New York Press

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New York Press
The June 7, 2006 front page of the New York Press
Type	Alternative weekly
Format	Tabloid

Owner	Avalon Equity
Publisher	Peter Polimino
Editor-in-Chief	Jerry Portwood
Founded	1988
Headquarters	333 Seventh Ave., 14th Floor New York, NY 10001 United States
Circulation	105,854^[1]

Website: nypress.com

New York Press is a free alternative weekly in New York City. It is the main competitor to the Village Voice, although some competition is currently offered by two other free papers with local listings, The L Magazine and The Onion. It was founded in 1988, and originally conceived and published as a conservative voice in traditionally liberal New York. The paper developed an impressive following over its first decade, and by 1996 had forced the Village Voice to become a free paper to compete.

The rivalry with the Village Voice has expressed itself in other ways. New York Press launched an annual "Best of Manhattan" issue in 1996, and the Village Voice responded with an annual "Best of New York" issue in 2001. Press editors have written about hiring away writer Nat Hentoff from the Voice. [1]

The paper's weekly circulation in 2005 was around 100,000, [2] in comparison with around 250,000 for the Village Voice. [3]

The paper was founded by Russ Smith, who published it until he sold it in 2003 to investment group Avalon Equity Partners for around US$3 million. [4] Publishers Chuck Colletti and Doug Meadow became the president and C.O.O., respectively. Smith still contributes his long-running column, which was originally published under the pseudonym "MUGGER" but is now simply called "Mugger" and published under his real name.

Although Smith was nominally editor-in-chief, the actual editor through most of the paper's history was John Strausbaugh. When Smith sold the Press, Strausbaugh was fired and replaced by former production editor Jeff Koyen. Since then the paper has seen a series of editors come and go, and has seen its page count shrink dramatically. Under Smith, the paper was a money-losing operation, rumored to function as a tax shelter for Smith's wealthy family.

From April 2003 to July 2004, the Press had a sister publication, New York Sports Express, that was a free weekly devoted to sports. The publishers discontinued it due to insufficient circulation.

New York Press gained notoriety in March 2005 for a cover story entitled "The 52 Funniest Things About the Upcoming Death of the Pope," written by Matt Taibbi. [5] The cover prompted outraged comments from a variety of New York politicians, [6], and within a few weeks led to the resignation of its then-editor, Jeff Koyen. He was replaced by "interim editor" Alexander Zaitchik. Harry Siegel became the paper's editor in August 2005, bringing along with him three editors and writers (Tim Marchman, Jonathan Leaf and Azi Paybarah), and giving the Press a greater focus on local politics. In February 2006 all four resigned from the paper, after the publisher pulled at the last minute a planned cover story that would have shown the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons. [7] Siegel was replaced for a short time by Steve Weinstein, former editor of the New York Blade. In 2006, Adario Strange, former editor of The Source, became the new editor. A year later, in 2007, Strange left the paper to return to film directing. The new editor became former arts & entertainment editor Jerry Portwood, leaving just one editor at the paper.

Noted memoirist and longtime staff writer, occasional arts and entertainment critic, and author of the nearly two decade old "Slackjaw" column, Jim Knipfel was one of the paper's only mainstays for more than thirteen years. "Slackjaw" ran in the Philadelphia Welcomat for five years before it was picked up by the Press in 1993. Later, Knipfel worked as the Press' receptionist before moving into a staff writer position. In June, 2006, his column was discontinued. Film critic Armond White is another of the paper's mainstays.

During Strausbaugh's editorship, the Press ran regular columns by Alexander Cockburn, Taki Theodoracopolous, Christopher Caldwell, Soul Coughing lead singer M. Doughty (both under his own name and under the pseudonym "Dirty Sanchez"), future screenwriter William Monahan, Toby Young, Amy Sohn, Jonathan Ames, Scott McConnell, and David Corn, among others. During Koyen's and Zaitchik's editorship, the paper ran regular columns by Paul Krassner, Michelangelo Signorile, and Matt Taibbi, among others. Currently the Press runs regular columns by Amy Goodman and Ed Koch (former Mayor of New York City), among others.

In the tradition of earlier NY underground papers like East Village Other, New York Press has regularly published cutting-edge comic art, including early work by founding art director Michael Gentile, Kaz, Ben Katchor, Charles Burns, Mark Beyer, Mark Newgarden, Ward Sutton, M. Wartella, Gary Panter, Danny Hellman, Tony Millionaire and others.