Brian Lambert This past Monday the Star Tribune staff received the following memo from editors Nancy Barnes and Scott Gillespie. “Rob Daves has agreed to take on the role of project manager of buzz.mn through the end of March. In this role, Rob will be in charge of working with everyone in the newsroom to make the … Read more
Steve Perry, the talented and reliably caustic editor of City Pages handed in his resignation Monday, ending 13 years, in two separate shifts, as the alternative weekly’s ruddering hand. Perry cited more or less predictable philosophical differences with City Pages’ new(ish) corporate management, a recognition that journalism is moving on-line and that now was his … Read more
The mice were snickering Monday. Within the Star Tribune there was much chatter about Kate Parry v. Sid Hartman, Round Two. Or is it three? Or four? Maybe you caught Parry’s ombudsman column Sunday criticizing Hartman — Sid Friggin’ Hartman! — for appearing in an ad for Sun Country airlines, (with Ex-KSTP sports anchor, Joe … Read more
I’ve been cautioned to be careful with this. Schadenfreude, though a lovely sounding word, is unseemly. Its supposedly beneath a responsible adult. But what the hell is a media blogger supposed to do when confronted with the train wreck ratings for KTLK-FM (100.3), where I very briefly co-hosted a show? I mean, come on kids, … Read more
A generally reliable voice from within the Star Tribune’s reporting ranks defends Ms. Moses in the previously-posted back and forth e-mail spat with City Pages’ Steve Perry. Reliable Voice defends her on the grounds that she may actually be making a defensible argument. Voice argues that Moses probably saw that she was the only one … Read more
Just one question here. You’re a big city newspaper manager. Why declare a letter to a rival editor “Not for Publication” and then copy a dozen reporters, several if not all of whom have little reason to be sympathetic to your argument? Have you perhaps not heard of the internets? You know, the thing with … Read more
Here’s an interesting look from Slate’s Jack Shafer into the notorious incident up in Minot, North Dakota a few years ago when a train derailment threatened the city with a poisonous vapor cloud, but authorities couldn’t alert the population because all the Clear Channel-owned stations were on robot control …
I don’t know who looked less credible on last night’s edition of “60 Minutes”, George W. Bush or the president of Duke University, but the CBS News crew deserves a shout out for allowing both men to present their case regardless of how anemic each was. It is fashionable to avoid ever complimenting bigfooting mainstream … Read more
A nagging techno-glitch has had the mighty Lambert mainframe down for a few days. Anyone out there who knows a sure-fire, never fail fix for preventing a router from crashing the cable internet connection, drop me a line. As on election night, I spent the post-Bush “surge” speech with MSNBC. Since Fox is … well, … Read more
The report Friday that The Fox News Channel, (“FNC” in acronym argot, or “Faux News” if you aren’t drinking the Kool-Aid), was the 8th highest-rated cable channel of 2006 wasn’t exactly a press-stopper. But for those who don’t follow this stuff, #8 may seem low considering the tankers of ink media types dump into re-cycling … Read more