On Thursday, Valentine’s Day, WaPo officially discussed the circumstances surrounding the layoffs of employees, FishbowlDC sources have learned. Internal sources appropriately place the number at 54, though a publicist hasn’t confirmed the exact number. Every department facing cuts was asked to keep the news to their department only, as to not make it look like a mass layoff. We’re told those given pink slips include Beth Jacobs, General Manager of Mobile, and Ken Dodelin, Director of Mobile Products. Sources say the entire Mobile Product Management and IT Project Management staffs have been eliminated.

“[CIO and VP Shaliesh] Prakash thinks these are ‘inefficiencies’ –  that is the exact word he uses for human beings who are not useful according to him,” said a source who spoke only on condition of anonymity. “Get rid of experienced people to save money, under the garb of streamlining is the new trend inside the Post.”

The news comes on the heels of the NYT, which recently offered buyout packages to 30 employees. That target number wasn’t reached; it isn’t clear how many employees were let go.

Jacobs’ LinkedIn profile describes her as a “senior-level executive with over 20 years experience in the in marketing, business development, product management and operations in the digital media and mobile sectors.” Before WaPo, she was VP of Mobile Business Development at AOL. She earned degrees from Bucknell and NYU Business School. She has been employed at WaPo for two and a half years.

Dodelin, meanwhile, is also an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. Like Jacobs, he previously worked in Mobile Business Development at AOL. He earned three degrees — a JD and MBA from from the University of North Carolina and a B.S. in psychology from the College of William & Mary. He has worked at WaPo for nearly two years.

We reached out to a WaPo publicist Kris Coratti, who had no comment at this time. We also sent requests for comment to Jacobs and Dodelin. The emails, sent to the usual WaPo configuration, came back with failed delivery notices.

See the internal memo from Prakash. Read more

Stop the presses! Has WaPo stolen fashion writer Robin Givhan back from the clutches of Tina Brown‘s failed Daily Beast?

Last month Washingtonian‘s Harry Jaffe reported that Brown let Givhan go. Givhan told Jaffe, “I”m shell-shocked.”

Last night at 8:47 p.m. WaPo published this lengthy story in its Style section by Givhan on inaugural gowns and the global interest the ordeal attracts. Much of the story details the fashion designers who have attracted a flash of attention from various first ladies only to later crash and burn.

As if he predicted the story in WaPo, Jaffe wrote, “Brown could not have picked a worse time, for her, to let Givhan go. The inaugural season is the height of fashion coverage in the capital.”

The headline: “The agony and ecstasy of creating inaugural gowns”

We’re told that Givhan will have more stories in WaPo. But speaking of agony, is she back for good? She left WaPo for The Daily Beast in December, 2010. A click on her name shows her picture and a single word description: “Critic.” We’ve reached out to WaPo spokeswoman Kris Koratti for more details.

Update: “It’s a freelance piece,” Koratti replied. The print version includes the phrase with her byline, “Special to the Washington Post.”

Come the summer of 2013, WaPo will have an online video channel devoted to politics. Will it crash your computer or smartphone? Who knows, but we’ll be there to test it out.

According to a release sent out today, the channel will broadcast several franchise shows that feature WaPo journalists and commentators, and “key newsmakers and viewers” from around the country. Programming will be produced in the newsroom with the help of the Politics reporting team. Viewers will be able to watch the video as individual clips or complete shows on desktop and mobile devices. Content will also be available on selected connected TV devices.

As with every other outlet in town and likely the world, they’re promising something “different” and “easy to use” (we’re crossing our fingers on this part)… Read more

From JournoList to activist, it appears that WaPo‘s liberal blogger Ezra Klein is once again blurring the lines between being a journalist and trying to sway politics. In what appears to be at a minimum a breach of journalism ethics, Klein spoke to a group of Senate Democratic Chiefs of Staff last Friday about the Supercommittee, just days before the Committee announced its failing. “It was kind of weird,” said a longtime Senate Democratic aide, explaining that while people “enjoyed it” and gave it “positive reviews” this sort of thing is far from typical.

A longtime Washington editor who deals with Capitol Hill regularly also said this is not the norm: “”I have never heard of a reporter briefing staffers. It’s supposed to be the other way around. This arrangement seems highly unusual.”

Klein’s speech to high-level Democratic aides was in the Capitol, closed door and off the record. It lasted 30 minutes. “I think they thought it was very helpful,” said the aide. “I think it’s unusual. What’s more common is to get someone like Paul Begala or a White House staffer. To get a journalist to talk is a little unusual.”

But then again, Klein is unusual. In the summer of 2010, his exclusive partisan JournoList, a secretive listserv of some 400 members, collapsed as contents of the exchanges began leaking out. Journalists took hits for their participation, such as then WaPo‘s Dave Weigel, who quickly apologized on the newspaper’s blog for some of what he wrote. He was fired over the matter and is now at Slate. The Daily Caller reported extensively on the offending material. The end result: Klein shut the list down.

Briefings for journalists covering Capitol Hill are usually the reverse of what transpired here. Lawmakers brief reporters. Aides brief reporters. Think tanks brief reporters. Think tanks brief aides. But reporters briefing aides? This is unheard of.

Important questions to have answered: Was Klein strategizing with Democrats on messaging of the Supercommittee’s failure? What exactly was the purpose of the reporter’s speech?

We wrote Klein for comment. While he may refuse to read FishbowlDC, preferring instead to stick to the confines of CJR, his readers need to demand answers from him if they are going to trust the integrity and validity of his journalism. We also wrote WaPo Publicist Kris Coratti to find out what the rules are on these sort of talks and if WaPo was even aware that Klein was giving the speech. She said she’d look into it. That was three hours ago. If we get a statement we’ll bring it to you.

See the email FBDC sent to Ezra after the jump…

Read more

On Thursday, Washingtonian‘s Harry Jaffe went after WaPo yet again — this time, he alleges, for ripping off his story on Kathy Wone, whose husband was fatally stabbed five years ago. In true Jaffe form, he tells it like it is. He writes, “Post writers can’t resist saying they were first; editors love it. In this case, [Keith] Alexander and the Post were second.” Read here.

Jaffe is quite the villain these days when it comes to attacking WaPo. The magazine recently offed his Post Watch column and he reasoned that it simply didn’t hold enough interest to continue. In that column he took a meat cleaver to Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli and reported that the newsroom was feeling rather lackluster under Executive Editor Brauchli’s leadership, that he has “sapped newsroom vitality.”

At the time, WaPo said Jaffe can have his opinions but they don’t share them. We’ve requested another comment from WaPo on Jaffe’s latest column.

UPDATE: WaPo Spokeswoman Kris Coratti tells FBDC, “We are running a correction.” Jaffe had no comment on the matter.

Washingtonian‘s biting media writer Harry Jaffe didn’t just take a stab at WaPo‘s Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli in Thursday’s final Post Watch column, he scooped a sizable chunk of bone out of Washington’s hometown newspaper.

The whopper is that Washingtonian is killing Jaffe’s Post Watch column in its current form because the writer says the topic matter — The Washington Post — is no longer interesting enough to sustain the feature. The column is morphing into a more expansive feature with a “wider scope” called Media Players.

In a word: Ouch.

The bulk of Jaffe’s final column is devoted to taking a scalpel to Brauchli. Among other insults, including a bold headline that says “Brauchli is Sinking the Washington Post,” Jaffe has reporters saying he has “sapped newsroom vitality.”

No WaPo reporters speak on record for this story — it’s no wonder as the quotes would certainly get them all shit-canned. Which, by the way, is what Jaffe thinks ought to happen to Brauchli. He concludes, “What needs explanation is why he is still in charge.”

We’ve put in a request for comment from WaPo PR.

UPDATE: Publicist Kris Coratti wrote to FishbowlDC: “Harry is entitled to his opinion, but it isn’t one that we share.”

Read here.