DAILY News owner Mort Zuckerman negotiated heavily in the second half of 2007 to land a new British editor-in-chief for his embattled tabloid.
The man in Zuckerman’s sights was Fleet Street veteran Richard Wallace, who has been the editor-in-chief of the Daily Mirror for the past 2 ½ years.
Wallace so far has rejected all of Mort’s overtures.
Actually the interest in Wallace goes back to late 2006, sources say, when the current editor-in-chief Martin Dunn reached out to his old Fleet Street mates to edit New York’s so-called “hometown paper.”
Not clear is exactly what role Dunn would have played at the paper had he found the right replacement. Dunn had exhibited a distinct distaste for editing the paper day-to-day – even though he’s earning an eye-popping $1.2 million a year, sources say – and has overseen a slew of high-level buyouts and axings over the past year.
Dunn had edited the paper in the mid-1990s, and had only agreed to return in 2003 with the title of editorial director and deputy publisher.
He hired the Chicago Sun-Times’ Michael Cooke in 2005, but it turned out to be one of the shortest runs in the entire history of the newspaper, and the junket-loving editor-in-chief decamped back to Chicago after less than a year. That forced Dunn to return to the trenches and work in a day-to-day role.
Zuckerman has suggested in at least one recent interview that the struggling paper may have slipped into the red again over the past year.
The Snooze has been dumping an average of 140,000 free papers a day on the street to shore up its sagging paid circulation. Its ad pages are also off.
The bulk-distributed papers draw ad support from third-party ad sponsors and can be counted as paid circulation – even though they are free handouts as far as consumers are concerned.
Industry auditor ABC recently relaxed its guidelines even further so that papers which charge as little as a penny can be counted as paid circulation.
Wallace was on vacation in New York this week and could not be reached. He was the newspaper editor of the year for British GQ in 2006.
One publishing source said the negotiations had gone well beyond a simple discussion. Last summer, Wallace was flown to New York City to meet with Zuckerman and the paper’s CEO Mark Kramer on several occasions.
An actual contract had been negotiated and put on the table but Wallace was said to have some last- minute misgivings about going to work for the mercurial Zuckerman and turned him down.
Calls to Dunn, Kramer and a Daily News spokeswoman were not returned at presstime.
Boomerang
The upper-echelon ranks at BusinessWeek, which were rattled right before Christmas with a corporate-mandated downsizing that axed eight editorial and four business people, just lost another high-level editor.
Paul Barrett, an assistant managing editor, who was lured from The Wall Street Journal by Editor-in-Chief Steve Adler, is heading back home to the Journal.
Among the named editors let go in the pre-Christmas bloodbath were veteran national correspondent Tony Bianco and Personal Finance Editor Jeff Laderman.
The loss of Barrett, who was handpicked by Adler to head up its investigative efforts, was apparently something unplanned for by Adler, who has just overseen a big redesign that created a big feature well inside the paper.
“He did a terrific job for us,” said Adler. “I’m sad he’s leaving.” Shortly after Media Ink called, Adler dispatched a memo to his jittery staffers late yesterday in a bid to reassure them that investigative reporting still counted, even though it had lost its top editor.
Barrett has written a number of books on wide-ranging topics, including the soon-to-be-released in paperback, “American Islam: The Struggle for the Soul of a Religion” and “The Good Black: A True Story of Race in America.”
He had been at the Journal for 18 years before following Adler to BW.
“It’s time for me to get back into reporting and writing,” said Barrett when we spoke yesterday. He’ll be a senior special writer, and will tackle a broad range of investigative stories. His last day at the mag is Jan. 11. He wastes no time and starts at the Journal on Jan. 14.
Broken egg
Some months ago, Media Ink learned that Cyndi Stivers, the former executive vice president of Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia had landed at blueegg.com as CEO. It now appears that she is out.
Stivers, who was the founding editor-in-chief and president of Time Out New York and Time Out Chicago, was drawn to blueegg.com, which was trying to offer green-friendly service pieces to a variety of mainstream media outlets.
Blueegg is backed by Vantage Point Venture Partners.
It was described on its Web site as “an e-media company that celebrates attainable, sustainable living. By providing clear, credible information and practical solutions, we want to help you become more mindful of the environment – without suggesting that you surrender style, comfort and convenience, and without asking you to spend a lot of extra cash.”
“The important thing is to begin!” blueegg continued. It was said to have drawn its name because it was evocative of the color of robin’s eggs.
We had e-mailed its Web site, but 24-hours later, there was still no word back. A rep from the Rosen Group said that negotiations are underway regarding the sale of the company and that is why Stivers could not comment.
In the About Us portion of its Web site, it still lists Stivers as the CEO and Patti Purcell as president.
Rodale redux
There is even more thinning of the Rodale executive ranks.
Ben Roter, who was an executive vice president, apparently left the payroll at year-end. That was at the same time that Chief Operating Officer Steve Kalin exited.
A company spokesperson said that Kalin had left on his own to pursue other opportunities and that the two departures were unrelated.
Roter – who was a strategic adviser to company CEO Steve Murphy and the Rodale family – “is still with the company in an advisory capacity,” said the spokeswoman.
For the record
Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia said that its President and CEO Susan Lyne has never sold any shares of common stock in the company on the open market. The Post reported she has been unloading stock valued at “just under $890,000,” in the past year.
She has been surrendering stock, according to SEC filings, but it apparently was of no net gain to her financially. An MSLO spokeswoman said that the “surrender” was to satisfy tax-withholding obligations.