New York Times Martin Savidge will anchor "Worldfocus," which debuts Oct. 6 on public television stations in eight of the top 10 markets. The newscast is described as a cross between ABC's "World News" and its late-night program "Nightline."[...]

Romenesko Misc. "We are thrilled to have Jonathan [Dube] back at ABC News where he began his career in digital media," says ABC News president David Westin. In 1999, Dube worked with ABCNews.com as a national producer. A Poynter Online columnist, Dube most recently has been director of digital media [...]

Portfolio.com Maghound, which debuts next month, will allow consumers to pay one price for a flexible mix of monthly magazines. "Look at TiVo, iTunes, Netflix," says Maghound president Dave Ventresca. "They have raised consumer expectations of how much control they should have over their media choices. We haven't seen that [...]

Romenesko Memos The publisher of McClatchy's Rock Hill, SC paper tells her staff: "We are implementing an across-the-board, one-year wage freeze effective September 1, 2008. This means that if you are scheduled to receive a merit or salary review between September 1, 2008 and August 31, 2009, your review will [...]

News Gems Jon Marshall's top three "best describers" are Jeffrey Fleishman of the Los Angeles Times, Lane DeGregory of Poynter's St. Petersburg Times, and New York Times columnist Dan Barry.[...]

WashingtonPost.com That's Paul Farhi's contention. "Political protests? Not on this channel; no sir. Beijing's fearful pollution? Maybe, but only if a marathoner coughs up a lung or it spoils a beauty shot. Doping scandals? In passing, perhaps. Tibet? China's role in Darfur? Now, wait just a second... The aftermath of [...]

Forbes.com | Editor & Publisher That's about the same as 2000 and 2004, although Forbes claims the larger papers are cutting back on convention staffing this year. USA Today is sending 34 reporters to each convention, and Dow Jones will have 23 reporters in both Denver and St. Paul. The [...]

AdAge.com In the future, writes Simon Dumenco, "just as there will be fewer and fewer full-time journalists producing words for pay, there will be fewer and fewer full-time photojournalists taking photographs for pay. Maybe five or 10 years from now, with the newspaper industry and old-school media empires such as [...]

Los Angeles Times If Jay Leno lands at ABC, it'll probably spell the end of the nearly 29-year-old "Nightline," reports Meg James. Executive producer James Goldston tells her: "The show is starting to matter again, just as it once did. My hope is that we are going to see 'Nightline' [...]

Publishers Weekly Penguin's Portfolio business books division has bought world rights to Ben Johnson's "Sam I Am: The Inside Story of How Deal-Maven Sam Zell Is Reshaping the World's Two Largest Industries." The book will track Zell's life from law school to his recent takeover and makeover of the Tribune [...]

New York Times In the first quarter, the auto industry spent $414 million less on advertising than in last year's first quarter. Newspapers saw a decline of $131 million in auto ads. Magazines are also suffering, losing $72 million in ads in the same period.[...]

San Francisco Chronicle It comes from conservative columnist Debra Saunders: "Yes, fewer reporters mean fewer biased stories about lesbian immigrants fighting an unsympathetic establishment. But there also won't be as many stories about sanctuary city policies gone bad, the latest zany law out of San Francisco City Hall, or the [...]

Romenesko Memos "While we were not looking to sell the Connecticut Post, we took advantage of an opportunity to accomplish several important objectives," says a memo to MediaNews employees. "First, proceeds from the sale were used to repay almost 25% of our outstanding bank debt. Secondly, the transaction provided a [...]

Politico.com That's what ABC News' Brian Ross says. He tells Michael Calderone that his investigative team began looking into the John Edwards story back in October. || ABC News: Edwards admits he cheated, but denies being father of Rielle Hunter's baby.[...]

Minneapolis Star Tribune | Salon "I couldn't understand why I was the only one who felt relieved when he was gone," says former Twin Cities Reader staffer Cherie Parker, who worked briefly for David Carr. During her job interview, "he shouted at me, 'When I was your age, I was [...]

NewsTimes.com "This transaction allows MediaNews to manage its balance sheet during a challenging economic environment and transfer ownership of the Connecticut Post to a company we admire," says MediaNews president Joseph Lodovic. The weeklies that Hearst acquired are the Darien News-Review, Greenwich Citizen, Fairfield Citizen-News, New Canaan News-Review, New Milford [...]

Reflections of a Newsosaur | Charlotte Observer | TV Barn Alan Mutter says the mainstream media "look foolishly out of touch by continuing to remain silent about the allegation that John Edwards fathered the girl recently born to a former campaign aide." || Aaron Barnhart: "The Enquirer, along with my [...]

Time-blog.com Justin Fox points out that small-town papers benefit from the reality that: * their communities are too small for Craigslist to have gotten to; * their populations are less transient and less Internet-addicted; and * the real-estate bust (and real-estate ad bust) has been mostly a metro-area phenomenon.[...]

Variety "In fact, Rupert Murdoch has stood out in an economic climate where some 6,000 newspaper jobs have vanished nationwide this year alone, showing faith in a shrinking business," writes Jill Goldsmith. "The Journal has yet to see the massive layoffs of other publications, and there are plans to expand [...]

Louisville Courier-Journal The Courier-Journal has had an ombudsman for 40 years. Executive editor Bennie Ivory says "the position has been a very valuable part of the newspaper, but I felt the need to move the resource to another area. I didn't think we should weaken the editorial voice of the [...]

In chasing information like birth certificate listings, which the News & Observer did last week, "it becomes easy to get caught up in the salacious details and drop the restraint that has marked The N&O;'s responsible approach to the [John Edwards' alleged mistress/"love child"] story," writes ombud Ted Vaden. "[Edwards] [...]

AdAge.com Eric Schmidt surprised many at an Ad Age conference with his lament that investigative journalism was fading along with the newspaper industry that once championed it. He cited thin journalism from Iraq as proof of the problem, reports Hoag Levins in his intro to a three-minute video of the [...]

NYTimes.com Executive Suite Times business columnist Joe Nocera says "there is simply no question that the ['you're a slime bucket'] comment was on the record. Quoting [Steve Jobs] calling me a 'slime bucket' is not even remotely problematic. He didn't go off the record for another 10 minutes."[...]

Charlotte Observer McClatchy's Raleigh News & Observer and Charlotte Observer report that no father is listed on the birth certificate of a child who the National Enquirer claims is linked to former Sen. John Edwards. The Charlotte paper obtained certificate on Thursday.[...]

Schwitzer Health News Blog | New York Observer That's what Gary Schwitzer wants to know. Was it to please drug company sponsors? "['NBC Nightly News'] devoted more than two minutes out of its total of 22 minutes or so of news time to this story," he writes. "We are at [...]