Pigs Flying Much Closer To Ground

Last last week, Phillymag’s Steve Volk wrote about the financial worries at Philadelphia Media Holdings, the Brian Tierney-captained crew running the Inquirer, Daily News and other related properties.

The 411: Standard & Poor’s reported PMH will have its debt interest rate go up a point in exchange for being allowed to miss a few payments. Its loan was trading in the mid-70s in June and is now in the 40s.

Want more bad news? Sure: Boscov’s, which has filed for bankruptcy, owes the paper nearly a million dollars.

Of course, when the company gets that money, it will immediately be spent on inflatable pigs and cat food, so that Philly.com may construct a whole army of 40-plus pound cats to put on the front page.

Financial Worries Deepen at Philadelphia Media Holdings [Phillymag]
Boscov’s files for bankruptcy; several stores closing immediately [Baltimore Sun via Phawker]

Flying Pig Farm Destroyed By Blaze

Just to prove that I’m an equal opportunity offender — i.e. it’s not just Barbaro, I must comment on the Burlington County fire that killed 1500 pigs.

In this case, a picture says a thousand words. Or 1500 pigs.

1500 Pigs Killed in Burlco Barn Blaze [KYW 1060]
Nov. 9: Hey The Inquirer Is Doing That Pig Thing Again

Hey The Inquirer Is Doing That Pig Thing Again

Inquirer circulation numbers were up slightly; the flying pigs “concept” was “re-launched.” Uh-huh. Look, The Return of the Flying Pigs dot com.

The theme this time is “The Return of the Flying Pigs: The Movie,” and there’s a whole ‘nother four-page supplement. So far, the flying pigs movie trailer has crashed my browser twice.

Marky Mark Disney Film Inspires Philly Pride

In a largely we’ve-seen-all-of this-before profile of Brian Tierney from Columbia Journalism Review, there’s a little point about Inquirer editor Bill Marimow on his return to Philadelphia. (Yeah, this has been reported before, too, but if you haven’t seen it, it’s new to you! Ahh, such cutting edge references on this blog.)

Marimow, then at National Public Radio, said he had written to Tierney asking to be considered for the job in August after the film Invincible, about an unlikely Philadelphia football hero, had stirred his desire to return to his hometown paper. Even the prospective layoffs—he’d fought similar cuts as editor of the Baltimore Sun, and been fired as a result—didn’t dissuade him. “I knew that for these two newspapers, the Inquirer and the Daily News, to flourish,” Marimow said, “they had to be smaller.”

Yeah, it’s kinda like that scene in Invincible where Vince Papale makes the team! Only if instead of making the squad, he was cut. And the Eagles were only carrying 45 players instead of 60. And Dick Vermeil had quit over a previous head coaching job where he wouldn’t cut the players the owner wanted. And then the Eagles were renamed the Flying Pigs in honor of a 9-7 season.

Brian Tierney’s Grand Experiment [CJR]
May 4: ‘Inquirer’ Uses Font Size Usually Reserved For Terrorist Attacks To Tell Us Circulation Is Up