The New York Post's Page Six feature has always managed to stir the pot, mixing celebrity sightings and gossip with unwanted photos and innuendo. Now, following an official law enforcement investigation, it sounds like at least one of the Page Six reporters was caught threatening one of New York's social butterflies with year-long harassment in the column, unless the "playboy billionaire" was willing to fork over more than $100,000 to keep his name out of the paper. Now finding its way onto the front page of the New York Times and the New York Daily News, both no doubt very pleased with their competitor's trouble, it's said that other notorious socialites have finessed their own coverage - though it's unclear whether payments were expected.Mainstream journalism has taken a black eye in recent years with multiple plagiarism scandals, ranging from Jayson Blair to the recent resignation of a Republican flunkie the Washington Post had hired to bring on a conservative view to the paper, but to demand hundreds of thousands of dollars just to ensure a lack of bad coverage is eye opening. That a paper like the New York Post is behind it isn't a huge surprise. Long known for sensationalism over hard news, it's papers like these that give the craft a bad name. It should be interesting as the "facts" unfold to see what more we learn from the investigation.
Listening to ''Assorted Hard Trance Vol. 4'', by DJ Irish (Play Count: 4)