Manhattan Media has finally pulled the plug on the New York Press. However, The New York Observer reports that the company is reviving Our Town Downtown, and the name New York Press will live on in a section inside the new newspaper.

Our Town Downtown will be a weekly publication and cover art, real estate, news and politics, but only for the area below 14th Street, of course.

The paper is going to compete with practically everyone. At least that’s what Tom Allon, President of Manhattan Media, thinks. “It’ll compete with the Voice for hipsters, Downtown Express for community activists, and New York magazine for intelligentsia who care about real estate and their home values,” he told the Observer.

Last week, after working for fashion and nightlife Web site Shecky’s for several months as interim senior editor, PJ Gach lost her steady gig.

Shecky’s brought the longtime freelancer and style maven on board in April to help relaunch the site and upgrade the content — a short-term contracted position she hoped would become full-time. But after three months Shecky’s decided to let her go, “due to budgetary concerns,” she said. And since she was working on a contract basis for the site, Gach was not offered severance and isn’t eligible for unemployment. It’s a story that’s told too often these days.

“PJ was a freelancer on temporary assignment,” Shecky’s CEO Chris Hoffman told FishbowlNY. “Her assignment was over and we reevaluated it and decided to end the relationship. We wish her the best of luck.”

Like many writers in her position, Gach considers herself “freelance by default.”

“Since I moved to New York in 2000, all I’ve wanted was to work on staff [at a publication],” she told FishbowlNY. “Working as a freelancer is exciting and fun and you get to meet amazing people, but you are still just working assignment to assignment. It’s not the same as being on a team.”

While at Shecky’s, Gach produced and edited content for the site, developing its voice and persona and creating features like the Style Guide. Over the years, Gach has written for AOL‘s Lemondrop.com, The New York Post, New York Press and Rolling Stone, and she recently published a nonfiction book for tweens, “Crazy For Cody: An Unauthorized Biography,” that she hopes to turn into a series and is working on a nonfiction book series for tweens. Here’s hoping she lands on her feet, but we know there are plenty of talented, unemployed journalists out there looking for a job.

(Photo by Caroline Torem Craig)

Remember when New York Press was edgy and cool and, dare we say, relevant? Well looks like they are aiming to become so again, this time online! In a better late than never move the weekly has launched a new, user-friendly website that now features three blogs: NY ComPRESSed: culture, news, opinion, etc.; PRESS Play: music reviews & news; On Screen: movie rants & raves. As well as the usual classifieds and movie times and locales.

Just to give you a taste, one of today’s features is The Black List: “With the election of Barack Obama, political correctness ain’t what it used to be. To help you navigate the new ins and outs, here are a few of the words, phrases, ideas and people that have now been officially blacklisted.”

Digital magazines are all the rage it seems, or at least a popular sort of print lifeboat. Last week we told you that the New Yorker is now offering up a digital version to subscribers and now 02138, the Harvard magazine has followed suit. Sort of. You will recall that 02138, the magazine, which takes its name from Harvard’s zip code and was headed up by former New York Presser David Blum folded a few weeks ago — on the first of many black Fridays to follow — before its inaugural relaunch issue made it to press. Well the magazine, redesigned by Pentagram’s Luke Hayman, is now available in a digital edition and alas, it looks pretty good.

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