Media Navel Gazing by Mark Kollar

The unemployment rate held steady at 9.7 percent while non-farm shed some 36,000 jobs, all better than expectations; GM said it would reinstate 660 dealers once slated for dismissal; the Dow ended the week some 2.3 percent higher at 10,566, boosted in part by the jobless report; and HBO acquired the book rights to “Too Big To Fail.”

The Big Apple Makes It to The Journal
The Wall Street Journal will launch its local New York City section next month, competing head one with The New York Times and even its own hometown newspaper The Post. The New York section will have as many as 35 reporters covering sports, culture, real estate and politics and be the second section of the New York edition, six days a week. The Journal is also expected to be part of Apple’s iPad tablet computer so many changes/advances afoot under Murdoch at the moment a little over two years after he bought the newspaper.

All the News That Fit to Advertise
Yikes! The Los Angeles Times graced its cover last week with a wrap-around ad, which looked like the Times, but was a picture of Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter in “Alice in Wonderland.” The editorial staff reportedly opposed the move, which blurs the lines of news and commerce, but were obviously voted down in the sake of money.