News Notes

If you’re a reporter covering the media you may have noticed new pitches flowing in for The Hill from Elizabeth Luke at High10 Media, a New York-based communications agency that also reps The Hollywood Reporter, Norman Lear‘s People for the American Way, NatGeo Network, Time Inc., Adweek, A&E Networks and Simon Cowell. The Hill has notoriously not had a publicist in a good while ever since Tricia Barba left the role in 2011 after about a year. Before Barba, they went years without a publicist. In January 2012 they brought on Megan McCourt as an editorial assistant to handle social media.

Now they’re giving High10 Media a try.

It’s hardly surprising that the publication would secure a New York-based firm considering The Hill‘s hands-on owner, Jimmy Finkelstein, resides in Manhattan. But what is a little confusing is that they’re not actually letting Luke autonomously speak to the media. When I asked her questions about whether she will serve in an actual role of spokeswoman, ironically she never replied, despite saying repeatedly in her emails, “Feel free to contact me with questions.” Editor Hugo Gurdon also did not reply to simple, basic questions we sent yesterday.

So who is actually speaking for The Hill? That would be High10 Media CEO Lisa Dallos, who said Tuesday morning that she would be handling my questions, but had to talk later because she was on an airplane. She explained quickly by email, “We were retained by The Hill to help promote its editorial and business interests — stories, events, special reports, and so forth. We work very closely with the client, in terms of what gets promoted. Elizabeth is part of the HIGH10 team working on the account.” On the subject of Luke, she said, “Elizabeth works with me, I run High10 Media, I oversee all the work with The Hill. I am the one to speak to.”

I told Dallos that Luke not being able to talk seems fishy. She replied, “Funny u think this is fishy. This would be a lot better if I could talk with you when I land.” She added, “It is very straightforward and not complicated. I am the CEO of company and lead work on all our clients Elizabeth as well as other members of the high 10 team work collaboratively to fulfill our clients needs.”

Luke seems qualified to answer questions and Dallos said I could call her or Luke anytime. Before joining High10 Media, Luke spent three years at Nielsen, most recently as a corporate communications analyst. She graduated from the University of Southern California with a B.A. in Communications. While it appears that Luke will not serve as an actual spokeswoman for the publication, Barba’s role also did not involve commenting on the record to reporters.

In a morning phone interview with Dallos, she said she’d be handling all questions related to the editorial and business sides of the publication. “Any of those questions feel free to call me,” she said. “I think the hope to have a coordinated communication effort under the guidance of Hugo and that we would be able to properly disseminate information to media on multiple subjects, whether it’s breaking news, evergreen and on announcements of whatever kind, both on the business side and the editorial side.”

So far, Luke typically sends out one email a day featuring a story they mark as “Breaking News.” Luke’s email intro on most pitches is as follows:

Good morning, I represent The Hill at High10 Media and am sharing this breaking story with you (link and text below) because it aligns with your beat and I thought you and your readers might be interested.  If you decide to cover this story, please link to the article and credit to “The Hill.”  Feel free to contact me with questions.  Thank you!

But maybe don’t take that second to last line too seriously. That’s not exactly true.

Launch a social media campaign that will build your brand and deliver results in our online Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting June 7. Speakers include Abigail Cusick (Bravo Digital), Gregory Galant (Sawhorse Media), Alex Leo (Thomson Reuters Digital), Jim Tobin (Ignite Social Media), and many more. Read the reviews.

WaPo media opinion writer Erik Wemple is on the receiving end of threats today after writing about the purported plagiarism of TWT and UPI Columnist Arnaud de Borchgrave (pictured here). He reported today that the columnist has taken a leave of absence. With heated stories comes heated emotions. And nasty threats like these from a prominent Washington Attorney issued in the comment section of Wemple’s De Borchgrave story today. FishbowlDC has confirmed through Timothy Naegele (pictured below) that he wrote the commentary. “The comments speak for themselves,” Naegele told FishbowlDC. “If you bothered to read other comments about Arnaud de Borchgrave, and the attacks on him, you would realize that other people feel exactly as I do.” Oh, we bothered to read the other comments, Naegele. Touchy, touchy.

by Timothy D. Naegele
9:07 AM EDT
It bears repeating, Wemple, that you are a hack writer and nothing more. It is what you will always be.

Arnaud de Borchgrave is brilliant, and he has done more in his lifetime than you would ever do if you had 20 lifetimes on the face of this earth. However, you must be salivating about what has happened to de Borchgrave.

Lots of us will be following your every word from now on, to trip you up. And yes, rest assured, we will call for your swift ouster from the Post when you make any mistakes, which you surely will.

Hopefully we can say “good riddance” to you, very soon.

Another reader doubted the attorney’s comments were really from him, saying, “I think this post must be from a troll masquerading as Naegele. There is no way that an experienced attorney would publicly post something like this.” (Well, there is and he did.) We also reached out to Wemple for comment, asking if threats make him nervous, if he wishes he had half the life of De Borchgrave or, for that matter, his sexy name? Erik de Borchgrave or Arnaud Wemple both have a nice ring, don’t they?

Wempled replied to FishbowlDC: “Whenever I see stuff where people are taking aim at me, yes, it’s a little jarring at first. But what he’s proposing to do here is to become a very loyal reader, which I appreciate. As for the scrutiny, well, that already applies to me, and you, and the rest of us in this line of work. Wemple continued, “I cannot dispute the commenter’s claim that I haven’t done a fraction of the things that de Borchgrave has done on the face of this earth. He’s had a long career. To your question as to whether I wish I had, no: I’ve been very happy. For years and years, I have enjoyed seeing his name. It’s much cooler than mine.”

A third commenter takes Wemple to task for a different reason — his caricature. We’re going to practice Wemple’s pointed eyebrow raise in the mirror later today. Read what that person has to say after the jump… Read more

Will the film ever get off the ground? Politico‘s Patrick Gavin brings us the story of Norman Kelley‘s plan to make a documentary about Charlie Peters, former founder and editor of The Washington Monthly, which is now bimonthly. But will the film ever come to fruition? So far the film has raised $1,685 and they need $15,000. By today. And this is Kelley’s big sell of Peters: “Charlie Peters is not a sexy guy,” Kelley told Politico. “He’s not a sexy subject. … It’s just hard to raise money on a film about a guy from the past. … It’s hard raising money for a documentary film if you’re not Ken Burns or Michael Moore, particularly about a journalist who’s not a sexy journalist on one of the television talk shows.” Read the full story here. Publish time: 4:36 a.m.

Arianna discusses philandering father – Mother’s Day brings up poignant memories. HuffPost-AOL Editor-in-Chief Arianna Huffington penned an op-ed in the NYT over the weekend. It’s called “Greek Tragedy.” In her walk down memory lane in Athens, she recalls her father’s unsuccessful attempt to own a newspaper as well as his cheating habit. “It wasn’t the bankruptcy that got to my mom in the end, but the philandering,” she wrote. Read here.

Media failure or fairness? — With opinion journalism being all the rage these days, Media Matters took the networks to task Sunday for hosting conservatives like Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council and former GOP Presidential hopeful Gary Bauer, both of whom fiercely oppose same-sex marriage. They called it “Easy Sunday for Group Hate Leader on CNN, CBS.” The writer, Jocelyn Fong, says if she ever has kids someday she’ll get to tell them about the President’s historic announcement, but she’ll also have to inform them that the networks gave “hate group leaders” a platform for their views. Perkins turned up on CNN’s State of the Union with Candy Crowley and on CBS’s Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer. Tsk. Tsk. Fong says Schieffer never challenged Perkins. Instead, the newsman agreed with Perkins that he was glad to allow all sides of the debate. (Which psst… is kind of the point of journalism in the first place.) Read the full story here.

From the Dept. of Bad Timing…this was The Hill‘s White House Correspondent Amie Parnes‘s story two days before President Obama broke the earth-shattering news that he supports gay marriage. So it turns out she’s not the Nostradamus of Washington politics?

Headline: “Obama not comfortable on gay marriage.”

While Parnes likely isn’t responsible for the headline, it doesn’t look good. It also shows that repeated ass kissing of first lady Michelle Obama may not pay off after all.

Read the story here.

Guess who has a new publisher? It’s GOVERNING Magazine. Her name is Erin Waters.

In a release posted on their website today, it says “Waters will oversee business development and sales across market segments such as public finance, infrastructure, energy and advocacy.” Over the last two years, she has been focused on “business development and expansion across the GOVERNING platform, and is credited with the launch of GOVERNING U, a resource for prospective public policy students.”

In other boring news about this…Prior to joining GOVERNING, Waters worked for CQ, where she first managed the digital media platform and later handled advocacy advertising sales across different properties. Fred Kuhn becomes the Associate Publisher for Information Technology, where he manages a 16-member sales team across e.Republic, GOVERNING’s parent company. “Kuhn will focus his deep experience and expertise in this segment to maximum expansion for the company.”

Congratulations to Waters!

Labor journo Mike Elk was on a tear yesterday about his pre-flight jitters. Though just on a short jaunt from Chicago to D.C. Monday, his fears about flying loom large. “Damn flight anxiety already started – covering the airline industry completely fucked over my life,” he eloquently wrote on Twitter. He went on sarcastically, “The magazine assures me that if I die in a plane crash, they will use my death for fundraising, feeling more relaxed already. Worst part about flight anxiety is you got anxiety about having anxiety. I never used to be afraid of flying.”

Elk, who writes for InTheseTimes.com, tells FishbowlDC he used to live for flying and found it exciting. “Like it was the only time in my life that I could just read and not have to deal with cell phone, email etc..,” he said. But then a few months ago he covered how a lot of aircraft engine repair work is being outsourced to shady places in El Salvador and China and it and now flying just “freaks him out.” For instance, he shares,  50 percent of aircrafts are repaired overseas where there is limited FAA inspection.

Yesterday he got off easy. Tomorrow, he says, “I gotta fly to Paris.”

Poor thing.

After using an incorrect source in his post about the Iraq War for Huffington Post, sports broadcasting heavyweight Jim Lampley faced backlash from readers. But, for the host of HBO’s Fight Game, that scenario — and covering politics, in general — was never in his game plan.

“I had been persuaded to do it by someone very high up in political media who has specific purpose in mind for me. At the end of the day, I decided I wasn’t interested in that purpose,” Lampley said in mediabistro.com’s latest So What Do You Do? interview.

Lampley also touched on media personalities voicing their personal views or politics. “I guess it would be a little hypocritical of me to say they shouldn’t. I used to always prefix any political or social comments I made on the radio by saying, ‘I’m about to give you my personal opinion. I happen to be a commentator by trade, not an editorialist… so you take it as you see fit.’ And then from time to time I would speak out.”

Read the full interview: So What Do You Do, Jim Lampley, Host of HBO World Championship Boxing?

Al Jazeera English is now available on TV in Haiti through the multimedia service company NUtv™.

Al Jazeera English will reach up to 40,000 homes in Port au Prince in the first three months, and an additional 100,000 homes across the country.  It will be available to all of the 140,000 homes on the Caribbean island.

Al Jazeera English was one of the first news organizations on the ground after the earthquake struck Haiti in January 2010.   The channel was the only international broadcaster to establish a bureau in the country after the earthquake, to document the progress of the relief effort.  Al Jazeera reporter Sebastian Walker was the first TV journalist to report the confirmed existence of cholera in the country, and the first to link the outbreak with UN peacekeepers in the town of Mirebalais.

Al Jazeera English’s Fault Lines film Haiti: 6 Months On won the prestigious DuPont-Columbia award in 2012.  The film has been translated into Creole and distributed throughout Port au Prince.

“We continue to be deeply committed to covering the stories in Haiti with the depth and context they deserve,” said Amjad Atallah, Al Jazeera English Bureau Chief of the Americas in a release.

Kevin Delaney, editor-in-chief of Atlantic Media Company‘s new global business brand, announced today that Michael Donohoe has joined as Product Engineering Director for the new brand, which will launch later this year.

Donohoe comes to Atlantic Media from RealNetworks, where he served as a senior software engineer, working on video and sharing web applications. According to a release issued this morning, he and his team of developers and designers “will design products that fit the needs of today’s global business executives, a new class of leaders who spend much of their physical and intellectual lives outside their native lands.”

Um, translation? “Michael is responsible for some of the most creative product and engineering work in digital media over the past five years,” said Delaney.  “His leadership will drive innovation across tablets, mobile devices, and the desktop web, to provide global business professionals with access to information instantly, conveniently, wherever they are.”

Prior to his work at RealNetworks, Donohoe worked at NYT as a member of the Client Technology group responsible for implementing key innovations at the NYTimes.com.  He won the Times Technology and Innovation Challenge five times, most prominently for his work on TimesNow, which became Times Wire.

A new study on potential Republican VP picks says Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) received the most media coverage out of anyone else within the last month.

The study, conducted by HighBeam Research found that Ryan was mentioned almost 27 percent of the time when veeps were discussed in the news media. Just behind Ryan is Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) at almost 24 percent. In a distant third, Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell at 11 percent.

Out of the nine potential picks, two are women: South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez, both at 6 percent in media coverage.

At the bottom of the list (receiving only one mention in the Las Vegas Review-Journal) is Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval (half a percent).

The study was conducted from March 16 to April 16.