Tomorrow is Texas Press Association D-day

 Yep, starting tomorrow, by state law, you're supposed to post your legals with the TPA webpage run by that grifting Column.

If I owned a paper that were a TPA member, since the new state law applies only to TPA members, especially if I were a smaller newspaper that didn't have its own website, especially if I were not a "full" TPA member and wasn't getting the 2x2 ads and TexScan, etc.?

I believe I'd quit, Mike Hodges. At a minimum, the onus would be on TPA staff to talk me out of it. I know, we get a run a year, maybe two, every other year, of constitutional amendments ads, and once a year, maybe, of the affordable housing ad since COVID started, but I think that's gone away again, and I know that, last year, shockingly, Danny Goeb placed some political campaign ads via TPA. But, other than that, if you're not paying the extra freight for the 2x2s (most of which are oilfield ads anyway), what do you get?

And, mark my words: By 2027, more of the camel's nose and head that was let in the tent this spring will be shoved inside by a future Texas Legislature. (I wouldn't be surprised if somebody makes a run at that in 2025, but doubt it will pass then.)

Notes from the field?

First, setting up default rates sucks if they're not an even dollar, and your liner rates and mine aren't if they're per-word or per-line based. You CANNOT enter ".35" for 35 cents a word. You have to start with $1 and then use the up/down (down in this case) cursors. AND? Despite that I've never heard of a paper charging fractional cents for anything. Column's "wizardry" calculates out to not just mills, or tenths of a cent, but to tenths of mills, or hundredths of a cent. Hey, Hodges, as long as you're paying Column for its Florida public benefit corporation stable genyus, can you get that fixed? Or, rather than Hodges, Kevin King, the guy who emailed me? (I tried, after I started the cursor going, editing "within the field," but when I hit save, it changed 0.35 to $35. More stable genyus there.

And, my office puter being a 10.6.8 Mac, of course it is not compatible there.

Wonder how many other papers hadn't set up accounts, and of them, how many are hitting the old Mac issue.

Finally, per my owner's desire not to give away the store, my newspapers DO NOT HAVE WEBSITES. I'd argue that the TPA, in conjunction with the Lege, is involved in a reverse-spin restraint of trade. Why didn't the stable genyuses, TPA version, get newspapers like us exempted? We're not the only newspapers in the state without websites.

More notes for the stable genyuses at Column?

First, supposably, I can adjust my templates under "my organization." Don't see that. Don't see any place to input column widths for legal displays. 

I do see under "my organization," a Column employee also listed as part of the "team." More "ugh" and probably more snooping by TPA, which has also in the past couple of months increased its nagging about "you have a missing issue." Technically, NewzGroup, but on TPA's behalf. Since we don't have a website, and no current full-page wind farm ads, I delay posting there by a month, ever since the county's IT person asked if we had a website and I mentioned we have that as an option. Sorry, Hodges and NewzGroup but that's the way it is.

"Community News and Small Business Support Act" thoughts

 First, this legislation, overviewed by Nieman Lab, appears to be somewhat better than the old Local Journalism Sustainability Act, harshly critiqued by me here, but that's a low bar.

It does address the issue of "pink slime" getting any money, though not really on hedge funds.

The 750-employee size limit remains unchanged and is still too large.

It does double the LJSA's 100-hours-per-quarter standard of eligibility for employee tax credits to 200, which is definitely good. (I had suggested 250, but could live with 200.)

It does not mention requiring the Ad Council to advertise in community newspapers, a blown opportunity.

So, on some big-ticket items, it's one-third better than the LJSA, or 40 percent if we split the diff on pink slime and hedge funds. Still should go back to the drawing board on the Ad Council issue. (And on the employee max size issue, of course.) And, a Congresscritter who used to be a newspaper editor shouldn't have missed that, unless Claudia Tenney thinks that's "socialism," which means that how much brainstorming she will do will be problematic.

Update, Oct. 4: NNA supports this because of tax credits to small biz to advertise in local newspapers. Also at its convention, it called on the feds to get various agencies to advertise more in local papers, but did NOT mention, at least by name in a presser I got, the Ad Council.

NNA also supports the Journalism Protection and Competition Act, S 1094, to make large social media companies pay for using newspaper content. I oppose, partially but not entirely based on what's happening in Canada with its social media journalism law.

Riddle me this on Texas newspaper jobs ...

 Why would a pair of weekly papers with known ownership, a website, and contact email addresses, namely Cuero and Yorktown, advertise for what is essentially a general manager position, and do so with a Gmail contact address? And, that known ownership is ... Moser.

So, Hearne is for sale

Dennis Phillips, after the passing of his wife Theresa, reportedly wants to sell it. Understandable in some ways. Interesting only it; info I had mentioned neither Marlin nor Cameron, which I had heard he was also acquiring or going to acquire, but apparently that never happened.

I'm not interested, personally, and wouldn't trust his books.

You know who COULD buy it? And I told him on Twitter. Dennis' old best buddy, Ty Clevenger. Ty would surely like to slow down his life from national-level wingnuttery, now that the Seth Rich conspiracy theory has been legally thrashed and crashed six ways from Sunday.

The anti-First Amendment fascist hell of Marion, Kansas

Eric Meyer, owner and publisher of the Marion County Record, speaks in more detail about last week’s police raid on his newspaper, which included seizure of ALL newspaper computers and other items.

The big new takeaway? Besides the story already printed about restaurateur Kari Newell booting Record staff out of a meeting she was having with Congressman Jake LaTurner, and beyond information provided by an anonymous source to both her and the town’s assistant mayor about a previous DUI that might, indeed, have affected her application for a special event liquor permit?

The paper had been investigating information from anonymous sources about newly hired Police Chief Gideon Cody about him possibly leaving his previous policing position rather than face fines and/or demotion over sexual misconduct issues.

That would, of course, be the same person who led and organized this raid, and who would have assisted in getting the warrant for it, and who might have known that federal law requires a subpoena in such cases — and who now claims the Privacy Protection Act’s subpoena requirement does not apply in criminal cases. Per its Facebook statement, there is a HUGE conflict of interest when the Marion PD sets itself up as judge, jury and executioner on deetermining when an alleged loophole on the Privacy Protection Act exists when its own chief is under investigation.

And, Chief Cody (no hiding behind “police department statement,” since you ARE the police department in a small town) is STILL wrong. The PPA notes that when a newspaper or other First Amendment-protected institution faces a warrant without subpoena it is STILL supposed to be given adequate opportunity to file an affidavit of objection. That CLEARLY did not happen.

This is more than just prior restraint, although that’s part of it. It’s also clearly an illegal, authoritarian attempt to uncover anonymous sources.

As a newspaper editor myself, I hope the Record’s federal lawsuit names individuals, not just the city of Marion.

When I grow up, I want to ...

 Will a newspaper that I own to an NPR radio station.

Was looking at a recent issue of the Denton paper.

Kicking out all the frequency runs that say "Vote for Me" for the upcoming Best Of special (I ASSUME they're discounted and that Denton businesses aren't dumb enough or vain enough to pay Bill Patterson full price), and adjusting for the number of pages they ate up as well? Less than 25 percent adhole for a paper in a city of nearly 200K that's cut itself to weekly in print. No wonder he wants to get rid of print entirely. But, remember, there's no paywall with KERA running you, when that finalizes.

And, if I were Pilot Point (not that Dave Lewis needs an excuse to go poaching for legal ads), I would consider doing exactly that if Patterson junks print.