If there's one thing Jack Shafer hates to see, it's media outlets jumping on imaginary trends, especially of the drug use variety. But if there are two things Jack Shafer hates to see, it's reporters editorializing in their supposedly objective copy. Which is why he's tired of seeing the word "loophole" show up so often, especially in political reports. "It's a loaded, partisan word," says Jack, "one that implies wrongdoing and scandal where none exists, and inserting it into a political argument gives the inserter the upper hand. When loophole creeps into news stories, they start to read like editorials."

Clearly, not many papers feel the way he does (in what looks like a column topic that's been shelved for a few weeks). Rags with titles that include "New York," "Boston," "Times," and "Tribune" all allow the use of the "extra naughty" word. We know what you're thinking: Somewhere, in the history of journalism, there must have been a major loophole that allowed this.

Now with these newfangled blogs and such, everyone's a critic! Which means professional critics – whose bylines appear in respectable publications like newspapers instead of titles that end in ".com" – are losing their relevancy. Or at least their corporate employers think so! So the higher ups have been cutting back on the staff positions of the nation's opinionated pop culture critics, like those whose job it is to tell you whether that new USA series Burn Notice is worth investing in.

CONTINUED »

• Seventeen launches a new online game called "Editor's Assistant," based on EIC Ann Shoket's real-life assistant. The game, unofficially dubbed "The Devil Wears Unlaced Converse Sneakers," is available here.

• Newspapers continue to slash classical music critics in favor of hiring multiple Paris Hilton vaginaphiles instead.

• YouTube continues to piss off greedy Hollywood types by airing copyrighted material on their site without having the decency to charge an overinflated premium.

• Interview lauded for being 1.5 decades behind the times.

• "If the internet is killing newspapers, why are they doing so well?" wonders the Guardian. Related: Crazy near-death Guardian reporters clearly in denial.

Have you heard? It's, like, hard for young people in journalism. Even with fancy j-schools on their resume, that first gig is tough to come by. And even when you do get on the first rung of your ladder to media conglomerate slavery, the going just doesn't get any easier. Can you believe? Hardship in this industry?!

CONTINUED »

At least when the New York Post runs a full-page ad tomorrow proclaiming its circulation gains, the Daily News won't have to sit in a corner and cower, for it, too, saw readership increase. The Audit Bureau of Circulation's latest figures, released today, show the Post gaining 7.6%, bringing daily circ to 724,748, while the News climbed 1.4%, to 718,174.

And that's about where the celebration ends. Most other papers saw circ drop, including the New York Times (1.9%), Washington Post (3.5%), Boston Globe (3.7%), Los Angeles Times (4.2%), Chicago Tribune (2.1%), Newsday (6.9%), and some paper in Texas (Dallas Morning News) that dropped 14% after doing away with circulation methods that probably shouldn't count for anybody.

But hey, it's not like Americans are watching the evening news, flipping through magazines, or reading books in substantial quantities either!

Update: Look at that … the Post is already celebrating.

The Pulitzer Prizes are being handed out probably as we speak. We're hearing the Wall Street Journal picked up the award for public service. More to come.

Update: The full list of winners is coming through ..WSJ: 2. LAT: 1. NYT: 1. Newsday: 1. NYDN: 1. AP: 1. LA Weekly: 1. Boston Globe: 1. Miami Herald: 1. Other papers unrecognizable outside the city: a few others.

Newspaper fuck up chronicler Regret The Error leads in to the end-of-the-year listicle scene with a compilation of the year's biggest errors of judgment, overlookings, and general idiocy. Like this one from the Delaware News Journal:

An article in Sunday’s Local section on the estate sale of former Gov. Elbert Carvel quoted Olin Vanaman of Wilmington about his excitement in purchasing 35 of the governor’s decanters during the auction, including one used at Queen Elizabeth’s coronation. Vanaman said he used a slang term when describing Carvel as "a big boozer,” but he did not mean that the former governor was a heavy drinker. Vanaman refers to people who collect decanters as "boozers,” he explained, "the same as guys who collect cars are gear-heads.” No reference to drinking or the consumption of alcohol was intended in the article.

And, can you believe it, that was merely the runner up for Correction of the Year.

Editor & Publisher may be the go-to newspaper trade, but we only read it for news on Sulzberger's stock trading and its electic listing of the best newspaper ads. Like the one above, where some silly lass thought it might be cute to scrawl her number on today's headlines. She gets off easy, though, with just a swat. Since we're a bunch of faries scared of getting newsprint ink on our fingers, we only read the news online — and if that bitch tried writing her number on our computer screen, her cankles would be swollen by now.

If you're the type of media ass who reads more than one college newspaper, that copy/pasted editorial you just read in each of those rags isn't the latest instance of plagiarism on a college campus. Rather, a consortium of self-important university papers joined together for a self-important cause – college newspaperdom – and printed the same editorial blasting the University of Southern California for blocking the reelectiion of Zach Fox as EIC of the Daily Trojan. Fox had grand plans for the paper, like actually making a stab at journalism, and went so far as to request financial documents for the rag he spearheaded. As the editorial puts it, it was a lone administrator who got pissy and blocked the Fox's renewal, just like it was just one jerkoff administrator who refused our transfer credits and made us have Friday 8am classes.

After the jump, the editorial in full.

CONTINUED »

• Jon Friedman pees his pants a little when you start talking about private ownership of newspapers by gajillionaires.

• The sale of Time Inc.'s 18 Time4Media magazines stalls, freaking out staffers who don't know who their new overlord might be.

• This Internet thing is totally going to take off in '07.

• David Letterman reups contract with CBS thru 2010 for a fat $30 million per year.

• Wife and daughters of mission CNET editor James Kim have been found after a week of being stranded in Oregon's wildernes. Kim remains missing after leaving to find help.

• Derek Jeter hits Fox News with a couple Victoria's Secret model to plug his new fragrance. FBNY licks boots of Fox publicist.

• Onetime producer Joseph Medawar gets a year in a day in jail for bilking investors out of millions to produce a never-to-be-made show on DHS.

By now you've heard the good news: Google is going to save the newspaper industry! Circulation down? Google it! Advertising revenue in the shitter? Google it! Hollywood egomaniacs building war chests to make outrageous takeover bids for a piece of dying newsprint? Rip through famous paintings! Google it!

That's right: Google's ad sales foray is hitting newspapers, with the search giant buying up ad real estate in more than 50 newspapers (just for starters) and then using its fancy computer bidding system to sell that ad space to – you guessed it! – the highest bidder. Now, while we wait for Adam Penenberg to explain how click fraud is going to inevitably affect Google's new scheming, we're more interested in how Google's knack for contextual advertising* is going to make for some super awesome, super offensive adjacencies.

* We're aware Google's contextual advertising system is not a part of this newspaper gimmick, but give it time.

Even we got scared when everyone started saying blogs were the future of newspapers. Blogs would thrive; newspapers would die. Thank god that didn't happen — we can barely shoulder the responsibility of scrounging together a lackluster comedic punchline everytime Jon Friedman publishes a column. But an even scarier thought – so appropriate, given yesterday's costuming – is whether tabloids like the New York Post and Daily News are the future of newspapers.

In case you didn't hear, THE NEW YORK POST IS THE NATION'S NO. 5 NEWSPAPER!!@#$^#! So they've got to be doing something right .. doing something to please the fickle, iPod-BlackBerry-Ryan-Phillippe obsessed masses, yah? Forbes' Louis Hau thinks so, and he's even got a listicle to show you. Among the bullet points: emphasize local coverage, keep article length short, SPORTS!, and keep the physical size of the newspaper shrunken down enough so readers can flip through it without mastering origami. Oh, and the one critical strategy Hau left out? Forget about any so-called truce between rival gossip columns, ramp up attack efforts, and ensure said columnists meet at least a 1:5 ratio of "reaming the competition" to "actual gossip items."

• The sky is falling! The sky is falling! But you're already well aware. [E&P]

• In magazine land, Bush, Beyonce, Tom Ford's naked ladies, and digits make for fast-moving covers. [WWD]

• There's no place for Time in Time Inc.'s web endeavors. [WSJ]

• Congratulations to MSNBC's Contessa Brewer, who eschewed the network's questionable future to beat fellow anchor Alison Stewart to the alter. [ICN]

• InterActivCorp's Barry Diller isn't sitting out this this YouTube thing. [HWT]

Did you know that John Harris of the Washington Post wrote a book? No? Really? Well, apparently, neither did his co-workers. Or, at least Harris doesn't think they know about it. Hence this letter "from the department of shameless self-promotion" in which he begs his peers to buy The Way to Win: Taking the White House in 2008." And they say the media isn't biased! Well, at least he's honest.

From: John Harris/news/TWP
To: NEWS - All Newsroom@WashPostMain
Date: Wednesday, October 11, 2006 02:05PM
Subject: from the department of shameless self-promotion

I recently wrote a book on presidential campaigns and strategy. "THE WAY TO WIN: Taking the White House in 2008" is focused on the way the political game has changed over the past generation and tries to illuminate the specific principles that people who have thrived at winning this game (including Bill Clinton and Karl Rove) know and how they put those principles to work.

He also encourages his Post colleagues to come hear him speak tonight. And the alluring fact that his underling simply adored the book is his main selling point.

CONTINUED »

As Jossip has previously reported (and eventually wondered "why has this not happened yet?") Lloyd Grove is leaving the pages of the Daily News. Whether he is to be replaced by Ben Widdicombe's Gatecrasher has yet to be reported by the New York Times … buy maybe in a few more weeks.

Because nothing is official until it's in the Times, Grove's departure does create plenty of buzz, but certainly nothing anyone is surprised to hear. After three years and six weeks as the News' awkward gossip monger, Grove is throwing in the towel, along with the conversations with his many imprisoned friends. And he even has some random, sketchy, plans for the future.

“The end of my gossip column in The Daily News is not the end of my presence in New York,” he said. “I have discovered in the last few weeks, oddly enough, that I am still employable. I will be doing something that is multimedia, with components of Internet and television and print media.”

Oooh, now what could that be? Sounds very futuristic and media-centric. We bet he's setting up his own blog/vlog/newsletter out of his basement. Just kidding! We have no idea what job Grove managed to snag, but, hell, good for him. And we should probably extend our congratulations to Widdicombe, too.

Lowdown: A Farewell to Gossip [New York Times]

After standing his ground against the Tribune Company's attempt to cut staff members at the Los Angeles Times, publisher Jeffrey M. Johnson was forced out of the newspaper during a meeting this morning.

Tribune Publishing President Scott C. Smith was huddling with top managers at the newspaper and was expected to announce after the meeting that David Hiller, publisher of the Chicago Tribune, would immediately replace Johnson as chief executive at the 125-year-old newspaper. Hiller would become the 12th publisher of The Times.

In response to the Tribune's decision to consider selling the company or break it up, Johnson defied executives by insisting slashes at the paper would be detrimental to the paper's "high-quality" editorial content.

New LA Times publisher David Hiller is expected to ask top editor Dean Baquet to stay on, despite his protests against further job cuts and his qualms over selling the paper to movie producer David Geffen. No word yet on Baquat's decision.

Joel Stein & Co. were last ferociously sending their resumes over to the San Fransisco Chronicle and VH1.

Times Publisher Johnson Forced Out [LA Times via Mediabistro]

In a Miami Herald staff meeting on Tuesday, Tom Fielder, the paper's executive editor used a somewhat insulting metaphor to describe the listeners of Cuban Radio. We have to sign up for the Miami Herald to get the full article, which is taking forever, so we don't exactly know what this meeting was about … but we assume it has something to do with those who were laid off for accepting bribes from our extremely ethical government.

In staff meetings Tuesday, Miami Herald reporters asked whether the paper was caving to critics. Editor Tom Fiedler dismissed that notion, saying the "22 people who listen to Cuban radio" were being stirred up by "little chihuahuas nipping at our heels." He later apologized for his choice of words.

Yeah. We can see how calling a group of Latinos "chihuahuas" might be taken as an offense. But, the editor apologized, and said he meant no harm by his choice of words. It just popped into his head for whatever reason.

Words are important. Using them properly is critical to me as executive editor of this newspaper and to me personally. I am conscious of the power of words to render good. And the power of words to create hurt.

I am guilty of using words that created hurt by way of an ill-chosen metaphor I used during a newsroom staff meeting Tuesday.

I want to repeat my sincere apologies for those remarks. I was referring to a particular critic mounting relentless attacks on our newsroom for the last several weeks charging that we are in league with the Cuban government. I used an unfortunate term, intending only to refer to the persistence and sharpness of the commentary. My intent was not to offend anyone, although I now realize that I did. Again, my deepest apologies.

If only he had the foresight to have said "poodles" instead.

Fiedler Apologizes, But For What? [New Times]
An apology over my words [Miami Herald]
Miami Herald editor apologizes for "ill-chosen metaphor" [Romenesko]

Do you have a journal (actual paper, not a blog) where you babble on about random stuff that has to do with being nerdy-fabulous in New York? Well, Choire Sicha is desperately seeking your contributions for the New York Observer. There's just one catch: no college grads. You can have attended college and then dropped out, or applied and never gone, or you can just have spent your post-high school years fishing upstate and/or roaming about Washington Square Park begging for change, playing chess, and bumming cigs from NYU kids.

You should probably be smart-ish (or just know lots of large words) — but just don't be "degreed." Sicha has enough well-bred intelligence floating around his desk (office? we don't know) for now.

College drop-outs and never-applieds are invited to pitch or send, for consideration, stories to The Daily Transom at csicha@observer.com. Written is fine; if not, a good pitch—since you don't have no prof to tell you—is about three sentences long, contains the nugget of news obtained or sought, shows flair, and has nothing to do with any of the following:

· Celebrity poker
· Food-eating competitions
· Ryan Adams
· MisShapes
· Janice Dickinson
· Stunt karaoke
· The Museum of Sex
· Speed-dating
· "9/11"
· MySpace
· A strange coincidence.

Email any questions. Proof of non-attendance is required. Pay is somewhere between "a pittance" and "sure better than a day's work digging ditches." Opportunities for advancement not un-possible.

A word of advice: your chances of landing gig will possibly be improved if you show up for a face-to-face drunk and/or on drugs.

Screw J-School: Transom Seeks College No-Gos, Drop-Outs for Digital Apprenticeships [The Transom, New York Observer]

Can a Hollywood producer own the Los Angeles Times? A real estate mogul can own the New York Observer. A child molester once partially owned Radar. So, why not? Rich people more or less get what they want, especially when it comes to media, right?

We like to take the attention off the small time PR people and random porno filming assistants once in awhile to focus on the actual larger issues in media these days. And DreamWorks SKG founder, David Geffen (the G in SKG) reportedly wanting to buy the L.A. Times is a bigger-ish deal.

Especially when it's being reported that, when the current editor of the L.A. Times, Dean Baquet got wind of that news last year, he was stunned.

“How’s he going to feel the first time we review a movie or music produced by a friend of his?” Baquet asked.

Or God forbid praising and/or not attempting to destroy a rival. And n "insider" tells Nikki Finke that Geffen is “very serious” and “pretty confident” in regards to getting his hands on the paper. Not that Baquet is off Finke's hook, either, though. She hears that the EIC has been hand-picking staffers who will "drum up local support" for a "local buyer" (aka, "golfing buddy") who would snap up the paper. It seems to be a pretty classic "boys club" case.

But the Times’ most pressing problem isn’t whether Geffen or someone else buys it, or Tribune sells it, or Baquet gets fired. Instead, the widespread media coverage has ignored the dangerous game being played with the paper’s integrity between this billionaire boys’ club and Baquet or his surrogates behind closed doors.

Oh, wait. Why are we getting in such a tizz? This is L.A.! We should be expecting as much. They can just sell the paper to Rick Hilton or Donald Trump and Paris and Ivanka can run the editorial section. Except for the part where Joel Stein murders the entire staff, we think that plan is flawless.

Baquet's Billionaire Boys' Club [Nikki Finke, LA Weekly]

In order to compete with the Daily News and the New York Times, News Corp. will broaden their New York reach to become an inter-borough newspaper company. News Corp. has acquired 28 weekly papers, serving Brooklyn and Queens for a reported $16 million.

While the price of the acquisition was not disclosed, someone close to the deal but not authorized to speak about the matter said News Corporation paid $16 million for the two operations: the TimesLedger and Courier-Life newspaper groups.

With TimesLedger publishing 16 weekly newspapers in Queens and Courier-Life holding down 11 Brooklyn papers, the deal would hopefully increase News Corp's owned circulation by $140,000. Les Goodstein, senior vice president of News Corp., tells the Times that neither editorial jobs nor content will be changed in light of the purchase.

Ad content, however, will likely increase about 89%.

News Corp. Buys 2 Groups of Weekly Papers [Maria Aspan, New York Times]