee several hurdles along the way," he said. "However, I am ready to run the paper in the spirit of freedom and professionalism taught by my peers during the good old days."

One of the main hurdles will be beating the competition.

"It won't be easy for all the newspapers to survive. As a reader, I can't afford to buy every newspaper, every day," said taxi driver Tun Win, 52, who normally kept up with current affairs by buying three news weeklies. Nonetheless, he called the arrival of daily papers a big step for the impoverished country.

"Now we can get information every day, rather than once a week," he said. "It's the best way to get up-to-date news for those who don't have access to the Internet."

The newspaper renaissance is part of the reform efforts of President Thein Sein, who, after serving as prime minister in the previous military regime, took office in March 2011 as head of an elected civilian government. Political and economic liberalization were at the top of his agenda, in an effort to boost national development.

As part of an easing of media restrictions, The Associated Press became the first international news agency to open a bureau in Myanmar since the new government took power two years ago. Six multi-format journalists will staff the new AP bureau full-time.

The government lifted censorship in August last year, allowing reporters to print material that would have been unthinkable under military rule.

It's not smooth sailing yet. The draconian 1962 Printing and Registration Act remains in place until a new media law is enacted. It carries a maximum seven-year prison term for failure to register and allows the government to revoke publishing licenses at any time.

The government announced in December that any Myanmar national wishing to publish a daily newspaper was welcome to apply and could begin publishing on April 1.

There were nearly two dozen applications, and Golden Fresh Land was one of 16 to win approval. Others include dailies to be put out by opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy party and Thein Sein's ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party.

The Voice Daily made its debut Monday, issued by the same group that has published a popular weekly since 2004.

"I am very excited that we are finally printing daily editions. It is a dream come true because that was our objective when we began publishing the Voice Journal in 2004," 42-year-old editor-in-chief Kyaw Min Shwe said Sunday, as reporters hustled around his newsroom to put out their first edition.

He said the established government newspapers have an advantage in terms of money and distribution, but "I can say with absolute confidence that we can compete with government papers in terms of content and quality of news."

Most coverage of local and national news in the state press is little more than the equivalent of government press releases, typically reporting on less-than-riveting topics such as the names of all the officials who attended the inauguration of a new bridge. Opinion pieces invariably reflect conservative positions that seem decades behind the times.

Aware of its vulnerability, the English-language state paper, the New Light of Myanmar, is seeking a joint venture partner to help with a makeover.

The entry of the ruling Union Solidarity and Development Party plans to make use of its strong financial base. The pro-military party, which holds a strong majority in parliament, is backed by many tycoons. Chief editor Win Tin said the paper will be distributed free of charge for the first 10 days.

"We are financially strong and we have many experienced people," he said, adding that the party will have its own separate propaganda sheet and that the newspaperwill not be a mouthpiece for it.

Strong competition will come from savvy big media groups who say they will launch later.

"We need more time for preparation. It is quite challenging for the reporters to switch from weeklies to dailies," said Nyein Nyein Naing, executive editor of the 7-Day weekly news journal.

"We need more time for preparation and we have to have test runs before we start the daily edition," said Dr. Than Htut Aung, CEO of the popular Eleven media group, which plans to launch The Daily Eleven on May 3.

"I will print my first daily edition on May 3, Press Freedom Day, because it is very symbolic," he said.

INDUSTRY NEWS 3-28-2013

SC Press Association names new leaders

Jack Osteen, publisher of The Item in Sumter, S.C., has been elected president of the South Carolina Press Association.

Osteen was selected Saturday, March 23, at the association's winter meeting in Greenville. Osteen is the fourth member of his family to lead the association. H.G. Osteen was president in 1922, H.D. Osteen was president in 1953 and Hubert D. Osteen Jr. was president in 1977.

Morrey Thomas, publisher of the News and Press in Darlington, and Judi Mundy Burns, publisher of the Index-Journal in Greenwood, were elected as vice presidents. Ellen Priest, president and publisher of The Summerville Journal Scene, was elected treasurer.

Three people were selected to two-year terms on the association's executive committee: Barbara Ball, publisher of The Voice of Blythewood and Fairfield County, Dan Cook, editor of the Free Times in Columbia; and Jane Pigg of Cheraw, publisher of The Link.

Newspapers seek release of shale settlement

The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and the Washington Observer-Reporter have returned to court to force the release of the confidential settlement ending a claim by a Mount Pleasant family that Marcellus Shale gas development damaged their farm and their health.

In a motion filed Friday, March 22, in Washington County Common Pleas Court, the newspapers asked President Judge Debbie O'Dell Seneca to order Stephanie and Chris Hallowich to file the missing document with the Washington County prothonotary.

That document was not part of more than 900 pages of court records the judge ordered unsealed Wednesday, March 19, even though the agreement supposedly was "attached" to other filings in the case and is identified as "Exhibit B" in the released documents.

"While it is unbeknownst to Intervenors why an exhibit averred to be attached to a court pleading filed with this Court is missing," the newspapers' said in the 12-page motion, "it is clear that the Agreement, Exhibit B, is a judicial record subject to public access."

Attorney Frederick Frank, who represents the Post-Gazette, said the motion asks the Hallowiches to produce the settlement agreement because their attorney, Peter Villari, prepared the settlement petition for their children, Nathan and Alyson, to which it was attached. Mr. Villari is on vacation and was unavailable for comment.

The court records were sealed in August 2011 by Washington County Common Pleas Judge Paul Pozonsky, who has since resigned.

The settlement between the Hallowiches and Range Resources Inc., Mark West Energy Partners and Williams Gas/Laurel Mountain Midstream paid the family $750,000, according to a summary document that was part of the unsealed court record. That summary said about $600,000 was paid to settle the claims of Stephanie and Chris Hallowich, including $10,000 set aside in a trust fund for each of the two children. Attorneys fees totaled $150,000, plus $5,179.63 for expenses.

The settlement also established a mechanism to assess any future claims of personal injury to the Hallowich children that could be related to their exposure to the air and water pollution the family claimed occurred when four Marcellus Shale gas wells, compressor stations and a 3-acre wastewater impoundment were installed adjacent to their 10-acre farm.

In the years leading up to the settlement, the Hallowiches filed numerous complaints with the state Department of Environmental Protection that their well water supply had been contaminated and that their children had been exposed through the water and air to volatile organic compounds from the drilling operations.

Ms. Hallowich said water testing found ethylbenzene, toluene, styrene and tetrachloroethylene -- all cancer-causing organic compounds. She said the air and water contaminants caused family members to experience burning eyes, sore throats, headaches and earaches, and they had to pay about $500 a month to have water delivered to the farm.

On July 25, 2011, the Hallowiches signed an affidavit agreeing that with respect to their children's claims for nuisance and personal injury, "there is presently no medical evidence" to support that the claims were related to shale gas development activities.

Three days later, the Hallowiches filed a court petition for approval of the settlement.

NYC judge OKs sale Journal Register Co. assets

A bankruptcy judge says newspaper publisher Journal Register Co. can sell its assets to an affiliate of its current owner.

A federal bankruptcy court judge in Manhattan on Thursday, March 21, approved the sale of assets controlled by the publisher of more than a dozen local newspapers.

The judge found a union's objection to the sale lacks merit because a collective bargaining agreement will expire before the sale closes.

The decision clears the way for 21st CMH Acquisition Corp. to buy the assets for $114 million in secured debt and $6 million cash.

The Yardley, Pa.-based Journal Register Co. publishes 18 papers between New England and Michigan and estimates its total print and online audience at 21 million. It filed for bankruptcy in September.

INDUSTRY NEWS 3-22-2013

Judge: Aggregator of AP news can't have free ride

A federal judge concluded that an Internet news clipping service essentially resold stories from The Associated Press, saying in a decision released March 21 that the ability of news organizations to perform "an essential function of democracy" is jeopardized when a company merely redistributes the news of others.

Media observers say the ruling against Meltwater U.S. Holdings Inc. and its Meltwater News Service, if upheld on appeal, could provide strong protection for the news industry as it struggles to survive in an Internet age.

U.S. District Judge Denise Cote rejected Meltwater's claims that its use of Web stories drawn from a scan of 162,000 news websites from more than 190 countries was a fair use of copyright-protected material.

"Through its use of AP content and refusal to pay a licensing fee, Meltwater has obtained an unfair commercial advantage in the marketplace and directly harmed the creator of expressive content protected by the Copyright Act," Cote said.

She said in a ruling released to lawyers in the case Wednesday and to the public on Thursday that investigating and writing about newsworthy events worldwide was expensive and enforcement of the copyright laws permits the AP to earn revenue to fund it.

"Permitting Meltwater to take the fruit of AP's labor for its own profit, without compensating AP, injures AP's ability to perform this essential function of democracy," Cote wrote.

In a statement, Meltwater said it was disappointed and will appeal. It called the ruling "at odds with a variety of prior decisions that have paved the way for today's Internet."

The judge noted that commercial Internet news clipping services like Meltwater perform an important function for their customers, but that "does not outweigh the strong public interest in the enforcement of the copyright laws or justify allowing Meltwater to free ride on the costly news gathering and coverage work performed by other organizations. Moreover, permitting Meltwater to avoid paying licensing fees gives it an unwarranted advantage over its competitors who do pay licensing fees."

Meltwater is a 12-year-old electronic news clipping service that helps its clients monitor how they are covered in the press. In its lawsuit, the AP alleged that Meltwater News had been pilfering current and past material from the AP and other news providers without paying licensing fees.

AP CEO Gary Pruitt said: "We are thrilled. This is first and foremost a victory for the public and for democracy."

George Freeman, a media law expert in private practice at Jenner & Bloch, called the ruling a "very significant and important opinion" and an "important precedent."

"This decision is one of the most solid and comprehensive that we've had in this very important field," he said. "I know the media is watching it very carefully."

The judge rejected Meltwater's claims that it operates like a search engine.

"Meltwater News is an expensive subscription service that markets itself as a news clipping service, not as a publicly available tool to improve access to content across the Internet," she said. "Instead of driving subscribers to third-party websites, Meltwater News acts as a substitute for news sites operated or licensed by AP."

Cote praised the operation of legitimate search engines.

"These interests are complementary. The Internet would be far poorer if it were bereft of the reporting done by news organizations and both are enhanced by the accessibility the Internet provides to news gathered and delivered by news organizations," Cote said.

She also defended the creativity necessary to write the first paragraph of a story, known as a "lede," saying Meltwater "misses the mark" when it argues that ledes are teasers and not summaries of news.

"If anything, the observation emphasizes the creativity and therefore protected expression involved with writing a lede and the skill required to tweak a reader's interest," Cote said.

Meltwater said it believes Cote misapplied the fair use doctrine.

"Meltwater is especially troubled by the implications of this decision for other search engines and services that have long relied on the fair use principles for which Meltwater is fighting," the company said.

Jorn Lyseggen, Meltwater's founder and chief executive, said the company was considering options and looked forward to appealing to the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Lyseggen said he was confident the appeals court "will see the case a different way."

Pruitt said the ruling was important for the AP and "others in the news business who work so hard to provide high-quality original news reports on which the public relies."

"For years all of us have been hearing that if it is free on the Internet, it is free for the taking. The judge in this case just rejected that argument," he said.

Earlier this year, The New York Times, USA Today publisher Gannett Co. Inc., the McClatchy Co. and Advance Publications Inc. said in court papers that their businesses would be jeopardized if Meltwater was permitted to continue as it had.

The publishers said the ability of companies to distribute their content without paying licensing fees jeopardized their websites and other digital businesses that generate revenue through advertising, subscriptions and licensing fees.

One of Meltwater's competitors, BurrellesLuce, joined in a friend-of-the-court brief to say that it operates at a disadvantage because it pays to license content that Meltwater takes for free.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation and Public Knowledge supported Meltwater in a court brief.

Caroline H. Little, president and CEO of the Newspaper Association of America in Arlington, Va., which joined an amicus brief on behalf of news companies prior to the ruling, called the decision a "monumental decision" that recognizes the value of newsgathering in society.

"The significant costs associated with global, national, regional and local newsgathering cannot be sustained if news organizations cannot protect the integrity of our publishing process," she said.

"The court correctly found that simply taking this content for free, for someone else's commercial benefit, undermines the investments our industry makes in original news reporting that is so essential to democracy," she said.

Meltwater was founded in 2001 in Oslo, Norway. According to the company's website, it has more than 800 employees working in 55 offices around the world.

Reuters editor says he did not conspire in hack

A Reuters social media editor accused of conspiring with hackers to deface a Los Angeles Times story has posted a statement on Facebook saying he did not commit the crimes he's accused of.

Federal prosecutors say 26-year-old Matthew Keys provided the hacking group Anonymous with login information to access the computer system of The Tribune Co., the Times' parent company.

According to the indictment handed down last week, a hacker altered a Times article posted in December 2010.

Keys posted on Facebook late March 20 that he "did not give a username and a password to anyone." He also says he did not conspire to damage a protected computer or cause transmission of malicious code, as the indictment states.

Reuters hired Keys in 2012. He has been suspended from his job.

Vt. newspaper to sell Barre building

The daily newspaper that serves Vermont's capital of Montpelier and the city of Barre says it has reached an agreement to sell its Barre headquarters.

In a story posted on the website of the Barre-Montpelier Times Argus (http://bit.ly/Xs5HmR) March 20, Publisher R. John Mitchell says a purchase and sale agreement has been signed with a real estate company owned by Thomas and Karen Lauzon. Thomas Lauzon is the mayor of Barre.

The building was listed at $895,000, but the sale price wasn't disclosed. The sale is contingent on an inspection of the building.

Mitchell says the Times Argus is now looking for a downtown location for its news operation, which won't be affected by the sale.

UK: Senior editor at The Sun charged over payoffs

The deputy editor at The Sun tabloid in Britain has been charged with authorizing thousands of pounds in illegal payoffs to government officials, prosecutors announced March 20.

The charges against Geoff Webster are the latest in a drumbeat of criminal charges against employees of Rupert Murdoch's media empire.

Scores of journalists — most of them British employees of Murdoch's New York-based News Corp. — have been involved in a wide-ranging scandal over phone hacking, police bribery, and a host of other media misdeeds. The scandal has spawned a series of overlapping investigations and was the impetus for a controversial plan to install a tough new U.K. media regulator with unprecedented powers.

News International, Murdoch's London-based unit responsible for publishing The Sun, confirmed that Webster is still an employee of the tabloid but had no immediate comment on the charges.

In a statement, Britain's Crown Prosecution Service said Webster was accused of authorizing a 6,500 pound (nearly $10,000) payment to an unidentified public official in return for information given to an unidentified Sun employee between July 2010 and August 2011. That was right around the time when rumblings about the phone hacking scandal were beginning to emerge.

A second charge relates to a similar but smaller payment made in November 2010.

Webster joins a small but growing list of senior journalists at The Sun who are facing prosecution over illegal payments and other crimes.

In January, the paper's defense editor, Virginia Wheeler, was charged along with Constable Paul Flattley with conspiracy to commit misconduct in a public office.

Flattley is accused of receiving 6,450 pounds between 2008 and 2011 for information on "accidents, incidents and crimes" — including details about the death of a teenage girl.

Webster is due to appear at London's Westminster Magistrates' Court on Tuesday.

In open records battle, judge agrees cheaper, digital copies better

The Citizens' Voice, of Wilkes-Barre, Pa., won an open records battle with Luzerne County March 19 when a judge ruled the county must provide the newspaper with digital copies of emails, instead of making it spend thousands of dollars to obtain paper copies.

After the ouster of Director of Elections Leonard Piazza, the newspaper filed a right-to-know request seeking access to his emails. The paper and the county engaged in a yearlong battle about the release of the emails, and ultimately the method of release - print or electronic.

"I can't see why you can't give them the emails on a disc," Luzerne County Judge Lesa Gelb said. "You have to. So, it's a disc."

Previously, the newspaper filed a similar request to obtain the emails of Chief Public Defender Al Flora Jr. The county produced 4,020 pages of Flora emails, but then sent The Citizens' Voice a bill for $1,005, an invoice the newspaper refused to pay because it requested the emails in electronic form. It cost $5 for a disc with the emails.

On March 19, Gelb ruled that the newspaper does not have to pay the bill for Flora's emails. She directed assistant county solicitor Michael Butera and informational technology director Steve Englot to provide the Flora emails in electronic version if it could be easily done.

Michael Cosgrove, an attorney for The Citizens' Voice, argued that the emails are already in electronic form and providing them in paper form was a method to punish those making right-to-know requests.

Citizens' Voice reporter Michael Buffer, who made both requests for emails, said the county refused to process other right-to-know requests he submitted due to the $1,005 bill.

"It's the medium requested. It's the medium they are in. It's the least expensive method. There is no reason at all to provide the emails on paper unless it's requested that way," Cosgrove said.

DC's Examiner to cease 6-day-a-week print paper

The Washington Examiner will stop publishing a six-day-a-week newspaper in June and 87 employees will lose their jobs as it becomes a weekly magazine and online publication, the newspaper's parent company announced March 19.

The free tabloid, which launched in February 2005, will eliminate coverage of local news, sports and entertainment, according Clarity Media Group, its Denver-based parent company. A company spokeswoman said 87 editorial and business employees will be laid off, while 38 staffers will be retained. The new publication focused on national politics will hire at least 20 new people, the company said.

The Examiner is popular with riders of the Metro transit network, where it's widely distributed, and known for aggressive coverage of local crime, politics, education and transit. Reporters often used the paper as a steppingstone to more established publications. The editorial page is right-leaning, reflecting the conservative politics of Clarity Media Group's billionaire owner, Philip Anschutz.

Clarity closed its Examiner newspaper in Baltimore in 2009 and sold the San Francisco Examiner in 2011. It still owns The Gazette in Colorado Springs, Colo., and The Oklahoman in Oklahoma City.

Clarity Media Group president Ryan McKibben said the company had conducted research over the past year and decided to shift its focus to meet demand. He said departing staffers should be proud of the work they've done.

"We have accomplished a great deal over the past seven years, as we built The Washington Examiner into a credible and respected brand in a very competitive market," McKibben said in a statement. "The strong foundation we established with the website and daily newspaper presents us with the opportunity to shift our focus and meet a pressing need in the political content marketplace."

Kytja Weir, who covered the Metro transit agency for the paper, said staffers had no idea their jobs were in jeopardy until they were told Monday afternoon to attend a Tuesday meeting at the downtown newsroom.

"I think it's a sad day whenever I hear about layoffs in journalism," said Weir, who is on unpaid maternity leave. "Obviously, it's sad for all of us and my colleagues. It's never easy to find out the job you love doing is not going to be there for you."

Two local political reporters were asked to join the new national publication.

The daily Examiner will continue being published until June 14. A redesigned website will go online June 17, and the weekly publication will debut on June 20. The product will offer news, analysis and commentary on national politics and policy, and its targeted readership will be roughly 45,000 professionals in government, public affairs, advocacy and academia, Clarity said.

The laid-off staffers will receive severance packages in addition to drawing paychecks for the next three months.

"To their credit, they didn't shut it down immediately," Weir said. "All things considered, they handled it as professionally and courteously as they could, given the situation."

Conn. man who helped get WWII photo published dies

A Connecticut man who helped get a groundbreaking photograph of dead American soldiers published during World War II, has died, his son said. He was 94.

A.B.C. "Cal" Whipple of Greenwich died March 17 of pneumonia, said his son, Chris Whipple.

Chris Whipple said his father was a Pentagon correspondent for Life magazine who tried to convince the military to allow the photo by George Strock of three dead soldiers on a landing beach to be published. Whipple went up the military ranks until he reached an assistant secretary of the Air corps who decided to send the issue to the White House, his son said.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt eventually cleared the photo.

Publication of the photo ended the censorship rule, boosted support for the war and had a lasting effect on photo journalism, Chris Whipple said.

"I think that he felt this was a watershed in the course of the war," Chris Whipple said. "I think that he felt that in his own way he had made a real contribution. I think he thought it was a special achievement and probably the most important thing he did as a journalist."

Whipple gave an interview in 1986 for an oral history project for Time Inc., said Bill Hooper, archivist for Time. He said Whipple's job involved getting photos cleared.

"I had to go over to the Pentagon and really beat on the censors," Whipple said.

Whipple said the photo by Strock was his favorite, saying the military hadn't allowed such photos published.

"And that took a lot of negotiating on the part of a lot of people at Life who were trying to get that picture cleared," Whipple said.

Whipple went on to become executive editor of Time-Life Books and wrote more than a dozen books about maritime history.

Newspapers worried about new UK media regulations

Britain's politicians have finally struck a deal to regulate their country's press. Whether the press will allow itself to be regulated is another question.

Across Britain, newspaper front pages voiced disquiet at the establishment of an independent watchdog that would have the power to order prominent apologies and take complaints into arbitration — a move one newspaper described as overturning centuries of press freedom.

"UNFREE SPEECH," was the headline of London's business-oriented free sheet City A.M. The Sun, Britain's top-selling tabloid, compared the new body to the infamous Ministry of Truth from George Orwell's "1984," while The Independent displayed the words "HOLD THE FRONT PAGE!" written in supersize font.

Although many in Britain acknowledge the need for reform of the country's press following a damaging scandal over phone hacking, bribery, and other media misdeeds, newspaper groups are concerned that the new body agreed to by politicians will become a burdensome regulator, bogging down newspaper groups with endless and expensive complaints about coverage.

Some kicked back against the idea of any independent oversight of the newspaper industry. In its editorial, The Daily Mail wrote that "for the first time since the 17th century, there will be political interference with British newspapers."

"Rubbish," said Jean Seaton, who teaches media history at London's University of Westminster. She described suggestions that bureaucrats would be peering over journalists' shoulders as "absolute baloney."

The watchdog being set up would replace the widely discredited Press Complaints Commission, a self-regulatory body run by newspaper editors. Seaton said the main difference was that the new body would have official recognition and be subject to periodic audits to make sure it was doing its job — and that it hadn't been "captured" by the very editors it was meant to police.

"There is nothing to be frightened of in that," she said.

But across the British journalism world, worries persisted. Many wondered whether — or how — foreign news providers could be compelled to participate in the new system. Concerns also bubbled up in the British blogosphere, where political writer Paul Staines warned that citizen journalists who joined the regulatory regime would find every little online grievance being magnified into a formal complaint. Those who refused to submit to the regulator would become "media outlaws," he wrote.

Des Freedman, who teaches media and communications at Goldsmiths, University of London, acknowledged that there was little clarity as to whether bloggers would have to submit to the new regime

But he said independent regulation was overdue, describing an entrenched corruption in newsrooms that he said had pressured British journalists into breaking the rules.

"There was a tendency to take any shortcut that was necessary to get to a story, whether it was bullying, bribery, as well as hacking," he said. "The hope is that these reforms will empower ordinary journalists to do the job that they want to do."

What happens next isn't entirely clear. Some British newspapers — the left-leaning Guardian and The Independent among them — have expressed guarded support for the watchdog. Others — including the Times and the Mail — have hinted at legal challenges. Britain's Spectator Magazine has already announced plans to boycott the new regulator. If others could follow suit, the system could fall apart before it even begins.

Freedman said he doubted the threats would amount to much, calling it "both politically highly risky and financially undesirable."

Prime Minister David Cameron said Tuesday that he was convinced of the new watchdog's merits.

"I'm confident that we've set up a system that is practical, that is workable," he said. "It protects the freedom of the press, but it's a good, strong self-regulatory system for victims, and I'm convinced it will work and it will endure."

Pulitzer winner Coll named Columbia j-school dean

Two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Steve Coll has been appointed the new dean of Columbia University's Graduate School of Journalism.

Coll has reported for The Washington Post and The New Yorker.

Columbia President Lee Bollinger made the announcement March 18. He called Coll "one of the most experienced and respected journalists of his generation."

Coll succeeds Nicholas Lemann on July 1. Lemann has been dean since 2003.

Coll won a Pulitzer in 1990, with David Vise, for a Post series about the Securities and Exchange Commission. In 2001, he won his second Pulitzer for general nonfiction.

Coll was the Post's managing editor from 1998 to 2005, leading its transition to the Web.

Columbia administers the Pulitzer Prizes and its journalism graduate program is generally considered one of the best in the U.S.

The New York Times Announces New Berlin Bureau Chief and Europe Editor

The New York Times today announced March 19 that Alison Smale will become Berlin Bureau Chief and Dick Stevenson will become Europe Editor, based in Paris. Both will take up their positions later in the year.

Mr. Stevenson will be responsible for directing coverage of European news for all editions of The New York Times on all platforms, including the International New York Times, which the rebranded International Herald Tribune (IHT) will be called when it debuts later this year. He will report to foreign editor Joe Kahn as well as to assistant managing editor Larry Ingrassia.

Most recently Chief Washington Correspondent, Mr. Stevenson has been politics editor, Washington, DC deputy bureau chief, economics correspondent and a correspondent in Los Angeles and London. A graduate of the University of Pennsylvania and the London School of Economics, Stevenson joined The Times in 1985.

Ms. Smale became executive editor of the IHT in 2009. She joined The Times in July 1998 as weekend foreign editor and served as deputy foreign editor before becoming managing editor of the IHT. She was previously the AP’s Vienna bureau chief for Eastern Europe and a correspondent in Moscow.

In making the announcement, Jill Abramson, executive editor of The New York Times, said, "As we build one news gathering operation that will combine our journalistic strengths and help us to expand our global readership, we are lucky to have such a talented editor and manager direct our European news coverage. Dick’s deep understanding of politics and economics, and his embrace of digital journalism make him especially well-suited to the role.”

Jill Abramson continued, "For the past decade, Alison Smale has been the heart and soul of the IHT, a consummate journalist and passionate leader as executive editor for more than four years. Her deep knowledge of Germany will enable The Times, both the domestic edition and the International New York Times, to cover Germany and Europe’s place in the world – one of the most important stories anywhere – with the unparalleled sophistication and insight that The Times and IHT have long provided to readers.”

New publisher named for western NY news operation

Richard Procida, circulation director for the Utica Observer-Dispatch, has been named publisher of Messenger Post Media in Canandaigua. Both operations are owned by GateHouse Media.

Procida began his newspaper career in 1981 at the Poughkeepsie Journal, working in various roles over 17 years. He subsequently was circulation manager for the Journal News in Westchester County and then the Palladium Item in Richmond, Ind., before joining the Observer-Dispatch, which GateHouse acquired from Gannett in 2007.

He starts work as publisher of Messenger Post Media on April 8.

Messenger Post Media is a multimedia operation serving communities south of Rochester with a daily paper and several weeklies, as well as extensive commercial print operations.

Arizona lawmakers go after newspaper notices

Republicans in the Arizona House of Representatives are once again trying to repeal a mandate that makes local governments publish public notices in newspapers.

The House voted 31-27 March 18 on the measure that would allow some cities and towns to instead post public notices online. Communities with populations smaller than 100,000 people would still be required to publish notices in newspapers under the proposed law.

The bill returned to the Republican-led House after it failed in a 26-31 vote March 13. Republicans joined Democrats to defeat the bill.

Republican Rep. Warren Petersen of Gilbert, the measure's sponsor, promised to amend the bill in the Senate so only some notices could be published online. It would also remove the exemption for cities and towns smaller than 100,000 people.

Republican Rep. Karen Fann of Prescott, one of the bill's fiercest critics initially, was among the handful of Republicans who changed their minds and ultimately helped send the measure to the Senate for approval. Fann said Petersen's proposed amendment would address her concerns about rural, low-income and elderly residents not being able to find notices online.

"Regardless of which medium you use, you will be notified," she said of the proposed changes.

But Democratic Rep. Lisa Otondo, of Yuma, said the changes would still leave some residents in the dark.

"I love newspapers and, as I heard someone say, I love the smell of them and I love the touch of them, but this just isn't about newspapers," she said. "It's about the digital divide that exists in Arizona."

A second measure to limit the publication mandate failed with opposition from Republicans and Democrats. The House voted 18-39 against the legislation that would have established a maximum rate for the cost of the notices. It also would have required governments to post the notices in the local newspaper with the greatest circulation.

The bill's sponsor, Republican Rep. David Stevens of Sierra Vista, called it a first step toward stopping the mandatory notices.

"We dictate that people have to do it, that they have to go publish in a newspaper, then we should be able to dictate the price," Stevens told The Associated Press before the vote.

But critics said the measure violated the First Amendment because it limited the publication of public notices to only certain newspapers. They also opposed the rate cap.

The newspaper industry opposes any effort to limit the mandate. Smallernewspapers could face steep revenue losses if the measures became law, prompting job losses and some publications to fold.

"Public notices have been in newspapers for years. It has been a very effective way to notify the public of what the government is doing," said Paula Casey, executive director of the Arizona Newspapers Association.

Under the proposed changes, voters would have to hunt down information about budgets, hearings and other public business on government websites, Casey said.

"They will be able to hide stuff if they want to. Who would know unless you are privy to what is going on in that situation," she said.

Proponents said it is unfair to force local governments to pay for newspaper space. They note newspaper circulation is generally in decline and more people are getting their news from the Internet.

"If it was 20 years ago I wouldn't even support it, but today as it stands, yes," Stevens said.

Similar bills in recent years have failed to win passage.

WSJ denies bribery in China

The FBI has been investigating a purported whistleblower's allegations that the Wall Street Journal bureau in China bribed officials there to get information for news stories.

Dow Jones, which publishes the Journal, became aware of the allegations last year and has concluded they are unfounded, a spokeswoman for Dow Jones said Monday. Details about the probe were first reported by the newspaper on March 17.

"After a thorough review of our operations in China conducted by outside lawyers and auditors, we have not found any evidence of impropriety at Dow Jones," spokeswoman Paula Keve said in a statement. "Nor has anyone taken issue with our findings."

A law enforcement official said March 18 that despite the news organization's own findings, the inquiry by the FBI's New York office was still open. The official was not authorized to discuss the case and spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity.

Both the Justice Department and the FBI declined comment.

The bribery allegations surfaced amid a sprawling investigation of a phone-hacking scandal that's plagued Rupert Murdoch and his News Corp. media empire, which includes Dow Jones and the newspaper, since 2011. Scotland Yard launched the probe after learning that the News of the World had hacked into the phone of a slain teenager in that newspaper's quest for scoops.

The FBI's New York office also has been investigating whether any Americans were involved in the scandal. According to the Journal, authorities in New York also have been probing the newspaper's claims last year that its computer systems had been breached by China-based hackers.

The Journal reported March 17 that the Justice Department told News Corp. last year that a whistleblower claimed one or more Journal employees had provided gifts to Chinese officials in exchange for information for articles. News Corp. has told U.S. officials that it suspects a Chinese government operative leveled the allegations in retaliation for the Journal's reporting on power struggles within the country's leadership.

"The allegations of gifts in China went beyond the typical meals or drinks shared by reporters and officials and included lavish entertainment and travel," the paper reported, citing unnamed sources. Such activity would be a potential violation of U.S. laws barring American corporations trying to gain a business by plying foreign officials with gifts.

In her statement, the Journal spokeswoman said the newspaper was still committed to "vigorous" reporting in the region.

"We are extremely proud of our important and impactful coverage coming out of China and regret that some unknown source has sought to taint our work," she said.

In Britain, the phone-hacking scandal brought the demise of the News of the World along with dozens of arrests and resignations, scores of lawsuits against Murdoch's empire and a public inquiry into media ethics.

INDUSTRY NEWS 3-14-2013

Catholic newspaper draws rebuke from bishop

A newspaper known for unflinching coverage of the Catholic church scandal was rebuked by a bishop in its own backyard after calling for his ouster in a battle that illustrates tensions between U.S. bishops and groups that call themselves Catholic but aren't sanctioned by the church.

The National Catholic Reporter, an independent Kansas City, Mo.-based weekly, called for Bishop Robert Finn's removal or resignation in September, after he was convicted of failing to report suspected child abuse.

Finn, leader of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Kansas City-St. Joseph, later wrote in an editorial in his own diocesan newspaper that parishioner anger is growing over the NCR's challenges to Catholic orthodoxy on topics ranging from the ordination of women to contraception.

In the last several years, church leaders have been trying to shore up the religious identity and mission of organizations that call themselves Catholic, including trying to bar groups from saying they have ties with the church if bishops believe the organizations stray from church teaching. Conflict over the issue intensified in the 2008 presidential election, when some Catholic advocacy groups backed Barack Obama despite his support for abortion rights.

Finn, who declined to be interviewed by The Associated Press, wrote in his editorial that a local bishop first asked the paper to remove Catholic from its name in 1968 — "to no avail."

"In light of the number of recent expressions of concern, I have a responsibility as the local bishop to instruct the Faithful about the problematic nature of this media source which bears the name 'Catholic,'" Finn wrote in The Catholic Key. "While I remain open to substantive and respectful discussion with the legitimate representatives of NCR, I find that my ability to influence the National Catholic Reporter toward fidelity to the Church seems limited to the supernatural level."

Thomas Groome, professor of religious education at Boston College, said he was surprised Finn was "picking such a public fight." Finn is the highest-ranking U.S. church official convicted of a crime related to the sex abuse scandal. The misdemeanor charge stemmed from the case of an area priest who pleaded guilty in August to producing child pornography. Finn and other church officials knew about photos on the priest's computer six months before they turned him in.

Groome said the Catholic Church benefits from publications such as the National Catholic Reporter.

"There are all kinds of ways the church's position has evolved, and if that's to happen you need publications like the NCR that raises critical issues, controversial issues, and I think it does that respectfully with a sense of faithfulness to the church's core teaching," he said.

NCR, founded in Kansas City in 1964, has been widely lauded for its coverage of the church and garnered widespread recognition for its reporting on child sex abuse in the 1980s. The newspaper, which has a circulation of about 35,000 and is available online, has won several awards from the Catholic Press Association, including for general excellence for 13 straight years. The CPA, while independent, works closely with church hierarchy, according to Timothy Walter, CPA's executive director.

"We don't present official teaching, and we don't pretend to," said the newspaper's editor, Dennis Coday. "What we do is report on what's happening in the church. And part of what's happening is dissent and questioning, and that's what we report about. And that's why we remain Catholic and continue to call ourselves Catholic."

Coday said the question for the paper is: "Are we upholding the deepest values set out in the Gospel, the message Jesus preached?"

Finn is not alone in complaining about NCR, which has also called for the church to reverse its teaching on women's ordination and supported re-examining the church's approaches to contraception and sexuality.

Canon lawyer Edward Peters, the Vatican's expert witness in U.S. sex abuse lawsuits and an adviser to the Vatican's highest court, said in a recent blog post that Finn was "too kind" in his remarks about NCR and noted that other groups have stopped using "Catholic" in their names.

Peters said the newspaper has carried on "a steady tirade against ecclesiastical authority in general, and against numerous Church teachings in particular, for several decades."

"But the last few years have seen a shrillness that should discomfort even its dwindling number of friends," Peters wrote.

The tension between NCR and Finn likely won't resolve easily because it's tied to an ongoing battle over authority in the church, said the Rev. Thomas Reese, senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center at Georgetown University.

"The vision of the Vatican and the hierarchy is that the Catholic media should support and ... promote the positions taken by the hierarchy," said Reese, who was removed from his position as editor of the Jesuit magazine America in 2005 after it published stories on topics including gay marriage.

"But you know," Reese said, "many people in the Catholic media think that they should also criticize those positions or be a forum where there can be discussion and argument and dialogue on issues facing the church."

Online editor in Md. accused of soliciting sex

The online news editor for an Annapolis newspaper has been charged with soliciting sex from someone he thought was an adolescent girl.

George "Nick" Lundskow, the interactive media editor for The Capital, was charged in Pennsylvania last week.

Authorities say Lundskow tried to arrange sex with an undercover special agent posing in an Internet chat room as a 14-year-old girl. Authorities accuse Lundskow of using a webcam to send pictures exposing himself.

A phone message left at Lundskow's home wasn't immediately returned. Online court records don't list a lawyer for him.

The Capital says (http://bit.ly/Z8Ufhi) Lundskow has worked for the newspaper for about 25 years, including as Internet director, page designer and photographer.

Capital Editor Steve Gunn called the charges serious but said the newspaper would have no comment.

Sunshine quiz: Outsider restriction in Tennessee mostly unknown

Most people quizzed recently about open-government laws did not know that only Tennessee citizens are guaranteed access to Tennessee public records from state and local governments, according to the online findings.

Nearly three-fourths of people who have taken the Tennessee Sunshine Quiz gave incorrect responses to a question about that portion of the state's Public Records Act.

Open-government advocates would like to see the requirement removed. They say the restriction makes it difficult for out-of-state requesters to obtain Tennessee records on issues of broad public interest.

The Tennessee Sunshine Quiz is sponsored by the Tennessee Coalition for Open Government through the support of the Tennessee Press Association, Tennessee Association of Broadcasters and The Associated Press. The AP is a member of the TCOG.

The quiz coincides with Sunshine Week, an annual initiative by the American Society of Newspaper Editors to promote greater transparency in government. Sunshine Week begins Sunday.

As of Wednesday, 335 people had taken the 15-question quiz about the public's right to attend government meetings and access public records in Tennessee. Questions test knowledge of the law, including the cost to copy public documents and how to find out when a government body is meeting. At the end, the quiz provides the correct answers.

Margaret Nash, 23, took the quiz during a Middle Tennessee State University journalism course and said most classmates were surprised to learn about the Tennessee citizen restriction.

"If it is public property, I would assume that all the public should be able to access it, not just particular citizens of a certain state," she said.

Frank Gibson, public policy director for the Tennessee Press Association, said the 1957 Public Records Act specifies that records shall be open to "any citizen of Tennessee," but government agencies don't apply that clause uniformly and some officials interpret it to mean they must deny requests from people outside the state.

"It is a frequently abused section of the law," Gibson said.

He said a 2006-07 legislative study committee recommended the restriction be removed because at least one federal appeals court had ruled similar restrictions to open records were a violation of the U.S. Constitution.

The U.S. Supreme Court is weighing the issue of whether states can limit public records' access to only citizens in a case from Virginia.

Rhode Island resident Mark J. McBurney and California resident Roger W. Hurlbert sued after they were blocked from getting public documents that Virginia citizens can easily obtain. Virginia's Freedom of Information Act limits access to state citizens and some media outlets. The suit argues that violates the U.S. Constitution's privileges and immunities clause, which prohibits states from discriminating against out-of-staters in favor of its own citizens, and the commerce clause, which prohibits discrimination against interstate commerce.

The TCOG joined several other media organizations to file a friend of the court brief in support of removing the citizens-only restriction.

The high court's ruling could lead to changes in public records access in Tennessee.

Richard Jones, an Ohio resident, challenged Tennessee's citizens-only provision with a 2010 lawsuit after he was denied records about the granting of a government contract in Memphis. A district court judge ruled against, and his appeal to the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has been stayed to await the Supreme Court decision in the Virginia case.

A student journalist working on a national project that looked at instances of voter fraud and voter ID laws also was denied Tennessee records last summer because she wasn't in the state.

Kassondra Cloos was a student journalist for News21, based at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University. Cloos was researching the motivations behind the law requiring voters to show voter identification.

"I wanted to see the emails of all the state representatives and senators, but I was told I could not have access to those even though they were public record because I wasn't a state resident," Cloos said.

She eventually got help to obtain the records through the Tennessee Coalition for Open Government. After a search of public records in all 50 states, the investigation by News21 eventually found that few cases of in-person voter fraud occur across the country, despite several states — including Tennessee — citing voter fraud as a reason to tighten voting restrictions.

"It was challenging because every state has different laws," Cloos said.

Miss. government sunshine laws not consistent

Want to get personnel records for a government employee or attend the board meeting of a county-owned hospital in Mississippi? How about reviewing records of the state Board of Dental Examiners or attending a Parole Board hearing?

You're probably out of luck.

Although many government functions are open to citizens, there are plenty of exceptions to sunshine laws.

Gov. Phil Bryant signed another one March 4: A new law, which took effect immediately, says the public no longer has access to the names and addresses of people who receive state-issued permits to carry concealed weapons.

The law to cloak the concealed-carry information was supported by the National Rifle Association. It was pushed by Mississippi legislators who were upset that a New York newspaper earlier this year published details about some permit holders there.

"Sensitive gun owner information is entitled to privacy protections — just like medical records, tax documents and personnel files," Republican Bryant said in signing the new law.

Before the new law was enacted, the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal newspaper and the Jackson Jambalaya blog requested what were then public records about the concealed-carry permits, although they said they didn't plan to publish names and addresses. The Department of Public Safety delayed responding to the requests, and DPS deputy administrator Ken Magee told a legislative panel that employees "tried to put it off as much as they can, putting DPS in an awkward position."

The Madison County Journal criticized the new law.

"If the government is going to insist on keeping any kinds of records on gun owners — and we don't think it should — those records, at the very least, should be open to public inspection as a guard against abuse and fraud which government is so apt to fall into," the newspaper editorialized.

Leonard Van Slyke of Jackson, an attorney for the Mississippi Center for Freedom of Information, said the state's Open Meetings and Public Records laws have several holes. The Board of Dental Examiners and the Parole Board, for example, are not subject to the sunshine laws.

Boards of water associations also exempt from the Open Meetings law, but Rep. Jerry Turner, R-Baldwyn, is trying to change that. At his urging, the House changed Senate Bill 2322 to include a provision saying members of water associations or systems would have the right to attend the group's board meetings and that the group must give members at least 15 days' notice before any meeting to elect officers.

"I am a firm believer that as long as you have transparency that will solve just about any problem you have," Turner told the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal. "If you have open meetings and the members are informed, they will sort out the problems.

Mississippi's Open Meetings Act generally requires public bodies such as county boards of supervisors or city councils or boards of aldermen to conduct most of their business in public view. However, there are specific reasons they're allowed to close meetings, including discussions about hiring, firing or disciplinary matters for government employees.

Van Slyke said he has heard many complaints about public boards being too vague when giving their reasons for closing meetings.

"Public bodies tend to use the word 'personnel' too broadly," Van Slyke said.

The law allows meetings to be closed to talk about job performance, character, professional competence or physical or mental health, he said.

"You often hear that a board will go into executive session and say 'personnel' without a description," he said.

Ruling on a Hinds County case in the 1980s, the Mississippi Supreme Court said boards need to give a specific enough description about why they're closing the meeting that the public might have some idea of what will be discussed behind closed doors.

The Legislature writes state laws — and it has also partially exempted itself from the Open Meetings Act. The law says legislative subcommittees and conference committees don't have to be open to the public, Van Slyke said. However, in the past decade, the House and Senate have said in their own operating rules that such meetings are supposed to be open.

Conference committees consist of three House members and three senators, and they generally meet at the end of a session to negotiate final versions of bills. Times and locations for conference committee meetings are posted on the legislative website. But, the reality is that negotiations often take place in Capitol hallways or in more informal settings, as lawmakers juggle multiple meetings or sensitive legislation. Sometimes, negotiators leave the open meeting and go confer privately with each other, or to talk privately with lobbyists or others trying to pass or kill bills.

Tim Kalich, editor and publisher of the Greenwood Commonwealth, said thenewspaper has covered board meetings of the county-owned hospital for decades, with mixed levels of access. Because state law does not compel the board meetings to be open, members of the general public, including reporters, have gotten to attend meetings when the board feels like letting people watch business being conducted.

"At times, they have been more open than at other times," Kalich said.

For example, in the 1970s, Commonwealth publisher John Emmerich would send a reporter to cover the hospital board. "They would routinely kick her out, not let her sit in and listen to the meetings," Kalich said.

In recent years, Kalich said another Commonwealth reporter was often allowed to attend hospital board meetings but they'd close the sessions when they wanted to discuss matters such as whether to re-hire an administrator. It was similar to what city councils and county boards of supervisors are allowed to do, by law — closing a meeting to discuss personnel matters, pending litigation or certain other matters.

Still, Kalich said a publicly-owned hospital can be one of the largest employers in a community and he believes the law should specify that such boards should be subject to the same Open Meetings laws as most other taxpayer-funded entities.

"I think the public should be able to keep tabs on what's going on with its largest asset," Kalich said. "It shouldn't be up to the whims of the hospital board to decide what they want the public to know and what they don't want them to know."

Vt. paper defends 'fry Rice' sign supporting team

A Vermont newspaper is defending a poster it published in support of a local team that read "fry Rice" in type associated with Chinese calligraphy.

In an editorial (http://bit.ly/Yj75aB), the Caledonian Record says the back-page poster meant no offense to any individual or group. The editorial says it sought a play on words, and simply invoking ethnic customs does not constitute racism.

The poster was printed in support of St. Johnsbury Academy's basketball team in its championship game against Rice Memorial.

The Asian American Journalists Association criticized the poster published Thursday. The group's president, who's an Associated Press editor, wrote to the newspaper's publisher that the slogan might be considered clever but was offensive when written in that typeface.

St. Johnsbury Academy ended up losing the game.

News Corp. to spin off publishing with $2.56B cash

News Corp. said that it will spin off its publishing division with $2.56 billion in cash and no debt, giving it the means to invest in digital operations and acquire businesses.

The amount of cash the publishing unit will receive was included in a securities filing. The amount includes a payment of $1.82 billion from the parent company, to be renamed Fox Group. Another $741 million is already held in cash by the businesses to be spun off.

The separation of the publishing businesses from the TV and movie businesses is expected by June.

The publishing company will include newspapers such as The Wall Street Journal, the HarperCollins book publisher, Australian TV assets and its fledgling for-profit education business, Amplify. It will keep the News Corp. name.

News Corp. also said that the new publishing company would not have to pay for any further legal costs or civil claims related to the phone hacking scandal involving its British newspapers. News Corp. has spent $346 million on probes related to the case.

The publishing company would be liable for criminal penalties if they arose.

News Corp. CEO Rupert Murdoch will be executive chairman of the spun-off company and remain CEO of Fox Group. He'll end up controlling both entities through the nearly 40 percent of Class B voting shares he controls through a family trust.

Robert Thomson will be CEO of the spun-off News Corp. He had been managing editor of The Wall Street Journal.

INDUSTRY NEWS 3-7-2013

Community Media buys W. Pa. newspapers

Community Media Group of Illinois has bought three western Pennsylvania newspapers and related publications.

A release March 4 says that The Courier-Express of DuBois, the Jeffersonian Democrat of Brookville, and The Leader-Vindicator of New Bethlehem were sold to a division of Community Media Group, which is based in West Frankfort, Ill.

The newspapers had been owned by Independent Publications, a company controlled by members of the McLean family, who have published newspapers in Pennsylvania since 1895. The McLean family made the decision to exit the publishing business last year.

Community Media Group operates daily and weekly newspapers and web sites located in Pennsylvania, New York, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan and Iowa.

Terms of the sale weren't disclosed.

Buffett: 'No thanks' on buying Tribune papers

Warren Buffett has been buying newspapers recently but says he's not interested in the big papers owned by Tribune Co.

Buffett spoke about his recent interest in the newspaper business on CNBC March 4. His Berkshire Hathaway will own 28 daily newspapers in small and mid-sized cities once its acquisition of the Tulsa World is complete.

When asked if he wants to buy a batch of papers that includes the Los Angeles Times and Chicago Tribune, he says, "No thanks."

Buffett says the papers that are going to make money will be those in a tight-knit community that wants local news.

He says that even the smaller papers have smaller profit margins than most other companies that Berkshire Hathaway invests in.

Indiana University journalism school fights for independence

Indiana University's century-old School of Journalism is fighting for its independence after the university's provost proposed merging the school with other communications departments and placing the new entity under the jurisdiction of the College of Arts and Sciences.

Bloomington Provost Lauren Robel said in her first State of the Campus address earlier this month that she'll recommend that mass media studies be rolled into one new School of Communication, Media and Journalism.

The move to put the journalism school back under the College of Arts and Science's umbrella has rankled many students and staff. The school separated from the college in the 1980s and became an independent school within the university.

Interim journalism Dean Michael Evans told the Bloomington Press Club that a merger would increase the school's resources and bring together different faculty members. But he balked at losing the journalism school's independence and said there is no precedent for moving an existing school inside a college at IU.

"I have been in favor of the idea — carefully worded — the idea of a merger, because I think properly done, a merger could be wonderful in a lot of ways," Evans said. "I am adamantly opposed to moving it into the college."

Robel's proposal sparked a backlash from students, faculty and alumni who say it will decrease the presence and prestige of journalism, affect tenure and promotion policies and put the school into a culture where it doesn't fit.

"It was broken off in 1989 for a reason," J.R. Ross, a former IDS editor, Associated Press reporter and president of the IU School of Journalism Alumni board, told The Herald-Times (http://bit.ly/Ywn8l7). "Why you'd try to pound this round peg into a square hole 20-plus years later makes no sense to us.

"One of the messages the provost delivered was that by doing this, it would create efficiencies," he added. "Adding another layer of bureaucracy does not look like an efficiency. This is 1984-speak if I've ever heard it."

Many also have voiced concerns about the future of Ernie Pyle Hall, the building that houses the journalism school. Robel's plan would move journalism into a renovated Franklin Hall.

A Facebook page titled "Save Ernie Pyle Hall" had more than 800 likes as of Friday.

Robel said she understands that a school with 100 years of history will be protective of its legacy and reputation but stressed that the new school "comes with incredible possibilities."

"The thing I think is important to keep our eyes on is we're talking about creating something better. Not getting rid of something good," Robel said.

Robel's recommendation goes to IU President Michael McRobbie and the Board of Trustees for consideration.

GI's WikiLeaks admission energizes his supporters

While it may be a curious legal strategy, an Army private's decision to admit in court that he sent hundreds of thousands of classified documents to WikiLeaks has energized his supporters around the world.

Pfc. Bradley Manning, 25, has been called by some a whistleblowing hero, a political prisoner and a symbol of the misplaced priorities of the U.S. military and the Obama administration. Others, particularly in the United States, view him as a traitor. Regardless of his motives, he appears likely to spend many years in a military prison.

At the very least, Manning likely ended speculation that he leaked the largest trove of classified material in U.S. history wantonly or unknowingly.

At a court hearing Thursday, Manning read a 35-page statement describing his internal deliberations about whether to send the first batch of hundreds of thousands of battlefield reports from Iraq and Afghanistan. He said he was trying to expose the American military's disregard for human life and provoke a public debate about U.S. military and foreign policy.

"I felt this sense of relief by them having it," Manning said Thursday of WikiLeaks. "I felt I had accomplished something that allowed me to have a clear conscience."

Jeff Paterson of the Bradley Manning Support Network, which has raised more than $900,000 for Manning's legal defense, said the statement confirmed what supporters have long thought of him.

"We've been defending this person as a heroic whistleblower for 2 1/2 years now, and it was inspiring and it was motivating to finally hear in his own words why he made this life-changing and possibly history-changing decision," Paterson said.

Besides the battlefield reports, he sent WikiLeaks hundreds of thousands of State Department diplomatic cables, detainee records from the military prison at Guantanamo Bay and other classified records. He also released a 2007 combat video of a U.S. helicopter assault that killed 11 men, including a Reuters news photographer.

Manning said he didn't think the material would harm the United States, although the diplomatic cables would be embarrassing. The Obama administration has said it threatened valuable military and diplomatic sources and strained relations with other governments.

Gabriel Schoenfeld, a fellow at the conservative Hudson Institute and the author of "Necessary Secrets," said Manning made a brash decision to release the State Department cables and should be punished for it.

"He said nothing he put out, he thought was damaging to the United States. I would beg to differ with that," Schoenfeld said. "He wasn't in a position to evaluate the damage."

But Schoenfeld doesn't think Manning was guilty of his most serious charge, aiding the enemy. "I don't think that was his intention," he said.

Manning's supporters say the documents exposed war crimes. They also credit a State Department cable indicating that the U.S. would not back former Tunisian president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali with helping spark the pro-democracy Arab Spring uprisings in 2010.

"I think he really deserves great credit for his courage and for doing the right thing," said Daniel Ellsberg, who leaked the Pentagon Papers revealing that the U.S. had deceived the public about the Vietnam War. "I hope people will see these quotes and realize how well-motivated he was."

Military justice experts say it's unclear whether Manning will derive any benefit from pleading guilty to offenses that carry a maximum 20-year sentence. He admitted guilt without the benefit of a deal with prosecutors — known in military parlance as a "naked plea."

After the judge accepted the plea, prosecutors announced that they would go forward with the remaining charges. Aiding the enemy, an offense that has not been brought to trial in decades, carries a maximum life sentence. Manning is also charged with violating federal espionage laws and theft counts that carry decades in prison.

Eugene Fidell, who teaches military justice at Yale and has followed the Manning case, said Manning gained little by pleading guilty without a deal.

"The only thing that might have been a nice outcome for him would have been if the government had said they don't want to pursue these other charges," Fidell said. "The only thing he has gained is some brownie points from the judge."

But Michael Navarre, a former Navy judge advocate and military justice analyst, said there might be some advantage, because the remaining charges would be more difficult to prove.

"He's laying the groundwork for a more lenient sentence and laying the groundwork for a potential defense to the aiding the enemy and the espionage charges," Navarre said. "You end up with a more reasonable starting position — 'I admit I did it, but I didn't think it was going to harm anyone.'"

Internationally, Manning tends to be seen far more favorably than in the United States — particularly in countries such as Britain where many opposed the 2003 invasion of Iraq and see his prosecution as an attempt by the Pentagon to punish a soldier who dared challenge the war.

Manning's picture was on the front page of Britain's left-leaning Guardian and The Independent newspapers Friday.

Supporters held an early-evening vigil in Manning's honor Friday in front of the U.S. Embassy in London. Ben Griffin, a former British soldier who resigned to protest the tactics of his American colleagues in Iraq, said Manning was trying to gain control over a trial that has been weighted against him.

"He is defining — before the prosecution and anyone else can try to define for him — why he did this," Griffin said. "It's been put out into the public domain now."

Jude Fleming, a 50-year-old Canadian teacher, said Manning's statement of principles had raised his moral stature in the eyes of the world.

"I think it elevates him," she said. "It takes the word 'alleged' out. Instead of saying 'alleged whistleblower,' all of a sudden he becomes the hero: He is the whistleblower. He's proud to say that he's the whistleblower."

Jesselyn Radack, an attorney with the Government Accountability Project, said her clients accused of leaking classified material are treated like "rock stars" abroad. But she doesn't envision a groundswell of support for Manning in the U.S.

"We continue to move on this very draconian path in terms of whistleblowers," Radack said. "I think historically, people will be vindicated, but that may not be for decades or even in my lifetime."

Study: Sports departments still lack diversity

The numbers of sports editors that are women and people of color showed some improvement at the 150 websites and newspapers that belong to Associated Press Sports Editors, according to a study released March 1

Still, the report released every two years by the University of Central Florida's Institute for Diversity and Ethics in Sports again gave the members of APSE a failing grade for their gender hiring practices.

The report gave those outlets a C-plus, the same as in 2010, for racial hires and a third consecutive F for gender hires in jobs including sports editor, columnist, reporter and copy editor.

This is the fourth report that's been done on APSE since 2006.

Overall, it said, sports departments continued to still be led mostly by white men.

In 2012 there were 90.9 percent of sports editors, 86.6 percent of assistant sports editors, 83.9 percent of columnists, 86.3 percent of reporters and 86 percent of copy editors/designers that were white.

Those numbers were 96.9, 85.4, 85.6, 85.6 and 90.1, respectively, in 2010.

The number of white male sports editors has also fallen slightly, dropping from 90.6 in 2010 to 83.2 in 2012. At the same time, there was an increase in opportunities for people of color as sports editors, rising from 3.1 to 9.1 percent.

The first Latina sports editor was reported in this year's study at ESPN. But overall 90.4 percent of sports editors were men in 2012, along with 88.3 percent of reporters and 90.2 percent of columnists.

"This is happening of course at a time where the number of people working at newspapers has been dramatically decreasing. But nonetheless the numbers have consistently stayed low," said primary study author Richard Lapchick. "The good news is APSE continues to want to do this and open itself up to the public.

"They have long way to go in this area. But the fact that they asked for this report is a sign they want to bring about change."

Since the first study of APSE in 2006, the 83.2 percent of white male sports editors in 2012 is the lowest over that span.

APSE president Gerry Ahern said that as a whole the organization is being proactive to improve its overall numbers. He highlighted APSE's Diversity Fellowship Program started last year for mid-career journalists, as well as the Scripps Howard Day of Diversity at Hampton University and Sports Journalism Institute, which is the top internship program for sports in the country.

In the past year APSE has also held the first joint conference with the Association for Women in Sports media.

"Clearly there remains much work to be done," Ahern said. "Our commitment to improving diversity has not wavered....Progress will come if we remain steadfast."

Bryant gets bill to seal concealed gun names

The Mississippi House has sent a bill to the governor’s desk to block public access to information about state-issued permits for people to carry concealed weapons.

The move came March 1 even as controversy intensified over the Department of Public Safety’s apparent decision to delay pending requests for the records until the bill was pushed into law.

The bill, supported by the National Rifle Association, has been backed by lawmakers upset that a newspaper in New York published the names and addresses of people who have concealed weapons permits. Supporters say allowing open records violates gun owners privacy.

A reporter for the Daily Journal has requested the records, as has James Hendrix, who runs the Jackson Jambalaya blog. Neither has yet received a copy of the records.

Daily Journal Executive Editor Lloyd Gray said the paper has no intention of publishing names or addresses of gun permit holders but sought the records to assist in its reporting of gun trends in the region.

The Journal made a similar request in 2006 and received the records, never publishing the names.

Halifax Media reorganizes southeastern NC papers

The Halifax Media Group is reorganizing its southeastern North Carolina newspapers to more closely align The Daily News of Jacksonville and the StarNews of Wilmington.

According to an announcement from Halifax, StarNews Publisher Bob Gruber is adding new duties, including overseeing The Daily News.

Elliott Potter will continue as the publisher and executive editor of The Daily News and report to Gruber.

The company says the move is part of a realignment and expansion that covers New Hanover, Brunswick, Pender, Columbus and Onslow counties.

Gruber said the change allows the two papers to work more closely together and better share resources.

Halifax purchased the StarNews from The New York Times Co. in January 2012, and in June it purchased The Daily News and other North Carolina newspapers from Freedom Communications.

Ala. hospital fights paper's effort to get records

An Anniston, Ala.,hospital is going to court in an effort to stop an Alabama newspaper from obtaining details of its purchase of another hospital.

The Regional Medical Center board filed a lawsuit Feb. 27 as part of its effort to deny a request by the Anniston Star for financial details of its December purchase of Jacksonville Medical Center. The newspaper is seeking the purchase price and other contract details under Alabama's open records law.

Anniston Star Editor and Associate Publisher Bob Davis said in the newspaper (http://bit.ly/Z36OKT) that there didn't seem to be a need to go to court. He said the paper considers it an "open-and-shut open records case."

Regional Medical Center attorney Michael Jackson declined to comment until he had received permission to do so from the newspaper's attorney.

INDUSTRY NEWS 2-28-2013

Dubai officials block Bahrain-based AP journalist

Two Bahrain-based journalists, including a reporter for The Associated Press, were blocked from entering the United Arab Emirates on Feb. 25 under apparent new restrictions by Gulf Arab states.

Reem Khalifa and her husband, Mansoor al-Jamri, chief editor for Bahrain's independent Al Wasat newspaper, said they were told by authorities at Dubai International Airport that they were on a list to deny entry.

No further explanations were immediately given, but it appears part of tighter coordination between Gulf allies to control and monitor journalists, activists and others in the region.

Like all Gulf partners, the UAE has expanded crackdowns on perceived political dissent since the Arab Spring, including charging 94 people last month with conspiring to overthrow the ruling system. But it still remains among the most open countries in the Gulf for journalists, researchers and scholars.

Bahrain's 2-year-old uprising is a critical issue for Gulf leaders, who want to safeguard the ruling families across the region.

Khalifa and her husband — on a private visit to Dubai — closely cover Bahrain's struggles between majority Shiites and the Sunni rulers in the strategic kingdom, which is home to the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet.

Khalifa had visited Dubai last year without incident. Al-Jamri was among the winners in 2011 of the International Press Freedom Award by the Committee to Protect Journalists.

A senior UAE official said airport immigration issues fall under Dubai police, which had no immediate comment. Bahrainis and other citizens from the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council — as well as many Western passport holders — can enter the UAE without a pre-arranged visa.

Bahrain, however, has imposed a special journalist visa that has sharply limited outside media access to the country.

Last week, the UAE also denied entry to a prominent academic from the London School of Economics who was scheduled to speak about Bahrain at a conference on the Arab Spring.

The UAE's Foreign Ministry said Monday that Kristian Coates Ulrichsen was not allowed into the country because his work has been critical of Bahrain's monarchy, which is closely backed by other Gulf leaders. The UAE said "non-constructive" views on Bahrain are unwelcome.

FBI to release records on Withers' informer work

The FBI will release records about civil rights-era photographer Ernest Withers' work as an informant for the FBI, to settle a Tennessee newspaper's Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.

The Commercial Appeal of Memphis reported on its website Feb. 25 that under the settlement, the paper will have access to portions of 70 investigative files in which Withers participated as an informant. In addition, the paper reported, the FBI will pay $186,000 in attorney fees and legal costs.

Neither the Justice Department nor the FBI would provide any information on the settlement. Charles D. Tobin, a First Amendment lawyer who represented the newspaper, confirmed the details of the settlement.

Withers, a freelancer for America's black press, was known as "the civil rights photographer" for iconic images of the late Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and others protesting for racial equality in the South.

In 2010, The Commercial Appeal's publisher, Memphis Publishing Co., and one of its reporters, Marc Perrusquia, filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the FBI. About a year ago, the judge in the case said that documents confirmed that Withers, who died at 85 in 2007, secretly served as an informer for the FBI.

Last year, under a court order, the FBI released 348 pages that were heavily redacted, but the newspaper had called that release insufficient.

Monday's settlement calls for the National Archives and Records Administration to release records related to Withers from investigative case files, but not from Withers' informant file, which is retained by the FBI, the Commercial Appeal reported.

Withers' photographs had chronicled the Emmett Till murder trial in 1955, racial integration at the University of Mississippi in 1962 and the 1968 sanitation workers' strike in Memphis that brought King to the city where he was assassinated. Withers marched with King and was beaten by police while covering civil rights leader Medgar Evers' 1963 funeral.

Tulsa World sold to Warren Buffett's Berkshire

Billionaire Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway said Feb. 25 that it is buying the Tulsa World, bringing its newspaper unit to 28 small- or medium-sized dailies.

The privately held Tulsa newspaper has a daily circulation of 95,000. The sale was reported by the Tulsa World and Berkshire's Omaha World-Herald, whose executives oversee the company's newspapers.

Terms of the deal, which is expected to close in March, weren't disclosed.

Terry Kroeger, who runs Berkshire's newspapers, said the Tulsa paper will be a great fit. "The Tulsa World is a special newspaper in an outstanding market and we are honored to have the opportunity to own it," Kroeger said in a statement.

Buffett did not immediately respond to a message about the Tulsa World acquisition.

The chairman of the World Publishing Company, which owns the Tulsa World, said selling to Berkshire would provide a secure future for the Tulsa newspaper.

"Our family takes great pride in the Tulsa World and its many years of service to Tulsa and Oklahoma," Robert Lorton Jr. said. "The newspaper business has become a difficult business model within a changing society and in particular for local family owned newspapers."

Besides daily newspapers, Berkshire owns 40 other newspapers that publish less frequently and other monthly publications and regional magazines. The growing media chain owns newspapers in Nebraska, Iowa, Texas, Oklahoma, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Alabama and Florida.

Berkshire bought 63 Media General newspapers last year for $142 million to launch its newspaper unit. At the end of 2012, Berkshire did close the Manassas News & Messenger, a Virginia newspaper, because it was struggling to compete in the Washington suburbs.

But Berkshire has continued buying newspapers since then with the addition of the Greensboro, N.C., News & Record last month, and now the Tulsa World.

Buffett has said newspapers that are the primary source of information about their communities will continue delivering decent returns. Buffett, who is Berkshire's chairman and chief executive, has said he won't try to influence the newspapers' editorial policies.

Newspapers are still a relatively small part of Berkshire Hathaway, which owns an assortment of more than 80 subsidiaries and holds major stakes in companies like Coca-Cola Co., Wells Fargo and IBM.

Berkshire's subsidiaries include Geico and General Reinsurance, BNSF railroad, MidAmerican Energy utility, Fruit of the Loom, Nebraska Furniture Mart, Dairy Queen and many others.

New York Times renames International Herald Tribune

The New York Times Co. said Feb. 25 that it was planning to rename The International Herald Tribune, its 125-year-old newspaper based in Paris, and would also unveil a new website for international audiences.

Starting this fall, under the plan, the paper will be rechristened The International New York Times, reflecting the company’s intention to focus on its core New York Times newspaper and to build its international presence.

"This recognizes our global reach and is an exciting and logical move,” said Jill Abramson, the executive editor of The New York Times.

Mark Thompson, president and chief executive of The New York Times Company, said in a statement that the company recently explored its prospects with international audiences, and noted there was "significant potential to grow the number of New York Times subscribers outside of the United States.”

He added: "The digital revolution has turned The New York Times from being a great American newspaper to becoming one of the world’s best-known news providers. We want to exploit that opportunity.”

A Times Company spokeswoman would not provide details on how the name change would affect the International Herald Tribune’s employees. Currently, half of the staff members who work in Paris are subject to French labor law, while Herald Tribune employees spread throughout the rest of the world are governed by local labor laws.

The masthead of the paper will also change, the spokeswoman said, but she declined to elaborate.

Stephen Dunbar-Johnson, publisher of The International Herald Tribune, said in an interview that the name change was driven by "extensive research” showing that there was substantial potential, under the new name, to increase the number of international subscribers to the digital editions of The New York Times.

Mr. Dunbar-Johnson said the name change would be accompanied by new investments aimed at enhancing the paper’s international appeal. New employees will be hired to work on nytimes.com— currently the combined Web site of The New York Times and the Herald Tribune — in Europe and Asia, he said.

The renamed paper will remain based in Paris, where it was founded 125 years ago as the European edition of The New York Herald, Mr. Dunbar-Johnson said. It will also keep its sizable office in Hong Kong where the Asian edition is edited. Mr. Dunbar-Johnson said there also would be investments in other locations. Until the fall it will continue to be published as The International Herald Tribune.

"Everyone at The New York Times thinks fundamentally that for this to be successful, the paper needs to be edited and curated for an international sensibility,” Mr. Dunbar-Johnson said. "The core attributes of The International Herald Tribune will be retained and refined.”

Through a series of ownership changes, the paper became The New York Herald Tribune in 1959. In 1967, it became The International Herald Tribune when The Times and the Washington Post Company invested in the paper to keep it afloat after The New York Herald Tribune folded. In 1991, the Post and Times companies became co-owners of the paper, and in 2003 The Times bought out The Post’s share and became its sole owner in 2003.

The announcement is part of the company’s larger plan to focus on its core brand and build its international presence, the Times spokeswoman said. Last week, the Times Company said it was exploring offers to sell The Boston Globe and its other New England media properties. Last year, the company sold its stake in Indeed.com, a jobs search engine, and the About Group, the online resource company.

Washington Post Co. absorbs $45M loss in 4Q

The Washington Post Co. said Feb. 22 that it lost $45.4 million in the fourth quarter, as the company absorbed a variety of one-time charges to account for problems and cutbacks at its flagship newspaper and Kaplan education division.

The loss amounted to $6.57 per share. The results for the final three months of 2012 contrasted with a profit of $61.7 million, or $8.03 per share, in the same period a year earlier.

If not for the charges, the Post Co. said it would have earned $78.8 million, or $10.61 per share, from its ongoing operations in its most recent quarter, compared with $68.4 million, or $8.91 per share, in the same period a year earlier.

Revenue grew 1 percent to $1.05 billion.

The Washington Post newspaper, like other publications, has been beset with a decline in print advertising revenue. Until recently, the success of Kaplan's schools and test preparation services helped bolster the Post Co.'s overall results.

But Kaplan is no longer thriving. Tougher federal regulations forced the company to change its admissions standards. Kaplan is now required to ensure that students don't take on a lot of debt to attend the for-profit school unless there is a realistic chance they can graduate. The company has made it tougher for students to be admitted into its schools and revised its recruitment programs.

That has led to smaller enrollment. Kaplan's enrollment was 65,470 students at the end of last year, a decline of 12 percent, or nearly 9,100 students, from the previous year. Fourth-quarter revenue in the education division fell 6 percent from the previous year to $544 million. As a result, Kaplan is closing some campuses and jettisoning staff.

The downturn has diminished how much Kaplan's business is worth. To account for the erosion in value, the Post Co. booked a non-cash charge of $111.6 million before taxes in the fourth quarter. The company also took a $41.2 million charge for the costs of severance and early retirement payments to workers whose jobs were eliminated at Kaplan and the newspaper business. Another $18 million write-down was taken on one of the Post Co.'s investments, which the company didn't identify.

The company's newspaper publishing division eked out a fourth-quarter operating profit of $2.6 million, despite the continuing drop in advertising. It was $6.8 million a year earlier. Print advertising revenue at The Washington Post declined another 12 percent from the previous year to $67.5 million.

The newspaper division's digital ad revenue, including contributions from Slate.com, climbed 5 percent from the previous year to $33.1 million. The gains in digital revenue, however, haven't come close to making up for the deterioration in print advertising. For instance, digital revenue in the Post Co.'s newspaper division increased about $1.6 million from the previous year. The Washington Post's print advertising revenue decreased by $9.6 million over the same period.

The newspaper division also included The Herald in Everett, Wash., during the fourth quarter. The Post Co. announced plans to sell The Herald earlier this month.

Television helped shore up the Post Co. during the fourth quarter.

Cable-TV revenue rose 6 percent from the previous year to nearly $202 million. Revenue from broadcast-TV channels totaled $116 million, a 32 percent increase from the previous year. Much of the increase was from political advertising in a presidential election year.

Publisher leaves Elko Daily Free Press, Times-News

Nevada's Elko Daily Free Press and Idaho's Times-News in Twin Falls are looking for a new publisher.

After four years as publisher at both newspapers, John Pfeifer announced he's leaving to accept a job as vice president of sales and development for training for Community Publication Division of GateHouse Media Inc. based in Chicago.

The 55-year-old Pfeifer came to the Free Press as general manager in 2008, also serving as advertising director at the Times-News. In 2010 he was promoted to publisher of both Lee Enterprises newspapers.

A national search is now under way for a new publisher at both.

Covering Obama: Is this trip worth it?

By Paul Farhi
The Washington Post

No one ever said covering the most powerful man in the world would be cheap. But given how the White House has treated the traveling press lately, some journalists are wondering whether covering President Barack Obama on the road is worth the enormous investment.

News organizations whose reporters hitched a ride on Air Force One to cover President Obama's trip to Florida over the Presidents' Day weekend will pay about $3,500 for the three-day journey once all the bills — air and ground transportation, hotels and food — are counted up.

The money didn't buy much, however. The White House Correspondents' Association lodged a formal protest with White House officials last week after reporters were barred from seeing any part of Obama's activities, including a round of golf with Tiger Woods. Obama spoke with reporters on the trip home, but only on an off-the-record basis, meaning none of what he said could be reported.

With media outlets under increasing financial pressure, some question whether routine presidential trips provide much bang for the buck — or rather, millions of bucks, which is what it costs some news outlets to keep up with Obama throughout the year.

The steep cost of following the president here and there has led many news organizations to cut back their travel. Among those that have dropped regular reporting trips: Time magazine, whose former White House correspondent, Jay Carney, now serves as Obama's press secretary.

Some reporters suggest that traveling with the president has a limited upside, anyway. For one thing, many reporters don't get much more than a glimpse of the president during his trips. They have to rely on the same "pool" reports that journalists back home receive at the same time that they do. (Pool reports are dispatches to the press corps from reporters designated to attend events that can accommodate only a limited number.) Under strictly observed rules, only the wire services can break news ahead of the distribution of the pool report to everyone else. The wire services enjoy this privilege because they cover the president on every trip.

Even if something happened to Obama, "we wouldn't be able to report it for our own [outlets] until the pool report is sent out by the White House to the [full] White House press corps," grumbled one White House reporter, who asked not to be named because he was not authorized to speak on his employer's behalf.

— — —

The president's Florida sojourn was relatively inexpensive, as such trips go. The White House Office, which arranges reporters' travel, said last week that a charter flight to Newport News, Va., for a presidential speech on Tuesday would cost reporters between $1,300 and $4,300, depending on which carrier was selected and how many reporters signed up. Reporters voted for a second option for the 340-mile round trip — a chartered bus, costing about $60 per person.

A three-day trip in October by the president to California (for fundraising) and to Ohio (for a campaign speech) cost media organizations $33,022.86 for each person they sent, according to The Washington Post's billing records.

A presidential visit to Thailand, Burma and Cambodia in November may have been the most expensive yet. With multiple legs, lodging and food, news organizations wound up paying nearly $35,000 per head, according to The Post's records. Some reporters saved about half the cost of the trip by taking commercial flights to Thailand, boarding the official press plane only while traveling within Asia.

Only a handful of news organizations — typically, the major wire services, the TV networks and the New York Times and The Post — regularly send a reporter along with the president now. Others take what some wags call the Expedia Option (after the travel-booking Web site), picking their trips based on cost and perceived news value.

But knowing which might produce the most news is pure guesswork. "We just don't have a theory," says Ben Smith, editor of Buzzfeed, a Web site that assigned reporters to travel with the president during the campaign. "We are still figuring out which ones are worth it."

The Wall Street Journal's Washington bureau chief, Gerald Seib, said his paper decided not to send a reporter to cover Obama's golf vacation. "If a trip is designed to be non-newsworthy, with no prospect of access, we'll take a pass, " he said. But "when the president is doing the president's business, our inclination is to be there." Added Seib, "You do wonder at times, is this worth it?"

In fact, important news can break out at any time, even during nominal "down" times on the road for the president. In December 2009, while Obama was on vacation in Hawaii, a Nigerian man attempted to blow up a Detroit-bound jetliner with explosives concealed in his underwear. During another presidential vacation in August 2011, the uprising in Libya came to a head.

"All of these trips are important because you don't know what hasn't happened yet," said Cameron Barr, The Post's national editor. News organizations "have to balance the cost of not being with the president and missing something important."

Even when news doesn't happen, reporters can gain valuable insights about the president and his administration by traveling with him and his staff, said David Leonhardt, the New York Times' Washington bureau chief. "Yes, [these trips] are expensive," he added. "But we still think they're worth it."

By far, the most costly part of presidential press is airfare, particularly the special charter planes that reporters take. The charters are hired by the White House Office based on a competitive bid that is approved by members of the White House Correspondents' Association. Most of the eye-popping cost of the trip to Asia in November was for passage on Air Force One and the chartered press jet; The Post paid $31,717 for its seats on the two planes during that trip. (The White House Office charges the media the same for either plane).

Why so expensive? Among other reasons, the press charters carry relatively light loads (often 30 or 40 people compared with 150 for a commercial flight), according to a charter-company executive. The private jets also operate on irregular schedules and fly "dead legs" — that is, empty — en route to picking up passengers. In addition, press charters have more elaborate food and beverage offerings than commercial flights and greater security constraints than regularly scheduled planes, said the executive, who asked not to be named because his company is a contender for White House contracts.

Since the cost of the charter flight is split among all of the people on it, news organizations wind up paying more when others decide not to go. In other words, when others deem a trip too expensive, it gets more expensive for everyone else.

— — —

Although the White House Correspondents' Association didn't mention the cost of covering the president in its complaint last week after the Florida golf outing, Ed Henry, the group's president, said the issue has come up in the past. "It costs some of our [news] organizations millions of dollars a year to cover the president," said Henry, speaking as head of the WHCA, not in his role as Fox News's White House correspondent. "Would we like to find ways to make it more economical and efficient? Yes, we would."

During long trips abroad, for example, the correspondents association has asked the White House for more background briefings from Obama's top advisers and traveling staff members. "We think it's appropriate, given the huge sacrifice of traveling all around the world . . . to get a little something extra on the road," he said.

By the end of last week, Henry said the WHCA's complaint about access may have gotten some attention at the White House. In an unusual move, Obama took a question from the media during an Oval Office visit on Friday by Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe — a small sign of progress, according to Henry.

"The president decided to take a step, not a big step but a step, toward us," he said. "That's awesome."

INDUSTRY NEWS (2-22-13)

Mother Jones reporter wins Polk for Romney story

The reporter for Mother Jones magazine who broke the story of Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney's remarks that 47 percent of Americans "believe they are victims" is among the winners of the 64th annual George Polk Awards in Journalism.

David Corn, Mother Jones' Washington bureau chief, received the political reporting prize for his work, which shook up the campaign when he reported on the remarks in September.

The awards were announced Monday by Long Island University. Winners also include journalists from Bloomberg News, The New York Times, CBS News, McClatchy Newspapers, GlobalPost, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, the Maine Sunday Telegram, "Frontline," and the nonprofit California Watch.

Among the top prizes in U.S. journalism, the Polk Awards were created in 1949 in honor of CBS reporter George W. Polk, who was killed while covering the Greek civil war. This year's awards will be given out April 11.

Stories on China won David Barboza of The New York Times as well as the staff of Bloomberg News the award for foreign reporting. Barboza's three-part series looked into the financial assets of government officials and their families. Bloomberg News put together a series of stories looking at China's elites and their wealth.

China was also the subject for an award-winning television news report by CBS News correspondent Holly Williams and cameraman Andrew Portch. They covered Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng, who escaped from house arrest to the U.S. embassy in Beijing.

Coverage of Syria won awards for war reporting and video reporting. David Enders, Austin Tice and the staff of McClatchy Newspapers were awarded the war reporting prize for their coverage of the war and its factions. Tracey Shelton of GlobalPost was honored with the video reporting prize for her work showcasing the human impact of the conflict.

John Hechinger and Janet Lorin of Bloomberg News won the national reporting award for a yearlong series that looked at abuses in the system for financing higher education, while the local reporting award went to Gina Barton of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel for reporting on a Milwaukee man who died in police custody after repeatedly telling officers he couldn't breathe.

Law enforcement's use of young confidential informants became the subject of a piece by Sarah Stillman of The New Yorker, for which she won the magazine reporting prize.

A 10-month investigation into drug abuse and mismanagement at New Jersey's privatized halfway houses earned Sam Dolnick of The New York Times the award for justice reporting.

Ryan Gabrielson of California Watch won the state reporting prize for a series looking at how abuse at state clinics was poorly monitored and investigated by the state office responsible for doing so.

The Washington Post's Peter Whoriskey won the medical reporting award for a series about the practices of the pharmaceutical industry that can be dangerous to patients.

David Barstow of The New York Times, working with Mexican reporter Alejandra Xanic von Bertrab, traveled across Mexico to look at Wal-Mart's activities and the lengths to which the company's executives would go to get their goals accomplished. The duo won the business reporting award.

The education reporting award went to Colin Woodard of the Maine Sunday Telegram for reporting how for-profit online education companies are affecting the state's digital education efforts.

"Frontline" producers Martin Smith and Michael Kirk won the prize for documentary television reporting for a piece looking at the global economic crisis.

Records spotlight double life of Legion of Christ founder

Newly unsealed documents in a lawsuit brought against the Roman Catholic order Legion of Christ show the group's former second-in-command testified he discovered the order's founder, the late Rev. Marcial Maciel, had fathered a daughter in 2006, but never confronted him about his double life and didn't share the news with the group's broader membership.

The documents, previously sealed in a lawsuit in Rhode Island, include thousands of pages of testimony from high-ranking leaders at the Legion, its members, and relatives of Rhode Island widow Gabrielle Mee, who bequeathed $60 million to the Legion before her death at age 96 in 2008.

The Legion, founded by Maciel decades ago in Mexico City, was taken over by the Vatican in 2010 after a church investigation determined that Maciel had sexually molested seminarians and fathered three children by two women.

The scandal, which tarnished the legacy of Pope John Paul II, has been cited as an especially egregious example of how the Vatican ignored decades of reports about sexually abusive priests because church leaders put the interests of the institution above those of the victims.

The documents released Friday, at the request of The Associated Press and other news organizations, include the first-ever depositions made available of high-ranking Legion officials, including the Rev. Luis Garza, the Legion's former No. 2.

In a deposition December 2011, Garza says he became suspicious while visiting Maciel in 2006 at a Jacksonville, Fla., hotel about two women he saw there. He later learned they were Maciel's daughter and her mother, a fact he confirmed with both women.

Garza said he obtained the daughter's birth certificate as proof — listing the father as "Jose Rivas." Later, it was revealed that Maciel used the "Jose Rivas" pseudonym with his other hidden family, a Mexican woman with whom he had two sons.

Yet Garza said he never asked Maciel about his daughter or discussed it with him, and he didn't think it was necessary to share the news with the Legion's membership or its lay movement, Regnum Christi. He said he only told the Legion's superior and two other priests.

"I didn't think at the time that the fact that fathering a child would change in any way the way we needed to behave vis-a-vis Father Maciel or the actions that we needed to do," Garza said in the deposition. "Because we needed to comply with indications of the Holy See and also because there was an issue of privacy and respect for the mother and the daughter."

The Legion didn't acknowledge Maciel's children or the sexual abuse allegations against him until February 2009, about a year after he died.

Mee's niece, Mary Lou Dauray, filed the Rhode Island lawsuit after her aunt died, saying Mee was defrauded by an order whose leaders orchestrated an effort to hide its founder's misdeeds from her aunt. A Superior Court judge ruled in September that Dauray did not have standing to sue.

But the judge noted that the documents filed under seal raised a red flag. He referred to the Legion's top officials as "clandestinely dubious religious leaders," and said there was evidence that Mee had been unduly persuaded to change her trusts and will.

Bernard Jackvony, the lawyer for Mee's niece, said taken as a whole, the depositions expose how the Legion knew by 2004 that the Vatican was investigating Maciel for sexual abuse and by 2006 that he had a daughter yet kept the information private. He argued that Mee never would have given the Legion her money had she known of Maciel's true nature.

"In terms of fraud, when you withhold information from people, that's the same as if you said something to them that's not true," he said.

The Legion said Friday it didn't exert undue influence over Mee's decision-making and she made her gifts of her own will.

"Our actions with regard to Mrs. Mee and her estate were appropriate and honorable," Legion spokesman Jim Fair said. "We were respectful and diligent in carrying out her wishes in the handling of resources provided to the Legion."

Among other documents released Friday was 2001 testimony from Mee in a separate lawsuit, showing her complete trust in the Legion.

"I know they needed money and what their dealings were, and I have complete confidence and trust. I know it's all above board. It's all very honest," she said. "I know no details and I don't ask."

The documents in Dauray's lawsuit were kept under seal until the AP, The New York Times, the National Catholic Reporter and The Providence Journal intervened, arguing that the documents were in the public interest. The Legion argued that media coverage of the documents could taint prospective jurors if there was a trial.

Provo newspaper lays off executive editor

The Daily Herald of Provo, Utah, laid off its executive editor a week after letting nine other employees go.

Executive Editor Randy Wright told The Associated Press he was laid off last week for cost-cutting reasons.

The 58-year-old Wright was executive editor for 11 years. He has worked for nine other newspapers, joining the Daily Herald in his hometown of Provo after a stint as assistant managing editor at the Arizona Daily Star of Tucson.

Davenport, Iowa-based Lee Enterprises, which owns the Daily Herald, says the paper has a daily circulation of 24,000. Messages left for corporate officials weren't returned Friday.

The Daily Herald laid off nine employees in news, finance and advertising departments on Feb. 6. It ran a story about those layoffs, but hasn't reported on Wright's layoff.

Arizona House panel OKs bills on newspaper public notices

A divided Arizona House committee last week gave initial approval to a pair of bills that change the way public notices are required to be published, pushing the bills forward despite strong opposition from the newspaper industry.

One bill would allow cities and towns to post their public notices online instead of paying for publication in local newspapers, something the League of Cities and Towns estimates costs nearly $2 million a year. The other changes the basic definition of publication to encompass non-print forms, including the Internet. Sponsor Rep. David Stevens, R-Sierra Vista, said that won't immediately change the rules requiring newspaper publication for many other types of notices, but it sets the stage for it.

A computer technology expert, Stevens said newspapers are steadily losing circulation and allowing Internet postings should allow a greater reach for the notices, which include everything from requests for bids to foreclosures notices.

Newspaper industry representatives who testified at the House Technology and Infrastructure Committee hearing argued that having an outside entity like a newspaper publish notices puts a check on government, because otherwise important notices could be hidden on an obscure website or difficult to find.

"You cannot trust the fox to guard the henhouse on this," said Jonathan Paton, a former state senator who now represents Wick Communications, publisher of several papers in southern Arizona.

Other publishers, like Tom Arviso Jr. of the Navajo Times, said many people in rural areas don't have computers or Internet access and rely on the paper to get all their news, including legal notices.

But he and others acknowledged they would be badly hurt by the revenue loss. Manuel Coppola, publisher of the Nogales International, said it amounts to 25 percent of the paper's revenue and staff cuts would likely be needed if that were lost.

Rep. David Gowan, R-Sierra Vista, challenged Paton on the costs to papers.

"If we're talking revenue loss, let's not beat around the bush," he said. "Let's talk about why should we be subsidizing a print entity when we have this other stuff," like the Internet.

But Democratic Rep. Lisa Otondo, of Yuma, pushed back, saying the local newspaper is essential to her region and she would not vote for a bill that damaged it so badly.

Both bills now go to the full House after a routine legal review. Similar bills in recent years have repeatedly failed to win passage.

LSU rebuffs public records request from newspaper

Lousiana State University will continue to keep secret the names and qualifications of candidates in the running to become the university's next president after rejecting a public records request from The Advocate of Baton Rouge.

The Advocate (http://bit.ly/12MQrr4) formally requested access last week to the applications, background materials and other information related to LSU's search for a new university system president.

The records request cited a section of Louisiana law requiring that "each applicant for public position of authority" be made "available for public inspection."

Members of LSU's Presidential Search Committee said earlier this month they were considering about 30 candidates for the position. While addressing the committee, consultant Bill Funk pointed to a collection of documents in front of him, presumably containing the names and qualifications of the candidates.

Funk and the committee, however, did not discuss the candidates publicly, opting instead to move into a closed-door session lasting roughly an hour.

In a written response to The Advocate's public records request, LSU System Lead Counsel Shelby McKenzie said none of those candidates has submitted written applications directly to LSU.

Instead, McKenzie said, all application materials are being handled by Dallas-based R. William Funk and Associates, through the firm's contract with the private LSU Foundation, and therefore, are not subject to state public records laws.

"That company maintains proprietary information on persons holding high academic and other positions who might become candidates for a top university position ..." McKenzie wrote. "The LSU Board of Supervisors has not been given possession of any documents from William Funk and Associates that are responsive to your request."

Funk, the head of the firm, has said he won't talk to reporters during the search expected to last until June.

LSU's decision to conduct a secretive search isn't unprecedented. The university has a history of secretly meeting with candidates in remote locations and airports during past searches for former administrators, including LSU Chancellors Sean O'Keefe and Michael Martin and former System President John Lombardi.

At Ohio Newspaper Association convention, Kasich explains decision to tax newspapers

The Toledo Blade reported Ohio Gov. John Kasich walked into the midst of one of those "special interests” last week he expects will fight his sales tax expansion plan as he explained his decision to tax newspapers -- to newspapers.

"You know we already tax a bunch of services already...,” he told a convention of the Ohio Newspaper Association. "You know why the legislature taxed them? To fill a budget hole... All of these services are going to get taxed. It's just a matter of whether they're going to be taxed by somebody pushing for a tax increase in Ohio or somebody who's trying to figure out how to lower the taxes that lead the most to our economic growth,”

Mr. Kasich’s $63.3 billion, two-year budget proposal now before lawmakers proposes a broad expansion of the sales tax base and higher taxes on shale oil and gas drilling to help underwrite income tax cuts for individuals and small businesses.

After factoring in a half-penny cut in the state sales tax rate to 5 cents on the dollar, the expanded base expansion is still expected to clear about $3.1 billion more for the state over the next two years. Kasich, however, promises that the net effect of his entire tax reform will be a $1.4 billion tax cut over three years.

Sales of advertising in print, on billboards, and on radio and television would now be taxed while national broadcast ads would remain exempt. The plan would tax magazine subscriptions but not newspapers, and the base would now include advertising agency fees.

"This is really a nightmare for the industry and for a lot of local merchants,” said Dennis Hetzel, the association's executive director. "An advertising tax is a bad idea. It’s been tried in larger states…The way they are proposing it, it would give tremendously unfair advantages. It would tax TV and radio advertising but when it comes to Internet advertising, it would be a voluntary tax when people do their income tax returns.”

Few states tax newspaper advertising. Florida tried it in the mid-1980s. The tax was gone after about six months after national advertising organizations canceled conventions in the tourism-dependent state.

"There were economic arguments to demonstrate why it didn’t make sense,” said Dean Ridings, president and chief executive officer of the Florida Press Association. "Sure, we had that (argument that newspapers were seeking special treatment), but our organization didn’t take the lead in opposing it…Broadcasters came out very strong (against it).”

And this was before the dawn of the Internet and the continuing struggle for states to force the Amazons of cyberspace to collect and remit sales taxes on goods sold to Ohioans. The state has largely relied on the inefficient method of convincing consumers to track their untaxed online purchases and voluntarily remit the taxes when they file their annual income tax returns.

"We have a bill in the legislature,” Kasich said. "All the special interests will go down there. Maybe they'll win. Wouldn't that be a great outcome, huh? Special interests win again. One of the things we have to realize in this state is if all we think about is ourselves, we're not going to do better.”

Hetzel said he understands what Kasich is trying to do conceptually.

"But taxing advertising is a bad idea,” he said. "It’s not going to work. It’s terribly damaging not only to local newspapers but to a lot of local merchants.”

Kasich said his plan can still be "tweaked."

"Nothing is in concrete, but at the end of the day, if we fail, I'm not failing," he said. "We're just going to fail to move the state of Ohio in a more aggressive way in terms of jobs.”

INDUSTRY NEWS 2-14-2013

Myanmar denies hacking journalist email accounts

Myanmar's government denied this week that it was behind a possible attempt to hack into the email accounts of journalists working for foreign and local media who Google warned might have been the targets of "state-sponsored attackers."

At least 12 reporters, including a Yangon-based correspondent for The Associated Press, received messages from Google last week when they tried to access their Gmail accounts. The messages said hackers "may be attempting to compromise your account or your computer."

A spokesman for Google, Taj Meadows, confirmed the company issues such warnings to protect users. But he said he could not disclose how Google knows the activity is "state-sponsored" without giving away information that would help attackers avoid detection.

Meadows said users in other countries have also received similar warnings since the company began issuing them in June, but he declined to specify which ones or say which state was behind the recent alleged hacking attempts.

Myanmar presidential spokesman Ye Htut called on Google to identify those responsible "because the vague reference to state-sponsored attackers hurts the image of the government."

"There is no state-sponsored attack on individual accounts," said Ye Htut, who is also the nation's deputy information minister. "That's not a policy of our government."

Ye Htut said he also received one of hacking warnings on his own Gmail account on Monday, about one week after most of the Myanmar journalists received theirs. He posted a screen photo on his Facebook page to back up the claim.

Google's warnings spooked journalists in Myanmar, and raised concerns about the status of newfound press freedoms in a country that until recently was considered one of the most censored in the world. For decades, journalists in Myanmar were subjected to routine state surveillance, telephone taps and censorship so intense that independent newspapers could not even publish on a daily basis.

Many of those restrictions were eased drastically after President Thein Sein's administration took power two years ago. Over the last year, his government has significantly relaxed media controls, abolishing an official policy of censorship and allowing reporters to print material that would have been unthinkable during the previous era of absolute military rule, such as photographs of opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

However, reporters complain that the harsh laws which enabled the government to jail them remain on the books, and old misgivings linger. Some local journalists keep separate email accounts for dealing with the government, for fear their sources may be compromised.

The reporters who received the recent hacking warnings from Google include Burmese correspondents for Agence France-Presse, Reuters and Kyodo News. Journalists working for Yangon-based The Voice Weekly and the Eleven Media Group also received the warnings, as did Thailand-based author Bertil Lintner, who has written extensively on Myanmar.

Author and government adviser Thant Myint-U said on his Facebook page that he had received the same message last week.

"It's difficult to pinpoint which group has done that, but it is very obvious that those who did that do not appreciate freedom of expression and the democratic reform process in the country," said Wai Phyo, chief editor at Eleven Media's Weekly Eleven news journal. "We can only assume that some of them could be from the military."

The Gmail warnings have prompted speculation that the hacking attempt could be related to critical recent coverage of fighting in northern Kachin state, where government forces have launched aggressive artillery attacks against ethnic rebels. The government has complained publicly that coverage of the conflict has been one-sided.

"Targeting the media for not reporting what they like is not a good sign," said Kyaw Min Swe, chief editor of The Voice Weekly. "Our security concerns are high and every journalist must be alert to this."

Myanmar has seen a rash of hacking attempts recently. The Voice Weekly's Facebook page has been disabled by a hacker since Feb. 4, and the website and Facebook page of Eleven Media were also hacked, journalists at those organizations said.

But the apparent cyberwar has gone both ways. The website of the president's office was shut down briefly last week by hackers, and Ye Htut said the attack was traced to an Asian country, though it remains unclear who was responsible.

Last month, both The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal reported that their computer systems had been infiltrated by China-based hackers. In both cases they said the focus was on monitoring news coverage and the reporters digging into stories the Chinese government deemed important.

Media organizations with bureaus in China have believed for years that their computers, phones and conversations were likely monitored on a fairly regular basis by the Chinese. The Gmail account of an Associated Press staffer was broken into in China in 2010.

Kentucky Newspaper wins fight for jail report

A newspaper in Glasgow, Ky., has won its fight for records of a jail investigation.

The Glasgow Daily Times (http://bit.ly/WVkSnX) reports that an agreed order of dismissal was filed last week in Barren Circuit Court in a case that began when the newspaper filed an open records request with Barren Fiscal Court almost nine months ago.

The court order states the county must hand over an unredacted copy of the report immediately. The report was produced by a private investigator for the Fiscal Court at a cost of $3,500.

County officials said they originally denied the request because they didn't have physical possession of the report, but the newspaper argued officials intentionally voted not to take possession so the report wouldn't be public record.

Wabash, Ind., Plain Dealer gets new publisher

The Wabash (Ind.) Plain Dealer is under the leadership of a new publisher. Andy Eads, current publisher of the Huntington Herald-Press, will replace Linda Kelsay as publisher of the Plain Dealer. Eads will oversee both the Plain Dealer and Herald-Press. Eads has been publisher of the Herald-Press for the past four and a half years. He has been employed by Paxton Media Group, which owns the Plain Dealer and Herald-Press, for 12 years. He spent seven of those years as a sales representative and advertising director for the Plain Dealer. "I’ve been heavily involved in both communities and look forward to becoming more involved in the future,” Eads said. He and his wife, Amy, have two sons, Austin and Aden. David Holgate, Paxton Media Group’s Indiana Michigan group president, said that he is pleased to announce Eads as the Plain Dealer’s new publisher. "As a previous employee of the (Plain Dealer), Andy brings unique perspective that will be beneficial to employees and the community. I am excited for Andy and the community,” Holgate said. Kelsay will become publisher of the Marion Chronicle-Tribune, replacing Neal Ronquist. "It was a delight to work in the Wabash community and I thank everyone for their support,” she said.

Police probe attacks involving newspaper editor

State police are trying to figure out why someone smashed a brick through the window of a small-town, south Georgia newspaper editor's home, then fired gunshots into the house and tried to light his vehicle on fire.

There's been an outpouring of support for Ben Baker, editor of the Wiregrass Farmer in Ashburn, but the reasons behind the attacks remain a mystery.

"People are coming up to me telling me they're praying for me and the family," Baker said Friday. "People have contributed to the reward fund, and I've had people say ... they'll come sit in my yard with a shotgun."

Baker hasn't taken anyone up on that offer, but says he's deeply appreciative of the support from residents in Ashburn, a city of roughly 4,200 people, about 160 miles south of Atlanta. His 2,100-circulation Wiregrass Farmer prints the kind of pictures people put up on their refrigerators: photos of schoolchildren, athletic teams and civic groups.

After Baker's kitchen window was shattered in the pre-dawn hours of Jan. 30, police found that someone had also poured gasoline into one of his vehicles in an attempt to set it on fire.

About 13 or 14 hours later, someone fired a gun into the home while Baker and his family were inside, Ashburn police said.

"I wouldn't wish this on anybody," Baker said.

The case has now been turned over to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, Ashburn Police Chief Joe Saxon told The Associated Press last week.

Now, a reward of more than $500 is being offered in hopes of breaking the case.

Newspapers can sometimes provoke intense reactions.

In December, a suburban New York newspaper fueled outrage nationwide when it posted an online database of gun-permit holders in its circulation area. The Journal-News, which serves the Lower Hudson Valley, posted armed guards at its offices after threats were made against reporters and editors.

However, Baker's Wiregrass Farmer hasn't covered anything approaching that level of controversy.

Some residents do have strong feelings about a local sales tax issue and have written letters to the editor to express them.

This week's issue featured a front-page photo of a firefighter using a firehouse to knock down suds in a fountain at a local park after someone added detergent to it as a prank. There was also coverage of annual awards for local firefighters and conservationists — fairly typical items for the weekly.

Despite the lack of any obvious story that might have enraged readers, items such as arrest reports sometimes do anger people.

"In the business we're in, we make people mad — that's just simply a given," Baker said.

"Nobody likes to see their name in the arrest reports," he said. "We get a lot of people who say 'Can you keep my name out of the paper?' and I say no and they get mad."

The names stay in the arrest reports, Baker said, because "people have to trust the media to present the whole story, the full story and the accurate story.

"In that regard those of us who work on small weekly papers enjoy a level of trust in our community that is unsurpassed, and they look to me to tell them the truth," he said.

Baker said he isn't sure whether someone has a particular beef with him personally, or the newspaper generally.

It could be both — after all, he's the public face of the publication around town.

"When you deal with newspapers, especially weekly newspapers across the nation, the editor is the newspaper," he said. "Whatever goes into the paper, whatever is done at the paper, whatever happens, people say 'The editor did it.' Like it or not, I am this newspaper."

Baker said he has no plans to change the newspaper's coverage as a result of the crimes.

"We do not shy from controversy," he said.

Suspect charged with stealing sheriff's newspaper

Sheriff's deputies in Cedar Rapids didn't have to go far to arrest a man charged with stealing the newspaper outside their office.

Linn County Sheriff Brian Gardner said his deputies arrested 50-year-old David Dillon after he was seen last Friday stealing the Gazette newspaper from the steps of the office. Gardner sent a press release to announce his office had solved the - quote - "paper caper."

Gardner says Dillon was seen on security camera stealing the office's newspaper Wednesday and Thursday. He says deputies waited for Dillon and caught him in the act Friday.

Gardner says Dillon told deputies that he took the papers because he simply wanted to read them.

Dillon is charged with fifth-degree theft and possession of drug paraphernalia. A number for him isn't listed.

New deal at Philly newspapers includes wage cut

A new labor contract for journalists at Philadelphia's two main newspapers includes a wage cut as well as assurances that the papers will continue to be published for at least two years.

Members of the Newspaper Guild ratified the two-year deal last week with the 2.5 percent wage cut.

Owners of The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia Daily News and Philly.com now have new pacts with all 11 unions.

According to union leaders, Interstate General Media said last month that the struggling company would have to liquidate or sell assets unless it got concessions from each unit.

A statement from the owners says the new contracts "will stabilize the company and create a platform for future growth."

The guild deal also states there will be no layoffs in the first year.

Newspaper, FBI report agreement in Withers FOI case

A Tennessee newspaper and the federal government said they have agreed in principle to settle the paper's lawsuit seeking documents about civil rights-era photographer Ernest Withers' work as an informant for the FBI.

In a court filing last week, The Commercial Appeal of Memphis and the FBI said they were in the process of finalizing and executing a settlement agreement. To allow time to do so, they asked the court to suspend deadlines in the case until March 8. No details of the settlement were included in the filing.

U.S. District Amy Berman Jackson granted the request.

In 2010, The Commercial Appeal's publisher, Memphis Publishing Co., and one of its reporters, Marc Perrusquia, filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against the FBI. Last year, under a court order, the FBI released 348 pages that were heavily redacted in places. In a court filing, the paper called the release insufficient.

"The Commercial Appeal and Marc are pleased with the agreement we have tentatively reached with the FBI," Charles D. Tobin, a lawyer for Memphis Publishing Co. and Perrusquia, said in an email Thursday. "The process underscores the public's right to know more about this troubling time in our government's history. We have no comment on the details of the settlement until the agreement is signed."

About a year ago, the judge in the case said that documents confirmed that Withers, who died at 85 in 2007, secretly served as an informer for the FBI. Withers was known as "the civil rights photographer" for iconic images of the late Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and others protesting for racial equality in the South.

In 2010, The Commercial Appeal reported that Withers was an informant who regularly tipped off authorities about civil rights leaders, many of whom trusted him so completely that he was allowed to sit in on their most sensitive meetings.

Withers' photographs had chronicled the seminal Emmett Till murder trial in 1955, racial integration at the University of Mississippi in 1962 and the 1968 sanitation workers' strike in Memphis that brought King to the city where he was assassinated. Withers marched with King and was beaten by police while covering civil rights leader Medgar Evers' 1963 funeral.

Arkansas committee advances bill on gun list

The names of about 130,000 Arkansas residents permitted to carry a concealed handgun would be kept secret under a proposal endorsed by a Senate committee this week, over the objections of media organizations that say the information should remain public.

The measure is among several aimed at loosening gun laws that are expected to win legislative approval after Republicans won control of the House and Senate in last year's election. The push for looser gun laws in Arkansas comes as Congress is considering tighter gun control laws in the wake of a school shooting in Connecticut last year.

The Senate State Agencies and Governmental Affairs Committee endorsed by a voice vote legislation that would exempt the concealed carry information from the state's Freedom of Information Act. Current law allows the names and ZIP codes of permit holders to be released.

Sen. Bruce Holland, R-Greenwood, said he proposed making the list secret after a constituent said he was worried by a New York newspaper's decision to publish the names and addresses of concealed carry permit holders in the wake of last year's Connecticut school shooting.

"I'm very sensitive to the Freedom of Information Act and believe it should be protected, but this is more of a privacy issue," Holland said.

News organizations, however, argued that the move would go against a compromise struck with the Legislature in 2009 after lawmakers then proposed making the list secret. The current law was the result of that compromise.

"This bill would eliminate a balance between personal privacy and open government," said Dennis Byrd, executive editor of Stephens Media's Central Arkansas newspapers.

Byrd and David Bailey, managing editor of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, said they weren't interested in publishing the entire list of Arkansas residents allowed to have concealed handguns but said the public has an interest in accessing the information.

Bailey said his newspaper can use the list to "spot check" and cross-reference it with other lists, such as convicted felons.

Two concealed carry permit holders told the panel they worried that keeping the list public would jeopardize their safety.

"If I have to protect myself, I would certainly not want somebody coming into my house expecting a gun," said Scotty Keller, a retiree from Faulkner County who said she recently received her concealed carry permit. "I want to be the person with a surprise, not him."

Sen. David Johnson, the only lawmaker on the panel who could be heard voting against the measure, said he believed the public has a right to know who has concealed weapons. Republicans hold 5 of the 8 seats on the panel.

"Homeowners and citizens of the state have an interest in knowing who of their neighbors may possess concealed weapons and the press has a legitimate interest in it too, I believe," Johnson, D-Little Rock, told reporters after the vote. "I think Arkansas so far has been very responsible in the use and access of the list."

A spokesman for Democratic Gov. Mike Beebe, who signed into law the 2009 compromise legislation, said the governor opposed Holland's bill but declined to say whether he'd veto the legislation if it reached his desk.

It only takes a simple majority to override a governor's veto in Arkansas. Republicans hold 51 of the 100 House seats and 21 of the 35 Senate seats.

"Governor Beebe feels that a good compromise was reached in 2009 that protected the privacy of permit holders while preserving the State's FOI act," Beebe spokesman Matt DeCample said. "Setting aside that compromise now would deteriorate the FOIA, and the governor opposes the bill."

Beebe earlier said he opposed new restrictions to the FOI in general.

"I've never been for FOI restrictions, never been for them," Beebe said.

The Senate also gave approval this week by a 34-1 vote to a measure that would allow concealed handguns in churches and other places of worship if the institutions OK it, agreeing to an amendment that added sponsors to the legislation.

Beebe has said he plans to sign that measure into law, but wants to work with legislators to develop another bill to address concerns that insurers could raise the premiums of churches that opt to allow concealed handguns.

Other measures pending in the Legislature include a proposal to allow faculty and staff at colleges and universities to carry concealed handguns. A House panel is expected to consider that measure as well.

INDUSTRY NEWS 2-7-2013

Gannett posts lower 4Q net income

Gannett Co. reported a 12 percent decline in its fourth-quarter net income Feb. 4, largely because of restructuring expenses and a tax benefit that boosted the previous year's results. But revenue increased 9 percent thanks to robust political advertising, increasing digital subscriptions and an extra week in the quarter.

The media company said it earned $103.1 million, or 44 cents per share, in the October-December period. That was down from $116.9 million, or 49 cents per share, a year earlier.

Revenue grew to $1.52 billion from $1.39 billion.

Adjusted earnings were $207.3 million, or 89 cents per share, in the latest quarter. The figures exclude one-time charges related to the elimination of jobs, a consolidation of facilities and other items. A year ago, Gannett's adjusted earnings were 72 cents per share.

Analysts, on average, were expecting earnings of 88 cents per share on revenue of $1.5 billion, according to a poll by FactSet.

Gannett, based in McLean, Virginia, owns USA Today and 81 other newspapers, 23 television stations and several digital businesses.

Company-wide digital revenue increased 29 percent and accounted for a quarter of all revenue, Gannett said.

Gannett began charging newspaper readers for online access last year, erecting so-called paywalls at most of its newspapers. At the same time, the company raised prices of single-copy newspapers and print subscriptions.

Gannett also bundled digital access with print subscriptions, hoping to entice new subscribers who might offset revenue lost from people who canceled because of price hikes.

The company said the "all access" subscription model helped increase circulation revenue in its newspaper publishing division.

Gannett said the division had revenue of $1.04 billion, up 4 percent from $1 billion last year. Circulation revenue grew 17 percent to $313 .1 million from $268.1 million. Advertising revenue fell 2 percent to $657.5 million from $670.7 million.

Broadcasting revenue soared 44 percent to $287.5 million from $199.8 million, helped by political advertising.

Gannett warned that its TV advertising revenue will be hurt this quarter by the absence of political ads and the Super Bowl's move from NBC to CBS.

Gannett's stock fell $1.10, or 5.5 percent, to $18.74 in afternoon trading. The stock has traded in a 52-week range of $12.17 and $20.61.

Ronquist named publisher of Traverse City paper

Neal Ronquist has been named publisher of the Traverse City (Mich.) Record-Eagle.

His appointment was announced Henry Bird, a senior vice president of Community Newspaper Holdings Inc., which owns the Record-Eagle. Ronquist succeeds Al Frattura, who resigned in May.

Ronquist has worked in the newspaper industry for 22 years and most recently was group publisher of five daily papers in central Indiana, including the Chronicle-Tribune in Marion.

The Minnesota native also has served as publisher of the Russellville, Ark., Courier and the Austin, Minn., Daily Herald.

Maine governor takes aim at state’s newspapers

Maine Gov. Paul LePage says he's not a fan of the state's newspapers.

LePage on Friday read a book to about 100 students at the St. John Catholic School in Winslow as part of the 2013 Catholic Schools Week celebration.

During a question-and-answer period afterward, he told students that his best accomplishment as governor is yet to come — improving Maine's public school system. He also said his greatest fear as governor is Maine's newspapers.

LePage later told the Morning Sentinel (http://bit.ly/YrAGB0) that he thinks the newspapers lack objectivity and aren't fair and balanced.

He went on to say he doesn't feel the same way about radio and TV, saying they don't "spin" the news.

W. Mich. newspaper dropping Saturday edition

The Holland Sentinel in western Michigan is dropping its Saturday print edition in March.

The newspaper says it will expand its Friday edition and continue to post breaking news and sports on its website,www.hollandsentinel.com.

Publisher Pete Esser says the Sentinel is "absolutely" committed to a print newspaper. But he says there have been significant changes in how and where people get their news.

The last Saturday print edition will be Feb. 23. Holland is near Lake Michigan, 30 miles southwest of Grand Rapids.

The Sentinel is owned by GateHouse Media, based in Fairport, N.Y.

Man gets prison for upstate NY newspaper attack

A 22-year-old man shot by a police officer at the offices of a Schenectady newspaper has been sentenced to 2 1/2 years in prison for charging at officers with a knife.

The Daily Gazette of Schenectady reports (http://bit.ly/YpqdpB) that Elvis Norwood was sentenced last week in Schenectady County Court, where he'd pleaded guilty in November to a felony count of menacing a police officer.

Authorities say Norwood was armed with a kitchen knife and apparently off his medications for paranoid schizophrenia when he was shot several times by one of the two Schenectady police officers he charged inside the Daily Gazette's lobby in October 2011.

Norwood apologized for the attack. A judge said she took his mental illness into account while not imposing a harsher sentence.

Times-Dispatch’s owner buys N.C. newspaper

The company that last year acquired the Richmond Times-Dispatch and 62 other Southeastern publications has added North Carolina’s third-largest daily to its growing chain.

BH Media Group, a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Inc., announced last week that it has acquired the Greensboro News & Record from Norfolk-based Landmark Media Enterprises for an undisclosed sum.

The News & Record, which has a history dating to 1890, circulates about 58,000 copies daily and 86,000 on Sundays.

"We’re delighted to have the Greensboro News & Record join our growing family of newspapers,” Terry Kroeger, CEO of the BH Media Group, said in a statement. "The News & Record is a great fit with our newspapers in North Carolina.”

Berkshire Hathaway is a Fortune 500 company managed by billionaire investor Warren Buffett, who has said in interviews that he believes in the future of newspapers in cities and towns with a strong sense of community.

Berkshire Hathaway has acquired two other newspapers since June, when the company bought The Times-Dispatch and 62 other publications from Richmond-based Media General Inc. for $142 million. Berkshire Hathaway closed one of those newspapers — the Manassas News & Messenger — at the end of 2012 because it could not find a way to make the newspaper profitable.

The deal in June included the Winston-Salem Journal, another daily that serves North Carolina’s Triad region and is about 30 miles from Greensboro.

Landmark has owned the News & Record since 1965. The company also owns The Virginian-Pilot, the Roanoke Times and Style Weekly in Richmond.

Landmark started exploring a sale of its newspaper properties in 2008, then delayed those plans because of the recession. However, the company did complete a deal to sell The Weather Channel for a reported $3.5 billion to NBC Universal and two private-equity firms.

The News & Record reported that it has about 265 employees. Employees were informed of the sale Thursday in a meeting with Frank Batten Jr., chairman and chief executive of Landmark and son of the company’s late founder.

"While we will miss the many talented and dedicated employees of the News & Record, we are pleased they will be joining a company such as BH Media that is committed to the future of newspapers,” Michael Abernathy, president of Landmark Media Enterprises’ publishing division, said in a prepared statement.

Washington Post says it may sell its headquarters

The Washington Post is considering selling its 63-year-old downtown headquarters.

The Post (http://tinyurl.com/bcqlade) reports that Publisher Katharine Weymouth made the announcement in an email to staff. She says the company's goal is to find "a more modern, bright, open and efficient building."

Weymouth says The Post isn't tied to the location at 15th and L streets, Northwest, because its printing presses have not been located there for more than a decade.

The District of Columbia government assesses The Post's properties at nearly $80 million. Weymouth's memo says the company has not yet decided on where or when it might move.

Some other major metropolitan newspapers have moved out of or leased their buildings, driven by industry struggles and the value of urban real estate.

NY newspaper Newsday reports web site hacked

A spokeswoman reports that the Newsday.com and News12.com websites were hacked but now are again fully operational.

Cablevision spokeswoman Kelly McAndrew declined to say how long the sites were affected. She said the problems had been resolved.

Cablevision Systems Corp. owns both Newsday and News12.

Newsday (http://bit.ly/WDToWC) reported an unauthorized third party illegally accessed its content management system. McAndrew says that led certain web browsers to post a temporary warning page.

The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal both reported that their computer systems had been hacked by the Chinese because of coverage of that country.

The Newsday report last week did not indicate its situation was related to the Chinese hackers.

Wall Street Journal infiltrated by Chinese hackers

The Wall Street Journal says its computer systems have been infiltrated by Chinese hackers who were trying to monitor the newspaper's coverage of China.

A spokeswoman for Dow Jones & Co., the newspaper's publisher, says the Journal completed a network overhaul to bolster security last week..

The New York Times reported last week that Chinese hackers repeatedly penetrated its computer systems and stole reporters' passwords. The Times said the hackers were hunting for files on an investigation into wealth amassed by the family of a top Chinese leader.

The Journal didn't address how the hacking of its systems occurred, but it said it has faced such threats from China in recent years. It says the hacking was not an attempt to "gain commercial advantage or to misappropriate customer information."

NY Times says Chinese hacked paper's computers

Chinese hackers repeatedly penetrated The New York Times' computer systems over the past four months, stealing reporters' passwords and hunting for files on an investigation into the wealth amassed by the family of a top Chinese leader, the newspaper reported last week.

Security experts hired to investigate and plug the breach found that the attacks used tactics similar to ones used in previous hacking incidents traced to China, the report said. It said the hackers routed the attacks through computers at U.S. universities, installed a strain of malicious software, or malware, associated with Chinese hackers and initiated the attacks from Chinese university computers previously used by the Chinese military to attack U.S. military contractors.

The attacks, which began in mid-September, coincided with a Times investigation into how the relatives and family of Premier Wen Jiabao built a fortune worth over $2 billion. The report, which was posted online Oct. 25, embarrassed the Communist Party leadership, coming ahead of a fraught transition to new leaders and exposing deep-seated favoritism at a time when many Chinese are upset about a wealth gap.

Over the months of cyber-incursions, the hackers eventually lifted the computer passwords of all Times employees and used them to get into the personal computers of 53 employees.

The report said none of the Times' customer data was compromised and that information about the investigation into the Wen family remained protected, though it left unclear what data or communications the infiltrators accessed.

"Computer security experts found no evidence that sensitive emails or files from the reporting of our articles about the Wen family were accessed, downloaded or copied," the report quoted executive editor Jill Abramson as saying. A Times spokeswoman declined to comment further.

The Chinese foreign and defense ministries called the Times' allegations baseless, and the Defense Ministry denied any involvement by the military.

"Chinese law forbids hacking and any other actions that damage Internet security," the Defense Ministry said in a statement. "The Chinese military has never supported any hacking activities. Cyber-attacks are characterized by being cross-national and anonymous. To accuse the Chinese military of launching cyber-attacks without firm evidence is not professional and also groundless."

China has been accused by the U.S., other foreign governments and computer security experts of mounting a widespread, aggressive cyber-spying campaign for several years, trying to steal classified information and corporate secrets and to intimidate critics. Foreign reporters and news media, including The Associated Press, have been among the targets of attacks intended to uncover the identities of sources for news stories and to stifle critical reports about the Chinese government.

"Attacks on journalists based in China are increasingly aggressive, disruptive and sophisticated," said Greg Walton, a cyber-security researcher who has tracked Chinese hacking campaigns. China's cyber-spying efforts have excelled in part because of the government's "willingness to ignore international norms relating to civil society and media organizations," he said.

The Times reported that executives became concerned just before the publication of the Wen investigation after learning that Chinese officials had warned of unspecified consequences. Soon after the Oct. 25 publication, AT&T, which monitors the Times' computer networks, notified the company about activity consistent with a hacking attack, the report said.

After months of investigation by the computer security firm Mandiant, experts are still unsure how the hackers initially infiltrated the Times' computer systems, the report said.

INDUSTRY NEWS 1-29-2013

Columbus newspaper switches to smaller format

The Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch is introducing a smaller-sized newspaper.

The Dispatch touts the redesigned product — cut down to 11-by-14 3/4 inches — as better organized, easier to navigate and easier for readers to handle.

The Dispatch says (http://bit.ly/Uwsy2m)the new format will allow for more photographs and fewer "jumps," or stories that have to be continued on other pages. Pages are narrower and about one-third shorter than the broadsheet product, and it's delivered to readers folded in half to roughly the size of a magazine.

The Dispatch's circulation is about 142,000 daily and 265,000 on Sunday.

The Cincinnati Enquirer plans a similar format change this year and has reached an agreement with the Dispatch to print the newspaper. The Enquirer will close its Cincinnati printing plant.

US judge delays unsealing of Legion of Christ docs

A judge agreed last week to delay the release of documents related to a disgraced Roman Catholic organization called the Legion of Christ to give it time to appeal his earlier ruling unsealing them.

Superior Court Judge Michael Silverstein gave the Legion until Feb. 15 to ask the state Supreme Court to intervene in the tug-of-war over the records, which are from a lawsuit filed by a woman contesting the will of a wealthy aunt who left the Legion $60 million.

The judge had ruled that the public had a right to access the documents despite concerns from the Legion's attorney, Joseph Avanzato, that they could taint a future jury. Avanzato, in asking the judge to stay his ruling, said that it would be wrong to release the documents before the Legion had an opportunity to appeal the decision that unsealed them.

"The Legion has a right of appeal here, which would be destroyed if there is no stay," Avanzato said.

The Associated Press, The New York Times, The Providence Journal and the National Catholic Reporter had asked the judge to unseal the documents, saying they could shed light on the Legion's operations and there was no justification to seal them. The media organizations' attorney, Joseph Cavanagh, asked the judge not to grant the delay.

"He (Avanzato) keeps arguing that once the cat is out of the bag, they're done," Cavanagh said. "Let it out."

The Legion, founded in Mexico City in 1941, calls itself a religious congregation of pontifical right and says its mission involves "extending the Kingdom of Christ in society," according to its website. The Vatican took over the Legion in 2010 after determining that its late founder, the Rev. Marcial Maciel, had sexually molested seminarians and fathered three children by two women.

The Legion, which has facilities in Rhode Island, has faced other complaints, including one from a Connecticut man who claims to be Maciel's son. Another Connecticut man has alleged the Legion used predatory means to persuade his ailing father to hand over hundreds of thousands of dollars, but the Legion says it doesn't pressure anyone to make a contribution.

The wealthy aunt whose will is the focus of the current case, Gabrielle Mee, a widow, died in 2008. Mee's niece Mary Lou Dauray had sought to challenge her will, saying Mee had been defrauded by the Legion into leaving it her fortune. The judge last year threw out the challenge because he determined the niece lacked standing, and her attorney plans to appeal.

Dauray's attorney, Bernard Jackvony, also had sought the documents' release. He said the documents, compiled in the course of the lawsuit and sealed by a probate court judge in 2009, contain information about the Legion that isn't known by the public.

Wis. lawmaker wants to charge for redactions

Government entities would be allowed to charge record requestors for time spent deleting confidential information under a bill a Republican lawmaker released last week that would effectively negate a state Supreme Court ruling barring the practice.

Open record advocates blasted the proposal, saying it would have a chilling effect on the public's access to information. The bill's author, Rep. Gary Bies, countered that advocates want the government to "give it all to me free. I don't care who has to pay for it. ... When you get requests for broad information where municipalities have to go through a lot of extra work you end up with the taxpayers footing the bill for somebody's research or investigation."

Bies' proposal comes after the state Supreme Court last year prohibited record custodians from charging requestors for redaction expenses. The decision came out of a dispute between the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel newspaper and the Milwaukee Police Department.

The newspaper sued after the department demanded $4,000 to cover time spent redacting hundreds of incident reports reporters asked for as part of an investigation into how the agency classifies crime data.

A Milwaukee County judge sided with the city, authorizing it to charge the newspaper for all costs related to complying with the requests, including redactions. The Supreme Court last June reversed that ruling, concluding Wisconsin's open records law allows custodians to charge only for reproducing, photographing, locating and mailing records.

The court's four-justice conservative majority, however, implored lawmakers to address the issue, saying they should decide whether taxpayers should bear the full brunt of redaction expenses.

Bies said local government officials in his district asked him to look at redaction costs. The bill he released is simple; it amends the open records law to allow custodians to charge for redaction as well.

Messages left at the Milwaukee city attorney's office and for a Milwaukee Police Department spokesman seeking comment on the bill weren't immediately returned.

Curt Witynski, assistant director of the League of Wisconsin Municipalities said the bill is one of the organization's priorities and just makes sense.

"It'll take staff time and resources to go through (a large request) and make sure all the confidential information is blacked out," Witnyski said. "We thought it was logical to add this as one of the costs authorities can get reimbursed for."

Open records advocates vowed to defeat the bill. They argued the public already pays the government to compile and maintain records and charging for redactions equates to double taxation.

"We knew this was coming," said Bill Lueders, president of the Wisconsin Freedom of Information Council. "We're optimistic that this legislation can be successfully resisted. ... The public is not going to be supportive of the idea of taxing people."

The Journal Sentinel's managing editor, George Stanley, said in an email to The Associated Press the bill would gut the state's open records law by making records too pricey to acquire.

"(The bill) will allow bureaucrats and politicians to seal off records they don't want the public — their bosses — to see," Stanley said.

The bill's prospects are unclear. Bies' fellow Republicans control both the state Assembly and Senate and have Republican Scott Walker in the governor's office, but Bies just began soliciting co-sponsors on Friday and said he hadn't spoken to GOP leaders about the measure.

Justin Cleveland, a spokesman for Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, R-Burlington, said Vos' office was reviewing the bill.

"We want to keep the government as free and open as possible," he said, "but do need to deal with all the costs incurred by the state and thus would consider any common sense approach."

Dayton promises list of services to be taxed

Amid jockeying by interests looking for a pass, Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton said last week it will take a "very compelling case" to win exemptions from his plan to subject more items and services to the state sales tax.

Dayton's declaration came as he was facing pressure from small-town newspaper publishers and editors, who warned of severe consequences on their industry if they had to pay or charge taxes on printing, advertising and subscriptions as the administration's plan contemplates. He said he is open to having his plan "refined," but will resist significant carve-outs because it would undermine his goal of a tax tradeoff. By expanding the reach of the tax, the Democratic governor proposes to drop the underlying sales tax rate to 5.5 percent — a cut of 20 percent.

"There's no free lunch here," Dayton told the Minnesota Newspaper Association assembly.

Revenue Commissioner Myron Frans told The Associated Press that his team planned to release an "exhaustive" list later identifying precisely what would be newly taxed. So far the administration has said that lawyer bills, accountant fees, haircuts and salon visits as well as clothing that cost $100 or more per item would be taxed. The expansion is projected to net $2 billion more for the state once the offsetting rate cut is factored in.

Officials have offered only a few examples of things that would be exempt. Among them are fees on child care, medical and funeral services. But there have been close calls as the administration has looked deeper. For example, Frans said his department has concluded that the medical services exemption should be read to include medical devices. Similar questions surround medication, with some suggesting over-the-counter drugs would be taxable while prescription medication wouldn't.

Republicans who have come out vehemently against expanding the sales tax criticized Dayton for setting off a lobbying frenzy by groups anxious for a waiver.

"Whether you get on this exemption list up front or not could very well determine whether it becomes law," said Rep. Pat Garofalo, R-Farmington. "If you're not on the front end of this package, you could be in trouble for the rest of session."

The Minnesota Bar Association has lashed out on the proposed tax on legal bills as a "misery tax" hitting people when they are in tough times. Advertising firms and accountants are warning of losing contracts to companies in other states if they have to charge prospective clients a tax.

Frans denied the administration had deliberately withheld the information to get a better sense of the political pressure spots. The rest of the budget was made public on Tuesday.

"This is a big change and contrary to popular opinion we were really working on this thing up until the last minute," he said.

What gets exempted has considerable ramifications. While business-to-business transactions will make up the bulk of the projected revenue, there are pockets of consumer purchases of services where a ruling one way or another could cost the state.

Not taxing personal care services now means the state is forgoing $102 million in revenue this fiscal year, according to a 2012 Revenue Department report. The lack of a tax on automotive repair and maintenance is a $135 million hit; the current legal service exemption is projected to cost the state at least $103 million in annual revenue.

All told, the present tax exemption on business services amounts to $3.2 billion and rising. Frans said Minnesota's tax system is outdated because people now spend more money now on services than taxable goods, a trend reversal from when the state first imposed a sales tax in 1967.

"We've neglected to have the tax code reflect the service economy we live in," Frans said.

Teacher fired due to letter sent to newspaper

The McCracken County school system in Paducah, Ky., has fired a teacher who helped a student write and send a letter to the local newspaper complaining about school safety.

The newspaper sent the letter to law enforcement, which led to officials closing Reidland High School and an adjoining middle school for one day in December while possible safety threats were investigated. The schools re-opened the next day without incident.

The teacher, Shawnda Pacheco, told The Paducah Sun (http://bit.ly/10UbV5K) that she was terminated last week as a direct result of the letter.

District officials declined to comment, saying it was a personnel matter.

Pacheco had 11 years of experience teaching Spanish in the school system.

She said Superintendent Nancy Waldrop expressed concerned that she didn't use the proper chain of command to report her concerns about schools safety.

"Did I do the right thing? I think so," Pacheco said. "I may not have gone about it in the right way, but I would rather err on the side of caution. I didn't want to bite my tongue, which is what every teacher will do from now on, I guarantee."

She said Waldrop told her that she facilitated in bullying by naming a specific student in the letter and saying the youth had "brought weapons twice" to school, and that she was insubordinate.

INDUSTRY NEWS 1-23-2013

South Carolina local governments oppose bill on public records

South Carolina residents told legislators that a bill strengthening the state's public records law is desperately needed, but advocates for local governments and law enforcement contend the proposal goes too far.

A House panel heard testimony, but took no action, on a bill designed to force public agencies, governments and school districts to respond more quickly to Freedom of Information Act requests and to bar them from charging excessive fees.

It's his second attempt at making it easier for residents to access public documents. The House approved a similar bill last year, but it died in the Senate.

A major change in his latest proposal is designed to settle disputes quickly and cheaply. Currently, the only way to force a public body to comply is to sue in circuit court, which means hiring a lawyer and possibly waiting years for a decision.

UK tabloid journalist charged over police bribes

The defense editor of Rupert Murdoch-owned tabloid The Sun and a former police officer have been charged in connection with the bribing of public officials for information, British prosecutors said.

The Crown Prosecution Service said journalist Virginia Wheeler and Constable Paul Flattley were charged with conspiracy to commit misconduct in a public office.

Prosecutors claim that Flattley was paid at least 6,450 pounds ($10,225) between 2008 and 2011 for information on "accidents, incidents and crimes."

Alison Levitt, legal advisor to the Director of Public Prosecutions, said "the information provided included information about the tragic death of a 15-year-old girl, as well as details about both suspects and victims of accidents, incidents and crimes."

She said some of the information was about "high profile individuals and those associated with them."

The bribery probe is running alongside investigations into phone hacking and computer hacking sparked by revelations that reporters at Murdoch's now-shuttered News of the World routinely intercepted voicemails of those in the public eye.

Free-speech ruling aides online firms, not users

The Iowa Supreme Court has given protections against libel lawsuits to Internet publishers but declined to extend them to average citizens, a ruling that media lawyers called significant.

The ruling extends free-speech protections long enjoyed by newspapers and broadcasters to companies that distribute Internet content, such as book publishers, experts said.

But the court declined to extend those rights to individual social media users, saying the victims of cyberbullying and online smear campaigns should be able to more easily sue for defamation.

University of Iowa journalism professor Lyombe Eko said the court "has given protection to people who are bullied on the Internet, the victims of smears or lies or accusations posted on Facebook and Twitter." People will be able to sue the attacker, but not the company that hosts the site where the statements are posted, he said.

NY gun control law limits access to permit info

New York's new gun control law may be the nation's toughest, but it also includes broad new privacy provisions allowing would-be gun owners to shield their identities from reporters and the public.

It is part of the swift reaction to a suburban New York City newspaper's publication last month of an interactive map with the names and addresses of thousands of permit holders. The Journal News defended its publication of public records, but it was inundated with complaints and even threats, and the newspaper pulled the information from its website.

"I am personally grateful that the Journal News will never be able to do something as dangerous and idiotic as this again," said Republican state Sen. Greg Ball, who helped draft the provision.

The provision allows handgun permit applicants to ask that their personal information be kept secret for any of several reasons: if they are police officers, witnessed a crime, served on a jury in a criminal case or are victims of domestic violence. More vaguely, they can claim that they fear for their safety or they might be subjected to unwanted harassment.

Permit holders can also ask that their personal information from previous applications be withdrawn from the public record, for the same reasons.

Claiming the possibility of harassment is "a little bit of a stretch," said Diane Kennedy, president of the New York News Publishers Association. "It just makes it really easy for anyone to opt out without really giving a particularly strong reason."

Journal News Media Group publisher Janet Hasson said she too was disappointed with the broad nature of the provision. In a statement after the newspaper took the gun permit names and addresses down, she said the new law didn't require the removal but "we believe that doing so complies with its spirit." The interactive map had been viewed more than 1.2 million times since it was posted Dec. 23.

Hasson wrote that the decision to remove the names "is not a concession to critics that no value was served by the posting of the map in the first place."

Union agrees to bargain to help save Philly papers

The union representing journalists at Philadelphia's two major newspapers said that it will bargain for a new contract to help prevent the troubled company from being liquidated.

Local Newspaper Guild leaders made the announcement after meeting with executives of Interstate General Media LLC, the group that owns The Philadelphia Inquirer, Daily News and the website Philly.com.

Interstate had threatened last week to liquidate or sell its assets unless it got new labor agreements with all 11 unions by Friday, according to the Guild.

Ten unions have been working without contracts since October; the current Guild contract expires next October. Now the Guild has agreed to negotiate a new deal while keeping current provisions in force.

"We were convinced that they were seriously considering selling off parts of the company," said Guild acting president Howard Gensler, a Daily News gossip columnist. "Our sense was that if we agreed to come to the table, they would not pursue liquidation at this time."

The company declined to comment.

INDUSTRY NEWS 1-17-2013

Faulkner estate settles lawsuit over newspaper ad

The estate of William Faulkner has settled a copyright lawsuit against Northrop Grumman Corp. and The Washington Post Co. for using a Faulkner quote in a newspaper ad by the defense contractor.

U.S. District Judge Henry T. Wingate in Jackson dismissed the lawsuit Dec. 12. Terms of the settlement are sealed.

The Faulkner estate sued in 2012 over use of what it said was a quote from a 1956 essay Faulkner wrote in Harper's Magazine. The Independence Day ad in the Post used the phrase: "We must be free; not because we claim freedom, but because we practice it."

The same quote, but with different punctuation, was the conclusion to Faulkner's essay criticizing the South's response to school integration.

UK detective found guilty in phone hacking scandal

A top British counterterrorism detective was found guilty last week of trying to sell information to one of Rupert Murdoch's tabloids, becoming the first person convicted on charges related to Britain's phone-hacking scandal since a police investigation was reopened in early 2011.

Detective Chief Inspector April Casburn was charged with misconduct for phoning the News of the World tabloid and offering to pass on information about whether London's police force would reopen its stalled phone-hacking investigation.

Prosecutors said the tabloid did not print a story based on her call and no money changed hands but she had committed a "gross breach" of the public trust by offering to sell the information.

Casburn, 53, also was accused of trying to ruin the phone-hacking inquiry — which centered on Murdoch journalists at the now-defunct News of the World — by leaking information to the press.

Community newspaper company buys Seattle Weekly

The Seattle Weekly has been sold to a community newspaper company.

Sound Publishing announced that they had bought the free alternative weekly from Village Voice Media Holdings. The publishing company operates 36 community newspapers around Washington and northern Oregon. Its parent company, Black Press, also purchased the SF Weekly from Village Voice.

The Seattle Weekly was founded in 1976, offering readers its take on the region's politics, night life, dining and other topics.

Sound Publishing says the Seattle Weekly will remain based in Seattle.

WikiLeaks case likened to US Civil War espionage

U.S. military prosecutors are using a 1863 case from the Civil War to advance their argument that an Army private charged with sending hundreds of thousands of classified documents to the secret-spilling website WikiLeaks aided al-Qaida.

Lawyers for Pfc. Bradley Manning refute the government's claim that Manning's case parallels that of Pvt. Henry Vanderwater, a soldier fighting for the Union against the rebels. Vanderwater convicted in 1863 of aiding the enemy by giving an Alexandria, Va., newspaper a command roster that was then published.

Vanderwater, a member of the 1st District of Columbia Volunteers, was sentenced to three months of hard labor and a dishonorable discharge.

The 25-year-old Manning could get life in prison if he's convicted of indirectly aiding the enemy by leaking U.S. secrets while working as an intelligence analyst in Baghdad in 2009 and 2010. The government must prove at a trial beginning June 3 at Fort Meade, Md., that Manning knew al-Qaida members would see what WikiLeaks published; and that he knew or should have known that the material he allegedly leaked could harm the United States or help a foreign power.

Tupelo newspaper revs up new press

The Monday edition of the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal was the first to come off a new printing press.

Clay Foster, chairman/CEO of Journal Inc. and publisher of the Daily Journal, says the paper worked for months to prepare the new multimillion-dollar, 160-feet-long printing press for its first full run on Sunday night.

Foster says more photos in the paper will now be in color, as well as the daily comics and other graphics. He says advertisers will have more options for color ads as well.

He says the page size has been reduced by an inch in width and 1 1/4 inch in depth.

The new press will produce all publications of Journal Inc.

Central Ohio weekly newspaper to end publication

The owner of an alternative weekly newspaper in central Ohio says the last issue of the publication will come at the end of the month.

The Dispatch Printing Company said Monday the final issue of The Other Paper is set for Jan. 31.

The Columbus Dispatch reports (http://bit.ly/UCO4EP) that The Dispatch Printing Company acquired The Other Paper in September 2011 from American CommunityNewspapers. The Other Paper was the company's second free-distribution entertainment weekly, joining its alive! publication.

Michael J. Fiorile, president and chief operating officer of The Dispatch Printing Company, said alive! was determined to be the stronger brand after a review of feedback from readers and local advertisers.

The Columbus Dispatch is also owned by The Dispatch Printing Company.

INDUSTRY NEWS 1-9-2013

Daily Herald of Everett lays off 6 workers

The Daily Herald Co. of Everett, Wa., has laid off six workers, including four in the newsroom.

Publisher David Dadisman cited slumping advertising revenues in an email to employees, and said the company would also leave several vacancies unfilled and shift resources to emphasize digital products.

The newspaper reports (http://is.gd/3e8sDj) that those laid off were a news reporter, a sports reporter, a photographer, a copy editor, a circulation employee and an operations worker. The news department has two vacancies that will not be filled, and one news reporter's hours were reduced.

The layoff is the third significant staff reduction in as many years. There were layoffs in late 2010 and early retirements in late 2011.

The company closed The Weekly Herald, which served south Snohomish County, and it will soon stop distributing the free Herald Shopper.

Yankee buys McLean Publishing

The publisher of Yankee Magazine and The Old Farmer's Almanac has acquired the assets of McLean Communications, which publishes New Hampshire Magazine and other publications.

Yankee Publishing Inc. said that McLean will operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary of Yankee and remain at its current headquarters in Manchester, N.H.

McLean also publishes New Hampshire Business Review, Parenting New Hampshire, New Hampshire Home, and a number of custom publications, such as annual publications for the Manchester and Nashua Chambers of Commerce.

McLean's president and publisher said Yankee was her first choice of buyers when she learned that McLean's parent company, Independent Publications Inc., of Pennsylvania, planned to sell. Yankee's president said the two companies are compatible and complementary with different business models and strengths.

Terms of the sale were not disclosed.

Pioneer Newspapers now called Pioneer News Group

Northwest newspaper company Pioneer Newspapers is changing its name to Pioneer News Group to reflect its expansion into the digital world.

Marnie Roozen of the Seattle-based company says it has become much more than a print newspaper organization, including mobile and e-reader publications as well as advertising and social media products.

Pioneer Newspapers, Inc. was formed in 1974 by James G. Scripps. The family-owned multimedia business is now chaired by Roozen, who is Scripps' granddaughter.

The company owns and operates 23 print and online daily and weekly newspapers in Washington, Montana, Idaho, Utah and Oregon.

NY county: Releasing gun names endangers public

A New York county clerk justified his refusal to release the names and addresses of handgun permit holders to a newspaper, saying it would give stalkers and thieves a convenient roadmap to target potential victims — and determine whether they have a gun.

"This certainly puts my public in danger," Putnam County Clerk Dennis Sant said last week following a news conference in which he was backed by the county executive and other elected officials.

The Journal News, which serves New York City's northern suburbs, sparked an outcry last month when it published clickable online maps with the names and addresses of pistol permit holders in Rockland and Westchester counties.

When the newspaper requested the same information from Putnam, Sant initially said the county needed more time to fulfill the request. Sant balked entirely this week, saying the law gives him the prerogative to refuse to release public information if it endangers the public. Judges and police officers could be targeted by the people they put behind bars, he said. People with orders of protection have expressed concern to him about would-be attackers finding them through the database.

Grand Junction (Colo.) Daily Sentinel owner buys weeklies

The owner of The Daily Sentinel in Grand Junction, Colo., has purchased two longstanding area weeklies for an undisclosed amount.

The Daily Sentinel reports (http://bit.ly/WorZ7q) Grand Junction Media Inc. purchased the Fruita Times and Palisade Tribune from Publisher Bob Sweeney. Sweeney also publishes The Villager Newspaper, which is a weekly publication distributed to readers in Denver's southern suburbs.

Grand Junction Media also owns The Nickel, which publishes classified ads.

The Nickel Publisher Doug Freed has already taken over as publisher of the Fruita and Palisade newspapers. He says no one will lose their jobs. Freed says he also hopes to increase the news content of the two newspapers.

Georgia publishing firm seeks Chapter 11 reorganization

The parent company of the Rome (Ga.) News-Tribune and several other publications in northwest Georgia has filed a petition for Chapter 11 reorganization. The filing is aimed at guaranteeing the business will continue, News Publishing Co. President Burgett H. Mooney III said in a story by the Rome News-Tribune (http://bit.ly/VBE8WQ). He said the publishing firm will be a stronger company as a result.

News Publishing Co. is the parent corporation of the Rome News-Tribune, Calhoun Times, Walker County Messenger, Catoosa County News, Cedartown Standard and Rockmart Journal.

According to the story, Rome News-Tribune Publisher Otis Raybon told employees, "Our newspaper is going to continue as always. We're going to come out in better shape than we went into it. ... We will cover and report local news and events just as our readers and advertisers expect.

AP: Judge rules US can keep secrets on targeted killings

A federal judge has ruled that President Barack Obama's administration doesn't have to publicly disclose its legal justification for the drone attacks and other methods it has used to kill terrorism suspects overseas.

Two New York Times reporters and the American Civil Liberties Union filed a 2011 request under the Freedom of Information Act that sought any documents in which Department of Justice lawyers had discussed the highly classified "targeted-killing" program.

The requests followed a drone strike in Yemen that killed an al-Qaida leader, Anwar Al-Awlaki, who had been born in the U.S. That attack prompted complaints from some law scholars and human rights activists that, away from the battlefield, it was illegal for the U.S. to kill American citizens without a trial.

Those demands for documents were turned down, on the grounds that releasing any details about the program, or even acknowledging that documents on the subject existed, could harm national security.

In a decision signed last week, U.S. District Judge Colleen McMahon chided the Obama administration for refusing to provide the documents but said she had no authority to order them disclosed.

INDUSTRY NEWS 1-3-2012

Six selected for Indiana Journalism hall of fame

Poynter Institute chairman and South Bend native Paul Tash and longtime Portland Commercial Review publisher Jack Ronald are among six people who will be inducted into the Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame in April.

The others selected are the late Joe Aaron, a longtime columnist for the Evansville Courier; Melissa Farlow, a native of Paoli and an award-winning National Geographic photographer; the late Jerry Lyst, who was The Indianapolis Star's editorial page editor for nearly half of his 45 years with the newspaper; and the late Lowell Mellett, an Elwood native who was a newspaper executive and columnist in Washington and a top aide to President Franklin Roosevelt.

The five will be inducted during an April 27 ceremony at the Indiana Memorial Union in Bloomington.

Harrisburg newspaper cuts back publication

The Patriot-News, one of central Pennsylvania's largest daily newspapers, is cutting back publication to three days a week.

The Patriot-News will be published Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.

The change is part of a corporate reorganization that also includes an expansion of its online news coverage on its PennLive website and an electronic edition of the newspaper that subscribers to the newspaper will receive.

A new company — the PA Media Group — now oversees The Patriot-News as well as the PennLive website and Central PA Magazine.

California newspaper defies trend to shrink costs

The Orange County Register is adding new and expanded sections to cover business, automobiles and food. It’s also increasing community news pages and boosting investigative reporting.

It feels like a throwback to an earlier era as a first-time newspaper owner is defying conventional wisdom by spending heavily to expand the printed edition and playing down digital formats.

Aaron Kushner added about 75 journalists and, with 25 more coming, will have expanded the newsroom by half since his investment group bought the nation's 20th-largest newspaper by circulation in July.

Kushner, 39, believes people will pay for high-quality news. His bet is remarkable in an industry where newspapers have shrunk their way to profits for years, slashing costs while seeking clicks on often-free websites to attract online advertising.

As more newspapers begin charging for online access, Kushner's spending spree is drawing close attention.

Tribune exits bankruptcy with new TV-focused board

More than four years after crushing debt and plunging advertising sales forced it to file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, Tribune Co. has emerged with a new television-focused board and over $1 billion in new financing.

Led by such creative and technology heavyweights as Ross Levinsohn, the former interim CEO of Yahoo Inc., and Peter Murphy, former strategic officer of The Walt Disney Co., the board's roster suggests a focus on the company's TV assets rather than newspapers, which haven't managed to turn around declines in readership and advertising. Peter Liguori, a former TV executive at Discovery Communications Inc. and News Corp.'s Fox, is expected to be named CEO in the next several weeks.

The exit closes a dark period for Tribune, which was founded in 1847 with a hand-cranked print run of 400 copies of the Chicago Tribune. It founded the WGN broadcasting brand with a radio station in 1924 and a TV station in 1948. The call letters stood for "World's Greatest Newspaper." Tribune first went public in 1983 valued at $206 million — one of the biggest IPOs of its day — and expanded over the years into a media giant through acquisitions of TV stations such as KTLA in Los Angeles and newspapers such as the Los Angeles Times, The Baltimore Sun and Newsday. It also owns a stake in the Food Network and online job site CareerBuilder.com.

Nashua (N.H.) Telegraph newspaper is for sale

The Nashua Telegraph is on the market.

Publisher Terrence L. Williams announced in the past week that the Telegraph's parent company, Independent Publications Inc., has put the newspaper up for sale.

Williams says the sale will not change the newspaper's role in the Nashua community.

The Telegraph reports (http://bit.ly/UyGs4a) that Independent Publications, based in Pennsylvania, has put its other holdings on the market, including other newspaper publications.

Independent Publications Inc. has owned the Telegraph for more than three decades.

Planned News Corp spin-off lost $2 billion in fiscal 2012

Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. said in December that the news and publishing unit it plans to spin off next year posted a $2 billion net loss in the fiscal year through June, mainly due to one-time charges and restructuring costs in its newspaper division.

The details of the split were revealed in a filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission. It confirmed investors' suspicions that the spun-off company — to be known as News Corp. — will be smaller and less profitable than the TV and movie business that will form Fox Group Inc.

The "new" News Corp. posted $8.7 billion in revenue last fiscal year, about a quarter of the company's total. Charges amounted to $2.8 billion, mainly due to declines in the value of newspapers and a drop in advertising at its in-store flyer business. The charges included restructuring costs of $156 million, most of which came from shutting down The News of the World, the tabloid at the heart of a hacking scandal in Britain.

News Corp. CEO Murdoch, 81, will be executive chairman of the spun-off company and remain CEO of Fox Group. He'll end up controlling both entities through the nearly 40 percent of Class B voting shares he controls through a family trust.

INDUSTRY NEWS (12-18-2012)

Lehigh Valley Media gets new publisher, president

An executive from The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J., has been named the new president and publisher of Lehigh Valley Media Group.

The Express-Times of Easton, Pa., (http://bit.ly/R29bxC) reported that Lou Stancampiano will begin in his new post Jan. 2. He is currently vice president of advertising at The Star-Ledger.

Stancampiano previously served as vice president of advertising at The News-Tribune in Middlesex County, The Record of Bergen County and The Morning Call of Allentown. He also headed the advertising department at The Orlando Sentinel in Florida.

Richard Diamond, president of Penn-Jersey Advance, worked with Stancampiano at The Jersey Journal and The Star-Ledger. Diamond says he has great respect for Stancampiano's judgment, openness and vision.

Lehigh Valley Media Group publishes The Express-Times and lehighvalleylive.com. Penn-Jersey Advance is its parent company.

NY Times jumps into mini digital book market

The New York Times is getting into the business of selling bite-sized digital books based on its reporters' work, giving it entree into a growing market for inexpensive "e-singles" that can be read in a couple of hours.

The Times' first mini book will go on sale Monday. It's an 18,000-word piece about skiers caught in an avalanche by Times reporter John Branch. The story, called "Snow Fall," expands on an upcoming piece in Monday's newspaper.

It will sell for $2.99 in Amazon.com's Kindle store, Apple's iBooks, and on Barnes & Noble's Nook.

E-singles fall somewhere between magazine pieces, which can top out at around 10,000 words, and full-length books, which can run around 100,000 words.

The product meets the rising demand for content as people buy tablet computers like the iPad and Kindle Fire in increasing numbers. IHS expects global shipments of tablets to hit 120 million this year, just two short years after the iPad jumpstarted the category in April 2010. Tablet shipments are expected to hit 340 million in 2016.

And people aren't just watching movies and surfing the Web on their mobile devices. The Pew Research Center's Project for Excellence in Journalism said in October that half of U.S. adults own a tablet or smartphone, and two thirds of them get news on their device.

The quick turnaround of digital publishing means non-fiction work remains timely.

Gerald Marzorati, the Times' editor for editorial development, said the company is betting the new format will make long-form journalism easy to read and reach people who don't visit the Times' website or read the newspaper.

"We're going to really experiment in the first year with different sorts of forms — long essays, long narratives," he said. "We may even try collections. We're just sort of experimenting with this form and we'll see if getting something at a very reasonable price in book form is something that appeals to people."

Amazon is considered the pioneer of the short-format digital book. It launched Kindle Singles in January 2011. In September this year, it said it had sold 3.5 million Kindle Singles so far. Others have followed suit. Apple calls the format Quick Reads and Barnes & Noble calls them Nook Snaps.

The Times is partnering with one of the early innovators in the space, a San Francisco startup called Byliner Inc., which has published nearly 50 short-form titles in its 16-month existence.

Staff at Ohio newspaper looks to protect jobs

Unionized newsroom employees at Ohio's biggest daily newspaper have ratified an agreement intended to minimize layoffs after job cuts planned next year.

The Plain Dealer in Cleveland plans to lay off 58 reporters, photographers, artists and researchers beginning in May.

The paper said (bit.ly/UBKVhy) the agreement endorsed by NewspaperGuild members would minimize future layoffs and provide job guarantees through 2019. The Guild's Harlan Spector said the deal would provide improved severance for anyone laid off.

Publisher Terrance C.Z. Egger said no decision had been made on changing the paper's seven-day publication schedule as its parent company Advance Publications has done with some other newspaper properties.

The Guild has waged a billboard campaign to preserve jobs and Cleveland's seven-day publication schedule.

Virginia judge bars media from teen rape hearing

A Rockingham County judge has barred the media from being present during a hearing for two Harrisonburg teens accused of violently raping a woman at knifepoint.

The Daily News-Record reports (http://www.dnronline.com) that Juvenile and Domestic Relations Court Judge David O'Donnell ruled that media could not attend the recent preliminary hearing because the newspaper had reported the juvenile suspects' names in a previous story. O'Donnell said he feared the victim's name would be published.

Daily News-Record City Editor Rob Longley said the paper's policy is not to publish the names of victims in sexual assault cases.

Several media outlets, including some who had not published the suspects' identities, argued that the hearing should be public due to the seriousness of the allegations. The AP generally does not name juvenile defendants.

The two 16-year-old defendants are charged with breaking into a 22-year-old woman's apartment in October and robbing and repeatedly raping her.

Aspen newspaper sues for police documents

The Aspen (Colo.) Times is suing for access to documents about a former Basalt police chief.

The newspaper says it filed suit to force the town to release an investigation report on the professional conduct of former Police Chief Roderick O'Connor (http://bit.ly/TRFEan). The lawsuit seeks a hearing to determine if the investigation documents should be released under the Colorado Open Records Act.

O'Connor was placed on paid administrative leave in October after the town received a complaint from within the department about him. The nature of the complaint has never been revealed.

Basalt's attorney said the documents are protected as part of a personnel matter. O'Connor resigned Nov. 23.

Newspaper attorneys argue that investigations into the conduct of a government official on the job don't qualify as a personnel issue.

INDUSTRY NEWS 12-13-1212

Mass. newspaper says reporter made up sources

A Massachusetts newspaper says one of its longtime reporters made up sources for her stories, and it has issued an apology.

Cape Cod Times Publisher Peter Meyer and Editor Paul Pronovost said an internal review found the reporter wrote dozens of stories with "sources who do not exist."

They say editors doing an audit of Karen Jeffrey's work can't find 69 people in 34 stories going back to 1998. They say Jeffrey admits inventing people and using fake names.

The newspaper says the bogus sourcing typically was in lighter stories, such as one about a Boston Red Sox opening game. It says in some cases none of the people quoted can be found.

A story posted on the newspaper's website says Jeffrey no longer works there.

Jeffrey hasn't returned a phone message seeking comment.

Jacobs family sells daily, weekly

Boone Newspapers Inc. has purchased The Daily Leader in Brookhaven, Miss., and The Prentiss Headlight weekly along with related websites and affiliated publications from the Jacobs family.

The newspapers will be operated by Brookhaven Newsmedia LLC, a BNI affiliate.

The sale ends more than 50 years of ownership and operation of The Daily Leader by the Jacobs family. Charles R. Jacobs bought the newspaper from Dalton Brady in 1958. Bill and Amy Jacobs acquired The Prentiss Headlight in 1985 then purchased the Daily Leader from his family in 1995.

Rick Reynolds who formerly headed Granite Publications, a Texas newspaper group Texas, has been named publisher.

The sale was completed Dec. 1. Terms were not disclosed.

Boone operates publications in eight states. Its chairman, James Boone Jr., is based in Tuscaloosa, Ala.

INDUSTRY NEWS (12-6-2012)

News Corp.'s new media co. to be named Fox Group

News Corp. announced that its new publishing company will keep the News Corp. name, while its separate media and entertainment company will be renamed Fox Group.

The conglomerate announced plans this summer to split into two public companies, one for its newspaper and book publishing business and the other for its fast-growing movie and TV operations. Rupert Murdoch will serve as chairman of the new News Corp. and chairman and CEO of Fox Group.

The new News Corp. will house newspapers such as The Wall Street Journal, New York Post and Dow Jones Newswires. The Fox Group, meanwhile, will include Twentieth Century Fox film and television studios and the Fox TV channels among other properties.

The company named Wall Street Journal managing editor Robert Thomson as CEO of the new News Corp. He's set to begin his work on Jan. 1. Chase Carey will serve as president and chief operating officer of Fox Group. James Murdoch will stay on as deputy chief operating officer of Fox Group.

As part of the changes, News Corp. said it will cease publication of The Daily, its iPad news application, on Dec. 15.

"From its launch, The Daily was a bold experiment in digital publishing and an amazing vehicle for innovation," Murdoch said in a statement. "Unfortunately, our experience was that we could not find a large enough audience quickly enough to convince us the business model was sustainable in the long-term."

News Corp. had hoped The Daily would lure both paying subscribers and advertisers to a digital newspaper that included news, gossip and opinion. The publication's intended audience included people who don't read traditional newspapers or watch TV news while still consuming media through other means. But The Daily never caught on. It had just 100,000 subscribers as of July, when News Corp. said it was laying off about one-third of the publication's 170-person staff — a clear sign that the project wasn't going well.

When News Corp. launched The Daily in 2011, it said it spent about $30 million to start it up, and estimated that operating costs would amount to about half a million dollars per week, or about $26 million a year.

Jesse Angelo, the editor-in-chief of The Daily and executive editor of The New York Post, will become publisher of The Post.

News Corp. said The Daily brand will "live on in other channels" while its technology and some staff will be folded into the New York Post.

News Corp Int'l news chief to step down

Tom Mockridge, the chief executive of Rupert Murdoch's British newspapers who was parachuted in to steady an organization swamped in scandal, is leaving the company at the end of the year.

Mockridge was appointed CEO of News International in July 2011, following the resignation of Rebekah Brooks in the wake of the phone hacking scandal at the defunct Sunday tabloid, News of the World.

He is leaving News International to pursue outside opportunities, parent company News Corp. said in a statement Dec. 2. Mockridge joined News Corp. in Australia in 1991, and headed the Sky Italia broadcasting operation in Italy from 2003 to 2011.

News Corp. Chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch says that Mockridge's "decision to step down is absolutely and entirely his own."

The conglomerate announced plans this summer to split into two public companies, one for its newspaper and book publishing business and the other for its fast-growing movie and TV operations. The Wall Street Journal said Dec. 1 that its current managing editor Robert Thomson is being named CEO of the new, unnamed publishing company.

Murdoch will be chairman of both companies.

In an interview last week with BBC radio, Mockridge said U.K. newspapers needed more effective regulation but argued against any legislative involvement by the government — the course recommended by Lord Justice Brian Leveson, who led a yearlong inquiry into the British press.

Mockridge said News Corp. would not consider closing The Sun, Britain's largest circulation newspaper, if members of its staff were convicted of crimes.

"One of the striking things about the troubles of the last 18 months is how quickly support, evidenced by people's purchase decisions, has come back to our newspaper titles and to other newspaper titles," he said.

Link to newspapers around the globe

From Elleda Wilson of the Daily Astorian, of Astoria, Ore: Anyone who loves NEWSPAPERS from all over will get a kick out of this website. http://newspapermap.com/

Just click on one of the bubbles, and it will take you to the newspaper’s website. Or, you can filter the papers shown by language. For a real treat, click on "hist.” in the blue box at the top of the page, and the map changes to historical newspaper editions such as The New York Sun, and yes, The Daily Morning Astorian. Translation is available, too. According to the rather baffling headline on the Ukrainian Fakty i Kommentarii the other day, "The newly elected MPs have knock yourself free apartments.” Really? But, like the website says, "All news is local news.”

Gazette newspaper acquired by Anschutz

A Denver-based media company owned by billionaire Phil Anschutz has purchased The (Colorado Springs) Gazette.

Colorado's second-largest newspaper announced that Anschutz's Clarity Media Group purchased The Gazette from Freedom Communications Inc.

Terms were not disclosed.

Anschutz's media company also publishes The Weekly Standard magazine and The Oklahoman and Washington Examiner newspapers. The Anschutz Corp. also owns two Colorado Springs landmarks, the Broadmoor hotel and the Pikes Peak Cog Railway.

The Gazette reported that Dan Steever would remain president and publisher. The newspaper was founded in 1872 and had been part of Freedom Communications since 1946.

UK judge issues damning press verdict

Britain’s unruly newspapers should be regulated by an independent body dominated by non-journalists with the power to levy steep fines, a judge said in a report that pleased victims of tabloid intrusion but left editors worrying about creeping state control of the country’s fiercely independent press.

Prime Minister David Cameron echoed concerns about government interference, expressing misgivings about a key recommendation of the report — that the new regulator be enshrined in law. He called on the much criticized press to show it could control itself by implementing the judge’s proposals quickly — and without political involvement.

"I’m proud of the fact that we’ve managed to survive hundreds of years without state regulation,” he said.

Lord Justice Brian Leveson issued his 2,000-page report at the end of a media ethics inquiry triggered by a scandal over tabloid phone hacking that expanded to engulf senior figures in politics, the police and Rupert Murdoch’s media empire.

His key recommendation was to create a new print media regulator, which he said should be established in law to prevent more people being hurt by "outrageous” press behavior that had "wreaked havoc with the lives of innocent people whose rights and liberties have been disdained.”

Cameron, under intense pressure from both sides of an issue that has divided his own Conservative Party, welcomed Leveson’s proposal for a new regulator and said "the status quo is not an option.”

But he said that asking legislators to enshrine it in law meant "crossing the Rubicon of writing elements of press regulation into the law of the land.”

"I believe that we should be wary of any legislation that has the potential to infringe free speech and a free press,” Cameron told lawmakers in the House of Commons. "In this House which has been a bulwark of democracy for centuries, we should think very, very carefully before crossing this line.”

Leveson insisted that politicians and the government should play no role in regulating the press, which should be done by a new body with much stronger powers than the current Press Complaints Commission.

But the judge said it was "essential that there should be legislation to underpin the independent self-regulatory system.”

He said the new body should be composed of members of the public including former journalists and academics — but no more than one serving editor, and no politicians. It should have the power to rule on complaints, demand prominent corrections in newspapers and to levy fines of up to 1 million pounds ($1.6 million), though it would have no power to prevent material being published.

Membership would be voluntary, but newspapers would be encouraged to join in part to stave off expensive lawsuits — the regulator would handle complaints that currently end up in court.

The proposal is similar to the system operating in Ireland, where a press council and ombudsman were set up in 2008 to make the print media more publicly accountable.

Critics of the tabloid press generally backed Leveson’s findings.

"I welcome Lord Leveson’s report and hope it will mark the start of a new era for our press in which it treats those in the news responsibly, with care and consideration,” said Kate McCann, who was the subject of intense press interest after her 3-year-old daughter Madeleine disappeared during a holiday in Portugal in 2007.

Brian Cathcart of the group Hacked Off, which campaigns for victims of press intrusion, said Leveson had produced "a workable, proportionate and reasonable solution to the problems of press abuse.”

He said Cameron’s "failure to accept the full recommendations of the report is unfortunate and regrettable.”

Cameron set up the Leveson inquiry after revelations of illegal eavesdropping by Rupert Murdoch’s now-defunct News of the World tabloid sparked a criminal investigation and a wave of public revulsion.

The furor erupted in 2011 when it was revealed that the News of the World had eavesdropped on the mobile phone voicemails of slain schoolgirl Milly Dowler while police were searching for the 13-year-old.

Murdoch shut down the 168-year-old newspaper in July 2011. His U.K. newspaper company, News International, has paid millions in damages to dozens of hacking victims, and faces dozens more lawsuits from celebrities, politicians, athletes and crime victims whose voicemails were hacked in the paper’s quest for scoops.

News International chief executive Tom Mockridge said the company was "keen to play our full part, with others in our industry, in creating a new body that commands the confidence of the public.”

"We believe that this can be achieved without statutory regulation — and welcome the prime minister’s rejection of that proposal.”

Leveson’s 4 million pound ($6.4 million) inquiry heard evidence from more than 300 witnesses during months of hearings that provided a dramatic, sometimes comic and often poignant window on the workings of the media. Witnesses ranged from celebrities such as Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling and Hugh Grant — who both complained of intrusive treatment — to the parents of Dowler, who described how learning that their daughter’s voicemail had been accessed had given them false hope that she was alive.

Leveson said that the ongoing criminal investigation constrained him from accusing other newspapers of illegal behavior, but concluded there was a subculture of unethical behavior "within some parts of some titles.”

While many editors have denied knowing about phone hacking, Leveson said it "was far more than a covert, secret activity, known to nobody save one or two practitioners of the ‘dark arts.’”

He said newspapers had been guilty of "recklessness in prioritizing sensational stories almost irrespective of the harm the stories may cause.”

"In each case, the impact has been real and, in some cases, devastating,” the judge said.

The hacking scandal has rocked Britain’s press, political and police establishments, who were revealed to enjoy an often cozy relationship in which drinks, dinners and sometimes money were traded for influence and information.

Several senior police officers resigned over the failure aggressively to pursue an investigation of phone hacking at the News of the World in 2007. But Leveson said that "the inquiry has not unearthed extensive evidence of police corruption.”

Leveson said over the past three decades, political parties "have had or developed too close a relationship with the press in a way which has not been in the public interest.”

Those relationships reached right up to the prime minister’s door. Former Murdoch editors and journalists charged with phone hacking, police bribery or other wrongdoing include Cameron’s former spokesman, Andy Coulson, and ex-News of the World editor Rebekah Brooks, a friend of the prime minister.

Leveson acquitted senior politicians of wrongdoing, but recommended that political parties publish statements "setting out, for the public, an explanation of the approach they propose to take as a matter of party policy in conducting relationships with the press.”

Cameron, who is tainted by his own ties to prominent figures in the scandal, said he accepted that proposal.

But politicians remained far apart on the broader issue of how, or whether, to regulate the press.

Cameron was holding talks Thursday with leaders of the other main parties in an attempt to thrash out agreement.

He faced a battle. Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, leader of junior government partner the Liberal Democrats, differed from Cameron in backing the call for a new regulator established in law.

"We owe it to the victims of these scandals, who have already waited too long for us to do the right thing,” he said.

Analysts say that it was possible for the coalition government’s two parties to join forces and push through a version of the recommended legal changes.

But Steven Barnett, a communications professor at the University of Westminster, said that if that does not happen, he would not trust the British press to set up a truly independent regulator.

"One possibility is that in the end (the report) has no effect whatsoever,” Barnett said. "The press can make some noises about regulating themselves. But in the end they will want to control themselves in ways that Leveson himself said was unacceptable.”

Vermont paper aware of reporter's sex offense

The publisher of a Vermont newspaper defended his paper's hiring of a convicted sex offender to cover police and courts, saying in a story last week that he supports fair punishment for those who break the law but also giving them an opportunity for rehabilitation.

Barre-Montpelier Times Argus Publisher R. John Mitchell spoke to a sister paper, the Rutland Herald, for a story about reporter Eric Blaisdell's hiring that ran in both papers (http://bit.ly/ToBDXk).

"This is an incredibly well supervised and restricted situation by the judge, the probation officer and a therapist," Mitchell said. "I am not going to second guess that process, (and I) am willing to participate in it and give it a chance."

Times Argus Editor Steven Pappas said Blaisdell disclosed his crime when he applied for the job in June. Pappas said New Hampshire Department of Corrections officials and Blaisdell's references said he posed no risk to the public.

Blaisdell served nine months in prison after pleading guilty to three felonies. He was arrested in 2007 for soliciting sex via computer from a 13-year-old girl who turned out to be a police officer. He had no physical contact with anyone.

Blaisdell, 27, of North Haverhill, N.H., told the Rutland Herald he didn't intend to do anything wrong. He did not return a call from The Associated Press seeking comment.

"It was never my intention of following through," he told the paper. "There was a lot of talk, a lot of talk, but I would come up with some excuse and say, 'Oh, my car broke down,' or 'My grandmother died.'"

INDUSTRY NEWS 11-28-2012

What earnings reports have revealed about ads

Companies that sell advertising have released earnings reports for the latest quarter. Here are highlights of recent quarterly earnings reports from selected Internet and media companies and what they say about the state of spending on advertising.

— Oct. 15: Gannett Co. reports higher net income and revenue, helped by strong gains in political and Olympics-related advertising.

— Oct. 16: Advertising and marketing company Omnicom Group Inc. reports nearly flat earnings and revenue compared with a year earlier, as U.S. revenue grew but international revenue declined.

— Oct. 17: Television and digital media company Media General Inc. says its third-quarter net loss widened because of higher expenses, but revenue grew sharply thanks to an increase in political advertising and the Olympics.

— Oct. 18: Google Inc. says ad revenue rose 16 percent from the same time last year, the slowest pace in three years. The company's ad revenue had climbed by at least 21 percent in each of the previous 10 quarters. As has been the case for the past year, the average prices companies pay Google for ads appearing alongside search results also fell. The decelerating growth in ad revenue is likely being driven by the growing use of smartphones and tablet computers to access the Internet. The ads are more difficult to see on smartphones, in particular, so marketers aren't willing to pay as much.

Microsoft Corp. says revenue in its online services division grew 9 percent to $697 million, while operating loss fell 29 percent to $364 million. Online advertising revenue grew 15 percent to $655 million, with growth in search advertising revenue partly offset by lower revenue from display advertising. Microsoft says search revenue grew because of increased revenue per search and increased volumes.

— Oct. 22: Yahoo Inc. reports net revenue that barely grew at a time when advertisers are spending more money marketing their products and services online. Still, it beat expectations. Net revenue in the latest quarter rose 2 percent to $1.09 billion — about $10 million more than analysts had predicted. Net revenue is the amount of money Yahoo keeps after paying its commission to search partner Microsoft and other sites that run its ads.

— Oct. 23: Facebook Inc. discloses that some 14 percent of its ad revenue came from mobile advertising. It started showing ads to users who access Facebook from their phones and tablet computers about six months ago. Investors have been worried that Facebook isn't taking advantage of its growing mobile user base.

— Oct. 25: The New York Times Co. says advertising revenue fell 9 percent in the third quarter to $182.6 million from $200.5 million a year earlier. The company says it expects fourth-quarter advertising trends to be similar to the third quarter.

WPP Group PLC, the world's largest advertising group, lowers its full-year outlook after not doing as well as expected from the Olympics, the U.S. presidential campaign and the European soccer championships.

The McClatchy Co., which owns The Miami Herald, The Sacramento Bee and other newspapers, says advertising revenue fell 5.4 percent to $212 million from $224.2 million a year ago.

— Oct. 26: Comcast Corp. says broadcast ad revenue at NBC more than doubled to $1.99 billion, and rose 9 percent excluding the Olympics. Ad revenue on pay TV networks such as Bravo, CNBC, MSNBC and NBC Sports was up less than 1 percent to $807 million. Comcast didn't say if pay TV network advertising revenue would have fallen without the boost from the Olympics.

The Interpublic Group of Cos., which owns advertising and marketing agencies, says the weak economy in Europe and slowdown in China have led a wide array of companies to cut spending on services such as marketing and advertising. Results missed expectations.

— Nov. 2: Clear Channel Outdoor Holdings Inc. says its third-quarter earnings surged as it sold more billboard advertising in several growing international markets to overcome weakening demand in many parts of Europe's ailing economy.

— Nov. 6: News Corp., which owns the Fox network, says it saw increased local advertising, particularly for political ads. The gains were partly offset by lower national advertising revenue because of lower prime-time ratings and the Olympics on rival NBC. At its U.S. pay TV networks, advertising revenue rose 8 percent, led by Fox News and its regional sports networks.

AOL Inc. says its advertising revenue grew for the sixth straight quarter. Advertising revenue grew 7 percent to $340 million.

— Nov. 7: Time Warner Inc. says ad revenue at its television networks fell 1 percent, as it saw better rates domestically but was hurt by the timing of certain sports events. It was also hurt by the shutdown of some channels overseas and by changes in currency exchange rates, in which ad sales made abroad converted back into fewer dollars. Ad revenue at the Time Inc. publishing business fell 5 percent.

—CBS Corp. says advertising revenue fell due to poor results from CBS Radio and the impact of having programs pre-empted by the Republican and Democratic national conventions.

— Nov. 8: The Walt Disney Co. says lower network ratings at ABC led to lower advertising revenue despite higher rates. ESPN saw flat ad revenue as viewers and advertisers turned their attention toward the Olympics on NBC.

— Nov. 15: Viacom Inc. says ad revenue fell 6 percent in the U.S. and 7 percent worldwide, including the U.S. The advertising environment has slowed for most major media conglomerates, and Viacom faces additional challenges of audience weakness at its major TV networks. Viacom says ad revenue was showing signs of improvement in the current quarter, though it likely won't be enough to show growth compared with last year.

Book tells how 18th-century newspapers covered revolutionary war

It was the 18th-century version of a tweet: a two-sentence, 25-word dispatch in a London newspaper reporting the American colonies had declared their independence from Great Britain.

The events of the Revolutionary War may seem like ye olde news to today's history students, but they were breaking news to people on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, and newspapers were the main source of information. Some historians theorize there would have been no American Revolution without the era's newspapers, even though they tended to be four-page publications crammed with information that was days, weeks or months old.

"Newspapers are what fanned the flames of rebellion," said Todd Andrlik, whose collection of 18th-century newspapers is the focus of a book published this month.

"Reporting The Revolutionary War" (Sourcebooks) primarily focuses on the turbulent 20-year period between the end of the French and Indian War and the conclusion of the American Revolution. The large-format book features reproductions of the actual newspaper pages from the era, with contextual essays written by three dozen historians, scholars and authors.

"For 250 years, newspaper accounts have been relegated to footnotes," said Andrlik, a marketing executive for a Chicago-area construction firm.

Over the past five years, his collection of newspapers from the 1700s has grown to more than 400, including editions of American and British publications that are among the rarest of their kind. Andrlik's book is unique because it compiles so many primary sources in a single publication, according to one Revolutionary War author and historian.

"I've seen nothing like it and I've been studying the Revolution since 1955," said Thomas Fleming, whose contribution to the book details the obstacles the Americans and British faced in negotiating a peace treaty to end the war.

Getting news into print was a hands-on, time-consuming task in the late 18th century. It could also be life-threatening, especially if a newspaper printer was on the wrong side of the rebellion.

Word of the outbreak of fighting at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, wasn't front-page news in nearby Boston because there were no front pages being published: Most of the city's printers had fled from the British occupation forces, Andrlik said. Two days later, a newspaper in Portsmouth, N.H., was one of the first with a page one story of the battles, publishing an account under the headline "Bloody News."

The news of the American Declaration of Independence was published in the London Gazette on Aug. 13, 1776, barely five weeks after the Continental Congress had finalized the document. Tucked between business notices and brief overseas dispatches, the short note served as a news bulletin at a time when the typical trans-Atlantic voyage could take up to two months:

"Advice is received that the Congress resolved upon independence the 4th of July; and, it is said, have declared war against Great Britain in form."

"Newspapers in those days had the same attitude toward a hot story: They got it into the papers as quickly as possible," Fleming said.

Full versions of the rebellious colonies' declaration were appearing in British publications just days later. One Scottish periodical provided its own analysis of the document, including a snarky response to what became one of the Declaration of Independence's best-known lines: "In what are they created equal?"

Fleming said the American population was "amazingly literate" during the period, and the new nation's military and political leaders such as George Washington and John Adams realized how newspapers could be as important to the Revolution's success as the outcome of any battle.

He pointed out how Washington started his own newspaper to fill an information void while his army was fighting in New Jersey.

"You didn't have to hold rallies," Fleming said. "You were rallying them with this journalism."

Judge allows Ky. newspaper to contact trial jurors

A judge has given permission to a Kentucky newspaper to contact jurors who heard a trial of two cousins charged in the kidnapping and assault of a gay man in Harlan County.

But U.S. District Judge Gregory F. Van Tatenhove declined to strike down the court rule that prevented The Lexington Herald-Leader (http://bit.ly/R1Yhcd) from contacting jurors unless permitted by court.

Jason and Anthony Jenkins were the first people in the nation charged under an expanded hate crimes law for attacking Kevin Pennington in April 2011.

During the trial in October, jurors convicted the cousins on kidnapping and conspiracy charges, but acquitted them on the charge that they assaulted him based on his sexual orientation.

The newspaper had challenged a court rule that said unless permitted by court, "no person, party or attorney, nor any representative of a party or attorney may contact, interview, or communicate with any juror before, during or after trial."

The newspaper argued it was an unconstitutional hindrance to the newspaper's First Amendment right to gather news.

Van Tatenhove said while the rule may be inconvenient, it does include a provision under which the newspaper can seek permission to contact jurors. He also declined to strike down a rule against publicly releasing information about the jurors, such as their names.

However, he said he would contact the jurors in the Harlan County case and ask if they are willing to speak to a reporter.

Judgment day: UK media faces moment of truth

It's judgment day for Britain's press.

After nearly 18 months of damaging revelations about widespread media misconduct, the senior judge tapped to investigate the ethics and practices of some of the English-speaking world's most powerful newspapers will deliver his verdict Nov. 29.

Lord Justice Brian Leveson's inquiry was launched in response to the phone hacking scandal at Rupert Murdoch's News of the World where journalists routinely intercepted phone messages to obtain sensational stories and allegedly engaged in computer hacking and bribery, too.

"The reputation of the British press is as low as it's possible to be," said James Curran, a professor of communications who has written extensively on the history and politics of the media. "For the first time, there is a possibility of modest reform."

A year's worth of hearings exposed a host of shady journalistic practices, from blackmail and stalking to trafficking in stolen medical records and other private information.

Celebrities, crime victims, and the falsely accused described feeling helpless as reporters ground their privacy and reputation to bits, while some of the country's most senior police officers — who should have been investigating the wrongdoing — were described glugging champagne at intimate dinners with those who would later become the scandal's chief suspects.

Leveson's recommendations and reaction from the press and politicians have been a matter of intense speculation since the inquiry was ordered by Prime Minister David Cameron in July, 2011. Leveson could recommend new rules for journalists, suggest a new press watchdog, or simply endorse the status quo. In the case of new regulations, lawmakers would have to sign off on his recommendations before they became law.

There have been scattered hints as to Leveson's approach. He and inquiry lawyer Robert Jay mostly eschewed the inquisitorial approach during hearings, often politely asking various witnesses for their thoughts on whether the press should be reformed and how to do it.

But the genial atmosphere of the hearings may mask a trenchant, industry-shaking verdict.

In August, the judge sent inquiry participants a sheaf of documents laying out his potential criticisms, a move intended to enable those targeted to have a final say before the inquiry's recommendations are released. They are meant to be confidential, but Chris Blackhurst, the editor of Britain's Independent newspaper, was so shocked by the tone that he broke with protocol to go public with his concerns.

"It is a damning indictment of my industry," he told the BBC. "The best way I can describe it is that he's loading a gun, and that this document — well over 100 pages — is all the ammunition. And believe you me, there's plenty of ammunition. You read it and you just gulp."

Paul Connew, a tabloid editor-turned-public relations expert who has followed the scandal closely, said he is worried, too. He predicted that Leveson would propose some kind of "light touch" regulation, for example one that would see publishers submit to the rulings of an independent regulator. But Connew — who counts himself among the thousands of phone hacking victims — said that the moment government becomes involved in setting rules for journalists, liberty suffers.

"It's a cliche, but it's the first step down a slippery slope," he said. "I'm not saying you're going to overturn 300 years of press freedom in one fell swoop, but you're removing one of the foundation stones."

The battle lines are being drawn as proprietors and reform campaigners prepare to fight. On Wednesday, victims of press abuse met with Cameron and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg to argue their case for greater protection against unscrupulous journalists. On Thursday, the Free Speech Network, a press lobbying group, unleashed a publicity campaign against any attempt at state-backed regulation.

The group's ad in Murdoch's The Sun newspaper was particularly stark:

"These people believe in state control of the press," the ad said over pictures of Syrian strongman Bashar Assad, Russian leader Vladimir Putin, and Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe. "Do you?"

Curran said the warnings were overwrought. He explained that a regulator — were one to actually be set up — would probably be a body "independent of government and independent of the press which will have some backup powers. That's a far cry from Zimbabwe."

Gettysburg Times to Be Sold

The family that owns The Gettysburg (Pa.) Times plans to sell the 9,300-circulation newspaper to George and Marlene Sample, with the deal expected to be final in about two months.

The sale was announced Nov. 19 by the Samples and the surviving family members of former Gettysburg Times publisher Phil Jones, who died last year.

George Sample is involved in ownership of 12 papers in five states, all with circulation below 10,000.

In Pennsylvania, those papers include The Daily News in Huntington, the Bedford Gazette, the Latrobe Bulletin, the Milton Standard, the News Chronicle of Shippensburg, The Morning-Times of Sayre and the Corry Journal.

Sample calls Gettysburg "a great market with a lot of opportunity."

The deal includes The Gettysburg Companion magazine and the Times' website, but not radio stations WGTY-FM or WGET-AM.

INDUSTRY NEWS 11-21-2012

MU journalist explores using drones for reporting

A University of Missouri journalist is studying the use of unmanned drones more commonly seen in military applications as a potential tool for gathering news.

The Columbia Missourian (http://bit.ly/TJ38fe) reports that KBIA-FM news producer Scott Pham has received a $25,000 school grant to work with counterparts in the MU College of Engineering to develop flying robots for journalism use.

Pham said the drones can take aerial photographs and record video from difficult-to-reach news scenes. He came up with the idea while reporting in southeast Missouri on the breached Birds Point Levee in October 2011.

"The reporting was difficult to do because you had to do it from the ground up, and it was so low," he said. "We would have benefited so much more from getting a bird's-eye view.

Researchers at the University of Nebraska are also studying the possible use of drones by journalists. The Lincoln school has received a $50,000 grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation to establish a Drone Journalism Lab.

The Missouri grant money will go toward drone construction, equipment purchases and teaching expenses. Pham said he hopes the first stories will be published by the end of the spring semester.

"Not knowing exactly what you're going to do is challenging," Pham said. "A good drone requires a quick reaction. They can't do that when there are wires sticking out everywhere. After we test them, we will build the drones with help from the engineering department."

Matthew Dickinson, the project's technical adviser, said the drones will be built using materials from existing components.

"When you build a house, you don't chop the tree down to build the walls," said Dickinson, an MU information technology specialist. "You go out and buy wood. We are using different materials that already exist, such as different kinds of plastic and computer chips, to build the drones."

U.S. government use of military drones has escalated rapidly under President Barack Obama's administration while also being used for covert CIA operations. The small planes can transmit live video and fire missiles, and are operated by remote control thousands of miles away at military installations such as Whiteman Air Force Base near Knob Noster.

The Federal Aviation Administration is developing regulations for commercial use of drones, with specific rules expected by 2015. A graduate journalism class assisting the project will also study the ethics of drone use to report news.

"There are a lot of civilian uses that can be good things," Dickinson said. "If someone wants an aerial shot, they can use a drone instead of paying thousands of dollars for a helicopter shot."

Pham said journalism drones could be particularly valuable in documenting rural, agricultural and environmental projects, such as droughts or flooding.

"This could be a really promising innovation when it comes to reporting," he said. "It could change the way we do it. We want journalists to do stories that put drones up in the air."

Newspaper wins open meeting ruling

A judge has ordered the Mitchell (S.D.) City Council to refrain from using attorney-client privilege as a blanket justification for closed meetings, thereby resolving a lawsuit filed three years ago by The Daily Republic.

Circuit Judge Cheryle Gering’s judgment adopted the newspaper’s interpretation of state law. The newspaper successfully claimed that the open-meetings law does not allow a public body to close a public meeting for the sole purpose of conducting a private discussion — known as an "executive session” — with an attorney.

The judgment says the Mitchell City Council may only invoke attorney-client privilege as justification for an executive session if the discussion is "strictly limited to ‘proposed or pending litigation or contractual matters.’ "

Korrie Wenzel, publisher of The Daily Republic, said he considers the judgment a victory.

"We’re happy with this decision. We felt the process, for whatever reason, was being needlessly delayed, so we are very appreciative that things finally moved forward,” Wenzel said.

The genesis of the lawsuit was a June 2, 2008, executive session conducted by the Mitchell City Council at the request of then-city attorney Randy Stiles.

After the executive session, The Daily Republic learned from two council members that the topic of the executive session was a state law requiring a public election to remove a park designation from public property.

Council members had been considering — against the wishes of some vocal opponents — removing the park designation from undeveloped public property near Mitchell Middle School. Council members had thought they could repeal the park designation themselves, but according to what two council members told The Daily Republic, Stiles said during the executive session that a public election on the matter appeared to be necessary.

In other words, The Daily Republic contends that Stiles took council members into a closed meeting to tell them the public was owed an election on the issue, rather than relating that information during the public portion of the meeting. There had been a group of people at the public meeting expecting to discuss the issue openly.

"We always have felt that what happened that night was wrong and we vowed to fight it — not necessarily for the newspaper, but for the Mitchell residents who were wronged at that meeting,” Wenzel said.

2 journalism groups merge in New England

Two leading New England journalism organizations completed a merger last week, joining forces to expand training opportunities for reporters and editors across the six-state region.

Members of the New England Society of Newspaper Editors ratified the merger with the New England Associated Press News Executives Association. Under the agreement, NEAPNEA will disband and transfer its membership and finances to NESNE, which becomes the region's pre-eminent organization for professional journalists.

"This collaboration brings together two fine journalistic organizations with mutual interests," said Jim Campanini, editor of The Sun of Lowell and the outgoing president of NESNE.

"It will strengthen our mission going forward to teach and train a new generation of reporters and editors dedicated to high standards and news excellence under one roof," he said. "I am proud of the work of the respective boards to cooperate in this exciting venture."

NEAPNEA, founded in 1948, had approved the merger in September.

NESNE members meeting at the group's autumn conference in Lowell also elected new officers for 2013. William J. Kole, AP's New England bureau chief, becomes president; James L. Franklin of The Boston Globe is vice president; and Anne Brennan of the Cape Cod Times is secretary.

Joining the NESNE board of directors are Brennan; Richard Lodge, editor of the MetroWest Daily News and other GateHouse papers; Paula Bouknight, assistant managing editor for hiring and development at The Boston Globe; and Dan Rea, host of "NightSide with Dan Rea" on WBZ 1030-AM.

The annual awards presented in the past by NEAPNEA will be blended with those awarded by the New England Newspaper & Press Association. NESNE will continue to award scholarships in honor of the late AP journalists George Esper and John Curran.

"Merging two groups that were doing many of the same things just made sense," Kole said. "It's the best way to ensure that a strong, financially viable organization will survive and thrive to encourage and recognize great journalism."

Winston-Salem Journal gets new publisher

The Winston-Salem (N.C.) Journal has a new publisher.

According to a story on the newspaper's website (http://bit.ly/TOd2Mv) Kevin Kampman replaced Jeffrey Green at the paper as part of an overall restructuring at its parent company.

The Winston-Salem Journal is owned by World Media Enterprises.

Kampman joined World Media in June as vice president of community newspapers for its Southern Group, which includes newspapers in North Carolina, South Carolina and Alabama. He will continue to serve as regional vice president for those newspapers.

Prior to being hired by World Media, Kampman was publisher of The Canton Repository, a Gatehouse Media newspaper, located in Canton, Ohio.

Newspaper does not have to produce commenters' IDs

A judge has ruled that a Memphis, Tenn. newspaper does not have to release identifying information about readers who commented on stories related to the reorganization of Shelby County's schools.

The Commercial Appeal (http://bit.ly/ZDQCSk) reports that the ruling by U.S. District Judge Samuel Mays rejects the Shelby County Commission's motion to force the newspaper to produce the identities of online commenters to 45 stories by The Commercial Appeal that ran between Nov. 19, 2010, and July 12.

The commission claimed that the comments could help them prove that state laws enabling new municipal school districts in suburban Shelby County were motivated at least in part by racially discriminatory intent.

Mays wrote that the information would not be relevant to a lawsuit challenging the creation of the six new school districts.

Christian named interim publisher of O-A News

Jim Whittum has left as publisher of the Opelika-Auburn (Ala.) News and is being replaced by Wynn Christian.

Whittum had worked as publisher since May 1. The Opelika-Auburn News (http://bit.ly/WevMJB) reports that his last day was Wednesday.

Whittum has 39 years of experience in the newspaper business. He says he's looking forward to retirement with his wife in northeast Georgia.

Alabama Group Regional Publisher Alan Davis says Christian is taking over as publisher on an interim basis.

Christian has been vice president of digital media for community newspapers of World Media Enterprises.

Fake reporter calling prep female athletes

Police say a man posing as a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter and photographer has been calling high school female athletes at home and asking to take their pictures and interview them.

Journal Sentinel security chief Robert Maldonado says reports about the impostor have been filed with law enforcement officials in Milwaukee and several suburbs, including Franklin, Cedarburg and Germantown, as well as Verona in Dane County. Police say other school districts may also be affected.

Journal Sentinel (http://tinyurl.com/cgbhg9s) prep editor Mark Stewart says staff reporters and photographers work with athletic directors and coaches and wouldn't contact athletes directly. Stewart says a call from a stranger to an athlete at home is a red flag. He says students who've been targeted seem to be female athletic standouts who have already had their pictures in newspapers or other publications.

What earnings reports have revealed about ads

Companies that sell advertising have released earnings reports for the latest quarter. Here are highlights of recent quarterly earnings reports from selected Internet and media companies and what they say about the state of spending on advertising.

— Oct. 15: Gannett Co. reports higher net income and revenue, helped by strong gains in political and Olympics-related advertising.

— Oct. 16: Advertising and marketing company Omnicom Group Inc. reports nearly flat earnings and revenue compared with a year earlier, as U.S. revenue grew but international revenue declined.

— Oct. 17: Television and digital media company Media General Inc. says its third-quarter net loss widened because of higher expenses, but revenue grew sharply thanks to an increase in political advertising and the Olympics.

— Oct. 18: Google Inc. says ad revenue rose 16 percent from the same time last year, the slowest pace in three years. The company's ad revenue had climbed by at least 21 percent in each of the previous 10 quarters. As has been the case for the past year, the average prices companies pay Google for ads appearing alongside search results also fell. The decelerating growth in ad revenue is likely being driven by the growing use of smartphones and tablet computers to access the Internet. The ads are more difficult to see on smartphones, in particular, so marketers aren't willing to pay as much.

Microsoft Corp. says revenue in its online services division grew 9 percent to $697 million, while operating loss fell 29 percent to $364 million. Online advertising revenue grew 15 percent to $655 million, with growth in search advertising revenue partly offset by lower revenue from display advertising. Microsoft says search revenue grew because of increased revenue per search and increased volumes.

— Oct. 22: Yahoo Inc. reports net revenue that barely grew at a time when advertisers are spending more money marketing their products and services online. Still, it beat expectations. Net revenue in the latest quarter rose 2 percent to $1.09 billion — about $10 million more than analysts had predicted. Net revenue is the amount of money Yahoo keeps after paying its commission to search partner Microsoft and other sites that run its ads.

— Oct. 23: Facebook Inc. discloses that some 14 percent of its ad revenue came from mobile advertising. It started showing ads to users who access Facebook from their phones and tablet computers about six months ago. Investors have been worried that Facebook isn't taking advantage of its growing mobile user base.

— Oct. 25: The New York Times Co. says advertising revenue fell 9 percent in the third quarter to $182.6 million from $200.5 million a year earlier. The company says it expects fourth-quarter advertising trends to be similar to the third quarter.

WPP Group PLC, the world's largest advertising group, lowers its full-year outlook after not doing as well as expected from the Olympics, the U.S. presidential campaign and the European soccer championships.

The McClatchy Co., which owns The Miami Herald, The Sacramento Bee and other newspapers, says advertising revenue fell 5.4 percent to $212 million from $224.2 million a year ago.

— Oct. 26: Comcast Corp. says broadcast ad revenue at NBC more than doubled to $1.99 billion, and rose 9 percent excluding the Olympics. Ad revenue on pay TV networks such as Bravo, CNBC, MSNBC and NBC Sports was up less than 1 percent to $807 million. Comcast didn't say if pay TV network advertising revenue would have fallen without the boost from the Olympics.

The Interpublic Group of Cos., which owns advertising and marketing agencies, says the weak economy in Europe and slowdown in China have led a wide array of companies to cut spending on services such as marketing and advertising. Results missed expectations.

— Nov. 2: Clear Channel Outdoor Holdings Inc. says its third-quarter earnings surged as it sold more billboard advertising in several growing international markets to overcome weakening demand in many parts of Europe's ailing economy.

— Nov. 6: News Corp., which owns the Fox network, says it saw increased local advertising, particularly for political ads. The gains were partly offset by lower national advertising revenue because of lower prime-time ratings and the Olympics on rival NBC. At its U.S. pay TV networks, advertising revenue rose 8 percent, led by Fox News and its regional sports networks.

AOL Inc. says its advertising revenue grew for the sixth straight quarter. Advertising revenue grew 7 percent to $340 million.

— Nov. 7: Time Warner Inc. says ad revenue at its television networks fell 1 percent, as it saw better rates domestically but was hurt by the timing of certain sports events. It was also hurt by the shutdown of some channels overseas and by changes in currency exchange rates, in which ad sales made abroad converted back into fewer dollars. Ad revenue at the Time Inc. publishing business fell 5 percent.

—CBS Corp. says advertising revenue fell due to poor results from CBS Radio and the impact of having programs pre-empted by the Republican and Democratic national conventions.

— Nov. 8: The Walt Disney Co. says lower network ratings at ABC led to lower advertising revenue despite higher rates. ESPN saw flat ad revenue as viewers and advertisers turned their attention toward the Olympics on NBC.

— Nov. 15: Viacom Inc. says ad revenue fell 6 percent in the U.S. and 7 percent worldwide, including the U.S. The advertising environment has slowed for most major media conglomerates, and Viacom faces additional challenges of audience weakness at its major TV networks. Viacom says ad revenue was showing signs of improvement in the current quarter, though it likely won't be enough to show growth compared with last year.

New publisher named for Tallahassee Democrat

Julie Moreno has been named the new president and publisher of the Tallahassee (Fla.) Democrat.

Gannett Co., Inc. announced Nov. 14 that Moreno will start Nov. 26.

Moreno began her career with Freedom Communications in 1986 as an account executive at The Brownsville Herald in Texas. She worked for the company for more than two decades, recently serving as publisher of The Gaston Gazette in North Carolina until the newspaper was sold earlier this year.

Moreno holds a journalism degree from the University of Missouri and an MBA from the University of Texas-Brownsville.

Observer-News-Enterprise names new publisher

Nanci Batson has been named the new publisher of the Observer-News-Enterprise of Newton, N.C.

According to the Observer-News-Enterprise (http://bit.ly/RYiigz), Batson is the first woman to hold the post of publisher in the newspaper's 133-year history.

Batson moved to Newton from Rhode Island where she was the publisher for a group of six community papers in the southern part of the state.

The Observer-News-Enterprise is owned by Horizon Publications of Marion, Ill.

Horizon Vice President Terri Leifeste, who is the group publisher for the Observer-News-Enterprise, said the papers that Batson oversaw in Rhode Island are similar to the Observer-News-Enterprise.

According to the Observer-News-Enterprise, Batson is a Texas native and veteran newspaper and magazine executive.

Interior secretary apologizes for reporter threat

U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar apologized for threatening to punch a Colorado reporter who asked him about problems with the government's wild horse program at a campaign event.

Salazar called Dave Philipps, a reporter with The Gazette of Colorado Springs, to apologize and offer him an interview, and also sent him a letter of apology. The apology came a day after the newspaper posted a story and an audio recording of comments Salazar made at an Election Day event in Fountain while on a tour to support President Barack Obama's re-election.

Salazar told Philipps by phone Nov. 15 that "I want you to hear me loud and clear," The Gazette reported (http://bit.ly/ZLfB5r). "I shouldn't have said that."

In the audio recording from the campaign event, Philipps is heard asking for an on-camera interview with Salazar, a Colorado native who previously served as a U.S. senator from the state.

After a few general questions, Philipps asked Salazar what he knew about Tom Davis — a Colorado horse slaughter proponent who has bought hundreds of wild horses gathered from public lands by the Bureau of Land Management — and about the agency's wild horse management program, which Salazar's office oversees.

Salazar answered briefly, saying the BLM has made a "major effort" to address long-standing problems with wild horses on public lands.

Salazar noted he was appearing at the campaign event, about 80 miles south of Denver, in a "personal capacity," and said his office could arrange to talk about Davis "at an appropriate time."

After the interview, Salazar accused Philipps of setting him up. He then posed the threat, saying: "If you do that to me again, I'll punch you out."

Also on the audio, Philipps is heard telling Salazar that he previously got no response after trying multiple times to arrange an interview through Salazar's press secretary.

The Gazette reported that it initially held off on posting the audio in hopes of getting an interview with Salazar. But a Colorado Springs-based wild horse advocacy group, The Cloud Foundation, publicized the exchange Nov. 12 and the Gazette published a story Nov. 13.

Philipps, a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2010, and Gazette editor Carmen Boles declined to comment on the matter to The Associated Press, but the newspaper did editorialize in favor of Salazar issuing an apology and granting an interview.

The BLM has struggled with how to manage growing horse herds, which can double naturally within five years if left unchecked. Horses have been injected with drugs and vaccines to slow reproduction and rounded up for adoption, but the agency currently has more horses in captivity than are left roaming the range.

Salazar addressed the problem in his phone call to Philipps.

"To tell the truth, the wild horse issue has been the most difficult issue we have dealt with. We've had hundreds of meetings on it and there are still a lot of problems," he said, according to the newspaper's account.

The Gazette previously reported that Davis acknowledged shipping horses out of state without inspections, in violation of branding laws. The case has been turned over to prosecutors in southern Colorado.

In a story for the nonprofit news organization ProPublica in September, Philipps reported that Davis has purchased 70 percent of the wild horses sold by the BLM since 2009 through its sale program and signed contracts promising that the animals wouldn't be slaughtered. Davis has said he has lived up to his contracts.

Buffett's firm will close suburban DC newspaper

Warren Buffett's company is planning to close a small Virginia newspaper that it bought from Media General earlier this year.

The 10,000-circulation Manassas (Va.) News & Messenger, which began publishing in 1869, has been struggling to compete in the Washington, D.C., suburbs. It will print its last issue on Dec. 30.

Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway Inc. said Nov. 14 it has no plans to close any of its other newspapers.

The Manassas closing will eliminate 33 jobs. An additional 72 corporate positions that Berkshire acquired with the Media General deal will be eliminated.

The Omaha World-Herald reported the closure on Nov. 14. Officials at Berkshire's newspaper unit, which is run by World-Herald executives, declined to comment on the closing.

Buffett said the Omaha World-Herald announced the closure because it oversees Berkshire's newspapers, but he didn't respond to questions about the decision.

After Berkshire bought the Media General newspapers, Buffett said Berkshire may buy more newspapers as long as they cover their communities well and aren't very large.

The Manassas newspaper certainly fit Buffett's criteria as a small publication, but Terry Kroeger, who oversees Berkshire's newspaper division, told the Omaha World-Herald that the News & Messenger had a difficult time maintaining a sense of community in the area it covered, and it had been losing money for years.

The News & Messenger, which is based in Prince William County, Va., is also competing directly with several other media outlets in the Washington D.C. metropolitan area, including the Washington Post, in which Buffett's company has a large ownership stake.

"We didn't see any way to really turn it back into a profitable enterprise, reliably, so what made the most sense was to just cease publication," Kroeger said to the Omaha World-Herald. Kroeger said he recommended the closing to Buffett.

Outsell Inc. media analyst Ken Doctor said the closing appears to be a result of Berkshire's initial review of the Media General newspapers it bought. Doctor said the Manassas newspaper didn't appear to be in a strong position in a competitive market, so it didn't fit well with Berkshire's model.

"They really prefer to be in communities where they can be the big dog," Doctor said.

Along with the Manassas newspaper, a companion newspaper, NOVA Weekly, and two websites associated with the publications will close. The employees losing their jobs will receive severance pay and assistance finding other jobs, the company said in a statement posted on the News & Messenger's website.

Aside from the 62 Media General papers Berkshire bought earlier this year, Buffett's company owns the Buffalo News, the Omaha World-Herald and several other newspapers in Nebraska and Iowa.

Buffett said in May that he was looking to purchase newspapers in cities and towns where residents care deeply about where they live.

"If a citizenry cares little about its community, it will eventually care little about its newspaper," Buffett said.

Newspapers remain a relatively small part of Berkshire Hathaway, which owns an assortment of more than 80 subsidiaries and holds major investments in companies such as Coca-Cola Co., Wells Fargo and IBM. Berkshire's subsidiaries include insurance, manufacturing, railroad, utility, furniture and restaurant firms.

Homeless newspaper loses Brentwood lawsuit

The Contributor, a newspaper written by and sold by homeless and formerly homeless, is celebrating its fifth anniversary, but one Nashville, Tenn., suburb has won a federal lawsuit that prevents their street vendors from selling to motorists.

The newspaper is sold by hundreds of vendors on street corners to drivers and pedestrians in and around Nashville. In celebration of their fifth anniversary, Nashville Mayor Karl Dean and the paper's staff, volunteers and supporters were gathering at the Downtown Presbyterian Church on Wednesday.

But a federal judge on Nov. 14 dismissed the newspaper's case against the city of Brentwood, a wealthy suburb in Williamson County, after granting the city's motion for summary judgment.

The Contributor filed the lawsuit last year after some of their vendors were cited in Brentwood for selling newspapers to motorists stopped in the street or at traffic lights.

The vendors were cited under a previous city ordinance that stated no one could stand in city streets or public sidewalks to sell any goods or materials.

Brentwood city attorney Roger Horner said the ordinance was revised in July of 2011, but still prohibits people standing in the streets or sidewalks from selling material or soliciting people in cars.

U.S. District Judge Todd Campbell ruled that the revised ordinance does not violate constitutional rights to free speech because the ordinance is based on public safety concerns and does not specifically target The Contributor.

"It was not adopted because of disagreement with the message of The Contributor; it was adopted in response to valid concerns about the unconstitutionality of the old ordinance," Campbell wrote in his Oct. 29 ruling. "It was adopted for legitimate reasons (public safety, traffic safety and traffic flow), separate from the content or viewpoint of The Contributor."

Irwin Venick, a Nashville attorney representing The Contributor, said Wednesday that they are still deciding whether to appeal the ruling.

Venick said the newspaper's method of distribution was meant to "promote face-to-face interaction between homeless or formerly homeless vendors with the public."

He said while vendors could still sell their newspaper to pedestrians in the city, he noted, "There are very few sidewalks and few people who walk on sidewalks in Brentwood."

INDUSTRY NEWS 11-15-2012

WVU students produce content for state newspapers

West Virginia University journalism students are getting real-world exposure for their classwork, producing stories and videos for the state's newspapers.

For about a month, Mountaineer News Service has been offering free content to members of the West Virginia Press Association.

Seniors produce multi-platform packages that target younger audiences and help improve newspapers' online presence.

Hampshire Review Managing Editor Jim King says it gives his editors access to stories they wouldn't otherwise find.

He says finding content that resonates with 20-somethings and 30-somethings is critical — and difficult.

The partnership grew from a restructured course that puts print, photo and video students in a professional atmosphere to produce stories.

Professor John Temple says they aren't expected to be experts, but they do get a better understanding of what the industry needs.

Halifax sells Santa Rosa newspaper

Halifax Media Group, which owns The Gadsden Times, has sold the Santa Rosa (Calif.) Press Democrat and its affiliated publications to Sonoma Media Investments, LLC. Halifax Media purchased the Press Democrat, The Petaluma Argus-Courier and North Bay Business Journal in January from the New York Times Co. as part of an acquisition that included 16 publications.

"The significant investment by Sonoma Media to buy our California businesses shows confidence in newspapers and that they are a solid investment,” said Michael Redding, CEO of Halifax Media Group. "This new group of investors isn’t just interested in buying the businesses, they are also interested in growing the business. We wish Sonoma Media and the great employees all the best.”

With lifer just out of prison, book release moved

Publication has been moved up for an award-winning journalist's book about Bill Macumber, the inmate recently freed after nearly 40 years in an Arizona prison on murder charges he still disputes.

Henry Holt and Company announced last week that it will publish Barry Siegel's "Manifest Injustice" in January, two months earlier than planned.

Siegel is a former Los Angeles Times correspondent and Pulitzer Prize winning feature writer. He interviewed the 77-year-old Macumber for the book, which will include his release from prison.

Macumber was released this week after he pleaded no contest in a Phoenix courtroom to second-degree murder and was sentenced to time already served.

Macumber was convicted of first-degree murder in 1975 for the killings of two 20-year-old telephone company workers. He insists he didn't commit the crimes.

Federal prosecutor demoted for online comments

U.S. Attorney Jim Letten has demoted his top assistant prosecutor for posting anonymous comments on a newspaper website about a South Louisiana landfill owner who is being investigated by federal agencies.

River Birch landfill owner Fred Heebe sued Assistant U.S. Attorney Jan Maselli Mann last week, saying she had defamed him in the comments on NOLA.com, the website of The Times-Picayune.

Letten confirmed in a written statement that Mann posted the comments. She remains an assistant U.S. attorney, but she was removed from two supervisory positions: first assistant and chief of the criminal division.

Heebe's attorney, Kyle Schonekas, declined to comment.

Letten said he has been in touch with Justice Department officials in Washington since he learned about Heebe's allegations.

"Because this matter is now under review by the Department of Justice in Washington, D.C., the release of any additional information by my office would not be appropriate," he wrote.

Mann is the second federal prosecutor in New Orleans to get in trouble for posting online comments about Heebe. Sal Perricone resigned in March after acknowledging he used the name "Henry L. Mencken1951" for Nola.com posts criticizing judges, politicians and cases.

Heebe has not been charged with a crime, but River Birch CFO Dominick Fazzio is charged with plotting to defraud a construction management company.

Newspaper seeks buyer for stake in Rockies

The Denver Post is seeking to sell its minority ownership in the Colorado Rockies.

The Post holds a 7.3 percent state in the major league baseball club that is majority owned by brothers Dick and Charlie Monfort.

Ed Moss, CEO of the Denver Post, said Digital First Media, which operates MediaNews Group, owner of the newspaper, is seeking to sell the minority stake in the Rockies as the Post focuses on core print and digital business.

"We've made great strides in growing our audience in the last few years, so when we look at anything that the company is involved in, what we want to do is have our focus on our core business," Moss said. "And anything that's not tied to it, we're going to evaluate whether we want to stay associated with those businesses or not."

Forbes magazine recently valued the franchise at $464 million, which would put the newspaper's stake at more than $33 million.

"If we don't get what we think would be a fair value, we are certainly happy to keep our interest," Moss emphasized.

The Post has held its stake in the team since the Rockies were founded more than two decades ago and Moss said the decision to seek a buyer for its stake is not a reflection of the team's ownership or the newspaper's relationship with the Monforts.

"We have a great relationship with the Rockies organization and certainly our reporting has been totally independent of our ownership stake and that will always continue," Moss said.

Moss said Los Angeles-based investment bank Park Lane and Katten Muchin Roseman LLP, a sports law group, will field offers for the newspaper's 7.3-percent stake.

The Victoria Advocate sells Matagorda Advocate

Southern Newspapers has bought the competing Matagorda Advocate from The Victoria Advocate and plans to merge the paper into the competing Bay City (Texas) Tribune.

Terms of the sale weren't disclosed in the Wednesday announcement.

Tribune Publisher Angie Pagel said the newspaper hopes to retain the best features of the Matagorda Advocate in The Tribune. The consolidated operation will remain at The Tribune building.

The Victoria Advocate launched the Matagorda Advocate 15 years ago. The Bay City Tribune has published since 1845.

Southern Newspapers also publishes The Facts of Brazoria County, the Galveston County Daily News and The Baytown Sun.

INDUSTRY NEWS 11-08-2012

RI judge hears Legion of Christ documents case

A Rhode Island judge heard arguments Nov. 5 in a legal tug-of-war over sealed documents relating to the Legion of Christ, a disgraced Roman Catholic religious order.

The Associated Press, The New York Times, The Providence Journal and the National Catholic Reporter want Superior Court Judge Michael Silverstein to unseal documents from a lawsuit contesting the will of an elderly widow who left the Legion $60 million. The Legion argues that the information could taint prospective jurors and wants it to remain hidden from public view.

The Vatican took over the Legion in 2010 after determining that its late founder, the Rev. Marcial Maciel, had sexually molested seminarians and fathered three children by two women.

The widow, Gabrielle Mee, died in 2008. Her niece Mary Lou Dauray had sought to challenge the will, saying her aunt had been defrauded by the order into leaving it her fortune. Silverstein last month threw out the challenge because he determined the niece lacked standing. Her attorney plans to appeal.

Joseph Cavanagh, attorney for the media organizations, told Silverstein that there was no justification to seal the documents, which he said could shed light on the Legion's operations. He said the religious order was attempting to use the courts to avoid publicity.

"This jury argument is a fake argument," Cavanagh told Silverstein. "There's a public interest argument here which clearly outweighs it. It shouldn't be kept from the public."

The Legion's attorney, Joseph Avanzato, said the media organizations are attempting to intervene in a case that's already settled. Should Dauray appeal, however, Avanzato said the documents must be kept under seal to ensure potential jurors approach the case with an open mind. He said media coverage of the lawsuit has already been "prejudicial and inaccurate."

"We would urge the court not to throw more fuel on that fire," Avanzato said.

Silverstein did not say when he would rule on the request to unseal the documents.

Bernard Jackvony, Dauray's attorney, is also seeking the documents' release. Jackvony said the documents compiled in the course of the lawsuit contain information about the Legion that isn't known by the public. The documents were sealed by a probate court judge in 2009.

The Legion, which has facilities in Rhode Island, has been the target of a petition from women once associated with the order and is being sued in Connecticut by a man who says he is Maciel's son.

Times Media CO. publisher named Publisher of the Year

Times Media Co. Publisher Bill Masterson Jr. has earned the prestigious Publisher of the Year award from Editor & Publisher magazine.

The award was announced in late October, and Masterson is featured in the publication's November edition. The recognition, which garners entries from around the world, honors publishers who not only are successful in their roles, but also have participated in efforts outside of their day-to-day tasks and are committed to the industry's survival.

Masterson, who last month was promoted to vice president of publishing for The Times' corporate parent Lee Enterprises Inc., said he was surprised to learn about the honor and was thankful employees thought to nominate him. The 52-year-old Valparaiso, Ind., resident has been publisher of The Times in northwest Indiana since 2006 and he has worked 25 years as a newspaper publisher.

Kristina Ackermann wrote in the magazine that Masterson earned the nod for his work in "bringing together local business leaders, leading a capital campaign to raise funds for charity, working to preserve jobs, offering high-quality content, and fostering a spirit of innovation."

Times Executive Editor William Nangle recommended Masterson for the award and said the publisher represents "the best the industry has to offer."

With offices out, NY Daily News keeps publishing

The New York Daily News got its Plan A and its Plan B eviscerated by Hurricane Sandy. The storm knocked out of commission the newspaper's Manhattan main office and the place where it planned to work during emergencies — its Jersey City, N.J., printing plant.

Help from other news outlets let the Daily News keep publishing its daily print edition and its frequently updated website throughout Monday's storm. The following Thursday evening, a Daily News editor said the newspaper would resume printing at the Jersey City plant within hours.

But it was unclear how long the main office would be out of use. The office, in an evacuation zone near the Staten Island Ferry, was flooded and lost power.

Ted Young, editor of Daily News Online, went into work at the main office at 6 a.m. Monday dragging an air mattress, expecting to spend the night. He did, but it wasn't quite how he imagined.

At about 8:45 p.m., the lights went out, he said. Another hour later, the computers were down. The phones went out, and so did most cellphone coverage. Young and about 15 other staffers waited through the night, smelling gas and watching the front lobby fill with 3 feet of water.

But even then, the newspaper kept updating, Young said. That's because Lauren Johnston, an editor who had gotten stuck in Pittsburgh, updated the website as reporters throughout the city sent her updates.

Back at the darkened main office, a few staffers made an escape through the lobby around 2 a.m. The rest trekked out around 7 a.m., through a lobby that was wet but no longer flooded.

Young said that website traffic surged on Monday evening, making the ordeal worthwhile.

"Our main concern," he said, "was how do we keep letting New Yorkers know what's going on."

He never did get to use the air mattress: He neglected to inflate it before the power went out.

On Tuesday, he and a few other staffers moved into borrowed space in The Associated Press' newsroom in midtown. Others worked from other temporary offices or spread out around the city and worked from wherever they could find wireless signals.

While the Daily News printing press was down, rival newspapers including The New York Times, Newsday and Newark, N.J.'s The Star-Ledger agreed to help print copies and perform some of the company's other commercial printing work, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The Daily News, a pugnacious tabloid that has one of the highest circulations among U.S newspapers, is owned by publisher Mort Zuckerman through a limited partnership called Daily News, L.P.

The newspaper was responsible for one of the most famous headlines in journalism. "Ford to City: Drop Dead," it wrote after President Gerald Ford wavered on a bailout for the struggling city in 1975.

On Thursday, the Daily News ran a front-page photo of firefighters hoisting an American flag in a flooded part of Queens under the headline "Stormin' Back."

Young said that the Jersey City plant was to print Friday's newspaper Thursday night.

The main office, meanwhile, was still deserted except for a clean-up crew. Hoses pumped water from the front lobby onto the street. The front doors were covered in yellow caution tape, but a supervisor there said that Daily News staffers might be allowed in Friday to pick up belongings.

Alan Murray named Pew Research Center president

Alan Murray, deputy managing editor and executive editor for The Wall Street Journal's online business, has been named president of the Pew Research Center.

The center's board of directors said last week that Murray will take over in January, succeeding public-opinion expert Andrew Kohut.

Kohut will stay on as founding director and will provide counsel on political polling and global attitudes research.

The Pew Research Center is a Washington-based subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts. It conducts public opinion polling, demographic research and performs other work to inform the public, the press and policymakers. It does not take a position on policy issues.

Murray is an award-winning journalist with more than three decades of experience covering politics and economics. Murray has served in numerous roles at The Wall Street Journal, including Washington bureau chief, and currently oversees the newspaper's websites. He is also the author of three books.

"Alan Murray is ideally suited to lead the Pew Research Center in the years ahead," Donald Kimelman, chairman of the center's board, said in a statement. "Alan has had an exemplary journalistic career in which he has demonstrated great integrity and a solid commitment to impartiality. He's a highly effective and creative leader. And he has a deep understanding of the digital arena in which the center's future will play out."

The center's parent organization, The Pew Charitable Trusts, is an independent nonprofit organization.

Former Opelika-Auburn News publisher to lead Tuscaloosa News

James Rainey, former publisher of the Opelika-Auburn (Ala.) News, is the new publisher of The Tuscaloosa News.

The Tuscaloosa News (http://bit.ly/SgS9rJ) reported Rainey's appointment last week. The 46-year-old newspaper executive was publisher of the Opelika-Auburn News from December 2002 to May of this year, when he became editor and publisher of the New Braunfels Herald-Zeitung in Texas. He said he would have remained in Texas but could not pass up the chance to lead the Tuscaloosa newspaper.

Rainey said his father was a University of Alabama graduate and named him after one of the football team's chaplains during the Paul "Bear" Bryant era.

Rainey, an Atlanta native, started his newspaper career in Georgia, including serving as general manager and executive editor of the News Daily in Jonesboro and the Daily Herald in McDonough and as advertising director and associate publisher of the Fulton County Daily Report, an American Lawyer Media publication.

During his tenure at the Opelika-Auburn News, the paper won the Alabama Press Association's top annual award, the General Excellence Award, eight times. In 2006, he supervised from concept to completion the building of a 40,000-square-foot multimedia complex with a new printing press. He served on the APA's board from 2007-2011 and was chairman of its legislative committee in 2011-2012.

Rainey said a good publisher is committed to the newspaper's staff and the public that the newspaper serves. "I look forward to getting involved in the community and finding various ways to serve it," he said.

Nebraska attorney general backs student newspaper

The Nebraska Attorney General's Office has backed a student newspaper in its quest for records regarding the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's new health center.

The office of Attorney General Jon Bruning called on UNL to release documents regarding bids to The Daily Nebraskan. But the office also said the university could black out portions containing proprietary information about the only company to submit a bid, Bryan Health.

The opinion from Bruning's office is not an order to the university and doesn't carry the force of law.

UNL spokeswoman Kelly Bartling told The Associated Press last week that the university will black out the proprietary information in the bid and provide the document to The Daily Nebraskan and anyone else who asks for it. She expects that to happen by next week.

An independent, student-run newspaper, The Daily Nebraskan sought the attorney general's help last month when the university refused to share contents of the private hospital company's bid to build and operate the new center, according to the Lincoln Journal Star (http://bit.ly/SBs5dD).

Andrew Dickinson, The Daily Nebraskan's top editor, said the newspaper wanted to examine the bid so it could share with readers more details about what Bryan Health would do.

"Potential privatization of the health center can affect students in a lot of ways, and those ways aren't particularly clear at this point," Dickinson said.

In an editorial, the newspaper said the university should be more transparent about the process of selecting a private contractor.

UNL Chancellor Harvey Perlman announced plans in September to seek a private vendor for the center. An evaluation committee will review the Bryan Health bid and make a recommendation to Perlman.

So far, plans are for the university to hand over operation of the health center to a private provider around May 1. The university would require the contractor to keep the health center's nearly 100 employees on the payroll for at least 90 days after the contract's effective date.

Santa Rosa Press Democrat sold to local company

Florida-based Halifax Media Group has agreed to sell the Santa Rosa (Calif.) Press Democrat and its affiliated publications to a recently formed local California company.

Halifax announced the agreement last week. Halifax purchased the Press Democrat, The Petaluma Argus-Courier and North Bay Business Journal in January from the New York Times Company as part of an acquisition that included 16 publications, mostly in the southeastern U.S.

Halifax CEO Michael Redding says selling the California publications to Sonoma Media, which was formed by local investors, makes geographic sense.

Halifax Media Group — founded in 2010 — is headquartered in Daytona Beach. The group consists of 36 newspapers and affiliated websites, published in six states.

New publisher for Daily News-Sun and other suburban Phoenix papers

Three suburban Phoenix newspapers — the Daily News-Sun, Surprise Today and Glendale-Peoria Today — have a new publisher.

Marji Ranes succeeds Jason Joseph, who left to become general manager for Houston Community Newspapers, said Terry Horne, general manager of Arizona's 1013 Communications, which owns the newspapers, among others in Arizona and Texas.

Ranes previously served as vice president of sales and marketing for technology company Caliber Data, the Daily News-Sun reported (http://bitly.com/RSVosF). She also was general manager of The Times of Northwest Indiana, associate publisher of the North County Times in Southern California, and a general manager over community newspapers for the Arizona Republic.

"Returning to Arizona, and to media, is really like coming home for me," Ranes said. "That return is even more exciting because I am doing so as the leader of a uniquely local voice. The West Valley is home to a vibrant group of communities that are playing an increasingly important role in metro Phoenix's future."

Joseph had served as publisher at the Daily News-Sun, Surprise Today and Glendale-Peoria Today for eight years. In Texas, he will also serve as publisher of The Courier of Montgomery County.

Horne said Joseph "will be a strong leader for the company's new Texas properties."

"We are fortunate to have someone of Marji Ranes' experience and leadership to follow him at our West Valley newspapers," Horne added.

In addition to the West Valley newspapers, 1013 Communications also owns the East Valley Tribune, Ahwatukee Foothills News and Tucson Explorer. The company, based in Reno, Nev., also recently acquired the 28 newspapers published by Houston Community Newspapers, along with community newspapers in the Dallas area.

INDUSTRY NEWS 11-2-2012

European newspapers take on Google, look to Brazil with hope

European news organizations bleeding money and readers are trying to avoid extinction by asking governments in France, Germany and Italy to step in and charge Google for links to stories the Internet search giant has always gotten for free.

Critics — including, unsurprisingly, Google — say the strategy is shortsighted and self-destructive, and the search engine warns it will stop indexing European news sites if forced to pay for links. But publishers advocating a "Google tax" aimed at benefiting their industry point to the example of Brazil, where their counterparts abandoned the search engine and say repercussions have been minimal.

The dispute underscores a fundamental question facing media agencies around the world: Who should benefit from links to online content that is costly to produce and yet generates a fraction of the ad revenue that once allowed newspapers to flourish?

Europe has tried to sidestep Google before. Six years ago, then-French President Jacques Chirac unveiled plans for Quaero (Latin for "I search") as the answer to U.S. dominance of the Internet. The multi-platform search and operating system was supposed to work with desktop computers, mobile devices and even televisions.

Despite millions spent to develop Quaero, it went nowhere.

This week, implicit threats hovered over a meeting between current French President Francois Hollande and Eric Schmidt, Google's executive chairman.

Hollande demanded Google reach a deal with publishers over the copyright dispute and also address the French taxes it escapes by basing its European headquarters in Ireland. Google essentially reiterated a point it made in a recent letter to French publishers: Paris' latest attempt to impose itself would force readers to "Anglo-Saxon" sites based in countries with more favorable copyright laws, such as Britain and Ireland.

Google's post-meeting statement said the discussions dealt with "the contributions of the Internet to job creation and the influence of French culture in the world."

Adding to the pressure on Google in France, a French newspaper reported Wednesday that French authorities are threatening Google with a 1 billion euro tax bill and investigating alleged financial wrongdoing.

Google France denied being notified of such a tax bill and said it will "continue to cooperate with the French authorities." Government spokeswoman Najat Vallaud-Belkacem wouldn't comment on the report in the weekly Canard Enchaine, except to say that if there were a tax probe, it would be covered by laws on fiscal secrecy.

French publishers, along with counterparts in Germany and Italy, are hoping Brazil will be the proof that there is a successful way to confront Google.

After failing to come to terms with Google in the past year, Brazil's biggest papers — representing 90 percent of circulation — decided to boycott Google News by essentially making their content unavailable to anyone using the search engine. The result? Negligible losses in Web traffic, the Brazilian papers say.

Brazilian newspapers haven't ruled out reopening talks with Google, if the company whose name is synonymous with "search" agrees to pay for their content. Unlike in Europe, the Brazilian publishers have not turned to their government to act as a mediator or impose a tax as part of their dealings with Google.

"Newspapers live off advertising revenues, like Google. They're our competition and they have billions and billions in revenues globally," said Ricardo Pedreira, executive director of Brazil's National Association of Newspapers.

Still, Pedreira is not convinced Brazil is a good model for European nations. "Every country has a specific reality, and I think there will probably evolve different models in each nation," he said.

Others in Brazil have warned about long-term consequences of the boycott.

Carlos Castilho, a media critic and TV journalist, writing on the press watchdog website Observatorio da Imprensa, argued that the boycott was a backward strategy, because "news is everywhere today and to surround it with walls of copyrights is like trying to dry ice."

The growth of search engines as a way to find information is affecting news organizations in different ways.

Print news was suffering in the United States and Europe long before financial crises took hold in recent years, its business model eroded by television and the Internet. As print advertising revenues have declined, more media organizations are trying to boost circulation and earn more through subscriptions, including charging for online content.

The New York Times is among the most prominent news organizations with a website paywall. The Associated Press and Google have a long-standing business agreement that includes Google licensing of AP content as well as joint efforts to improve news products and services.

European publishers have seen less rapid change in readership patterns as a result of the Internet and have been able to stave off the dramatic losses that gutted American print journalism. Still, competition has grown fiercer and profits slimmer with the onset of the European debt crisis. In France, the once-iconic newspaper France Soir went into liquidation in July. In October, dapd, a major Germany news agency, filed for bankruptcy protection.

German publishers already are getting some government support: A measure is headed through the legislature to force search engines to pay for links that include excerpts of content.

And in Italy, publishers say they are willing to risk leaving Google if the search engine refuses to pay, citing a study that indicates that clicks from Italian readers would drop by 6 or 7 percent — "a very low percentage," said Isabella Splendore, lawyer for the Italian Newspaper Publishers Federation.

The European publishers insist they are not trying to keep readers from getting information, but that they deserve compensation for use of their intellectual property. But Jeremie Zimmerman, of the French Internet liberty group the Quadrature of the Net, described engaging in the dispute with Google as "idiotic."

"It shows that the industry hasn't understood anything about the Internet and is fundamentally conservative about its future, and defending private interests rather than adapting to technology," he said.

Emma Llanso of the Washington-based Center for Democracy and Technology said that, at least for now, the dispute among governments, Google and publishers is a loss for readers.

"When we're looking at the free flow of information online, how much relevance do national boundaries have?" she said. "As the Internet becomes a primary source of information around the world, governments see a threat or a way to benefit. I think we are seeing a lot of national governments struggling to think of what they want it to be."

Wall Street Journal remains No. 1 US newspaper in circulation

U.S. newspaper circulation was almost unchanged in the six months that ended in September as publications continued to make gains in digital editions, according to data from a media industry group.

Average daily circulation for print and digital editions combined fell 0.2 percent for the 613 newspapers included in the semiannual study by the Audit Bureau of Circulations. Sunday circulation for the 528 newspapers in the report Oct. 31 increased 0.6 percent.

The Wall Street Journal kept its position as the No. 1 newspaper. Its average circulation grew 9.4 percent to 2.3 million, largely because more readers are paying to read content on its website and mobile devices. Digital circulation grew about 257,000 from a year ago, more than making up for a loss of nearly 60,000 in print.

USA Today was second at 1.7 million, down 3.9 percent. USA Today, which is owned by Gannett Co., remained the No. 1 print newspaper, with a higher circulation than the Journal after digital editions are excluded. Unlike the Journal, USA Today doesn't charge for website access. Its digital circulation is limited to other products, such as subscriptions on Amazon.com Inc.'s Kindle.

The New York Times followed at 1.6 million, a 40 percent increase. More than half of the Times' circulation was for digital editions, including subscriptions for full access to the Times' website and mobile apps. The company attributed the gains to the growing popularity of its digital editions and to new rules giving publications more flexibility to count as multiple subscriptions the same person's usage on multiple outlets, such as the website and a Kindle.

The Times was the leading Sunday newspaper, with a circulation of 2.1 million. The Journal and USA Today do not have Sunday editions.

Circulation numbers affect advertising rates at newspapers, particularly for printed editions. Print advertising revenue has been declining in recent years as readers and advertisers shift to the Internet. The economic downturn accelerated the decline. Some newspapers have seen growth in digital ad revenue, but it hasn't been enough to offset the losses in print advertising.

Circulation numbers for the 25 largest newspapers

The top 25 U.S. newspapers by average weekday and Sunday circulation from April to September. The figures include digital editions such as those on tablet computers or websites that charge for access. Also included are branded editions such as regional editions or those tailored for commuters.

1. The Wall Street Journal —2,293,798 weekday (includes 794,594 digital editions); no Sunday edition.

2. USA Today —1,713,833 weekday (includes 86,307 digital editions); no Sunday edition.

3. The New York Times —1,613,865 weekday (includes 896,352 digital editions); 2,100,893 Sunday (includes 850,816 digital editions).

4. Los Angeles Times —641,369 weekday (includes 151,577 digital and 35,294 branded editions); 962,192 Sunday (includes 153,016 digital editions)

5. Daily News of New York —535,875 weekday (includes 146,605 digital and 5,435 branded editions); 655,647 Sunday (includes 146,289 digital and 49,103 branded editions).

6. San Jose (Calif.) Mercury News —529,999 weekday (includes 43,318 digital and 362,093 branded editions); 651,337 Sunday (includes 22,813 digital and 443,175 branded editions).

7. New York Post —522,868 weekday (includes 178,113 digital editions); 434,043 Sunday (includes 163,517 digital editions).

8. The Washington Post —462,228 weekday (includes 27,535 digital editions); 674,751 Sunday (includes 23,323 digital editions).

9. Chicago Sun-Times —432,455 weekday (includes 70,932 digital and 169,163 branded editions); 408,677 Sunday (includes 71,200 digital and 151,295 branded editions).

10. The Denver Post —412,669 weekday (includes 176,446 digital and 10,105 branded editions); 604,184 Sunday (includes 149,097 digital and 66,713 branded editions).

11. Chicago Tribune —411,960 weekday (includes 23,112 digital editions); 766,561 Sunday (includes 32,580 digital editions).

12. The Dallas Morning News —410,130 weekday (includes 64,788 digital and 152,997 branded editions); 700,649 Sunday (includes 64,774 digital and 339,409 branded editions).

13. Newsday of Long Island, N.Y. —392,989 weekday (includes 114,620 digital editions); 471,662 Sunday (includes 129,817 digital editions).

14. Houston Chronicle —325,814 weekday (includes 91,331 digital editions); 1,070,290 Sunday (includes 71,514 digital and 587,025 branded editions).

15. Tampa Bay (Fla.) Times —313,003 weekday (includes 13,610 digital and 81,059 branded editions); 379,375 Sunday (includes 12,672 digital editions).

16. The Star-Ledger of Newark, N.J. —311,904 weekday (includes 127,430 digital editions); 442,274 Sunday (includes 114,662 digital and 27,536 branded editions).

17. Star Tribune of Minneapolis —300,277 weekday (includes 65,802 digital editions); 578,657 Sunday (includes 42,172 digital and 59,912 branded editions).

18. The Philadelphia Inquirer —296,427 weekday (includes 43,224 digital and 59,474 branded editions); 468,559 Sunday (includes 59,661 digital and 23,018 branded editions).

19. The Plain Dealer of Cleveland —293,139 weekday (includes 73,630 digital editions); 449,363 Sunday (includes 73,162 digital and 60,223 branded editions).

20. The Orange County (Calif.) Register — 285,088 weekday (includes 15,273 digital and 109,237 branded editions); 387,547 Sunday (includes 7,236 digital and 85,671 branded editions).

21. The Arizona Republic —275,622 weekday (includes 839 digital editions); 483,556 Sunday (includes 807 digital and 49,086 branded editions).

22. Las Vegas Review-Journal — 252,174 weekday (includes 13,412 digital and 109,399 branded editions); 200,239 Sunday (includes 9,791 digital and 45,000 branded editions).

23. The Boston Globe — 230,351 weekday (includes 49,432 digital editions); 372,541 Sunday (includes 49,196 digital editions).

24. The Oregonian —228,599 weekday (includes 17,323 digital and 2,193 branded editions); 304,701 Sunday (includes 17,343 digital and 19,870 branded editions).

25. Honolulu Star-Advertiser — 224,973 weekday (includes 29,932 digital and 69,319 branded editions); 170,298 Sunday (includes 29,781 digital editions).

Judge orders newspaper to reveal name of commenter

A northeast Kansas newspaper has been ordered to identify a person who posted a comment on its website about a story on a murder trial for which that commenter was serving as a juror.

Shawnee County District Judge Steven Ebberts last week denied a request by The Topeka Capital-Journal to quash a district attorney's subpoena seeking the name, address and Internet Protocol address of a poster who goes by the pseudonym "BePrepared."

That person is believed to have been a juror in the first-degree murder trial of Anceo D. Stovall, 27, who was being tried on 11 charges that included the shooting death of Natalie Gibson and the wounding of her partner, Lori Allison, on July 21, 2011, during a robbery.

The Capital-Journal (http://bit.ly/YnjqwU ) reported that court records indicate BePrepared accessed a news story posted July 19 while the person and other jurors were deliberating Stovall's fate two days later.

After a four-week trial and three days of deliberations, the jury convicted Stovall on July 24 of aggravated robbery, found him not guilty of the burglary of a Jeep, and was unable to reach verdicts on nine other charges, including murder.

District Attorney Chad Taylor said Stovall would be tried again on those other charges.

Stovall's attorney, Jonathan Phelps, said BePrepared posted at 1:45 p.m. July 21: "Trust me that's all they got in their little world, as you know, I have been there. Remember the pukes names they will do it for ever." Phelps filed a motion seeking a new trial, saying the online posting constitutes juror misconduct and hindered Stovall's right to a fair trial.

At a hearing Sept. 6, a man believed to be BePrepared asserted his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination when asked whether he was a juror in Stovall's trial, whether he made posts on CJOnline, and whether he posted under the name BePrepared.

While the man's name was reported by the newspaper in coverage of the Sept. 6 hearing, The Associated Press isn't naming him because he has not been charged with a crime. Ebberts' decision noted that interference with the judicial process is a felony.

The judge said the poster's identity was relevant to an investigation of criminal misconduct during the trial. He wrote that the prosecutor's office has claimed that without the information "a miscarriage of justice" would result.

He also agreed that the prosecutor's office couldn't reasonably obtain the poster's identity through any means other than CJOnline.

Mike Merriam, the newspaper's attorney, said The Capital-Journal would not appeal Ebberts' decision.

"This was not unexpected," he said. "It's disappointing, but I understand his reasoning."

Squabble over school newspaper ad content

A First Amendment squabble is brewing in California over high school newspaper and yearbook advertising content.

The Sacramento Bee (http://sacb.ee/S6CVGK ) says the Roseville Joint Union High School District's decision this month to give the superintendent the right to approve ads has raised legal issues that could have broad implications districts statewide.

The school board gave the superintendent the right to prohibit political campaigning and religious symbols in ads.

Attorney Adam Goldstein of the Student Press Law Center in Virginia says students could file lawsuits claiming their free speech rights have been violated.

And advertisers could go to court complaining their right to religious speech has been quashed.

Assistant Superintendent Ron Severson says the district will re-examine the ad policy.

Newspaper endorsements flood in, but do voters care?

In one October weekend, Republican Mitt Romney and President Barack Obama each scored a victory from a major newspaper in the all-important state of Florida. On one end, the Tampa Bay Times endorsed Obama, praising him for steady economic progress and sure-footed foreign policy. On the other, the Orlando Sentinel backed Romney, describing him an able and tested leader even as it frowned on his conservative statements about social issues.

Roughly halfway between the two along Florida's coveted, swing-voting I-4 corridor, Lorrie Walker shrugged.

"I don't think it has any influence at all," said Walker, an undecided voter in the town of Lakeland.

A public relations professional, Walker says she gets why both candidates are plugging their endorsements. But she doesn't think it works, primarily because newspaper editorial pages often have a reputation for leaning liberal or conservative. "I discount it, because I think, 'Of course they're endorsing that candidate,'" she said.

As the campaign nears its nail-biting conclusion, both campaigns are trumpeting a flood of newspaper endorsements — and using them as a stamp of approval in television ads and emails. On Sunday alone, Obama's campaign touted 10 endorsements he picked up, including the Detroit Free Press and the Toledo Blade. Fourteen papers, including the Florida Times-Union and the Richmond Times-Dispatch, gave their nod to Romney.

Nowhere do the candidates crave a newspaper's approval more than in the handful of battleground states that will decide the next president.

Obama minced no words in an interview he gave Tuesday to the Des Moines Register as he courted its support.

"I want your endorsement," Obama said. He added: "You'll feel better when you give it."

They didn't. Instead, on Saturday, the influential Iowa paper backed Romney and said he "offers a fresh economic vision."

But who reads newspapers anymore? For all the energy spent winning and then advertising endorsements, do they make any difference?

"The short answer is no," said Jack Pitney, a political scientist at Claremont McKenna College. "But at this stage in the campaign, you're looking for every edge you can get, even if it's a microscopic edge."

Newspaper circulation has steadily declined in recent years, from almost 47 million per day in 2004 to barely 40 million last year, according to the Newspaper Association of America. While there's little data to show whether voters listen to what their local paper has to say about elections, there is some evidence that endorsements from people — like celebrities and other politicians — sometimes have a minor effect. In January, a Fox News poll showed 29 percent of voters would be more likely to vote for a candidate endorsed by former President Bill Clinton. Seventeen percent said the same about former President George W. Bush.

At this stage, campaigns, more than anything, want to establish that momentum is swinging in their candidate's direction. With the debates and the nominating conventions over, that's getting increasingly tough to do. So along with poll numbers and fundraising totals, newspaper endorsements are one way to show that a candidate is benefiting from a burst of enthusiasm.

Even if candidates don't know exactly when an endorsement is coming, they generally have a sense of which way a newspaper is likely to go, based on endorsements from previous years and editorials the paper has written about the candidates earlier in the race. But readers often choose newspapers that match their views about the world, political strategists say, and so it is likely readers are already supportive of the candidate their paper chooses and won't be swayed.

One exception: Endorsements that seem to fly in the face of a newspaper's perceived political persuasion.

"If a traditionally left paper endorses Romney, or a traditionally right paper endorses Obama, that matters, because people go, 'Huh, that's curious,'" said Dan Hazelwood, a Republican strategist.

State and local races are the other scenario where endorsements could play a larger role. Voters often pay less attention to races for Congress, city council or county commissioner than they do about the White House race. With less information to guide their decision, they may turn to a local paper whose reporters they expect have been closely tracking the issues.

"This is what they do for a living, so they usually have the best information," said Cody Slater, a 23-year-old voter in Petrolia, Pa., who is undecided in the presidential race.

Still, not all newspapers want to get their hands dirty by wading into messy political fights. Count the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel among them; The paper announced Friday it had decided to "get out of the political endorsement business."

"This loss of credibility is a high price to pay to conjure a ghost of newspapering past that we have come to believe is of little value today," wrote editorial page editor David Haynes. "Endorsements are a relic of a time when every town had more than one newspaper, of a time long before the wide river of commentary now available to anyone with a smartphone."

New York Times lists newspaper endorsements for president

The presidential endorsements of the nation’s largest papers are starting to trickle in. The New York Times reports that, not surprisingly, most editorial boards supported the same party in 2012 as they had in 2008. But there were some notable exceptions:

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/us/politics/newspaper-presidential-endorsements.html?smid=tw-nytimes#/?filter=all

What earnings reports have revealed about ads

Companies that sell advertising have begun releasing their earnings reports for the latest quarter. Here are highlights of recent quarterly earnings reports from selected Internet and media companies and what they say about the state of spending on advertising.

— Oct. 15: Gannett Co. reports higher net income and revenue, helped by strong gains in political and Olympics-related advertising.

— Oct. 16: Advertising and marketing company Omnicom Group Inc. reports nearly flat earnings and revenue compared with a year earlier, as U.S. revenue grew but international revenue declined.

— Oct. 17: Television and digital media company Media General Inc. says its third-quarter net loss widened because of higher expenses, but revenue grew sharply thanks to an increase in political advertising and the Olympics.

— Oct. 18: Google Inc. says ad revenue rose 16 percent from the same time last year, the slowest pace in three years. The company's ad revenue had climbed by at least 21 percent in each of the previous 10 quarters. As has been the case for the past year, the average prices companies pay Google for ads appearing alongside search results also fell. The decelerating growth in ad revenue is likely being driven by the growing use of smartphones and tablet computers to access the Internet. The ads are more difficult to see on smartphones, in particular, so marketers aren't willing to pay as much.

Microsoft Corp. says revenue in its online services division grew 9 percent to $697 million, while operating loss fell 29 percent to $364 million. Online advertising revenue grew 15 percent to $655 million, with growth in search advertising revenue partly offset by lower revenue from display advertising. Microsoft says search revenue grew because of increased revenue per search and increased volumes.

— Oct. 22: Yahoo Inc. reports net revenue that barely grew at a time when advertisers are spending more money marketing their products and services online. Still, it beat expectations. Net revenue in the latest quarter rose 2 percent to $1.09 billion — about $10 million more than analysts had predicted. Net revenue is the amount of money Yahoo keeps after paying its commission to search partner Microsoft and other sites that run its ads.

— Oct. 23: Facebook Inc. discloses that some 14 percent of its ad revenue came from mobile advertising. It started showing ads to users who access Facebook from their phones and tablet computers about six months ago. Investors have been worried that Facebook isn't taking advantage of its growing mobile user base.

— Oct. 25: The New York Times Co. says advertising revenue fell 9 percent in the third quarter to $182.6 million from $200.5 million a year earlier. The company says it expects fourth-quarter advertising trends to be similar to the third quarter.

WPP Group PLC, the world's largest advertising group, lowers its full-year outlook after not doing as well as expected from the Olympics, the U.S. presidential campaign and the European soccer championships.

The McClatchy Co., which owns The Miami Herald, The Sacramento Bee and other newspapers, says advertising revenue fell 5.4 percent to $212 million from $224.2 million a year ago.

— Oct. 26: Comcast Corp. says broadcast ad revenue at NBC more than doubled to $1.99 billion, and rose 9 percent excluding the Olympics. Ad revenue on pay TV networks such as Bravo, CNBC, MSNBC and NBC Sports was up less than 1 percent to $807 million. Comcast didn't say if pay TV network advertising revenue would have fallen without the boost from the Olympics.

The Interpublic Group of Cos., which owns advertising and marketing agencies, says the weak economy in Europe and slowdown in China have led a wide array of companies to cut spending on services such as marketing and advertising. Results missed expectations.

Milwaukee newspaper stops making endorsements

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has decided to stop making political endorsements in most races.

Editorial page editor David Haynes wrote in a column last week (http://bit.ly/Y34vba ) that making endorsements puts readers' perceptions of the newspaper's independence at risk during the election season.

He said there would be rare occasions they recommend a candidate, like when they endorsed Gov. Scott Walker in the June recall. The editorial board thought the effort wasn't reasonable over a policy dispute.

He called endorsements "a relic of a time when every town had more than one newspaper." He said readers now have a wide array of commentary available.

Haynes said the newspaper's editorial board would continue to share opinions on political issues but they will leave the final voting decisions up to the voters.

New York Times 3Q net income drops 85 percent

The New York Times Co. reported a sharp decline in its third-quarter net income Oct. 25 and said revenue fell below analysts' expectations amid weakness in print and digital advertising.

The company's stock fell 21 percent in afternoon trading.

The media company, which publishes its namesake newspaper and the Boston Globe, earned $2.3 million, or 2 cents per share, in the July-September period. That's down 85 percent from $15.7 million, or 10 cents per share, in the same period a year earlier.

In the year-ago quarter, the Times Co. booked a one-time gain of $37.8 million, or 24 cents per share, from the sale of its stake in the Red Sox and other sports holdings. This was partially offset by a charge of $27.5 million, or 18 cents per share, from its early repayment of a $250 million high-interest loan from Mexican telecommunications billionaire Carlos Slim.

The company booked severance costs totaling $1.7 million, or a penny per share, in both quarters.

Excluding the severance expenses and the results of businesses it no longer owns, the Times Co. booked a loss of 1 cent per share in the latest quarter, the same as in the third quarter a year ago. Analysts were expecting third-quarter adjusted earnings of 8 cents per share.

Revenue fell less than 1 percent to $449 million from $451 million. Analysts, on average, were expecting revenue of $477 million, according to a poll by FactSet.

Advertising revenue fell 9 percent in the third quarter to $182.6 million from $200.5 million a year earlier. Circulation revenue rose 7 percent to $234.9 million from $218.6 million.

"While our results for the third quarter reflect continued pressure on advertising revenues, total circulation revenues rose led by the ongoing expansion of our digital subscription base," said Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., chairman and CEO, in a statement.

The company said it expects fourth-quarter advertising trends to be similar to the third quarter.

The Times Co. ended the quarter with 592,000 paying digital subscribers, up 11 percent from 532,000 at the end of the second quarter.

In March of 2011, the company erected a so-called electronic pay wall system, which charges readers for monthly access to an unlimited number of articles on its website and on mobile devices. The strategy, closely watched by executives in the industry, has helped to boost the Times' circulation and is being adopted at many other newspapers.

Monitor publisher named in McAllen, Tex.

Stephan T. Wingert was named publisher Oct. 25 of The Monitor newspaper, of McAllen, Tex., and as regional vice president responsible for all AIM Media Texas properties in the Rio Grande Valley.

The announcement was made by Jeremy L. Halbreich, AIM Media chairman and chief executive officer, and Rick Starks, president and chief operating officer. The appointment is effective Nov. 5.

Wingert is regional vice president for the Pacific Region of Freedom Communications Inc., and publisher of the Daily Press/Desert Dispatch in Victorville, Calif. He previously served in a number of management roles at The Monitor. His father, Larry, was publisher of The Monitor from 1977 to 1995.

AIM Media owns daily newspapers and affiliated websites in McAllen, Harlingen, Brownsville and Odessa, as well as various weekly and monthly publications and related websites.

Will Fleet quits Fresno Bee (Calif.) to buy Tracy Press

The publisher of the Fresno Bee is stepping down to take over co-ownership of a newspaper in Tracy.

Will Fleet announced his departure to Bee employees on Oct. 23. His last day is Oct. 31.

Fleet and Ralph Alldredge bought the 114-year old Tracy Press in San Joaquin County out of bankruptcy. It publishes weekly.

Alldredge also owns the Calaveras Enterprise and was the 2011-2012 president of the California Newspaper Publishers Association.

Fleet was named publisher of the Bee in 2008. He told staff members the purchase shows that he believes in the future of print newspapers.

The Bee's vice president for circulation, Tom Cullinan, will serve as interim publisher during the search for Fleet's replacement.

In 2010, the Tracy Press had a weekly circulation of 19,000.

Open records case decided in Kentucky newspaper's favor

The Kentucky attorney general's office has ruled in favor of the Lexington Herald-Leader in the newspaper's attempt to see documents from Eastern Kentucky University about the departure this year of the school's arts center director.

The attorney general's opinion, which carries the weight of law, said EKU violated the Kentucky Open Records Act by denying documents regarding the former director of the Center for the Arts, Debra Hoskins.

University officials tried to fire Hoskins in June, a week before she announced her resignation to the center's board. The Herald-Leader (http://bit.ly/SoAAtn) requested documents pertaining to the issue, but the school denied the request, citing a confidentiality agreement signed by EKU and Hoskins.

The opinion holds that such agreements don't outweigh the public's right to know details of a public agency's operation.

INDUSTRY NEWS (10-25-2012)

Digital newspaper archive hits 5M pages online

An effort to digitize the nation's historically significant newspapers is posting its 5 millionth page on a free searchable database online.

As of Oct. 22, the Chronicling America project has posted 5 million pages from more than 800 newspapers in 25 states. The project was launched in 2007 by the Library of Congress and National Endowment for the Humanities with 32 state partners.

The site provides free access to newspapers published between 1836 and 1922.

One feature displays news from 100 years ago. In October 1912, there were headlines about former President Theodore Roosevelt being shot in Milwaukee while running for president again with the Progressive Party.

The site averages more than 2.5 million page views per month. Organizers say it's used by students, researchers, congressional staff and others.

Columbus, Ind., newspaper building gets landmark status

A building housing an Indiana newspaper has become one of the youngest structures in the country to be designated a historic landmark.

The 41-year-old Republic building in Columbus is one of 26 sites nationally added to the landmarks list last week. The newspaper reports (http://bit.ly/QvsEnE) it is the seventh building in Columbus to gain that status.

The Interior Department says the newspaper building is "one of the best examples of the work of Myron Goldsmith."

Goldsmith and former Republic publisher Bob Brown developed the concept for the newspaper plant based on an open design offering full views of the building from the outside.

Other Columbus buildings on the landmarks list include three churches, an adult education center, The Miller House and the former Irwin Union Bank and Trust building.

Big Ohio newspapers split on president

Two of the biggest newspapers in the pivotal battleground state of Ohio split on their endorsements in the presidential race.

The Plain Dealer of Cleveland supported a second term for Democratic President Barack Obama. The Columbus Dispatch backed Republican Mitt Romney. Another major Ohio newspaper, the Akron Beacon Journal, also endorsed Obama for re-election.

The Obama and Romney campaigns each quickly sent out releases highlighting the endorsement that went their way. Both campaigns have focused major portions of their resources and candidates' time on the state, considered likely to be crucial to determining the election winner.

The Plain Dealer (http://bit.ly/T7HVgE ) endorsed Obama for a second term, after also endorsing him in 2008. Its endorsement praised Obama's leadership on issues such as the auto industry bailout, health care overhaul, education and war on terror. It said the auto plan was "unpopular but gutsy," and it worked, especially for Ohioans in places such as Toledo and Lordstown.

While saying this year's endorsement comes with "less enthusiasm or optimism" than four years ago, the newspaper criticized Romney for shifting positions and "tendency to bluster on foreign policy." The Plain Dealer's editorial board wrote that it was "sorely tempted" to endorse Romney because of missed opportunities and "grim economic statistics" under Obama.

"But Romney's frequent changes raise questions about his core principles and make his lack of policy details all the more troubling," the newspaper wrote.

"Obama has shown that he favors engagement over bluster, and practical solutions over easy bromides," The Plain Dealer wrote. "That's what the country needs."

The Dispatch said the United States needs a new direction. Its endorsement editorial stated (http://bit.ly/VqiLx6 ) that it warned four years ago about Obama's lack of experience, and says the result has been economic stagnation, massive unemployment, record-setting debt and government intrusion into the private sector.

"Obama has failed," The Dispatch's editorial board wrote. "That is why Mitt Romney is the preferred choice for president. Romney's adult life has been spent turning around troubled private and public institutions."

It praised Romney's "wealth of executive experience" to lead the nation out of economic malaise. The paper also endorse Obama's opponent in 2008, Republican John McCain.

"In 2008, Americans made a leap of faith. ... That faith was not rewarded," The Dispatch editorial concluded. "This time, voters should place their hopes for change in experience, by electing Romney."

The Beacon Journal also praised Obama for the auto industry makeover and for making progress in dire circumstances that he found when he took office. The newspaper's editorial (http://bit.ly/Qzj7fi ) added that Obama had promised too much.

"Yet he shouldn't be measured merely against his soaring words. What matters are his real accomplishments and the direction he proposes for the years ahead," the Beacon Journal editorial stated. It also questioned Romney's commitment on issues.

Newsweek to quit publishing the print edition of magazine

Newsweek will print its final edition at the end of this year.

After nearly 80 years of publication, the news magazine will shift to a digital-only format, available online and on tablet computers, editor-in-chief Tina Brown said on the magazine's website. Its last will be the Dec. 31 issue.

"We are transitioning Newsweek, not saying goodbye to it," Brown said. "We remain committed to Newsweek and to the journalism that it represents. This decision is not about the quality of the brand or the journalism - that is as powerful as ever. It is about the challenging economics of print publishing and distribution."

The digital-only publication, supported by paid subscriptions and dubbed Newsweek Global, will be aimed at a "highly mobile, opinion-leading audience who want to learn about world events in a sophisticated context," Brown said.

Newsweek's announcement marks a significant transition for the magazine, which was founded in 1933 and has been undergoing its own identity crisis and financial turmoil in recent years. Its problems are emblematic of the disruptions faced broadly by the print media industry, as readers shift online and away from the most valuable advertising.

In 2010, Newsweek and The Daily Beast announced they would merge, jointly owned by Sidney Harman, an audio equipment magnate who died last year, and IAC, the media and advertising company run by Barry Diller, chairman and senior executive.

Brown cited a Pew Research Center report that found 39 percent of Americans get their news from an online source.

"In our judgment, we have reached a tipping point at which we can most efficiently and effectively reach our readers in all-digital format," she wrote. "This was not the case just two years ago. It will increasingly be the case in the years ahead."

Brown said the shift would entail "staff reductions," though she didn't elaborate.

Newsweek had unique troubles as industry recovers

Newsweek's decision to stop publishing a print edition after 80 years and bet its life entirely on a digital future may be more a commentary on its own problems than a definitive statement on the health of the magazine industry.

Magazine ad revenue in the U.S. is seen rising 2.6 percent this year to $18.3 billion, according to research firm eMarketer. That would be the third increase in three years, driven mainly by gains in digital ad sales, though print ads are expected to be flat.

Paid magazine subscriptions were up 1.1 percent in the first half of the year, according to the Audit Bureau of Circulations. And while single-copy sales at newsstands are down 9.6 percent, overall circulation - the bulk of which is in print - is steady compared to a year ago.

The water is so warm for the magazine industry that in the first nine months of the year, 181 new magazines were launched while only about a third as many, or 61, closed, according to publication database MediaFinder.com.

By several measures, the magazine business has stabilized, albeit at a lower level, since the Great Recession ended three years ago.

For some, that casts a harsher light on Newsweek's decision to abandon print -- affecting the nearly 1.4 million Newsweek subscribers who get their copy each week in the mail. They say it speaks to the magazine's trouble connecting with and keeping its readers.

That brings to mind some questionable covers, like the July 2011 what-if image depicting what Princess Diana would have looked like at age 50, or last month's "Muslim Rage" cover depicting angry protesters, which was roundly mocked on social networks like Twitter.

Newsweek is using a difficult print ad environment as an "excuse" for its decision to end print runs, said Samir Husni, director of the Magazine Innovation Center at the University of Mississippi School of Journalism. He lays the blame at the feet of Tina Brown, the editor who took control of Newsweek when it merged with the news website she ran, The Daily Beast, two years ago.

"Tina Brown took Newsweek in the wrong direction," Husni said. "Newsweek did not die, Newsweek committed suicide."

To be sure, the problems were acute by the time Brown took control. Newsweek's circulation had plummeted from about 3.1 million in 2007 to 1.8 million in 2010, when The Washington Post Co. sold the magazine to stereo equipment magnate Sidney Harman for $1. Harman later placed Newsweek into a joint venture with IAC/InterActiveCorp's The Daily Beast website in an effort to trim the magazine's losses and widen its online audience.

This year, total circulation is down to about 1.5 million, less than half of what it was five years earlier, even including about 29,000 digital copies.

Meanwhile, circulation of rival Time magazine is down from about 4 million in 2006 to 3.3 million this year, a decline of just 19 percent.

General news format magazines have been challenged with the rise of news reading on the Internet, much of which is free. And Newsweek isn't the first to drop its print product. US News & World Report dropped its weekly print edition years ago and now focuses on the Web and special print editions, such as a guide to the best graduate schools. SmartMoney announced in June that it was going all-digital.

Yet others are succeeding. The Economist has nearly doubled its circulation to 1.6 million from 844,000 a year ago. The Week is up to 541,000 from 525,000.

And unlike the bold move by Newsweek, many publications are taking steps to add digital formats while maintaining the print product, which is still the mainstay of their business.

Paul Canetti, the founder and CEO of MAZ, a company that helps magazines publish digital editions, says he tells prospective clients to "dip their toes" into digital publishing and "wade in as the market demands it." He notes only about a quarter of Americans own tablet computers, which have become a popular way to read online magazines.

"Maybe what they're really facing is an audience-connection problem and not really a print-versus-digital problem at all," he said.

Going all-digital could solve many problems associated with the print magazine business. For instance, magazine publishers charge advertisers according to a so-called "rate card" that is based on a promised number of paying subscribers, called a "rate base." If subscriptions fall, publishers then must spend a lot of money mailing potential customers and offering heavy discounts just to keep advertising revenue from falling.

In contrast, online advertising usually requires advertisers to pay only for ads that are seen or clicked on by readers, a number that is easily measurable in real time and that doesn't require the discounting of subscription prices.

Moving online could solve that problem, which hit Newsweek in particular, said Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism at the Pew Research Center in Washington.

"Newsweek's problems came from spending an enormous amount of money to maintain a guaranteed rate base," he said. "They ended up spending millions each year to try to reach a number of readers they needed to reach."

Newsweek is betting that there will be enough growth in the number of tablet users to make up for the fact that when its print runs end with the Dec. 31 issue, a lot of subscribers will be left without a way to get the magazine.

The magazine expects that the number of tablet users in the U.S. will exceed 70 million this year, up from 13 million just two years ago, Newsweek spokesman Andrew Kirk said.

"We have reached a tipping point in the industry at which we can most efficiently and effectively reach ... readers in an all-digital format," he said.

However, it's a choice that doesn't reflect the general health of the industry, said Mary Berner, president of The Association of Magazine Media.

She said she doesn't want a decision by one publication to be an indication that the entire magazine industry "is going down the toilet."

"That's simply not true," she said. "The experience of reading the print version of magazines is not going away."

Going out of print, Newsweek ends an era

There was a time when the newsweeklies set the agenda for the nation's conversation — when Time and Newsweek would digest the events of the week and Americans would wait by their mailboxes to see what was on the covers.

Those days have passed, and come the end of the year, the print edition of Newsweek will pass, too. Cause of death: The march of time.

"The tempo of the news and the Web have completely overtaken the news magazines," said Stephen G. Smith, editor of the Washington Examiner and the holder of an unprecedented newsweekly triple crown — nation editor at Time, editor of U.S. News and World Report, and executive editor of Newsweek from 1986 to 1991.

Where once readers were content to sit back and wait for tempered accounts of domestic and foreign events, they now can find much of what they need almost instantaneously, on their smartphones and tablet computers. Where once advertisers had limited places to spend their dollars to reach national audiences, they now have seemingly unlimited alternatives.

So on Thursday, when Newsweek's current owners announced they intended to halt print publication and expand the magazine's Web presence, there was little surprise. But there was a good deal of nostalgia for what Smith called "the shared conversation that the nation used to have," when the networks, the newsweeklies and a few national newspapers reigned.

Before Newsweek, there was Time — the brainchild of Henry Luce and Briton Hadden. The first issue of the first newsweekly came out in 1923, and the formula, from the first, was to wrap up the week's news and tie it with a bow, telling it with a singular voice.

Newsweek — or as it was originally called, News-week — came along in 1933. The founding editor was Thomas Martyn. The first foreign editor of Time, he was British-born and had a single leg, having lost the other in World War I. His magazine sold for 10 cents and was advertised as "an indispensable complement to newspaper reading, because it explains, expounds, clarifies."

The magazine struggled for four years, until it merged with another magazine, Today, lost the hyphen, and emerged under the ownership of Averill Harriman and Vincent Astor, two of the country's wealthiest men.

The modern era at Newsweek began in 1961, when it was purchased by the Washington Post Co. Benjamin Bradlee, who was Newsweek's Washington bureau chief at the time and later executive editor of the Post, helped negotiate the sale.

Edward Kosner, who worked at Newsweek from 1963 to 1979, ending as executive editor, recalled the time as a kind of golden age of the newsweeklies.

"It's a lost world," he said. "It's like talking about the 19th century.

"Everybody cared about what was on the cover Monday morning. People took the magazines very, very seriously. They were important. They were influential."

Richard M. Smith joined Newsweek for a two-week writing tryout in 1970 and stayed until 2007, rising to executive editor before retiring as president and chief executive officer. Newsweek was always the scrappy competitor to Time, which grew to a corporate behemoth with numerous magazines and media properties and had the larger circulation; Smith said he and his colleagues preferred to think of themselves as "the noble guerrilla band, fighting the 'panzer division on Sixth Avenue.' We took pride in our speed and flexibility and occasional irreverence."

He recalled with pride Newsweek's coverage of civil rights in the 1960s, the end of the Vietnam War and economic issues in the 1970s, the AIDS epidemic in the 1980s.

Perhaps because of Time's Luceian origins — he and his wife, Clare Boothe Luce, were major Republican figures — Newsweek was often perceived as a more liberal counterweight. Its readers loved the weekly Periscope section, with its editorial cartoons and hot-off-the-presses news blurbs. Where Time only later started providing bylines for its stories, Newsweek offered star columnists like George Will, Eleanor Clift and Anna Quindlen.

Life in the newsweeklies, Stephen Smith recalls, was nothing like today's frenetic media sprint. At the start of each week, reporters would come into work for a couple of days and think about story ideas and how to pitch them. The correspondents were far flung; the editing and fact-checking were meticulous.

"That world doesn't exist anymore," he said.

The magazines have tried to adjust. They do not rehash the week's events as they once did. They offer more opinion, more analysis.

Newsweek often struggled over the years, and the Post sold it to stereo equipment magnate Sidney Harman in 2010 for $1. He died the next year, but not before the magazine was joined to The Daily Beast Web operation.

The cost of maintaining a network of correspondents has risen dramatically, along with the costs of printing and postage. Meanwhile, Newsweek's circulation dropped from 3.14 million in 2000 to 1.5 million in 2012. Time, too, has dropped, but not as precipitously, from 4.2 million in 1997 to 3.38 million now.

Other newsweeklies have done better: The Economist, with its upscale readership, went from less than 1 million in 2000 to 1.5 million in 2012, and The Week also has made gains.

Regardless, it is clear that the golden age of newsweeklies will not return.

Kosner recalled a time when there might be a presidential debate on a Tuesday night, and his readers would eagerly await the arrival of the next issue of Newsweek — five days later — to find out the story behind the story, to hear what the newsmagazine had to say about what had happened. Now, he says, they merely go to CNN, or log on to Slate.

"Time marches on," he said.

But for how long?

Publisher of newspaper in Easton, Pa., resigns

The publisher of The Express-Times of Easton, Pa., has resigned.

The newspaper reported (http://bit.ly/XzBtzH) that Martin K. Till has resigned as president of Lehigh Valley Media Group and Penn Jersey Advance. The company publishes The Express-Times, the website lehighvalleylive.com and affiliated publications.

Till said in a statement to the newspaper that he had decided to pursue new opportunities after 14 years with the company.

Richard Diamond has been named as Till's interim replacement. He heads Advance operations in Trenton and Jersey City, N.J., and will be based in Easton as he serves the interim role.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette names new president

The Pittsburgh-Post Gazette has a new president.

The paper says in a memo that Joseph Pepe has been named to the position.

Pepe replaces former president Christopher Chamberlain, who left the paper in July.

Most recently, Pepe was the president and publisher of The Commercial Appeal in Memphis, Tenn. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism from the University of Oklahoma and has worked for over three decades in the media industry as an executive at several large media companies, including Gannett and the E.W. Scripps Company.

Vt. newspaper to sell some buildings, but will stay

Vermont's largest newspaper is selling some of the buildings it owns in downtown Burlington, but the Free Press plans to stay as a tenant.

In a story published last week on the newspaper's website, Free Press Publisher Jim Fogler (http://bfpne.ws/S7WUX6) says seven buildings with about 45,000 square feet of unused space will be put on the market.

The newspaper's editorial and business operations require only about 10,000 square feet.

The Free Press will keep five buildings on South Winooski Avenue that house the mailroom and printing press.

The total value of the land being put up for sale is $3.3 million.

Los Angeles Times sues for release of LA teacher ratings

The Los Angeles Times is suing the Los Angeles Unified School District to obtain its teacher ratings.

The newspaper (http://lat.ms/Qz0c1X) says it wants to obtain confidential ratings for more than 10,000 math and English teachers. The ratings are based on how well students do on standardized tests.

The Times has tried to obtain the names and scores of the instructors but the district has refused, saying it could be an invasion of privacy.

The Times says district officials declined to comment on the suit.

Seattle Times reporters protest campaign ads

More than 100 reporters, photographers, designers and other staffers signed a letter protesting The Seattle Times Co.'s decision to support the campaigns of Republican gubernatorial candidate Rob McKenna and a gay marriage referendum.

The staffers sent the letter last week — one day after the state's largest newspaper ran a full-page ad backing McKenna.

More ads supporting McKenna and gay marriage are expected to run in what company officials said is a push to demonstrate the effectiveness of newspaper political advertising. The amount of the ads will amount to about $75,000 in-kind contributions for each campaign.

In the letter, the staffers said the ad campaign threatens to compromise the newsroom's integrity, pointing out the newspaper company has now become a top contributor to McKenna's campaign by running the ad.

"We are now part of a campaign's machinery, creating a perception that we are not an independent watchdog," the letter stated.

Seattle Times. Co. spokeswoman Jill Mackie said publisher Frank Blethen appreciates the staffers sharing their views and "notes that their doing so reinforces the reality of the independence/separation between journalism and this effort we are all talking about."

She said Blethen knew the ad campaign could bring pushback, but decided to move forward.

The newspaper's editorial board has endorsed McKenna over Democratic candidate Jay Inslee in what is one of the most watched campaigns for governor in the country.

Mackie said that about $100 million will be spent in political advertisement this cycle in Washington. The newspaper company is actively looking to get a share of that money.

"When one is financially responsible for paying for the journalism we produce every day, one has to give serious thought to all legitimate ideas," Mackie said Thursday.

She added the pilot program is not aimed at attracting political advertising money in this election, but rather in subsequent cycles.

The letter from staffers said the ad campaign undermines the newspaper's core mission of journalism.

"We strive to remain independent from the institutions we cover. We shine a light on the process from the outside. We are not part of the process," the letter said.

Puppy retrieved from newspaper sales box in Neb.

Officials have cited a trucker who put a puppy into newspaper sales box to keep it safe while he bought some lunch in the Nebraska capital city of Lincoln.

The Lincoln Journal Star reports (http://bit.ly/Pu0WWf) that Nebyou Brook, of Oakland, Calif., told animal control officials that he didn't want to leave his 7- to 9-week-old terrier in his truck, and he couldn't take it into the fast-food restaurant.

So Brook put some coins in a nearby newspaper paper sales "honor box" and went inside for some food.

Another man saw what happened, so he popped some coins into the box and retrieved the pup.

The long-haul trucker was cited for animal neglect but allowed to keep the dog.

A phone listing for Brook couldn't be found.

Prosecutors win key legal issue in CIA leak case

Prosecutors have won a key legal ruling in their case against a former CIA officer who helped capture a key al-Qaida operative in Pakistan but is now accused of leaking the names of covert operatives to journalists.

The judge who will oversee John Kiriakou's trial next month ruled last week that prosecutors will not have to prove that Kiriakou actually intended to harm the United States by allegedly leaking the covert officers' identities. Instead, they will only have to show that Kiriakou had "reason to believe" that the information could be used to injure the U.S.

U.S. District Judge Leonie Brinkema issued the ruling. Kiriakou is charged with one count of disclosing classified information identifying a covert agent, three counts of illegally disclosing national defense information and one count of making false statements. He faces up to 45 years in prison if convicted.

Trying to prove that Kiriakou, a CIA veteran who played a central role in the agency's capture of al-Qaida terrorist Abu Zubaydah in Pakistan in 2002, intended to harm the United States could have proven exceedingly difficult. When a judge imposed a similar standard in a leak case against two pro-Israel lobbyists, prosecutors ended up dropping charges they had been pursuing for years.

Kiriakou's lawyers argued for that stricter "intent-to-harm" standard to be applied in the Kiriakou case. They were demanding the government turn over classified evidence that would demonstrate Kiriakou's devotion to the U.S. That material includes details about his role in the capture of Abu Zubaydah, who gave interrogators information that led to the arrest of "dirty bomb" plotter Jose Padilla and exposed Khalid Sheikh Mohamed as the mastermind of the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks.

Prosecutors, though, successfully argued that the stricter standard should not be applied to a government employee who was on notice about the importance of protecting classified information, and Brinkema agreed.

"Kiriakou was a government employee trained in the classification system who could appreciate the significance of the information he allegedly disclosed," Brinkema wrote. "Accordingly, there can be no question that Kiriakou was on clear notice of the illegality of his alleged communications."

Kiriakou faces another potential setback in his defense: two journalists Kiriakou wants to depose have filed motions to quash the subpoenas. The journalists say they enjoy immunity from the subpoenas under the First Amendment protections guaranteeing freedom of the press. One of them is Washington Post researcher and former ABC producer Matthew Cole, identified in court papers only as "Journalist A."

A third journalist linked to the case, New York Times reporter Scott Shane, so far has not filed a motion to quash, but the paper has said it would resist any effort to compel Shane's testimony.

Court papers indicate that the investigation of Kiriakou began in 2009 when authorities became alarmed after discovering that detainees at Guantanamo Bay possessed photographs of CIA and FBI personnel. The investigation eventually led back to the alleged leaks by Kiriakou, according to a government affidavit.

The papers indicate prosecutors believe Kiriakou leaked the name of one covert operative to a journalist, who subsequently disclosed the name to an investigator working for the lawyer of a Guantanamo detainee.

Kiriakou's trial in U.S. District Court in Alexandria is scheduled for Nov. 26. He is free on unsecured bond.

New CEO starts at Washington Times

The new CEO of The Washington Times has formed a five-person senior leadership team to run the daily operations of the newspaper.

The Times reported (http://bit.ly/TuBDE4) last week that in his second day on the job, Larry Beasley announced a new strategy to reach profitability. He said he is committed to keeping The Times as a five-day-a-week print publication, while expanding its digital-first publishing capabilities.

Beasley also announced that Ed Kelley, the top editor for 18 months, has stepped down. A search is under way for a new editor. The newsroom will report to managing editor Christopher Dolan in the meantime.

INDUSTRY NEWS (10-18-2012)

Newspaper article helps uncover man's identity

A newspaper article has helped uncover the identity of a severely developmentally disabled man known as John D108 Doe who has lived in a group home in Detroit since 2008.

Relatives came forward this week saying the man the Detroit Free Press wrote about in that day's editions was 46-year-old Maurice Williams. He disappeared several months after his mother, who was his primary caregiver, died in 2008, the newspaper reported (http://on.freep.com/Rx2Pma ).

He was found that year wandering the streets. Williams doesn't speak beyond a few words, and his fingerprints didn't bring back any matches.

Kathleen White-Montgomery, owner of Guardianship Service, became his legal guardian in May after a hearing in Wayne County Probate Court. She and her daughter, Stacey Conyers, who also works for the company, worked to learn his identity and they contacted the newspaper about him.

His cousin Olivia Williams, 52, of Detroit, made arrangements to leave work early Monday to meet with White-Montgomery.

"It's been so long," she told White-Montgomery before breaking down in tears.

Family members said they filed multiple missing-persons reports with police, repeatedly checked with the morgue and called nursing homes, but ran into dead ends. Olivia Williams brought a photo of her cousin when he was growing up and showed it to White-Montgomery and Conyers.

"I'm so happy to have an identity for this man," White-Montgomery said.

It's unclear when Williams will be reunited with his family. White-Montgomery said she wants to be careful for his sake and isn't sure whether he will recognize them.

Audré Watts, who owns the group home where he lives, also tried to get more information. She began celebrating his birthday on Oct. 15 years ago after he wrote "10-15" on a piece of paper, which she believed he meant was his birthday. Family members said his birthday is June 30, 1966.

Regardless, a birthday celebration was held for him on Monday.

The state Department of Human Services has said 49 living John and Jane Doe adult protective services cases have been documented in Michigan since 1994.

Publisher switches to GOP for NYC mayoral run

Newspaper publisher Tom Allon has switched to the Republican Party for his long-shot bid for mayor of New York City.

Allon announced that he would leave the Democratic Party in order to increase his odds of making it to the 2013 general election ballot.

Allon's Manhattan Media publishes several neighborhood newspapers as well as City Hall and The Capitol. It also publishes the magazines Avenue and New York Family.

His campaign has struggled for attention in a Democratic primary field that includes elected officials such as City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and Public Advocate Bill de Blasio.

Allon said he would be a centrist politician like Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

Bloomberg switched from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party for his 2001 mayoral bid. He later became an independent.

Gannett reports higher 3Q earnings, revenue

Gannett Co. reported higher net income and revenue this week, helped by strong gains in political and Olympics-related advertising.

The media company said it earned $133.1 million, or 56 cents per share in the July-September period, up 33 percent from $99.8 million, or 41 cents per share, a year earlier.

Revenue grew 3 percent to $1.31 billion from $1.27 billion.

Analysts, on average, were expecting earnings of 53 cents per share, on revenue of $1.29 billion, according to a poll by FactSet.

Gannett, based in McLean, Virginia, owns USA Today and 81 other newspapers, 23 television stations and several digital businesses.

The company's newspaper publishing revenue dropped 3 percent to $890.2 million from $917.8 million. Gannett attributed the decline to "soft advertising demand" resulting from the slow economic recovery. Advertising revenue at the newspapers fell nearly 7 percent to $552.7 million from $591.7 million.

The company, however, saw its first increase in newspaper circulation revenue since 2007, helped by digital subscription growth.

Revenue in Gannett's broadcasting unit grew 36 percent to $237 million from $174.3 million last year, thanks to what Gannett called "substantial" ad spending during the Summer Olympics. Political spending was "slightly higher" than a year ago, the company said.

Tennessee newspaper ends presidential endorsements

The Knoxville (Tenn.) News Sentinel has ended a decades-old tradition of endorsing presidential candidates, saying it no longer has any special access to the candidates.

Editor Jack McElroy said in a column (http://bit.ly/WpA2Ec) it was a difficult decision.

"Citizens can find plenty of opinions about the presidential candidates to weigh against their own, and there is no shortage of community dialogue — far from it," McElroy wrote. "The News Sentinel also has no special access to the candidates, and, in this age of global Internet and 24-hour news, we have no sources of information that every other citizen does not have as well."

The tradition of endorsing a presidential candidate dates to the paper's beginnings in the 1920s.

Until 2008, the newspaper's presidential endorsement was decided by its parent company, E.W. Scripps Co. Most went to Republicans, including in 2000 when the paper backed George W. Bush over Tennessean Al Gore. In 2008, the newpaper's editorial board endorsed John McCain.

McElroy said the editorial board sees strong reasons for endorsing candidates in local races, including sparking community dialogue and using a newspaper's special access to candidates to help inform voters. That rationale no longer applies to the presidential contest, he said.

The paper will continue to endorse candidates in local races.

Augusta Chronicle VP named publisher in Ark.

The Augusta (Ga.) Chronicle's vice president of audience has been named the publisher of the Log Cabin Democrat in Arkansas.

Both papers are owned by Morris Publishing Group. The Chronicle reports (http://bit.ly/RmDA8X) that Alan English had been responsible for product development, marketing, new media and news. He joined the Chronicle in 2009 as executive editor and will begin at the Democrat on Nov. 1.

"I'm blessed to have been part of a team constantly producing great journalism with impact," English said. "Together we've experimented and made changes that have taken Morris and The Chronicle into a leading position in the industry with its digital products and concepts."

William S. Morris IV, CEO of Morris Publishing LLC, praised English's work in laying the groundwork for the Chronicle's digital operations.

"As publisher, Alan will be able to migrate many of the 'best-of-breed' innovations he has brought to our paper and community," said Dana Atkins, the president of TAC Media and The Augusta Chronicle.

English recently was re-elected to The Associated Press Media Editors board of directors.

Koenders named publisher of Altus (Okla.) Times

Denny Koenders, longtime news and military veteran, has assumed the position of publisher at the Altus (Okla.) Times.

Koenders was born in South Dakota, and has worked in the newspaper industry for 46 years. He has served at papers in New Mexico, Alabama, Montana, Iowa, South Carolina and North Carolina. Koenders will also oversee operations of the Altus Times sister newspaper, the Frederick Press-Leader.

"I want to make sure the community of Altus feels and understands the local newspaper belongs to them,” said Koenders. "I want the public to know they are free to come to The Altus Times at any time to express their thoughts and opinions openly.”

Another driving principle for the new publisher is making sure The Altus Times continues to have excellent local content.

Koenders points out that the newspaper has a number of employees, most of whom make their homes in Altus with their families.

This gives the paper s staff, from the pressroom to the newsroom, a vested interest in the community, he says.

Throughout his newspaper career, Koenders has been an avid supporter of chambers of commerce, and has served on chamber boards in Alabama and as chamber president.

He adds his life and his history have been formed in communities the size of Altus.

Koenders is also a long-time member of the Rotary Club and was in two centennial celebrations and the State of South Dakota Bicentennial committee, and has been active in past rodeos.

He has also served as an ambassador for several towns similar in size to Altus.

Also, having served in the Vietnam War, Koenders is a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, American Legion and served as junior vice-commander and Vietnam veteran coordinator for the state of South Dakota.

NYT shares hit new 52-week high on upgrade

The New York Times Co.'s stock rose last week after an analyst raised his rating and price target on the shares.

Barclays analyst Kannan Venkateshwar said the Times Co.'s recent sales of some assets have helped improve its balance sheet, while its online pay wall has generated enough new subscription revenue to offset declining print ad sales.

THE SPARK: Venkateshwar upgraded the rating on the company to "Overweight" from "Equal Weight" and raised the price target on the stock to $11 from $9.

Sales of assets, such as its About.com business for $290 million and Indeed.com for $100 million, will raise its cash level to around $935 million, Venkateshwar estimated. The company is also on pace to generate $117 million cash from core operations this fiscal year and has no near-term debt maturities to worry about.

That increases the possibility of a dividend to shareholders in the first quarter of 2013, the analyst said.

The company is also gaining digital subscribers thanks to its policy of requiring a paid subscription after 10 free article views per month. The Times is also gaining Sunday print subscribers. Gains in both areas should compensate for a decline in print ad revenues, the analyst said.

THE BIG PICTURE: The New York Times and other newspaper publishers have been buffeted by falling print ad revenue as marketers seek less expensive forms of advertising online. The Times has attempted to stave off those declines by selling some of its non-core assets and charging for online access to its stories.

THE ANALYSIS: Venkateshwar estimates that because of its circulation gains, relatively smaller print ad revenue declines and strong balance sheet, the Times Co.'s stock should trade at a slight premium to the earnings of its peer Gannett Co. That slight premium put the target price at $11.

INDUSTRY NEWS (10-11-2012)

Court says school project contract is public data

The Minnesota Court of Appeals backed a small-town newspaper group this week in an open records case involving how units of government farm out work to contractors.

The appeals court ruled that a contract involving a major school construction and renovation project in the St. Louis County School District is public information, so the Ely-based Timberjay Newspapers are entitled to see it.

The contract was between the construction management firm Johnson Controls Inc., and subcontractor Architectural Resources Inc. The appeals court concluded that Johnson Controls performed a governmental function as defined by the state's Data Practices Act, so the contract it signed with Architectural Resources is public data.

The ruling reversed an earlier decision by an administrative law judge.

Mark Anfinson, an attorney for the newspapers, said it's an important decision because the appeals court rejected arguments that would have restricted public access to information about work that governments outsource to contractors. Instead, he said, the court stuck to a precedent it set nearly a decade ago. He said the decision "pretty well pulverized" Johnson Controls' arguments that the open records law should be interpreted narrowly in such cases.

"It's a good day for citizen accountability," Anfinson said.

But Marshall Helmberger, publisher and managing editor of the Timberjay Newspapers, said it could be years before he gets access to the information because Johnson Controls indicated earlier that it was prepared to fight all the way up to the Minnesota Supreme Court.

Helmberger said he wants to examine the contract because the school district incurred a number of extra costs when problems, including code violations, came up during the $80 million project. He said Johnson Controls told the school board that provisions in the contract would make it difficult for the district to recoup those costs.

"I wanted to see some evidence of that," Helmberger said.

Lack of foreclosure notices prompts Oregon newspaper cuts

The parent company of The Bulletin newspaper of Bend, Ore., announced it is reducing employees because of a loss of revenue from foreclosure notices.

Western Communications, which also published the Redmond Spokesman and five other papers, says the cuts affecting less than 10 percent of the company's nearly 400 workers will be accomplished through layoffs and attritions.

The Bulletin newspaper reports (http://is.gd/Pfm25Z ) that new legal and legislative requirements caused banks to abandon the non-judicial foreclosure process, practically eliminating foreclosure notices from Oregon newspapers.

The company says the absence of those notices has resulted in hundreds of thousands of dollars in monthly losses.

WesCom President and Bulletin Publisher Gordon Black says the painful cuts ironically come at a time when The Bulletin's circulation is increasing.

The Tampa Tribune sold to private equity firm

A private equity investment group has bought The Tampa (Fla.) Tribune newspaper for $9.5 million.

The Tribune's longtime corporate owner, Virginia-based Media General Inc., is transferring ownership of the Tribune, its affiliated newspapers and TBO.com to the Los Angeles-based Revolution Capital Group. The investment group has formed a locally owned company to run the paper, called The Tampa Media Group.

Media General will retain the NBC affiliate, WFLA, News Channel 8. However, the newspaper and the television operations will continue their news partnership.

The Tampa Media Group will have 618 employees and will continue to operate the Tribune's affiliated publications: Hernando Today, Highlands Today, Suncoast News, Sunbelt Newspapers and the Spanish-language publication Centro.

Metro Appoints Editor-in-Chief and Commercial Director in Puerto Rico

Metro Puerto Rico announced the appointment of Aiola Virella and Félix Iván Caraballo as Editor-in-Chief and Commercial Director respectively for the Island's operation. With these two appointments, Metro gets ready for the launch of the world's largest international newspaper ("Metro"), in the Puerto Rican market during the month of October.

Virella, who has over 17 years of journalism experience, has worked in radio and newspaper in several positions, including as a reporter, news editor, editor in chief and more recently as executive director for a local newspaper.

Caraballo, the new Commercial Director, has had an ascending career that has taken him from being a media buyer to sales management and administration positions. Caraballo has worked as media supervisor, sales account executive and senior sales vice president for a local newspaper. He also has over 17 years of experience in a variety of media outlets including radio, print, magazines and TV.

"We are very pleased with the appointment of these two seasoned professionals with ample backgrounds and deep knowledge of the local media market. With their leadership, they will both make extraordinary contributions to the growth and success of Metro Puerto Rico," said Johanna Öberg, Executive Vice President and Global Commercial Director.

Metro's launch is scheduled in October with distribution Monday-Friday. The newspaper's sections will cover culture, sports, fashion, technology and many others.

Newspaper continues fight for jail report

A newspaper in southern Kentucky is continuing its fight for records of a jail investigation.

The Glasgow Daily Times (http://bit.ly/SFCC3g ) reports that its latest legal filing argues local officials willfully withheld the records and the county should pay the newspaper's legal fees.

Judge Phil Patton ruled in August that the county had to release the report on the Barren County Detention Center. The report was produced by a private investigator for the Barren County Fiscal Court at a cost of $3,500.

County officials have said they denied the request because they don't have physical possession of the report. But the newspaper argues the fiscal court intentionally voted not to take possession of the report so it wouldn't have to make it a public record.

The newspaper filed a motion Sept. 10 to enforce the Aug. 16 court order.

Syracuse newspaper to lay off 115 employees

The Post-Standard of Syracuse, N.Y., says it will lay off 115 full- and part-time employees as it moves ahead with plans to combine print and online operations to form two new companies early next year.

Stephen Rogers, editor and publisher of The Post-Standard, announced last week that managers at the newspaper and its online product, Syracuse.com, met with employees the previous day to discuss the changes.

He said 89 full-time and 26 part-time employees will be laid off and offered severance packages and help in finding new jobs. Rogers said 278 employees were offered positions in the new companies, Syracuse Media Group and Advance Central Services Syracuse, which will launch Feb. 1.

The layoffs come five weeks after the Post-Standard announced it would drop to three days a week in print in January.

Kentucky town to appeal open records ruling in newspaper's favor

An open records dispute between city officials in Owensboro, Ky., and the town's newspaper is headed to the Kentucky Court of Appeals.

The Messenger-Inquirer (http://bit.ly/Spr8Hp) reports that city commissioners voted last week to appeal a circuit judge's opinion that the city must release two internal investigations it opened last year against former police spokeswoman Marian Cosgrove.

Mayor Ron Payne told the newspaper that the city is comfortable with the expense of an appeal. Lawyers for the city have argued that the documents aren't subject to the open records law because the investigations ended when Cosgrove left and commissioners took no "final action."

Newspaper editor Matt Francis said the city's decision should cause residents to question the commitment officials have to transparency.

INDUSTRY NEWS (10-4-2012)

Judge to delay ruling on Pa. paper's poll access

A federal judge has agreed to wait until at least Oct. 5 before ruling on a lawsuit by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, which wants reporters and photographers to watch Allegheny County voters sign-in under the state's new voter ID law on Nov. 6.

U.S. District Judge Nor Barry Fischer expressed reluctance Oct. 1 to approve a consent decree between the newspaper and county elections officials, saying it could require the court to ratify terms that appear to violate a state law keeping anyone but voters and election workers at least 10 feet away from polling places.

Fischer strongly suggested that the county and newspaper could still allow for the media coverage if they settled the dispute out of court — and agreed to limit it to this election. Attorneys for both sides wouldn't say if they'd be willing to do that.

Officers elected to Southern newspapers board

Donna Barrett is the new chairman of the Southern Newspaper Publishers Association Foundation Board of Trustees.

Barrett, president and CEO of Community Newspaper Holdings Inc., in Montgomery, Ala., was elected during the group's meeting in Naples, Fla. Oct. 1.

The board of directors elected five trustees for the foundation.

Lissa Walls Vahldiek is the new vice chairman. She's the chief operating officer and vice president of Southern Newspapers Inc., in Houston.

The new treasurer is Gregg K. Jones, president and CEO of Jones Media in Greeneville, Tenn. He's co-publisher of The Greenville Sun.

Other new board members include Steve Brandt, president and publisher of The Greenville News in South Carolina and Todd Carpenter, president and chief operating officer of Boone Newspapers in Natchez, Miss.

Holder named publisher of Meridian Star

A former advertising director of the Joplin Globe in Missouri is the new publisher of The Meridian Star, of Meridian, Miss.

Vicksburg native Tim Holder began his new job as publisher Oct. 1, saying he wants to provide more community news (http://bit.ly/Su8vQB).

The Meridian Star is owned by Community Newspaper Holdings Inc. of Montgomery, Ala.

"I hope to bring a sharp local focus, strategic outlook and marketing experience that we need to be successful and build on the momentum that we have already created in our print, online editions and our magazine," Holder said.

Holder is a graduate of the University of Mississippi and began his newspaper career in 1995 at The Clarion-Ledger in Jackson, Miss. He moved up in Gannett as a manager in Montgomery, Ala., and then as classified manager in Lafayette, La.

He later worked for The Paxton Media Group as advertising director for The Times-Georgian in Carrollton, Ga., and then in Selma, Ala.

He began working for Community Newspapers Holdings Inc. at The Joplin Globe and was in that job six years.

Crystal Dupré, who had been publisher of The Meridian Star for the past six years, took a job in September as publisher of The Eagle in Bryan/College Station, Texas.

In the digital age, a rare fight for print readers

When The Times-Picayune decided to print three days a week, a nearby publication saw a chance to expand in the newspaper's backyard and fill a void that for some in the New Orleans area is as much a part of the morning routine as beignets and French coffee.

The Advocate of Baton Rouge, a family-owned daily published 70 miles north, begana daily New Orleans edition Oct. 1, setting up an old-fashioned newspaper war. The battle for print readers comes even as more people get their news online and from cellphones — generally from newspaper websites — and more news media share stories to save money.

The experiment will be closely watched by an industry that has struggled in recent years as print advertising declined during the recession.

Locally, readers will decide whether they still want The Times-Picayune, a Pulitzer-winning, 175-year-old New Orleans icon that will print every Wednesday, Friday and Sunday.

At the Morning Call coffee shop in the New Orleans suburb of Metairie, manhandled sections of The Times-Picayune littered the chairs recently as Louis Gomez, 77, and three friends sipped cafe au lait. Wireless Internet was available, but the printed newspaper was the medium of choice.

"I will get The Advocate," Gomez said. "I will quit the Picayune."

Other people in this tradition-bound city don't want to lose the Picayune, as most locals call it. Hundreds of people have rallied against the changes, and elected officials and community leaders have been quick to criticize. Some people even embarked on a futile campaign to get the paper's owner to sell it.

The Picayune has had a stranglehold on print news for decades, consolidating other dailies under its banner. The newspaper — named after a Spanish colonial coin worth about 6 cents — has had its finger tightly on the pulse of the people and events. Its coverage of hurricanes such as Betsy and Katrina, the New Orleans Saints, the entertainment, political corruption and ties to the Mississippi River all forged tight bonds with readers.

The Advocate's challenge entering the city is the first by a major daily newspaper in New Orleans in more than 50 years. The Advocate has built its reputation on accountability reporting in state government and coverage of Louisiana State University, particularly school sports.

Both newspapers have steadily shifted to online news.

In June, The Times-Picayune's owner, privately held Advance Publications Inc., and a new subsidiary, Nola Media Group, announced the paper would lay off 200 employees and shift its focus to the free website Nola.com. Advance is pursuing similar three-times-a-week strategies with several other newspapers in the chain, including publications in Michigan, Alabama and Pennsylvania.

Edward Atorino, a media industry analyst at Benchmark Co., said other newspapers in major metropolitan markets will closely watch The Times-Picayune's experiment.

"The day of the seven-day newspaper is fading," he said. "This has been a long, deteriorating situation. It's not a shock, and we're going to see more of it."

Atorino said total print advertising dollars in the United States dropped from roughly $23 billion in 2008 to $19 billion in 2011.

While The Advocate takes steps into the New Orleans market, Nola Media is planning to strike back. The company said it will expand its operations in The Advocate's home turf and offer a customized version of Nola.com for Baton Rouge residents.

"There are a lot of competitors in the market," new Times-Picayune publisher Ricky Mathews said. "We've always got to strive to be the best we can be."

Nola Media is telling readers the print edition will be familiar, complete and even better. Prototype pages included an expanded opinion section and color comics for the Wednesday edition, which will carry three days' worth of comics and crossword puzzles.

Editor Jim Amoss, who oversaw a news operation that won four Pulitzers, said there will be plenty of news.

"Reduction is something of a misnomer," Amoss said. "Yes, we're reducing frequency of printing, but the three editions that we will be printing will hold their own in news hole and amount of content against what is now distributed over seven days."

Even after recent layoffs, including more than 70 from the newsroom, Amoss said the new operation is employing 156 people to gather and disseminate news.

The Advocate hopes to grow its print audience by 20,000 in the New Orleans area. Currently, they sell about 400 papers a day there.

Publisher David Manship said 10,000 free copies were being distributed this week.

"I will be able to give the people of New Orleans, on a daily basis, news from around the state and around the world — and from New Orleans," he said.

A New Orleans nonprofit news website, The Lens, is also beefing up its staff, and local television and radio station are ramping up their online presence.

"Between The Advocate and The Lens and other things that may come up, yes, I think there will be more competition than they've faced to date," said industry analyst Rick Edmonds of The Poynter Institute.

Advance is usually reluctant to release financial figures, but Mathews has been revealing some details.

Unique visitors to Nola.com — those who visit the site once or more — were up 31.7 percent in August from a year ago, he said. Print advertising revenue has been down for the past five years, he said.

Audit Bureau of Circulation figures show paid circulation for The Times-Picayune at just under 155,000 for Sunday and more than 134,000 daily. It has never come close to the more than 257,000 figure prior to Hurricane Katrina in 2005. The paper won two Pulitzers for its coverage of Katrina.

Manship, publisher of the Advocate, said phone calls for subscription information jammed lines when the paper's expansion into New Orleans was announced.

"We're going to give it a minimum of six months," he said. "We think we'll be able to achieve some good numbers by then."

Capital Gazette Communications publisher to retire

Tom Marquardt, editor and publisher of Capital Gazette Communications, of Annapolis, Md., will retire at the end of the year.

The Capital (www.bit.ly/UysOKq) newspaper made the announcement Sept. 28.

Marquardt has spent more than 35 years at the newspaper, having joined the Evening Capital as managing editor in 1977. He was promoted to executive editor in 2001 and has been editor and publisher of Capital Gazette Communications since 2008.

Pat Richardson, publisher of the Carroll County Times in Westminster, will take over Jan. 1 as publisher in Annapolis. Richardson will serve as regional publisher for both newspapers, which are owned by Landmark Media Enterprises LLC of Norfolk, Va.

Katie Couric recalls father's legacy in Georgia

Students at the Center for Collaborative Journalism in Macon, Ga., might not have known distinguished Mercer University alumnus John M. Couric, but they likely recognize the last name.

The memorial plaque on the Couric Seminar Room at the center does not mention his famous daughter, Katie, but it details her father's career and steadfast service on the Mercer newspaper. Couric was editor-in-chief of The Cluster during his senior year.

"I always thought that his heart really belonged to journalism," Katie Couric said in a telephone interview Thursday as she prepared for her talk show taping in New York.

The elder Couric was born in Brunswick but grew up in Dublin, where his first job in print came at The Courier Herald newspaper when he was in high school. While at Mercer, he worked for The Macon Telegraph until he graduated in 1941.

He helped invade Sicily during his stint in the U.S. Navy in World War II and retired from the Naval Reserve in 1965. He covered Georgia politics for the Atlanta Constitution and joined the United Press in the late 1940s to report news throughout the Southeast.

After chronicling a devastating hurricane that hit the east coast of Florida and the political storm that brought former Georgia Gov. Herman Talmadge to power, Couric joined the news service's Washington bureau in 1951 and wrote about then-Senate Majority Leader Lyndon Johnson's heart attack in 1955 and other items of interest from the nation's capital, according to his obituary.

"My dad was really a Renaissance man," Katie Couric said. "He could talk fluently about so many different topics, and I was just in awe of him growing up and later when I embarked on a career in journalism."

He cut his teeth on print journalism but encouraged his daughter to pursue broadcasting.

She describes his unique combination of pragmatism and idealism. He brought values of honor, integrity and quality to his profession, she said.

When Katie was about 4, her father left what he later described as the "high priesthood of journalism" to embark on a more lucrative career to raise his four children.

"In some ways I wish he had stayed with it," said the former anchor of the "CBS Evening News." ''I could see him being the editor of The Washington Post or have a high-ranking position in a major national newspaper."

Instead, her father worked in public relations for the National Association of Broadcasters and the American Health Care Association before retiring in 1985 after six years at the Food and Drug Administration, where he wrote articles and speeches.

With Couric's wide-reaching résumé, Mercer awarded him an honorary Doctor of Humanities degree in 1996 when his daughter delivered the commencement address.

"John Couric loved Mercer," said Larry Brumley, Mercer's vice president for marketing communications, who met the Courics during their visit. "She's just a wonderful, down-to-earth person. She loved her father, and that's why she agreed to do the commencement."

Katie Couric, who hosted "The Today Show" at that time, told the graduates and their families a story about her father picking up a prescription.

"Are you Katie Couric's father?" the pharmacist asked.

"No, she's my daughter," he replied.

He was a serious journalist, but he had a lighter side.

"My dad had a great, wry and kind of sophisticated sense of humor," said Couric, who fondly remembered his impersonations of the late Sen. Strom Thurmond.

Her dad emanated integrity, was passionate about his career and instilled in his children the importance of hard work.

His daughter believes the ideals he taught her and her siblings are valuable lessons for all future journalists.

He received a master's degree in communications from American University and later was an adjunct professor of journalism there and at the University of Maryland.

In his later years, he was troubled by current media trends in blogging and websites that seize rumors and innuendos and report them as truth, his daughter said.

If he were able to lecture journalism students in his seminar room, he would likely tell them to be critical thinkers and strive to be great writers.

"My dad was passionate about it, too," Couric said. "You have to have a fire in your belly to make the sacrifices, to work the long hours and to forgo a party on the weekend because you want to cover a story."

Although he died of complications from Parkinson's disease last year, the family is excited his legacy and passion for journalism will be remembered through the Center for Collaborative Journalism.

"I know (Mercer is) a place that he held really close to his heart for his entire life, and that was such a life-shaping experience for him," Couric said. "I can't tell you how much it means to all of us that he will be permanently remembered in this way."

Webster named president, publisher of Sun News

A former vice president of the Sun News of Myrtle Beach, S.C., has been named president and publisher of the newspaper.

Fifty-four-year-old Mark Webster was named to the post Sept. 27.

He has held a number of management and executive roles at Knight Ridder and McClatchy news operations over the past 31 years.

He replaces P.J. Browning, who left in August.

Webster says he's glad to come back to the newspaper (http://bit.ly/S5KEbP) where he spent 13 years, rising to vice president of human resources and operations.

Webster has been the regional vice president of human resources since 2009 for three McClatchy newspapers, The Sun News, The Charlotte Observer and The Herald in Rock Hill.

Webster was given additional oversight of information technology for seven McClatchy daily newspapers in the Carolinas in 2010.

Colby College in Maine honors Bob Woodward

Watergate reporter Bob Woodward will be honored by a Maine college for courage in journalism.

Woodward is to receive Colby College's 2012 Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award on Nov. 11. Now associate editor of the Washington Post, Woodward will give a speech following convocation at the private, central Maine college.

Woodward was hired by the Washington Post in 1971 as a reporter, and the following year he and Carl Bernstein did most of the reporting that exposed crimes related to the Richard Nixon re-election campaign's involvement in the break-in at the Watergate Hotel in Washington.

The Lovejoy Award has been given annually since 1952. It honors the memory of Elijah Parish Lovejoy, Colby's valedictorian in 1826 and an abolitionist newspaper publisher who was killed in Alton, Ill., in 1837.

INDUSTRY NEWS (9-28-2012)

Students to cover Tenn. federal justice system

Judges and news industry leaders say an innovative project that will allow college journalists to cover the federal justice system in Tennessee will give students valuable experience while holding federal officials more accountable.

Seven students from Middle Tennessee State University's College of Mass Communication make up the inaugural staff of the Seigenthaler News Service, which will have a different group of students each semester and allow them to earn 12 credit hours.

The initiative is named after John Seigenthaler, founder of the First Amendment Center at Vanderbilt University and a former editor and publisher of The Tennessean. Seigenthaler persuaded the newspaper's senior editors to allow the students to work out of the newsroom and publish their coverage of the U.S. District Courts and other federal entities, such as the U.S. Attorney's office.

Supporters of the project say it is unique because very few journalism schools have similar initiatives, and none of them includes coverage of federal courts. Seigenthaler and others say the absence is symbolic of the lack of attention mainstream news media have given to federal systems in recent years, making the public wonder what is really going on behind courtroom doors.

"I think this is going to be a model, because the (federal) courts aren't being covered across the country," Seigenthaler said of the project, which he announced at the annual Associated Press Media Editors convention in Nashville..

APME, an association of senior newspaper, broadcast and online editors served by The Associated Press in the U.S. and by The Canadian Press, works closely with the AP to strive for journalism excellence. APME also supports training and development of editors and promotes programs in online credibility and diversity.

Tennessean executive editor Maria De Varenne said a large part of the lack of federal court coverage is due to the economic downturn.

"So many newspapers were having layoffs. Media organizations were having layoffs," she said. "We clearly don't have the staff that we had two or three years ago. We cover courts, but we don't have somebody covering federal courts every day. This will allow us that opportunity."

Dwight Lewis worked at The Tennessean for a little more than 40 years before retiring last year as the newspaper's editorial page editor and columnist. He said the courts will benefit from coverage by the students, who will in turn gain "invaluable" experience.

"If you don't have people covering you, you tend to get lazy, or maybe not do the best that you can do," said Lewis, who will be an editorial consultant on the project. "And I think the courts will be under more of a microscope."

The students will officially start their coverage Monday. To prepare, they have been meeting with federal officials and judges, including senior U.S. 6th Circuit court of Appeals Judge Gilbert S. Merritt. Merritt told the students their work will make the federal court system more transparent and hold the judges accountable.

"When you cover the courts, you're not just reporting to the public, but you're making the legal system more just," he said.

Student reporter Kate Prince says she's looking forward to educating the public.

"A lot of people we talked to have said the biggest issue with no one reporting from the federal courts, is that the public ... is just kind of in the dark," said the 24-year-old, who is double majoring in electronic media communications for journalism and criminal justice administration.

"So having somebody in there to kind of lay it out, and explain it, and educate the public on the federal court system is fantastic."

The Seigenthaler News Service will resemble existing programs at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Communication at Arizona State University, and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

News Service director and journalism professor Wendell Rawls said he hopes in the future to expand both the content and reach of the students' coverage, and to involve students from other departments, such as political science, business law and criminal justice.

Boston.com launches 1st online radio with DJs

A beloved Boston-area independent alternative radio station is getting new life online several times over in partnership with traditional print media, and experts say it could be a model for other stations that can no longer be found on a radio dial.

The station was known as WFNX until its frequency was sold to media giant Clear Channel earlier this year. The Boston Globe snapped up most of its popular, live local disc jockeys and created RadioBDC, which for the past several weeks has been streaming similar programming from Boston.com, the Globe's current events and entertainment news site.

"A lot of people around the country are going to be looking to this experiment or this venture to see how it does and to see if it can be applied in their market in their particular circumstances," Boston University mass communication professor John Carroll said.

Launched in 1983, Boston's WFNX was one of the first U.S. stations to exclusively broadcast alternative rock. It was the first to play Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and its album "Nevermind" in its entirety on air, pushing the band onto the national scene.

Fans like Andrea Berman, who listened to the station 24/7, were devastated when it announced it would go silent July 20. She started an "Occupy WFNX" Facebook page, Twitter account and blog and was ecstatic when Boston.com later announced the launch of RadioBDC with WFNX DJs.

"It's more than just a brand; it's more than just the name," she said. "It's the DJs; they're the heart and soul of a station."

Lisa Desisto, general manager of Boston.com and chief advertising officer for the Globe, owned by The New York Times Co., said she's been taking calls from other newspapers asking how and why she launched RadioBDC, which takes its name from the initials of Boston.com. But she said the station would be hard to duplicate elsewhere for the reason Berman articulated: the DJs.

Phoenix Media/Communications Group's MCC Broadcasting Inc. let most of the WFNX staff go when it sold its 101.7 broadcast license to Clear Channel's Capstar Radio Operating Company this summer for $14.5 million. People tuning in now hear a hits station called The Harbor.

"Despite its celebrated history, its cutting edge programming, its tradition of breaking new music, its ardent fans among listeners and advertisers, for some time it has been difficult to sustain the station — especially since the start of the Great Recession," Phoenix Media Publisher Stephen Mindich wrote in a memo to its weekly alternative newspaper, The Boston Phoenix.

More and more independent stations are disappearing because advertisers want a bigger platform for their ads, Carroll said. Web streaming is a cheaper alternative.

While RadioBDC has hired WFNX staffers, WFNX.com continues online, playing the same kind of music it always did, though without DJs. The sale of 101.7 granted Clear Channel the frequency license and equipment, but Phoenix Media retains the call sign, trademarks and intellectual property.

Eventually, WFNX.com will operate much like RadioBDC.

WFNX personality Kurt St. Thomas, who helped launch Nirvana under his watch, will join WFNX.com as executive producer and two Phoenix Media publications will eventually be linked to WFNX.com's music content. The venture was planned before the announcement of RadioBDC, a Phoenix Media spokesman said.

WFNX.com averaged 18,000 listeners a month when the station was still on air; it now averages 6,000.

Meanwhile, listeners tuned into RadioBDC online and via mobile application for 51,502 combined hours its first week, equivalent to 919 people listening to RadioBDC for eight hours a day, seven days a week.

The commercial station is two months in the making and a month on air and has committed advertisers, including Miller Corp., Sapporo, Bud Light and Heineken. It has expanded the Globe's 21- to 34-year-old male demographic, hence the alcohol advertising, Desisto said.

RadioBDC isn't for national advertisers looking for an expansive platform, she said, but for companies looking "to make a splash" in the Boston region.

DJs are manually uploading music into RadioBDC computers, often bringing in CDs from home to build a music library from scratch. The station faced costs like constructing a new studio, obtaining music rights and paying staff salaries but saves in marketing costs, utilizing the Globe's established ad and event staff. And across the hall are Globe journalists, ready to discuss morning news on air.

"We're going to be able to do a lot of things here that we weren't able to do at our last places because of resources, technology, money," said Julie Kramer, one of the WFNX DJs who moved to RadioBDC. "We'll be able to take this to a new level."

The endeavor faces challenges sustaining advertisers, reaching audiences who don't own smartphones and competing against iPods and online stations, said Justin Ellis of Harvard University's Nieman Journalism Lab, who has written about RadioBDC.

"At least in the initial phase and the setup, everything seems to be going their way," Ellis said. "But the question is: Will it work in the long term?"

News Corp. seeks dismissal of lawsuit over hacking

Attorneys for News Corp. asked a Delaware judge last week to dismiss a shareholder lawsuit alleging that company directors allowed a damaging cover-up of the phone hacking scandal in Britain.

The plaintiffs claim the board, in blind deference to CEO Rupert Murdoch, ignored several red flags about the extent of the hacking, dating back several years, and failed to act until the scandal exploded last year after British authorities reopened an investigation into the Murdoch-owned tabloid News of the World.

The shareholders say the damaging financial fallout included the folding of the best-selling News of the World after 168 years and News Corp. being pressured to withdraw its $12 billion takeover bid for satellite broadcaster British Sky Broadcasting Group PLC.

Investigations into the hacking scandal have resulted in more than 40 arrests. Among those facing criminal charges are Rebekah Brooks, the former chief of News Corp.'s British operations, and Andy Coulson, a former tabloid editor and the former communications chief for Prime Minister David Cameron.

Attorneys for the shareholders argued that the extent of the hacking should have been clear to News Corp. directors no later than July 2009, when The Guardian newspaper, a News Corp. rival, published an article suggesting that the problem extended far beyond a single rogue reporter, as News Corp. had previously claimed.

Shareholder attorney Jay Eisenhofer said News Corp. directors took no action in response to the Guardian article but instead stood by as News Corp.'s British newspaper subsidiary, News International, engaged in a systematic cover-up that included destruction of e-mails and computers

"The directors should be held liable for the cover-up that took place between 2009 and 2011," Eisenhofer told the judge.

Attorneys for New York-based News Corp. argue that the plaintiffs had not met the standards under Delaware law for bringing the lawsuit or demonstrated that the board acted in bad faith.

Defense attorney Gregory Varallo described the lawsuit as a "dog's breakfast" mishmash of unsustainable claims.

Varallo said the plaintiffs have conceded that News Corp.'s board did not formally discuss hacking-related issues until February 2011. Once the board became aware of the extent of the problem, it took action, establishing an independent Management and Standards Committee to investigate the phone hacking and setting up a process to compensate victims of phone hacking, Varallo said.

News Corp. directors are not only accused by shareholders of allowing the cover-up, but also of breaching their fiduciary duties by acquiescing to Murdoch's decision to buy Shine Group, a television production company controlled by his daughter Elisabeth, at an allegedly inflated price of about $670 million.

The shareholders contend the deal, completed last year in the midst of the hacking scandal, was motivated not by legitimate business reasons but by Rupert Murdoch's desire to ensure a family dynasty.

Defense attorneys argued that the deal was a proper exercise of business judgment, approved by an audit committee of independent directors advised by outside experts.

Gannett up as analyst says pay walls working

Gannett Co.'s stock rose last week after an analyst raised his price target on the newspaper publisher's shares, saying the rollout of so-called online pay walls across 70 of its 80 regional newspapers was going better than expected.

UBS analyst John Janedis said in a research note that Gannett's move to charge readers for online access after being allowed to read 7 to 20 stories for free each month is working so far.

He said the loss of subscribers who are being charged more for a package that combines home delivery and online access has been below the 5 percent expected by management. Janedis said the move helped raise circulation revenue in April, May and June. The analyst raised his forecast for 2013 circulation revenue growth from 5 percent to an increase of 12 percent to $1.19 billion.

Janedis also trimmed his estimate for the company's newspaper advertising revenue declines to a drop of 7.2 percent in the three months through September, slightly better than the 8 percent drop he forecast earlier. Janedis also sees advertising revenue at Gannett-owned TV stations rising by 33 percent, at the upper end of the company's guidance.

Gannett publishes national daily newspaper USA Today and about 80 regional newspapers such as the Detroit Free Press. The company, based in McLean, Va., also owns 23 TV stations and websites such as CareerBuilder.com and ShopLocal.com.

INDUSTRY NEWS 9-13-2012

Illinois prisons mum on who gets tours

First, Gov. Pat Quinn rejected reporters' requests to tour Illinois prisons as he plans a major shakeup in the state's corrections system. Now his administration is refusing to reveal precisely who has been allowed to see inside state penitentiaries during his three years in office.

Carefully controlled prison walk-throughs were commonplace for lawmakers, journalists and others in years past as a way to illustrate conditions for prisoners and the state employees who keep them in line. But after barring the gate to reporters last month, Quinn's administration has deemed it too burdensome to reveal who has been allowed to enter in response to a Freedom of Information request by The Associated Press.

Despite the governor's declaration that allowing reporters inside is a "security risk," prison officials say only individual wardens have information about tours by outside groups, and that top Department of Corrections brass don't keep track of who's coming and going, though some evidence contradicts that.

The policy raises more questions about the administration's transparency and management as the Corrections agency carries out Quinn's budget-cutting plan to shutter two major state lockups despite severe overcrowding. The union representing prison employees objects to the proposal, saying it could lead to dangerous conditions for guards and inmates.

The AP and other media have asked to see prison conditions, which are described very differently by the two sides. When rejected, the AP sought information about approved tours so it could speak with others who have been inside. But the state denied the information request, saying it would take too much time for a busy agency to collect the data from more than two dozen facilities.

The administration's tighter prison control comes as correctional systems nationally are trending toward more access, according to Daron Hall, president of the American Correctional Association, which accredits prison systems.

Hall, the county sheriff in Nashville, Tenn., and a Democrat like Quinn, says his own philosophy is to let reporters into his four jails of 4,000 inmates to see what his agency is up against, instead of merely reacting to a crisis and the resulting media demand for information. He said he understands safety concerns, however, and said Illinois' overcrowding situation might merit caution.

"It's a closed environment, literally, and the public (doesn't) understand," Hall said. "And when there is a problem, I've always felt it was good if the media has had access before, for various reasons — one, to educate the community about how tough our jobs are. It's not an easy world."

Quinn has ordered the closing of two major penitentiaries, though his original plan to have it done by Aug. 31 was thwarted by an ongoing union lawsuit. One of the facilities is the high-security Tamms, which holds the state's most dangerous prisoners. They would be transferred to Pontiac prison, where workers say there's insufficient space and safeguards.

A shutdown of a women's prison in Dwight would initiate a complicated movement of 5,000 inmates among a half-dozen prisons.

The administration has not volunteered much about how this will happen, even when media have requested information through open-records laws. The AP has filed 12 FOIA requests to the governor's office and Corrections since July, but three-quarters of them were denied.

The AP is asking for an on-site look at the state's segregation units, particularly Pontiac's, where more than two dozen inmates have already been transferred from Tamms. Among other media outlets rebuffed on tour requests is WBEZ, a public radio outlet in Chicago.

Corrections' denial of information about tours also raises accountability questions. How severe is the purported "security risk" if only individual prison wardens, and not their bosses in Springfield, have records of who's getting inside?

"If the governor is claiming there are legitimate security concerns, I do think it would be important for his senior staff or administrators to know who is or who is not being admitted for a tour," said Rep. Jason Barickman, a Republican whose district includes the Dwight and Pontiac prisons.

He and other members of the General Assembly say they have been allowed to visit various lockups within the past year. Lawmakers have not embraced Quinn's closure plan and included money in the budget to keep the prisons open.

The AP requested information on organized tours by community groups, lawmakers, reporters or others. Corrections responded that "there is no central repository for these documents" and offered, under the law, to consider a "narrowed" request — in this case, information from just two prisons out of two dozen.

Spokeswoman Kayce Ataiyero told the AP each prison's visitor logs "contain thousands of entries — including those representing the visits of inmates' family and friends," making a search too laborious.

But other evidence suggests top Corrections officials do know about separate tour groups, and are involved in approving them. When a reporter called Illinois River Correctional Center in Canton, a staff member in the warden's office said a tour request must be submitted in writing to the warden, but a deputy director of the department has final say.

In addition, prison wardens submit weekly activity reports to one of the three deputy directors who supervise them, routinely listing approved tours.

Ataiyero did not respond to a question about whether the data could be collected from the deputy directors.

Salem, Ore., paper to be printed by Oregonian

Beginning Oct. 14, The Statesman Journal, of Salem, Ore., will be printed by The Oregonian.

The Portland-based Oregonian will print the Salem newspaper and its related publications under a four-year contract.

Statesman Journal Publisher Steve Silberman said Monday that the move will enable his paper to close its printing press. He says between 20 and 25 full-time positions and about 30 part-time jobs will be cut. No cuts will come from the newsroom.

In a story published in the Statesman Journal (http://is.gd/tOB1l3 ), Silberman declined to comment on how much money the move would save.

Dupré leaving Meridian (Miss.) Star

Crystal Dupre, publisher at the Meridian (Miss.) Star for the past six years, has taken a job as publisher with The Eagle in Bryan/College Station, Texas.

The Meridian Star reports (http://bit.ly/SpLLUb ) that her last day in Meridian was Aug. 7. No successor has been named.

Dupré began her newspaper career in 1995 as advertising director for The Laurel Leader-Call, which was then owned by American Publishing.

The next few years involved a few moves — first to Meridian as advertising director, then back to Laurel as publisher and finally back to Meridian as publisher in May of 2006, succeeding Paul Barrett.

The Meridian newspaper is now owned by Community Newspaper Holdings Inc.

Dupre, and her husband, Ken, have three children.

3 Southern New Jersey papers to combine into 1 daily

Three southern New Jersey newspapers are going to combine to publish a new daily edition.

The seven-day-a-week South Jersey Times will debut in November. It will combine the Gloucester County Times, the News of Cumberland County and Today's Sunbeam in Salem.

The three papers are published by South Jersey Media Group. General manager Joseph P. Owens says reporters, editors and photographers from the three newspapers will contribute to the new daily.

The new South Jersey Times also will be published online at www.nj.com .

Owens said sales, distribution, artists, business office and other staff members will continue in their roles.

South Jersey Times will target news and advertising to northern and southern portions of the region.

South Jersey Media Group is part of Penn Jersey Advance, a division of Advance Publications.

The Advocate gears up for New Orleans edition

The publisher of Baton Rouge's daily newspaper says it is gearing up for a move into the New Orleans market.

Beginning Oct. 1, The Advocate plans to begin delivery of a new New Orleans edition of the paper. The move comes shortly after a decision by The Times-Picayune, which is owned by Advance Publications Inc., to convert the 175-year-old New Orleans daily to a 24-hour digital news operation with a print edition only on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays.

The Advocate's publisher, David Manship, said in a letter released last week that The Times-Picayune's changes "revealed that there is a demand for a daily newspaper in New Orleans that will not be met by any New Orleans publications."

Plain Dealer publisher to retire in 2013 from a fast changing industry

Amid transformation and turmoil in the newspaper industry, Terrance C.Z. Egger, the publisher of The Plain Dealer of Cleveland, announced last week he is stepping down early next year and will retire from newspapers.

Egger, who turns 55 this week, said many issues shaped his decision but that the changes in a profession he admires stand paramount.

"I love this industry, but with the changes in the industry, it was time for me to look to a new chapter in my life," he said in an interview.

Egger, who came to Cleveland six years ago from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, said he hopes to stay in the area and teach college. Much of his staff, meanwhile, hopes the 170-year-old institution he leads can survive the online era.

Egger's departure elicited both surprise and anxiety in a newsroom that has suffered layoffs and paycuts in recent years. Editor Debra Adams Simmons gathered staff near the center of the newsroom about 10 a.m. and alerted them of Egger's decision, adding that he would stay on to help find his successor.

Acknowledging that unknown changes were coming to the newspaper, Simmons told her reporters, editors and photographers that some things will not change.

"Our commitment is to continue to do good journalism and continue to put out a good paper and to continue to be the information leader in our community," she said.

As publisher and president of The Plain Dealer, Egger leads Ohio's largest newspaper and one of the most prominent papers in the corporate chain, New Jersey-based Advance Publications Inc., which is led by heirs of publishing magnate S.I. Newhouse.

INDUSTRY NEWS 9-6-2012

Journal Register Co. seeks bankruptcy protection

The Journal Register Co. has filed for bankruptcy protection for the second time in three years and hopes to reduce pensions and other costs through a quick sale of the news company's assets.

Journal Register has 18 newspapers and other media properties in 10 states, including the New Haven Register in Connecticut and The Oakland Press in Pontiac, Mich. The company expects normal operations to continue during the Chapter 11 reorganization.

Alden Global Capital, a New York hedge fund, acquired Journal Register last year. An Alden affiliate has posted an initial bid to buy the company at a bankruptcy auction expected within 90 days. Alden has been investing in distress sales of various newspaper and media concerns, including Philadelphia Newspapers, in recent years.

Journal Register, based in Yardley, Pa., also operates The Daily Local News in West Chester, among other newspapers. A company called Digital First Media currently operates Journal Register along with MediaNews Group.

In a press release Wednesday, Digital First Chief Executive John Paton said Journal Register has more than doubled its digital audience in the past two years. But he said the company still is struggling with print advertising declines and legacy costs such as pensions and leases.

An internal memo distributed and later posted on the poynter.org journalism website called defined pensions for employees "unsustainable."

"The company exited the 2009 restructuring with approximately $225 million in debt and with a legacy cost structure, which includes leases, defined benefit pensions and other liabilities that are now unsustainable and threaten the company's efforts for a successful digital transformation," the Digital First memo said.

Other media companies have likewise shed defined pensions in recent years, often through bankruptcy reorganizations, amid the steep decline in advertising and circulation revenue. Chapter 11 gives federal protection to businesses unable to pay their debts and allows them to restructure their operations.

"As difficult as they are, the steps we announced today are steps that will ensure the company's future," Paton said in a news release. "(The digital) transformation is threatened by a decline in print advertising revenue — the company's largest revenue source — and legacy costs incurred when Journal Register Company's total revenues were nearly twice the size it is today. Since 2009 the company's pension liabilities grew 52%."

When it filed for bankruptcy protection in early 2009, amid an industry-wide decline in newspaper advertising, Journal Register listed $596 million in assets and $692 million in debt. The restructuring plan cut what the company owed to secured lenders to $225 million in return for ownership. The plan wiped out stockholders, largely investment funds, and split a $2 million pool among unsecured lenders.

A judge approved the plan despite objections from the Newspaper Guild, as well as Connecticut and Pennsylvania state officials, who objected to plans for paying up to $1.7 million in bonuses to top executives.

Alden Capital bought Journal Register last year for an undisclosed price.

Cleveland newspaper publisher retiring next year

The publisher of The Plain Dealer newspaper in Cleveland will retire early next year.

Terrance C.Z. Egger announced on Wednesday (Sept. 5) that he's leaving Ohio's largest daily newspaper after more than six years in Cleveland. His successor has not been announced.

The 54-year-old Egger was named publisher, president and chief executive officer of The Plain Dealer in 2006. He also oversees a chain of weeklies in northeast Ohio.

He was publisher of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch before coming to Cleveland. He's also worked at Tucson Newspapers in Arizona and Copley Los Angeles Newspapers.

The Plain Dealer (bit.ly/OOXiqM) says Egger hopes to return to teaching in college.

The newspaper has a weekday circulation of about 286,400. It is owned by New York-based Advance Publications Inc.

Oklahoma judge grants Enid newspaper's request to unseal records

A Grady County judge has granted an Enid newspaper's request to unseal court records from a dismissed perjury charge against an Enid attorney.

District Judge Richard Van Dyck on Tuesday (Sept. 4) granted a motion by the Enid News & Eagle to intervene in the case involving Eric Edwards. The newspaper reports (http://bit.ly/OZePP9) Van Dyck ruled the records should be unsealed and access given to the public.

The perjury charge was filed in May and the case was sealed that day. The newspaper filed a request to unseal the records, saying the documents should be open to the public.

A judge dismissed the charge against Edwards in July.

Enid News & Eagle publisher Jeff Funk says the newspaper is pleased with the judge's decision.

Western Nebraska publisher takes job in Michigan

The publisher of The Sidney Sun-Telegraph in western Nebraska will be leaving to take a similar position in Michigan.

The Sun-Telegraph says (http://bit.ly/OUgXYi) Sue Mizell will be joining The Daily Globe in Ironwood, Mich., leaving Sidney on Sept. 19.

Stevenson Newspapers owns both the Sun-Telegraph and The Daily Globe.

Mizell began her newspaper career in 1989 in Sidney as an advertising representative. She moved on to jobs in New Mexico, Idaho and Colorado before returning as publisher of the Sun-Telegraph in October 2009.

City Manager Gary Person says Mizell "will be missed in Sidney."

Herald Journal of Logan, Utah, establishes pay wall

The publisher of the Herald Journal in Logan, Utah, says some of the newspaper's online content is going behind a pay wall.

Publisher Mike Starn says (http://bit.ly/TSbEar) digital subscriptions will be offered. Print edition subscribers will get free access to the Herald Journal's expanded website if they activate their account online.

Non-subscribers will be able to view some of the news online. They'll get daily access to limited content and seven pages of full content every 30 days.

Stark says the paper wants to protect its work and not let people use it extensively without paying.

The newspaper says it has a daily print readership of more than 53,000, and says its website gets about 9,000 visits each day.

U of Memphis newspaper gets funding restored

The University of Memphis is restoring full funding to its student newspaper after an internal review found the newspaper's content may have been a factor in its funding being cut.

The Commercial Appeal (http://bit.ly/O34rar) reports that university President Shirley Raines ordered the review after staff members at the Daily Helmsman criticized the budget committee's recommendation to cut funding as a violation of the First Amendment. Raines said in a statement last week that interviews with members of the Student Fee Allocation Fund Committee found that newspaper content was discussed, which led to the appearance that it may have been a factor in the recommendation. The committee had advised that funding be cut from $75,000 to $50,000.

The newspaper's faculty advisor, Candy Justice, says she's proud the university did the right thing.

INDUSTRY NEWS 8-29-2012

Right-to-know group backs newspaper fighting poll-access

Right-to-know advocates have endorsed a Pittsburgh newspaper's federal lawsuit seeking to overturn a law that it says violates the right of reporters and photographers to cover Election Day activity at Pennsylvania polling places.

The Pennsylvania Freedom of Information Coalition, which includes The Associated Press, urged newspapers to editorialize in support of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in its suit against the top elections officials in Allegheny County and the state government.

The Post-Gazette sued last month in U.S. District Court in Pittsburgh over a provision in the state Election Code that says no one but people officially connected to the balloting may come within 10 feet of a polling place.

It seeks to have the law declared unconstitutional and requests a court order barring officials from interfering with its reporters' and photographers' First Amendment right to gather news.

Ernie Schreiber, treasurer of the right-to-know coalition, said the "outdated and ill-conceived" law is seldom enforced.

"A court decision in Allegheny County's favor would give election officials across Pennsylvania the legal basis to shut down access to what has long been an observable public proceeding," Schreiber said.

The newspaper's filing of the federal lawsuit last month came shortly after the Post-Gazette asked a county judge to allow it to photograph or videotape voters as they sign in at polling places unless they object.

Frederick Frank, an attorney for the newspaper, said it withdrew the county action and elected to press the federal lawsuit instead because it wanted a ruling on the law's constitutionality.

In the federal complaint, the newspaper says public interest in this year's election is heightened by the presidential election and the heated debate over Pennsylvania's new voter ID law.

It also cited news photos of ballots being cast by Gov. Tom Corbett in 2010 and county executive Rich Fitzgerald in 2011 as examples of uneven enforcement of the law in Allegheny County.

Both defendants — county elections manager Mark Wolosik and Secretary of State Carol Aichele — have filed motions to dismiss the lawsuit.

County officials say they were simply doing their jobs.

"The Pennsylvania Election Code defines who can be in the polling place," Solicitor Andy Szefi said Monday. "Allegheny County does not have the discretion to disregard a state law."

The state attorney general's lawyers defended the constitutionality of the law and said Aichele, who oversees election laws that are locally enforced, should not have been named in the suit.

Postal commission OKs 'junk mail' discount plan

The government body that oversees the U.S. Postal Service has approved a plan that gives one of the nation's largest direct marketers a postage discount on advertising flyers known as "junk mail."

The three-year deal approved by the Postal Regulatory Commission on Aug. 23 is intended to boost use of the mail system by Valassis Communications Inc., which sends mass coupon mailings to homes under its RedPlum ad bundles.

The commission said the plan should add $4.7 million to $15.3 million in net benefit to Postal Service coffers over the course of the deal.

Many of the nation's newspapers opposed the plan, which gives a rate cut to their biggest competitor. The Newspaper Association of America said that for a meager benefit, about $1 billion in annual newspaper industry ad revenue would be put at risk because it would lure big advertisers away from its Sunday newspapers.

The NAA said it would appeal the decision.

"NAA believes this decision is contrary to law, and will challenge it immediately and vigorously," said NAA Chairman James Moroney, the publisher of The Dallas Morning News.

The commission dismissed the newspapers' damage estimate, saying in its order that "newspapers' claims of harm, while no doubt earnest, do not lend themselves to reasonable quantification."

Commission Chairman Ruth Goldway said in a statement that while the commission was "sympathetic" to the claims of market disruption, the policies of a postal reform law passed in 2006 "do not shield newspapers from the consequences of fair competition."

Livonia, Mich.-based Valassis applauded the decision, saying it was a "validation of this innovative proposal."

The dispute had put two traditional industries, buffeted by the Internet, on a collision course.

Use of the Postal Service is declining as more people turn to email, Facebook and Twitter to communicate. At the same time, print newspaper subscriptions and advertising have been falling due to a shift of readers to online outlets of news.

In royal photo scandal, some see Murdoch message

By letting his top-selling U.K. tabloid run photos of a naked Prince Harry cavorting in a Las Vegas hotel room, some say media mogul Rupert Murdoch was warning Britain's establishment that he could still shake things up.

British officialdom has largely turned its back on Murdoch because of the phone-hacking scandal that has badly tainted his media empire over the past year. So even though Murdoch's The Sun newspaper framed its decision to publish the nude pictures as a defense of press freedom, some observers saw the move as a feisty message from the tycoon.

"Not only was The Sun showing Harry's bottom, Murdoch was mooning the Establishment," said journalist Jane Merrick, whose article in The Independent on Sunday alleged that Murdoch personally ordered the paper to run the photos in a phone call with Tom Mockridge, the chief of his British newspaper unit, News International.

Murdoch, once assiduously courted by lawmakers across the British political spectrum, has seen his clout wither after his company was exposed as having hacked into the phones of hundreds of people to score scoops.

Allegations of bribery, corruption, computer hacking, and obstruction of justice are being investigated, and the scandal has prompted a judge-led media ethics inquiry that could propose sweeping changes to how Britain's press is policed — potentially subjecting newspapers to government regulation.

If The Sun was cowed, it didn't show it Friday, when it published the pictures of Harry along with a lengthy public interest justification claiming that the "the photos have potential implications for the Prince's image representing Britain around the world."

A picture of the unclad royal — clutching an unidentified woman — had already been bouncing back and forth across the Internet for the better part of two days. Newspapers around the world ran the pictures, but with the prominent exception of The Sun, British media largely held its fire.

News International has declined to comment on what role, if any, the 81-year-old Murdoch played in the decision to run the photos, but the mogul's Twitter posts suggested that, at the very least, he'd been following the issue closely.

In a message to a user who congratulated him on The Sun's challenge to the royal family, Murdoch said he "needed to demonstrate (that there is) no such thing as free press in UK."

"Internet makes mockery of these issues," he said, adding that Britain could use some First Amendment-style legislation.

But the mogul also extended an olive branch to the royals, telling his followers to give the prince "a break."

"He may be on the public payroll one way or another, but the public loves him," Murdoch wrote.

Judge to consider Enid newspaper's request

A judge has set a Sept. 4 hearing on a newspaper's request to unseal court records from a dismissed felony perjury charge filed against an Enid, Okla., attorney.

Grady County District Judge Richard Van Dyck also set a Sept. 6 hearing on attorney Eric Edwards' request to expunge the records in the case.

Prosecutors filed a perjury charge against Edwards in May and the case was sealed that day. The Enid News & Eagle filed a request to unseal the records, saying the documents should be open to the public.

A judge dismissed the charge against Edwards in July.

The newspaper reports (http://is.gd/XckWto ) the hearings were originally scheduled to occur on the same day at the same time, but the judge's office decided this week to hold them on separate days.

NY politician's email pushes letters to editors

A Republican New York state senator sent campaign staffers an email telling them to arrange constituent letters to editors attacking his "wacky" opponent while praising his own "leadership."

One of the emails from Sen. Greg Ball was inadvertently sent to The Journal News of White Plains. He represents parts of Dutchess, Putnam and Westchester counties.

The newspaper reports (http://lohud.us/O07FHn ) that Ball wanted several letters done by a deadline, including one from a small businessman thanking him for his role in a tax issue and "a 9-11 survivor letter attacking Wagner."

He referred to Democratic opponent Justin Wagner as "wacky Wagner."

Ball's campaign calls the letters legitimate testimonials from supporters.

Local publications are often filled with letters written by ardent supporters during campaigns.

Ball didn't initially respond to a request for comment.

Advance papers in Pa., NY to publish 3 days a week

Newspapers in Harrisburg, Pa., and Syracuse, N.Y., announced they will switch to a three-days-a-week publication schedule in January as their corporate owner continues its shift away from daily printed papers.

At the Post-Standard of Syracuse, editor and publisher Stephen Rogers told employees that newspapers' economic model has become unviable. The Post-Standard will publish on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays.

"If we simply maintain the status quo, if we continue to do just what we have been doing — no matter how well we do it — The Post-Standard would face extinction in a matter of years," Rogers said. "This is an irreversible trend. We either adjust, or we perish."

At The Patriot-News of Harrisburg, which won a Pulitzer Prize earlier this year, there will be an expansion of around-the-clock news coverage online, said publisher John Kirkpatrick.

"We are not making this move lightly," Kirkpatrick wrote in an email announcing the decision. "We understand how important the daily print paper is to a large number of people in our region. However, this is a major step to make sure we are leading, not trailing, in the world of innovation and solutions."

The newspaper will continue to publish on Sundays, while the other two days have not been determined.

The two newspapers are owned by Advance Publications Inc. Four other Advance newspapers, The Times-Picayune of New Orleans and the three largest papers in Alabama, said in June that they were switching to three-times-a-week publication. Those changes were accompanied by hundreds of layoffs.

In Harrisburg, Kirkpatrick said jobs will almost certainly be reduced, but those decisions are several weeks away and the number editorial content producers, such as reporters and photographers, would likely remain about the same.

"They understand the power of the digital world and the profound shift in the ways readers get their news and advertisers get their message out," Kirkpatrick told The AP, after meeting with the staff.

The Patriot-News won a Pulitzer Prize this year for its coverage of the Jerry Sandusky child molestation scandal. Its Sunday circulation has fallen to 118,000 from 176,000 in 1992, and Kirkpatrick said unique visitors to its website, pennlive.com, increased 80 percent in the past year.

A phone message seeking comment left at the parent company was not immediately returned.

An Advance newspaper in Michigan, The Ann Arbor News, was replaced by AnnArbor.com in 2009 and went to twice-weekly print publication, and the company has made similar changes to other papers in that state.

INDUSTRY NEWS (8-23-2012)

NYTimes CEO Thompson to make $5 million per year

The New York Times Co.'s incoming CEO Mark Thompson will receive annual compensation of about $5 million, the company said in a securities filing last week.

Thompson, 55, will be paid a $1 million annual salary, have an annual target bonus of $1 million and receive a signing bonus in stock and stock options worth $3 million, the company said.

In 2013, Thompson's pay package is slated to be largely the same, except the signing bonus will be replaced with a long-term incentive stock award also worth $3 million.

Thompson, the outgoing director-general of the British Broadcasting Co., will receive moving expenses of up to $100,000 through 2013 for relocating from Oxford, England, to New York. He will also receive legal fees up to $25,000 for contract negotiations. The Times Co. will also provide him with housing for three months after his start. Thompson is set to begin in November.

Thompson led the BBC for eight years. He replaces Janet Robinson, who resigned as the Times Co.'s CEO in December. Chairman Arthur Sulzberger Jr. will step down as interim CEO once Thompson starts work.

Cheaper junk mail? Newspapers decry US Postal plan

The U.S. Postal Service is proposing to cut its rates for one of the nation's top direct marketing companies, a move that threatens the newspaper industry's biggest money-maker: the Sunday advertising bundle.

The post office expects to generate $15 million in profits over three years by cutting what it charges Valassis Communications Inc. for new mass mailings. Livonia, Mich.-based Valassis sent more than 3 billion pieces of so-called junk mail through the post office last year. Under the proposal, Valassis has promised to send even more bulk mail. On those additional mailings, the Postal Service will give the company a discount of up to 34 percent. Valassis has agreed to pay a penalty if it does not boost its use of the mail service.

The newspaper industry says the deal is unfair and could wipe away $1 billion in annual revenue it gets from Sunday newspaper inserts and the advertising fliers it sends to non-subscribers during the week.

Valassis would be able to cut prices and attract advertisers like The Home Depot, Lowe's and JC Penney away from Sunday newspapers and toward its midweek bundle of fliers, called RedPlum. Valassis reaches 100 million homes every week and its clients include companies ranging from L'Oreal to DirecTV.

The Home Depot said in a statement that it has no plans to change distribution of its weekly advertising inserts away from newspapers, "but we are always evaluating new opportunities and options available in the marketplace."

Ruth Goldway, the Democratic chairman of the Postal Regulatory Commission, says the commission is reviewing the proposal with a critical eye. She acknowledges that the U.S. Postal Service has been "not very good" at predicting the negative consequences of its actions. But she says Congress has encouraged this kind of deal-making with the private sector in order to make the Postal Service "more businesslike."

"Even if we only make $15 million, but we increase the amount of volume in the mail and we get various businesses to think positively about using the mail in the future, then this is something good to do," she says.

The battle over mass mailing rates pits two old-world entities in a struggle for survival in the Internet age. The 237-year-old postal service's mail deliveries are declining as people communicate through e-mail, Facebook and Twitter. Even in the midst of a multibillion-dollar cost-cutting plan that includes the closure of 250 mail processing centers through 2014, the service expects to lose $14.1 billion this year.

"Our financial condition compels us to seek new revenue opportunities," the U.S. Postal Service said in a statement to The Associated Press.

At the same time, newspaper subscriptions and print advertising revenue have plunged as more people get their news online. At its peak in 2005, U.S. newspapers took in $49.4 billion in advertising revenue, both in print and online, according to the Newspaper Association of America. Last year, that figure had fallen to $23.9 billion. In that time, the industry has suffered waves of layoffs and newspaper bankruptcies.

The Associated Press is owned by U.S. newspapers and broadcasters.

Newspapers see the post office's proposed discounts as a direct attack on the Sunday newspaper, which is still delivered to subscriber's doorsteps literally overflowing with ads. Many newspapers would respond to the proposed deal by using cheaper but less reliable third-party firms to deliver fliers instead of the post office.

Many small town newspapers are delivered through the mail, and large metropolitan dailies use the post office to deliver fliers to non-subscribers.

"You're giving our biggest competitor these deep discounts," says Paul Boyle, senior vice president of public policy for the NAA. "We're going to have to respond to those discounts by lowering rates and lowering our costs."

The NAA's estimate for $1 billion in revenue losses is based on its survey of half its 806 member newspapers, including companies such as The New York Times Co., The McClatchy Co. and Gannett Co. Inc. Newspapers estimate that more than a third of the $2.5 billion in annual ad revenue they get from retailers of durable and semi-durable goods such as clothes, furniture and appliances could be siphoned off by a lower-cost alternative.

Some small newspapers would be put at an immediate disadvantage. The Courier-Times, a 7,200-circulation newspaper that publishes twice a week in rural North Carolina, says it could lose a significant chunk of the $100,000 a year it collects from ad inserts. For a newspaper with $1.5 million in annual revenue, that's a big loss.

Publisher Brinn Clayton says the newspaper would have no means of lowering costs to compete with Valassis since it relies on the U.S. Postal Service to deliver about half of its papers.

"There's nowhere else for us to turn. We can't deliver our newspapers as cheaply as (the post office) can," Clayton says. "We're kind of over a barrel."

"At the very least, it would certainly force us to reconsider our decades-long partnership with the post office," said The McClatchy Co. CEO Pat Talamantes, in an email.

The Washington Post says it could lose about 12 percent of its annual print advertising revenue if the post office's plan gets approved. Last year, the Post's print ad revenue was $264.5 million.

"There's no way this passes the test of not causing unreasonable harm to the marketplace," says the Post's vice president and counsel, Eric Lieberman.

Valassis says declining newspaper circulation is precisely why its direct mail services are needed.

"The continued erosion of newspaper subscribers has created a market need for an alternative distribution channel," said Steve Mitzel, senior vice president of shared mail for Valassis, in a statement.

The Postal Service's plan must be approved by the five-member Postal Regulatory Commission, which has been reviewing the deal since early May. A ruling is expected in the next few weeks.

The outlook isn't promising for newspapers. The commission has never in its 42-year history denied an application for a so-called "negotiated service agreement" related to its mail delivery monopoly, according to Postal Regulatory Commission spokeswoman Ann Fisher.

The U.S. Postal Service is allowed to forge such agreements if it believes they can help improve its finances, enhance its ope