Monkey’s paw tossed into flames; Radar Magazine returns to its grave

“Get down and stay down!”

It isn’t often a Halloween story involves a zombie announcing, “Feh!” turning around in its tracks and shambling back to the crypt whence it came. But that’s exactly the holiday tale that [Gawker] and [HuffPo] were relaying today when they announced that, yet again, Radar Magazine has lost its funding and will be shuttered.

I’ve [had] [fun] in the past tossing brickbats at Radar “The Little Magazine that Couldn’t” and its endless soap opera of being wooed by investors only to suffer unrequited funding, but there was a bigger story here beyond the questionable need for yet another celebrity-obsessed rag in an era up to its eyes in such tripe. It was a tragic… no, make that poignant — no, leave it tragic… tale of a promising young magazine editor caught at the turning of the tide in the publishing industry. Maer Roshan grew up worshiping Spy and Interview and Vanity Fair and wanted — so very much — to create something that would join those illustrious titles in the pantheon of magazine history. Alas, time and tide (and technology) wait for no man’s dreams of glory and Roshan, who I don’t think ever really got the internet, found the hallowed ground he sought crumbling under his feet as the online earthquake destroyed old print business models. It must sting that the only surviving part of the Radar opus will be the radaronline.com website which will be purchased by AMI, publishers of Star and the National Enquirer.

It was rumored back in 2006 when Roshan was shopping the magazine around to investors for its second iteration that he had been offered the job of editor at the revamped Star. Roshan, seeking a loftier roost, turned that opportunity down and it went to Bonnie Fuller, instead. Now AMI picks up the only valuable part of Radar — the website — for a song. Irony’s a bitch, huh?

Another one bites the dust: Empty storefronts are multiplying in the neighborhood.

While pundits and economists quibble about whether the recession has actually gotten underway, yet, I was presented with stunning evidence of how it will look this morning as I walked through Greenwich Village. On the short walk up Bleeker Street from Christopher to Magnolia Bakery on 11th Street I counted 12 empty storefronts. Twelve. In what is perhaps the most sought-after residential area of Manhattan. I’ve never seen anything like that in the 24 years I’ve lived in the city.

It was obvious what has happened: during the go-go run up of the real estate boom greedy landlords ran out established neighborhood businesses by hiking leases to astronomical levels and now, with the boom over and credit locked up by a paralyzed financial system, they can’t fill the spaces. I have, of course, not a scintilla of sympathy for the landlords — they get what they deserve. But I regret that a neighborhood’s identity was gutted by their greed. Perhaps, if the recession is long enough and deep enough, it will create an opportunity for small businesses that are truly needed by residents to return. Less flash, more utility. We’re covered for designer dress shops, thank you — but a hardware store sure would be nice.

Following up on my [post] of a few days ago that called out the New York Times for publishing an essay by one of its writers trumpeting the Google party line while neglecting to disclose the author’s association with Google, and that failed to indicate that one of the sources quoted on the deal works for a company (Publicis) that may benefit by it…

Even after bloggers and online journalists took the Times [to] [task], today the other shoe dropped — Google published a [website] entitled, “Facts about the Yahoo-Google advertising agreement” that collects in one place the flackish arguments in favor of the deal that’s now under review by the Department of Justice and European Commission. The site quotes prominent sources that back up Google’s claims, notably highlighting the very New York Times article that people have raised issues with and also features a quote from Maurice Levy — the CEO of Publicis — who views the deal as “very positive.” No kidding.

The arrogance of this company is really… unbelievable.

Was it good for you, Baby?

Something is officially fishy at The New York Times. It’s been obvious for awhile that the editorial oversight of the Technology section of the online paper was not subject to the same rigorous standards as the more traditional news sections (one need only track the baffling ascendancy of the gossipy Saul Hansell for evidence), and I’ve commented here on some of the more egregious [recent] [examples] of apparently favorable treatment that Google has received from one of the Times’ tech writers. But this weekend, something happened that was categorically different. On Friday, they published a column by Randall Stross entitled, “Why the Google-Yahoo Ad Deal Is Nothing to Fear,” that presents many of the anti-anti-trust arguments that Google has been making in favor of the pending Google-Yahoo ad merger that is now under review by both the Department of Justice and the European Commission. The article is significantly deceptive. The author regurgitates Google PR boilerplate about how the deal will not risk price-fixing by Google, though they will basically control somewhere between 70 and 90 percent of search advertising, because Google’s system is auction-based and (in theory) advertisers set the prices. Stross then compromises his own argument by acknowledging that prices may be higher than in the current environment with Yahoo acting as a competitor to Google but so what? — the quality of ad delivery from Google’s system is worth the increment. Stross works very hard to pitch the concerns about Google’s growing monopoly position as mere corporate warfare on the part of Microsoft — and quotes David Kenny, of the ad holding company Publicis, on the beneficial effects the deal could have for Yahoo and the advertising environment. What Stross neglects to mention is that Publicis is a business partner of Google and stands to benefit, through [preferential pricing], from the deal. Additionally, what the New York Times neglects to inform its readers is that Randall Stross — identified in his byline as “an author based in Silicon Valley and a professor of business at San Jose State University” is the author of a book about Google to be released this month that, according to [advance press], “[is] Based on unprecedented access he received to the highly secretive ‘Googleplex,’”. Sounds cozy, no?

Access is the key, more on that in a moment…

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Clever visual pun seen in Greenwich Village: Obama + “Eight is Enough” (get it?)

In my [last post] I hinted at the Factor that Dare Not Speak its Name in the Obama/McCain race — namely, race. At the time, Obama had just come out of his convention with a modest bump that McCain quickly countered following his selection of Sarah Palin. Since then, Democratic partisans have started to acknowledge the possibility of what must have seemed to them utterly impossible: Obama could lose. A [blog post] on The Huffington Post by Adam McKay entitled, “We’re Gonna Frickin’ Lose This Thing” has generated close to 3000 comments. But McKay blames the press for not holding the Republican’s feet to the fire. The same press that, just a few months ago, was criticized for being too friendly to Obama. McKay’s rant against the press is unsophisticated and knee-jerk. Their bias is a bit more self-interested: they simply want to be in front of the wave. When the Iraq war was popular, they turned a blind eye to its trumped-up rationale. They only became critical of Bush and his war after his popularity was plummeting.

When Obama (or any Democrat for that matter) looked to be a shoo-in, the coverage was clearly soft on Obama and critical of the Republicans. But, with the race tight, their blatant support has softened… allegiances are shifting. [New polls] like the one published this week in the Washington Post showing that McCain enjoys an advantage with likely voters largely on the strength of a large lead among whites is bad news for Obama in any number of ways. It suggests that he has lost the working-class white vote to McCain, as he did to Hillary. And this morning on the Sunday news talk shows, pundits were talking about the fact that 30% of “undecided” voters were saying they might not vote for Obama because they “didn’t know enough about him”. That sounds better than saying they won’t vote for him because he’s black.

The Obama campaign has to address the issue of racism directly, though I can’t imagine how they do it without further alienating the people who are already disinclined to vote for him. Perhaps a major address by Obama, akin to Kennedy’s 1960 speech about his religion, that reassures whites by acknowledging racial fears while allaying them. A challenge to Americans to change their perceptions, as well as their politics.