Morning Reading List, 05.28.08

Good morning Washington. Do you know at what restaurant the above picture was taken? Let us know your guesses. We think that the new (and wonderful) Viva Chuck Todd website has the potential to spark some great Chuck Norris Chuck Todd Facts (to wit: "Chuck Todd Facial Expression Translation: What the F%$# did you say Russert?"). Asked for the thousandth time: Has the media lost interest in Iraq? Did you catch Julie Mason doing her best "Night at the Roxbury" dance on MSNBC yesterday? HONK! DCRTV is unimpressed with the Washington Times' new website. More on the ongoing "MSNBC is liberal" thread (and TNR's Isaac Chotiner talks about "The pro-Obama case against MSNBC's pro-Obama political coverage"). Happy 42nd birthday, Katharine Weymouth. Did you get food poisoning in Guatemala? Do you blow through red lights when thinking about work? MicCheckRadio...where are you?!? As Romenesko points out, Linton Weeks' farewell article has a special little twist to it. Uh-oh: "Straight, proud, unmarried men over 30 are in crisis." And don't forget people (no matter what Mr. McGuire said): Time to get your aluminum bottles. Today's "Angry Journalist" rant of the day: "Three years into the business and I am realizing that I am never going to be as good as I want to be. And now I'm one of two 'senior' reporters in the newsroom. Something is wrong here." We've got your morning mix of media Muesli after the jump... Quickly navigate Morning Reading List: REVOLVING DOOR | NEWSPAPERS | TV | ONLINE MEDIA | MAGAZINES | RADIO | NEWS NOTES | JOBS It is close, but you think Hillary's RFK comments were uncalled for and obnoxious. REVOLVING DOOR It is now official. "Stephen C. Fehr, a 19-year veteran of The Washington Post, has been named a Senior Writer at Stateline.org, the leading online news site specializing in state policy and politics." Top of post NEWSPAPERS Michael Silence has launched a "dead-wood" version of his News Sentinel blog, "No Silence Here." Al Neuharth writes, "The first daily newspaper in the USA was born 225 years ago next week. The triweekly Pennsylvania Evening Post in Philadelphia became a daily on May 30, 1783. Since then, most cities or small towns across the USA have had their own daily or weekly newspaper. Currently, 1,422 dailies and 6,253 weeklies are being published. Sure, the slumping economy has made times a little tough for them. But most still have profit margins well above most other businesses." Famous DC reports, "Yes folks, even the Washington Post can still tie one on. WaPo reporter Megan Greenwell covered the 'tamer' side of Dewey Beach and her story ended up on page A-1 of the Monday edition." The Cleveland Plain Dealer's Reader Representative Ted Diadiun offers some friendly advice, "It's usually on the record when you talk to a reporter" 23/6 reports, "When Bill Kristol was hired by the New York Times, it was announced that he would continue on as the editor of the Weekly Standard. This led many to believe that Kristol would be phoning it in to the Times, not really giving them his top-level stuff. Sure, the Times has had to issue a few corrections here and there, but that's only because the column has been so original, so daring, that, to paraphrase Scotty Reston, to make a great editorial about a good omelet, you have to break some eggs. And those critics certainly have a lot of egg (ha!) on their faces now, especially after yesterday's Memorial Day column. Anyone who thought that Kristol would just phone in a tired local newspaper tribute to soldiers wrapped around another tired claim that we're winning in Iraq would be wrong. Okay, they'd be right, but, still, there was a lot of good stuff in yesterday's column, from which we learned so much." Top of post TV TVWeek reports, "High atop the list of good news last week was word that Bob Schieffer has decided once again to postpone his retirement and will remain for some time to come at the 'Face the Nation' post he has held since 1991. Mr. Schieffer, 71, who has a talent for boiling down major events (both professional and personal) with a straightforwardness The Insider has long admired (but seldom been able to imitate), said the deal was easily and simply done. CBS News and Sports President Sean McManus asked him not to step down as planned with the inauguration of a new president in January" Llewellyn King writes, "This is the year of the political talk show. Never have so many had so much to say about so little." ABC News.com reports, "In an unprecedented collaboration, all three major television networks will donate one hour of simultaneous commercial-free primetime this fall in an effort to raise money for cancer research. The broadcast, 'Stand Up To Cancer,' will air on Sept. 5 on ABC, CBS and NBC and will feature live performances by recording artists and movie and film stars who will, along with the evening news anchors from each of the networks, deliver information about potentially life-saving cancer research." Daily Howler reports, "On Wednesday night, Charlie Rose hosted Kurt Andersen, whose column, Imperial City, appears in New York magazine. (His current effort is entitled, 'About that Crush on Obama.') In our mind, Andersen's appearance was an embarrassing match for John Judis' recent TNR piece, the one in which Judis seems to say that one current White House hopeful should be held to a different standard. Our view? Given the record of the past dozen years, you'd almost think that major journalists would avoid the grisly word, 'swoon.' But not Kurt and Charlie -- they started right in! This cohort simply never adjusts, no matter how many people get maimed or killed in the wars their dumbness creates." "Pentagon inviting media to Guantanamo 9/11 hearings" The New York Times reports, "Along the way, some unofficial rules have emerged between the candidate and his aide. From Mr. Obama: 'One cardinal rule of the road is, we don't watch CNN, the news or MSNBC. We don't watch any talking heads or any politics. We watch 'SportsCenter' and argue about that.'" Isaac Chotiner outlines the "pro-Obama case against MSNBC's pro-Obama political coverage" for The New Republic. The New York Times reports, "Cable Prices Keep Rising, and Customers Keep Paying" The AP reports, "Comcast Corp. is trying to sell 46 smaller cable systems serving 400,000 to 500,000 subscribers as it seeks to improve efficiency by shedding disparate operations." The New York Post reports, "Former congressman J.C. Watts is behind a major push to launch an all-news channel for black people. The network, tentatively called Black Television News Channel and slated to launch in early 2009, already has an agreement with Comcast cable to be carried in several cities with large black populations including Philadelphia, Chicago, Detroit, Washington D.C., Atlanta and Baltimore." Time reports, "Keith Olbermann Blows Last Remaining Gasket" TVNewser's Steve Krakauer reports, "MSNBC Records First Prime Time Demo Win In 6+ Years" The New Yorker's Hendrik Hertzberg reports, "Those of us who love Chris Matthews have to rate this near the apex of our Top Ten Matthews Moments list." Barry Nolan tells, "The Story Behind My O'Reilly Protest" Top of post ONLINE MEDIA David All reports, "At the conservative bloggers briefing hosted by Robert Bluey of the Heritage Foundation, Washington Times editor John Solomon, who was sporting a retro Apple iBook G4, joined us to preview the re-launch of the new, modern, and social Washington Times." For more details, click here. PR Week reports, "USA Today, AARP The Magazine, and Huffington Post are the top newspaper, magazine, and blog according to the annual ranking conducted by BurrellesLuce, now in its fifth year. The ranking is based on the Audit Bureau of Circulations' (ABC) circulation figures and the Technorati Authority, which measures the influence of a blog based on links to it." Salena Zito looks at "The Drudge effect on the campaign" ReadWriteWeb reports, "As print circulation continues its slide at most newspapers, one of the United States' most respected newspapers, the New York Times, is taking steps to boost online readership. The paper is already the third most cited web site on Techmeme, and the first on Memeorandum, proving that bloggers at least pay attention to its reporting. Now, the Grey Lady is working on an API that aims to make the entire newspaper 'programmable.' In addition to the API, New York Times CTO Marc Frons told mediabistro.com that internal developers at the paper will use the platform to organize structured data on the site. Following that, the paper plans to offer developer keys to the API allowing programmers to more easily mash up the paper's structured content -- reviews, event listings, recipes, etc." B&C reports, "IFC is making a bet that people are hungry for online video with their lunch. The network's two-month-old Lunchbox is a daily Web show of independent-culture news and entertainment that premieres new episodes each day at noon. The two- to five-minute programs are hosted by different IFC Web personalities each day, and themed around topics like music and films that are near and dear to IFC's audience base." Chicago Tribune reports, "Entrepreneurs find creating and running Weblogs or developing them for others to use as a marketing tool can be profitable" Wired's Bruce Sterling writes, "Hmmm. I Just Got Extortion Spam ... Not particularly dramatic, effective or well-spelled extortion spam, but it is extortion spam. A death threat, even. And straight from the New York Times." Check it out here. FT.com reports, "Many members of the Web 2.0 generation of internet companies have so far produced little in the way of revenue, despite bringing about some significant changes in online behaviour, according to some of the entrepreneurs and financiers behind the movement." Top of post MAGAZINES Blog, p.i. asks, "Why wasn't Michael Isikoff's investigative piece outlining the lobbying connections of Barack Obama's lead strategist, David Axelrod, promoted in Newsweek's Sunday e-mail to subscribers?" LifeHacker.com reports, "Digital magazine provider Zinio offers up the current issues of 20 magazines -- including Popular Mechanics, PC Magazine, and U.S. News & World Report-- for free full-page browsing by iPhone users. As the gHacks blog points out, however, non-iPhone/iPod touch browsers can also score free access using the User Agent Switcher extension for Firefox or a simple Safari tweak, just as with AT&T hotspots at Starbucks and other locations." For the how-to, click here. Top of post RADIO Washington Post reports, "Federal Communications Commission Chairman Kevin J. Martin said yesterday that the agency could reach a decision on the proposed merger between Sirius Satellite Radio and XM Satellite Radio Holdings by the end of June." And, also from The Washington Post, "XM Satellite Radio Holdings warned in a regulatory filing last week that its financial position may be threatened if it cannot find $120 million worth of financing to adhere to the terms of its high-profile contract with Major League Baseball." A release announced, "Diane Rehm, host of The Diane Rehm Show, heard on WAMU 88.5 and more than 120 stations nationwide, will chat with listeners online tomorrow at 12:15 p.m., after her daily talk show. The chat will take place on The Conversation, an online meeting place for WAMU 88.5 listeners, producers, hosts, and reporters. Those interested in participating need only go to conversation.wamu.org and fill out a profile to join." The AP reports, "Clear Channel Communications Inc. said it will receive full funding for the debt financing needed for its $17.9 billion acquisition, clearing one hurdle in the transaction's path. Radio industry leader Clear Channel struck a deal to go private about a year and a half ago." Top of post NEWS NOTES I.D. Magazine asks, "With newspapers becoming relics, can a museum about journalism be anything more than a tomb?" From National Journal's Last Call: "'The streets are built for one way traffic but the cars flow both ways, and we seem to be the only ones slowing down to avoid a collision or a fall down a cliff' -- NBC/National Journal's Matthew Berger, in Puerto Rico with Bill Clinton (NBC/National Journal)." Ann Althouse writes, "The fervid brain of Bill Clinton knows what those other people are thinking: 'It is just frantic the way they are trying to push and pressure and bully all these superdelegates to come out.' Just frantic. Indeed. Is Bill Clinton crazy? She is winning the general election, and he is not. Oh my goodness, we have to cover this up. There's also this: 'I've never seen a candidate treated so disrespectfully just for running.' Who are these people he's so concerned about? Apparently, the media." Reuters has a Q&A with WPP's Sir Martin Sorrell Jack Myers reports, "Today, even as both large media corporations and emerging entrepreneurial enterprises are challenged to identify revenue-generating strategies that can achieve aggressive investor demands, and lip-service is paid to the demands of changing market conditions, most executives remain committed to outdated and dangerous mass-media-dependent economic models. Media companies today -- even the largest digital media companies -- are in danger of following the railroad industry model and becoming Industrial Age mass distribution vehicles rather than Relationship Age interactive brand and human connectors." Top of post JOBS Arcom Publishing, Inc. is looking for a Staff Reporter. Baltimore Examiner is looking for a Copy Editor. Politico is seeking a Life Editor McClatchy Newspapers is looking for a copy editor The Baltimore Sun is looking for a sports web producer. Computercraft Corporation is looking for an Online Journal Specialist. Congressional Quarterly is looking for a Tax Writer. Top of post Hat Tips: DCRTV, TVNewser, IWantMedia, Romenesko, MediaBistro, JournalismJobs, JournalismNext

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Morning Reading List, 05.28.08

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