Bay Area Media

FORTUNE has released its "40 UNDER 40" list of "Business's Hottest Rising Stars" (appearing online and in this week's issue), and it's lousy with Bay Area personalities. The top two spots and three of the top five are filled by the heads of local companies.

#1: Sergey Brin and Larry Page, Google co-founders.(Fun fact: Brin and Page still share an office.)

#2: Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook founder. (Fun fact: His early business card read, "I'm CEO, bitch.")

FORTUNE also talked to Zuckerberg about the fact that Facebook is hiring.

#5: Biz Stone and Evan Williams, Twitter co-founders. (Fun fact: Williams sold the blog service Blogger.com to Google in 2003.)

Sure, these names show up in this space all the time. At least now we know it's not just the Bay Area who cares.

The full list can be found here.

Tasting Table San Francisco launched today. The latest in a string of outlets launched by New York-based WHO, TTSF comes in the form of a daily e-mail highlighting a single restaurant, bar, chef, food or drink that the editors feel is sufficiently new or interesting.

The effort is being helmed by Scott Hocker, former senior editor at San Francisco Magazine.

From the press release: "Readers are kept up-to-date not only on buzz-worthy new restaurants, but also forgotten classics, chef's secrets, under-the-radar bars, cocktail recipes, value wines, great neighborhood shops (and bargains) and the week's best epicurean events—all for free."

Tasting Table already has operations running in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, as well as a catch-all “Everywhere” edition. Plans are in place for expansion to Washington DC, Boston and Miami.

This weekend marked the 20th anniversary of the Loma Prieta earthquake, and coverage was not in any way lacking. The Chronicle spared no effort in devoting pages -- and pages and pages -- to the topic, from news to sports to users' memories to photos to videos.

The San Jose Mercury News did similarly. Its Media News Group partner, the Oakland Tribune, ran both unpublished and Pulitzer-winning earthquake photos, among its significant coverage.

So things are getting interesting over at the Public Press.

Right on the heels of completing their three-month City Budget Watchdog project, the nonprofit news startup is partnering with Dave Eggers' McSweeney's Quarterly Concern to investigate the multi-billion-dollar retrofit of the Bay Bridge.

"Our reporters have been digging up documents for close to two months on the massive construction project, one of the most challenging, costly and complex bridge projects in U.S. history, and have found some surprising new facts about how and why the costs, currently projected at $6.3 billion, continue to rise," Public Press chief Michael Stoll writes on the organization's blog.

The story will appear in the next issue of McSweeney's, which Stoll says, will be published as a print newspaper focused on San Francisco. McSweeney's will also match any donations made to the project via Spot.us, dollar-for-dollar, up to $5,000. The Public Press estimates the cost of the project at $10,000.

The project has some heavy hitters working on it: two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter Bob Porterfield; former San Jose Mercury News business reporter Elise Ackerman; former San Francisco Chronicle local news editor Richard Pestorich; and former San Jose Mercury News assistant foreign editor, Michael Winter. Also on the team: Patricia Decker, a Public Press reporter with a master's degree in structural engineering.

BoomTown is reporting that former Zagat senior vice president of marketing and interactive John Boris is headed to Lonely Planet's Oakland offices as the new managing director of Lonely Planet Americas.

Boris' hiring follows the arrival of CEO Matt Goldberg who moved to the Australia-based Lonely Planet earlier this year from Dow Jones, where he was senior vice president of digital strategy and operations.

The two hires reflect the company's intent to move increasingly into the digital space and become a "cross-platform player." According to BoomTown, 75% of the company's revenues are still in print, but that's likely to change. Its digital revenues already doubled this year, to $20 million, due premium pricing and advertising.

Digital, hunh. Just thinking about it makes us nostalgic for our carefree backpacking days when those dog-eared handed-down travel guides were our constant and sometimes only companions.

NBC's Trauma has been getting a lot of local press recently for the fact that it's shot in San Francisco and that its pilot featured a substantial explosion. The reality, however, is that Trauma might not even be around next season, and that another locally produced, internationally distributed show has been around far longer, offers more explosions and by any measure has a longer shelf life than its high-profile counterpart.

That show is MythBusters on the Discovery Channel, and its seventh season premiers tonight at 9 p.m.

Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage.

Shooting takes place largely in the outfit's Bayview warehouse, called M5, and works with the theme of proving or exposing myths and urban legends through scientific experiment (and lots of explosives). Last year it received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Reality Program.

The show is shot here because its hosts, Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage, started it here, out of Hyneman's special-effects studio, in 2003. Since then, they've tested more than 700 myths, conducted nearly 2,300 experiments, set off 711 explosions and destroyed 104 vehicles.

They spoke with BayNewser last week about the joys and challenges of working in the Bay Area. Full text after the break:

continued...

Tasting Table is an epicurean magazine that's released in the form of a daily e-mail -- offering subscribers "one delicious discovery (each day)," according to its press materials -- with topics covering food, wine and travel. The site hopes to stand out for the quality of its first-hand reporting.

Tasting Table is launching a San Francisco edition on Oct. 21, and has just named former San Francisco magazine senior editor Scott Hocker as editor of the project.

The local endeavor will be added to Tasting Table's existing editions in New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, as well as a national edition. Tasting Table Washington D.C. is scheduled to launch later this year.

The new news non-profit from KQED, UC Berkeley and San Francisco financier Warren Hellman, announced yesterday, will distribute its content through a multitude of channels: online, radio, TV, and print. And that will be key to its success and sustainability, California Media Workers Guild representative Carl Hall told KQED's Forum this morning.

The central element is here is the multi-channel format, so you leverage the content into as many delivery vehicles as you can think of. We have Palm-held devices now. We have Kindles. We have people's laptops. We have a printed element. And we have TV and radio. So the idea will be to try and get as much out of that reporting as possible.

Hall helped work on the project to create the new Bay Area News Project. He was one of several guests on Forum this morning discussing the new venture. Other guests included University of California, Berkeley, j-school dean Neil Henry, KQED/Northern California Public Broadcasting president and CEO Jeff Clarke, and KQED/NCPB board chair Noelle Leca. Audio of the program will be available on the Forum Web site later today.

San Francisco financier Warren Hellman is teaming up with KQED and the University of California, Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism to create a new $5 million Bay Area News Project, a nonprofit organization that will use multiple channels to report and distribute news for the Bay Area, the San Francisco Business Times is reporting.

The project, which will be funded by the Hellman Family Foundation and possibly other philanthropists and foundations, will report on areas that are "increasingly underserved by commercial media outlets," including government, public policy and neighborhood news, but also arts and cultural affairs, education, the environment, food and wine.

The goal is to launch in 2010, though the group isn't committing to a firm date. Stories will be distributed online but also through KQED's TV & radio stations.

The New York Times, which has been reported to be launching a Bay Area edition later this year, is also reported to be in discussions about participating in the project, the story said.

Hellman had announced last spring that he was putting a team together to explore news options in the Bay Area, following reports that the Hearst Corp. might sell or close the San Francisco Chroncile.

Rich Lieberman has posted the his estimation of the top 20 media salaries in the Bay Area.

One interesting note at the top: KGO host Ronn Owens makes more than twice as much as his boss, Michael Luckoff.

Also, as Lieberman points out, Gary Radnich's contract is up at the end of the year, and KRON will be hard-pressed to offer him anything close to the amount he currently makes.

1. Ronn Owens, (KGO Radio) $1,250,000
2. Gary Radnich,(KNBR/KRON-TV) $900,000
3. Dana King, (KPIX/CBS/INFINITY) $500,000
4. Michael Luckoff, (KGO RADIO-VP/GM) $500,000
5. Dan Ashley, (KGO/ABC7) $475,500
6. Ken Bastida, (KPIX/CBS/INFINITY) $400,000
7. Frank Somerville, (KTVU/FOX2) $400,000
8. Mark Ibanez, (KTVU/FOX2) $325,000
9. Julie Haener, (KTVU/FOX2) $300,000
10. Cheryl Jennings, (KGO/ABC7) $300,000
11. Joe Fonzi, (KTVU--FOX2) $255,000
12. Ralph Barbieri, (KNBR) $250,000
13. Tom Tolbert, (KNBR) $250,000
14. Ed Baxter, (KGO RADIO) $225,555
15. Dennis O'Donnell, (KPIX, CBS5) $220,000
16. Rita Williams, (KTVU/FOX2) $200,000
17. Joe Fonzi, (KTVU/FOX2) $200,000
18. Stan Bunger, (KCBS Radio), $200,000
19. Wayne Freedman, (KGO/ABC7), $200,000
20. Larry Biel, (KGO/ABC7) $200,000

Update: Lieberman adds that paired groupings such as The Bone's Lamont and Tonelli (the morning team on 107.7, "The Bone") were not included, nor were those who make much of their money through syndication. Similarly, play-by-play sports broadcasters such as Jon Miller and Greg Papa were intentionally omitted from the list.