Around Town

Is the above item "Spinning Newsrack News" an example of the Weekly's journalistic objectivity? It seems to be one sided and full of opinion. At least when Diana Diamond writes about the Weekly, she gets the other side of the story. This item belongs on your editorial page. You shouldn't mix news and opinion in the news section.

Seems to me to be a rather snide little "newspiece". Clearly the Weekly is unhappy with the coverage of the issue and how certain people associated with the Weekly are being perceived--so the above "news item". There was clearly no fact checking involved and the tone of the article is a little bit too "whiny". Whoever wrote forgot to include certain other facts--Price applied for space and it was not granted to him, he asked for a hearing prior to removal of the boxes and this was not granted, the keys to the racks downtown could not be found!!!!
BTW, this is a first amendment issue and it would be good if someone sued to see if the PA ordinance is legally valid.

Free Speach. So is abuse and discrimination of employee's. Maybe someone could do something about that.
And maybe something could be done, before the City makes a huge mess out of a much smaller issue. Then having to settle for millions more.

How million to Enron? and then to Frank Enron Benest.

This whole City is one big,sad JOKE!
No jokes sre funny. or try to be.

[Portion removed by Palo Alto Online staff.]
Dave Price's papers, including the now much-improved Palo Alto Daily (since Price doesn't own it any more) have always been more about the paper that the news they report. Constantly wrong on the facts; ignorant of the details if administrative operation, and small-minded in municipal vision. That Price's editorial trash still manages to see the light of day is a reminder of how low journalism has fallen (at all levels) compared to just a few decades ago. The Weekly and Daily aren't perfect, either, but at least they try to be about something other than themselves. Newspapers are a business. Price has used that business to raise havoc, and cause pain. What good has come from his news business, except to Price himself?

I've got to agree that this article really reads like an editorial. ... a high school newspaper editorial. It's a departure from what I expect in the Weekly.

I'd also note that the Weekly doesn't dispute the key issue in this case--that the newsrack ordinance does not give new publications as many spaces as the existing papers. This ordinance limits competition. The city should treat all publications the same!

I am so pleased Dave Price and Diana Diamond have come back with the Palo Alto Daily News. They are current, up to the minute, thoroughly entertaining and their paper has some zing to it. OK, so their editorials bend the truth occasionally but if you're well informed you'll spot these and have a good laugh. Quit knocking the competition.

This article argues the city's confiscation of 27 newspaper boxes isn't news. I did a quick search online and found that the Associated Press, Mercury News and Palo Alto Daily News each had stories about the removal of the boxes. The Weekly obviously has different news judgment than those news sources. Maybe the Weekly is trying to justify why it failed to mention a word about the confiscation of the boxes for several days.

As a Palo Alto resident, I would want to know if my city government had seized a newspaper's boxes. I'm glad other newspapers felt this was news even if the Weekly did not.

And to say "That seems to be the strategy of Dave Price's Daily Post, which is elevating a tussle over newsracks to a battle over Free Speech itself" is opinion that doesn't belong in a news story. The Weekly should stick to the facts and simply report what happened.

It's obvious that if the city confiscates a newspaper's boxes, then that newspaper's ability to communicate with the public is reduced. I would say that's a First Amendment violation.

The article doesn't say how long the Post waited for newsrack locations downtown. It just says the Post "wasn't immediately given plenty of room by the city," but there's no definition of "immediately." The reader isn't given any information to determine if the city acted reasonably or unreasonably ... again, all we get are the Weekly's opinions. The Post's article said it took three months for the city to assign 14 spaces to the Post (a number about half that of the Weekly). How long should a newspaper wait for the city to do it's job?

At the end of this piece, the Weekly uses the "straw man technique" to make an unfounded attack on the Post. The article says "The Post has also insinuated in its articles that the Weekly has threatened to sue the city over the issue. But, again to set the record straight, that's not true, Weekly publisher Bill Johnson has noted." I don't have all of the Post's articles in front of me, but the ones from 08-14 and 08-17 don't make any claims about a lawsuit threat and only say the city was "acting on a complaint from the Palo Alto Weekly." I don't know how that insinuates anything about such a threat. But the Weekly sets up the straw man by claiming that the Post insinuated such a thing, and then the Weekly goes on to correct what the Post didn't say. How is this news reporting? It's simply misleading.

It's *obviously* a column--not a news article and, so, yeah, opinions are allowed.

First Amendment? That's stretching it, to put it mildly. Is my living in a zoned residential area and unable to open a bookstore in my house a violation of the First Amendment? No, didn't think so.

A column? There isn't even a name on it. Columns have the name of the author and usually their picture.

It is a 1st Amendment issue if the city allows some newspapers to distribute downtown, but not others. Especially when so many of the racks are abandoned, and it would be easy to let a new paper in.

the weekly doesn't want this to be seen as a first amendment issue because the logical conclusion would be that the weekly's complaints caused the city to deny another party their first amendment rights ... that's extremely awkward for a newspaper that wants to be seen as a champion of the first amendment ...

Sad to see the Weekly reduced to this! The Weekly used to be above this kind of gutter attack. Tremendous disappointment.

In downtown Los Altos, I have been searching for a POST box. There are plenty of Daily News boxes but I cannot find a POST.
Anyone seen one or are they also subject to the same "controls" as Palo Alto