You Gonna Have to Get on Outta Here, Mr. Geraldo
In your chesty Monday media column: the Oxford American lives, the Journal Register goes broke, Geraldo is trespassing, and Madoff pics are hottttt:
The Oxford American, the smart little magazine that it is mandatory to describe as "the New Yorker of the South," was about to be forced out of business after an employee embezzled $30,000 last year. But a generous donor has come forth with a $100,000 contribution that will allow it to keep publishing! Maybe this will finally make you start reading the Oxford American, hmmm?
While the bankruptcy of the Philly newspapers was getting all the headlines, the Journal Register company, publisher of 179 smaller newspapers, also went bankrupt this weekend.
Geraldo Rivera was down in Florida doing some hard-nosed journalistic tasks (aggressively questioning the father of a missing child about whether he's a drugged-out police-informing wife beater) when the cops came along and issued him a warning about trespassing on said father's property! How is Geraldo supposed to cover North Florida missing child cases without being able to roam the land upon which the child family's is camping? This is just one of the challenges real journalists face today. [Pic: UPI]
One guy making money from the whole Bernie Madoff debacle: the photographer who took some boring photos of Madoff for a Fortune article ten years ago. Suddenly everybody wants to buy those pictures! The lesson: take photos of as many people as possible, because at least a few of them are bound to become famous villains.
Romenesko headline paraphrase du jour: "Will move to Iowa affect ReadyMade's hip editorial sensibilities?" Yall don't know about that Romenesko humor!