Kyle Pope, the former Editor-in-Chief of The New York Observer, and current Contributing Editor for Vanity Fair, just tweeted that he’s hitching his wagon (people still say that, right?) to Tina Brown.

He says that he is joining Newsweek/The Daily Beast as an an Editor-at-Large.

UPDATE:
Adweek has some additional information on moves by Newsweek/The Daily Beast here.

The New York Observer had a bit of good news today, but  Dylan Byers, writing for Adweek, is raining on that parade.  He says that Christopher Barnes – aided by the unwavering confidence Jared Kushner has in him – is killing the newspaper.

Byers gets scathing quotes from several former Observer staffers, going from bad – “He’s a used car salesman” – to worse – “He would also mock employees who had been hired for painfully low salaries.”

Barnes’ main mistake, aside from apparently coming off like an overall jerk to employees, is that he has abandoned the paper’s longstanding journalistic niche, in favor of focusing on sales. Of course this approach has brought on a slew of editorial changes:

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A changing of the guard took place today at The New York Observer as Elizabeth Spiers has taken over for Kyle Pope as editor-in-chief. Spiers, a former editor-in-chief of our own mediabistro.com, will oversee both print and digital content.  Observer owner Jared Kushner is confident that his newest hire has what it takes to run the show.

I am very excited to be working with Elizabeth to further build on the great progress we have made over the past few years. She will be instrumental in taking our print and online products to the next level.

Spiers founded Dead Horse Media, parent company of Dealbreaker, Above the Law, and Fashionista blogs.  She also was founding editor of Gawker and served as an editor at New York magazine and a contributor to Fortune.

In a somewhat baffling series of moves, Joel Klein is stepping down from his post as New York City’s schools chancellor for a job at Rupert Murdoch‘s News Corp, where he’ll act as the company’s senior advisor. Taking his place as chancellor is none other than Hearst chairwoman Cathie Black.

Klein first took on the role eight years ago, with no prior experience working with schools. He was formerly an antitrust chief at the Justice Department and chairman and chief executive officer of media giant Bertelsmann Inc.

Black, who addressed the move in a press conference today, was asked to be Klein’s successor by Mayor Mike Bloomberg himself. Explained Bloomberg:

Cathy is a world-class manager, and she is uniquely qualified to take us in the direction people keep talking about: jobs, jobs, jobs. That is something Cathie Black knows about, as much as anybody in this room.

The Village Voice points out that Black’s own children attend private boarding schools in Connecticut.

And just how are New York media reporters reacting to this bit of news?

The New York Observer‘s Kyle Pope Tweeted, astutely, that “this is all very odd.”

Runnin’ Scared blogger Jen Doll, meanwhile, chose to look for a silver (or pink and navy) lining, Tweeting that she rather likes Ms. Black, “especially how she spells her name with that peppy ‘ie.’ that’s good for kids.”

Tru dat!

Ivylise Simones has been hired as The New York Observer‘s new design director. Simones is a former art director of the Village Voice. Most recently, she helped design the iPad app for People magazine.

“Ivylise is an enthusiastic fan of the Observer and will be a great help as we continue to reinvent the paper,”said Kyle Pope, editor of The New York Observer.  The Observer had a redesign of its pages in early September.

Simones starts Oct. 18.

The Village Voice reports that John Koblin quit the New York Observer and is moving to Women’s Wear Daily. Former Observer editor Peter Kaplan, is editorial director for Fairchild Fashion Group, which includes WWD. Kaplan ran the Observer until last summer, just under two years after it was purchased by Jared Kushner.

Reportedly, Koblin told editor-in-chief Kyle Pope his decision this morning.

Koblin spent four years at the Observer covering the New York media. He’ll cover the same beat for WWD.

Beginning tomorrow, you’ll find The New York Observer completely re-designed.

The newspaper will offer new columns and a new tagline, while retaining its iconic salmon color.

“Money, Power and the City,” will replace “New York’s Weekly Newspaper” as the tagline beneath the paper’s masthead.

“We’re very excited about this re-design,” said Kyle Pope, the Editor of The Observer.

Among the changes, the paper’s lead story will now begin on the front page, and a number of new features will be introduced.

Those new additions include: The Backstory, a visual treatment of the week’s news; The Player, a weekly rotating profile; and the O List, the paper’s take on what or who is interesting in New York.

The Culture and Op-Ed pages also have been reworked.

Having been on both sides of the editorial process as an editor (Wall Street Journal) and a freelancer (The Los Angeles Times and The New York Times), Kyle Pope of The New York Observer has learned a few keys to being a great writer and reporter: Never take no for an answer, develop your own voice, and be nimble.

That final lesson, of course, he experienced firsthand as deputy editor of presumably the most infamous magazine launch (and shuttering) of all time, Conde Nast Portfolio.

Although critics blamed its demise on everything from the mag’s cover choices and operating expenses to its overall disorganization and low staff morale, Pope has a simpler explanation: “When the world changed, we didn’t adapt quickly enough.”

Part 1: Kyle Pope on The New York Observer‘s Web Problem

Part 2: Observer Editor Kyle Pope on His ‘Necessary Tension’ with Jared Kushner

We couldn’t get Kyle Pope of The New York Observer in our Media Beat studio without asking him about his experience working with the paper’s headline-making publisher, real estate mogul Jared Kushner.

“I think there’s a necessary tension between an owner and an editor, and he and I have that. That said, I think he has been terrific for the newspaper,” Pope said. “He, himself, is fairly high-profile, and I think his profile has helped the paper.”

In the second part of our interview, the Observer editor discusses the future of the Observer in print and why he thinks the Times vs. Journal battle is “great in every way.”

Part 1: Kyle Pope on The New York Observer‘s Web Problem

Part 3: Kyle Pope Reflects on The Short Life of Conde Nast Portfolio

The New York Observer is one of the last of its breed. The pink paper features a full illustration on every cover and pages of in-depth writing that many journos would trade in their degrees just to score a byline in.

But the beloved Big Apple institution faces a huge challenge. How do you get proud print veterans to embrace the Twitter-friendly copy of the Web? Rather than threaten their jobs, editor Kyle Pope opted for an incentive program: mo’ traffic, mo’ money.

“Their salaries aren’t based on their traffic. It’s purely a bonus system,” Pope explained in our Media Beat interview. “So, they’re getting paid whatever they’re getting paid no matter what their web traffic is doing. What we said is that we’ve got a bonus pool of extra free money.”

And if a writer tries to boost his own stats? So be it.

Part 2: Observer Editor Kyle Pope on His ‘Necessary Tension’ with Jared Kushner

Part 3: Kyle Pope Reflects on The Short Life of Conde Nast Portfolio