So, you want to be a journalist? Ha ha ha. Jeez. Your timing sucks. But hey, it's a perfectly semi-honorable profession; nobler than finance, not as noble as being a postman. So whether you're already in journalism and wondering about what direction your career should take (besides down), or a terribly misguided young go-getter looking to get into journalism, we're here to help. Every freaking thing you need to know about the real state of the media job market, after the jump.

"Arthur Sulzberger Jr., publisher of The New York Times, had two breakfasts with the mayor, and although no specific commitments were made [about endorsing Bloomberg's third term], an understanding was reached." [Times]

“What we needed, as a minimum, was an investor or a group of investors who would contribute $10 million per year, to be matched by the current group of investors. That would give us about $20 million, which is what we were losing.” [New York]

Will the Times end up like the Wall Street Journal, sold off by disgruntled, money-grubbing family members? To find out, New York investigated the fifth generation of the Times' controlling Sulzberger family. The good news, for those who want to see the Times stay in family hands, is that none of these young men and women (some shown in this handy PDF chart) would talk smack about their poorly-managed company to a reporter, in contrast to the Bancrofts who sold off the Journal. All family kids are being indoctrinated at special "orientation sessions," camps and annual business meetings, starting at age 10. Everyone stays connected on Facebook, including an 87-year-old Sulzberger grandmother. The bad news: No one knows if this unity will hold together when the company cuts unsustainably high stock dividend. Also, the family twentysomethings seem at least as unlikely to ever run the company as acid-dropping Pinch Sulzberger did 35 years ago. Here, for example, is what Judith Sulzberger's young grandson Alex Cohen recently wrote on his Facebook:

More layoffs at the Village Voice have been confirmed: staff writers Maria Luisa Tucker and Sean Gardiner (who was a fine police beat reporter and good guy). Budgetary reasons were reportedly the cause. Further, "The paper’s copy chief also resigned in protest after the deputy copy chief was laid off Wednesday." This after the layoffs late last week of sex columnist Tristan Taormino and photo editor Staci Schwartz. Dayum, what a crappy Friday this is. [via Pop and Politics]

Mike Nizza (pictured?), the biggest Wu-Tang fan in the history of the New York Times, is leaving the paper in order to bring da ruckus to The Atlantic's web projects. His boss, NYT digital editor Jim Roberts, closes the staff memo on Nizza's departure by quoting a Gawker comment. With his exit, the Times loses a rebel, who makes more noise than heavy metal. Nizza will be remembered for that old loco style from his vocals—Bill Keller couldn't peep it with a pair of bifocals. We saw this moment coming, though. Mike was a vandal. Too hot to handle. Now, he's saying Goodbye like Tevin Campbell. Full memo below:

Mean old sexy hack and legendary Post guy Steve Dunleavy had his retirement party last night. Or as it was apparently called, his "wake." But uh, long life and good health, Steve! The Observer showed up (and was banished to the outside) to chronicle Rupert Murdoch's send-off to his favorite attack dog:

Gandhi is my homeboy. And yours! Let's figure out this ad campaign together. The slogan: "Life is easier if you don't speak up. Debate." Naturally you can see how the whole theme develops from that point. You can't see (I'm willing to bet) what the hell this campaign might be promoting, but hey, that's something you can "debate." After the jump, see Gandhi cookin' out, Mandela chillaxin', and the Dalai Lama ready to hit some serious slopes, screw the politics yo!

♦ Rachael Ray's mammogram is scheduled for tomorrow. And you'll be able to watch it go down if you tune into her show. [NYDN]
♦ The New Yorker just issued its endorsement of Barack Obama. Bet you're really surprised. [NYer]
♦ CNBC hit an all-time record the day the Dow dropped 777 points. [MCN]
♦ ABC's lineup of new shows isn't off to a very good start this season. [THR]
♦ Why Microsoft's ads with Bill Gates and Jerry Seinfeld was a flop and Apple's "I'm a PC" ad has been a success. [AdAge]
♦ Newark's Star-Ledger is hanging on, but barely. [AP]
♦ As the economy turns south, marketers are turning up the volume and going after their competitors. [WSJ]
♦ Donna Tartt is leaving Knopf for Little, Brown. [Galleycat]
♦ The new, ad-covered subway cars... revealed! [NYT]

When the newspaper industry is crumbling along with the American economy in general, the smartest people in all of journalism are the Northwestern J-school professors who packed up and decamped for Qatar. They left dreary Evanston, Illinois for beachfront condos in an oil-flush Middle Eastern paradise. There, they have only 39 students in total. And they don't talk back, because no one in the country really knows what journalism is all about:

The Times finally found space to publish a nice, chummy editorial bemoaning the death of the "lively.... handsome... muckraking" New York Sun. The loss of the neoconservative broadsheet is especially sad, the Times added, because internet journalism is very confusing and hard to navigate and just generally terrifying, unlike the Sun, which again is quite pretty and edited by a swell guy called Seth Lipsky. Glossed over was Lipsky's utter shortsightedness as both a civic observer and a businessman. And though the Times editorial board has long fancied itself a staunch defender of the First Amendment, it failed completey to note the Sun's revolting 2003 editorial calling anti-war protestors treasonous and saying they should be muzzled, spied upon and perhaps thrown in jail. Slate accurately labeled it "fascist" at the time, and a tipster this week reminded us of its existence. Some highlights:

Less than four months after he "broadened" the Wall Street Journal's Page One desk, promoting P1 editor Mike Williams to deputy managing editor and giving him oversight over investigative re porting, Journal editor Robert Thomson is again reorganizing the storied team. Williams, a pre-Thomson veteran once rumored to be in the Rupert Murdoch lieutenant's crosshairs, stays in place. But his deputy Mike Allen is moved to a new job where he will "nurture investigations" in foreign bureaus, under the title Page One Projects Editor. Allen was recently billeted to the international desk for a stint assisting another Deputy M.E., Nik Deogun, so the change isn't entirely out of left field. Moving up: Alex Martin, a Newsday veteran at the Journal just three years. Thomson's full memo on the changes is after the jump.

Ben Eason, the CEO of alt-weekly chain Creative Loafing—which declared bankruptcy this week—has a vision for the future of his publications. And that vision is to be like Huffington Post Chicago. Huh? Here's what he wants, and here's our free quality advice to him, before he fucks up some of the nation's best alt-weeklies for good:

Sam Zell is the gnomish CEO of Tribune, a company with a bunch of nosediving newspapers and one valuable parking lot. Luckily the Tribune Co. is owned by the happy employees themselves, leaving Zell with enough liquidity to throw himself huge, circus-like birthday parties. Did you miss your invite for his last one? Check out these pics of the frugal decor and musical guests!:

The New York Times is quite concerned about this economy and this "bailout" that is probably going to pass the Senate today in the most complicated form so far presented to the American People. They note, today, that its fate as political poison was probably set when it was labeled a "bailout" from the beginning. But just maybe, institutionally, as the voice of the moderate liberal establishment, the Times needs this bailout to work! So they spend a great deal of time trying to explain it, and they also seek to explain the effect of the bailout and The Crisis on You, the Little Guy on Main Street. And every other street! Join us, won't you, as we tag along on the Times Bailout Tour '08. First: it's not a bailout!

The New York Times launched its "social networking" feature TimesPeople months ago for no particular reason, and with no particular effect. Back then even top editor Bill Keller wasn't using it. But now he is! You know what this means, don't you? It's one more way for suckup Times reporters to track who the boss is favoring. Almost as good as looking at the front page! So what is Keller recommending? Let's see:

The Minneapolis Star-Tribune is in severe financial distress, of course, because it is a newspaper. It was sold (at a loss) by McClatchy in 2006 to a private equity firm, and has reliably lost value ever since. Though it still "makes money" in the strictest sense of the term! The paper has already laid off 100 newsroom people and put its headquarters up for sale, but now the company has hit on a new strategy for saving money: not paying the bills! The paper announced that it won't be paying creditors this quarter.

When we remember the New York Sun, we'll try to remember the great local reporting and the fantastic sports page and the serious and smart arts coverage. Not so much the ideological inanity and loud constant taking of the precisely wrong side of every important issue of this miserable era. In trying to remember them that way, of course, one is best advised to skip most of their farewell edition. The goodbyes are not self-pitying, at least, but they reveal a newspaper that imagines it had some small role in the destruction of this country while turning a blind eye to the many myriad ways they could've continued on their crusade if they hadn't been so utterly out of touch. The opening of the farewell editorial sets the scene:

Just last week, Wachovia awarded its $100 million-plus advertising account to WPP. Then yesterday Wachovia was bought by Citigroup, and they were like, Hey, whoa, no ad deal after all! That really sucks the big one, in ad industry parlance. Too bad for Wachovia, too; perhaps a better ad agency could have ensured that the bank didn't end up with horrific ad placement like this, in today's Wall Street Journal:

Lee Abrams, Tribune Co.'s "Chief Innovation Officer" of AWESOMENESS (pictured, with top advisers) is back with another hard-rockin', mind-shockin' memo to blow the socks off all you naysayers who thought newspapers could never change! Abrams is already single-handedly responsible for the ten dumbest things said about newspapers this year, and that was before he busted out yesterday talking about "freedom to have so much belief on the brand." Are you trying to upstage your own slammin' track record of badass, Martian declarations on journalism, Lee? I think you are! The Chicago Tribune just unveiled a redesign, which seems like a good occasion for a big old memo from Lee Abrams. High five! All ellipses are in the original text, people: