News

This week, the weekly Jewish newspaper the Forward announced that will now host Zeek: A Journal of Jewish Thought and Culture on its Web site, TheJewishDailyForward.com.

Forward Editor Jane Eisner spoke with FishbowlNY this week to explain why her pub decided to partner with the cultural publication Zeek and how she feels about competition from other Jewish magazines like the recently launched online magazine Tablet.

"This partnership is something that has been in the works for several months," Eisner said. "It didn't come in response to anything else that any other publication was doing."

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NBC is reporting that New York appellate court judge Sonia Sotomayor will be President Barack Obama's first nominee for the Supreme Court of the United States. If the nomination is approved, she will be the first Hispanic Supreme Court justice, making Sotomayor's nomination a number of firsts.

The president is set to formally announce his nomination later this morning.

Since it seems like almost everyone is heading out to the Hamptons this weekend, we thought we would give you a little Long Island media news.

Earlier this week, a federal judge said he will consider whether Long Island paper Newsday and TV station News 12 (both owned by Cablevision) can publish or broadcast photos or video of Nassau County Legislator Roger Corbin in handcuffs.

Corbin was arrested for tax evasion after failing to report income over $225,000 and lying about it, according to news reports. His lawyer, Thomas Liotti, filed a request with the court banning photos of Corbin in handcuffs after Newsday published eight pictures of the lawmaker with his hands behind his back as part of their coverage of his case, the paper reported. Newsday and News 12 argue that under the First Amendment they are free to publish any photos they wish.

But on Wednesday, Judge Arthur Spatt ruled that such images of Corbin might violate his right to a fair trial, so he scheduled a hearing on the matter. However, Judge Spatt refused to grant Liotti's requests banning Newsday and News 12 from publishing the photos before the hearing and ordering Long Island authorities to stop walking Corbin around -- in the aptly-titled "perp walk" -- in front of cameras.

It's an interesting case that raises questions of freedom of the press and public figures' right to privacy. If he wasn't a legislator, would Corbin still be getting the same treatment from the judge? Papers and local television stations publish and broadcast photos of suspects in handcuffs all the time. And, if every citizen has access to the same photos, why is Corbin's right to a fair trial in danger more than others? Do you think its fair for a federal judge to tell the media what to publish?

End of the week news just came out of the White House on the eve of the White House Correspondents' Dinner when no one is really paying attention. Louis Caldera, director of the White House Military Office, resigned today after organizing the fake Air Force One flyover that scared lower Manhattan last month. In his resignation letter, Caldera said the April 27 incident "has made it impossible for me to effectively lead" the military office.

The White House also released a full report about the flyover as well as pictures from it today (above).

Wednesday, the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation held a hearing on "The Future of Journalism" with testimony from experts on new media and the newspaper industry. Committee Chairman Sen. John Kerry called for the hearing to examine what, if anything, the government can do to save the newspaper industry from seemingly unstoppable decline.

Many of the day's speakers had ideas for improving the state of print journalism. They also seemed ready to take on news aggregators like Google and the Huffington Post.

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The Mirror Awards, begun in 2006 with the intention of honoring the work of media beat writers and Web sites, have proven a good forum for the industry to honor reporters and columnists like Times columnist David Carr, the New Yorker's Ken Auletta, and Joe Strupp over at Editor & Publisher. All three got their annual nods (three for three guys!), and this year's finalists are, again, pretty much all pulled from big media companies. Out of 140 entries, 12 of the 29 nominees hail from Conde Nast. There are a couple unconventional picks, but despite the fact that there are plenty of excellent smaller players these days on the media criticism beat, most came from the big guys. Regardless, congrats to all.

Full list of nominees after the jump...

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The news is not getting any better for American journalist Roxana Saberi, 31, who was arrested in Iran in January ostensibly for working without press credential, but was later charged with espionage.

The Times is reporting that Saberi (who has dual American/Iranian citizenship) was rushed to trial yesterday, behind closed doors. An Iranian spokesperson said "Yesterday, the first trial session was held. She presented her final defense...The court will issue its verdict within the next two to three weeks."

The Times says it is "unclear why the trial was moving at such a fast pace -- especially because the charges leveled against Saberi were so serious." The U.S. Government has been pushing for Sabieri's release and her parent's are apparently in Iran right now, though they have yet to speak publicly to the press there, though they have been very vocal here in the US since their daughter's arrest.

Yesterday's plane crash on the Hudson provided yet another example of how new media has enabled citizen journalists to beat the mainstream to the punch. Perhaps the most passed around picture of crash was taken by Janis Krums from the deck of a ferry which had diverted to rescue passengers evacuating from flight 1549 — Krums Twittered the picture saying ""There's a plane in the Hudson. I'm on the ferry going to pick up the people. Crazy.". It also one of the first bits of evidence that people had survived the crash. According to the Times "plane-related tweets accounted for eight of the ten top "trending topics" (Hudson River, MSNBC, US Airways, LaGuardia, etc.)." We first heard about the crash via our Facebook newsfeed where someone had updated with a link to another picture of the plane on the Hudson and passengers on the wing. How about you? Where did you first hear about it?

A friend of ours is currently watching Flight 1549 being towed by the window of her apartment just below 14th st.

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First of all various local news sources and Facebook links are reporting that everyone got off safely! Unbelievable. The NYT.com was a bit slow to get news of the Hudson plane crash on their home page (they had a breaking news update running up top at 3:48 — after the jump). The front page screen grab above didn't go up until close to 4pm. Flickr photo here of the plane in the water with passengers on the wings. Another Twitter pic here. For those of you not in front of the television MSNBC is running live feed here. TVNewser also has coverage.

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