Wednesday, January 25, 2006

A brand new New York Blade

Given that in the past I've been a bit harsh to the New York Blade on a couple of occations, I have to give props to new Chief Operating Officer Matthew Bank (also still the publisher of weekly bar-guide HX) who actually sent me an e-mail in response to my latest dismissive post and said that some changes were coming and that he was interested, as the new CEO, in improving the quality and reach of their news coverage.

I was out of the country for the launch of the "new" blade so forgive me if this is old news, but the print version has been totally re-designed (alas, the web version still does not reflect the design changes and the only image I found was of the cover of the last issue before the design was launched so I can't actually show you how it looks).

Gone are the gaudy and sometimes distasteful lead cover graphics illustrating a single story and instead you have a more serious hard news design with a lead story on top and two smaller blocks below the fold. This might be boring to people who like gaudy and over the top but it's a huge improvement for news junkies like me. Better still, there seem to be additional reporters listed in bylines and additional news coverage. There seems also to be a new street release date (Mondays instead of late Thursdays), and, at least in the January 23rd issue as well as online, no "Bitch Session" column. Just that in itself is reason to make me a believer.

As for changes at Windows Media? Well, you can read more here.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

No "Bitch Session?" That was often the only reason to read that paper.