Taking a page out of the Bruce Brugmann playbook, the San Francisco Newspaper Company, which owns SF Weekly, the Examiner and the San Francisco Bay Guardian, has filed suit against against the San Francisco Chronicle, alleging the Hearst Corp.-owned paper of record is blocking out the Examiner's advertisers by offering dirt cheap rates to advertisers who agreed not to work with the free daily paper.

The story was broken by Joe Eskenazi of the Weekly, in the same office building where where SFNC President Todd Vogt recently had to have his foot surgically removed from his mouth.

According to the Weekly's insider details (helpfully reprinted on the Examiner), the lawsuit alleges that the Chronicle began slashing ad prices around the time Vogt & Co. took over the Examiner in 2011. In exchange for the lower rates, advertisers had to refrain from working with the smaller operation:

"Hearst has demanded and obtained agreements from key advertising customers, which preclude those customers from purchasing any advertising space from the Examiner for a period of a year or more," the complaint said. "In many cases, these discounts were specifically conditioned on the advertiser agreeing to purchase advertising services exclusively from Hearst and requiring it to stop doing business with the Examiner."

The lawsuit alleges that, in one case, the Chronicle gave away $200,000 worth of ad space and offered secret rates to different buyers. Advertisers reportedly snitched to Examiner execs about the Chronicle's shady business practices late last year and an attorney for the SFNC says they have material evidence of the aggressive pricing schemes.

The SFNC also alleges Hearst has been using other money making properties to subsidize the discount ads on the Chronicle, claiming the Examiner doesn't have the same resources to do that. (Although that is getting harder to argue, with SFNC's growing empire.)

All of this is illegal under the California Unfair Practices Act, which observant readers will remember was the same law the Guardian used to successfully sue the Weekly's former owners for $21 million (although the final undisclosed settlement was reportedly lower) a few years back. At the time, that case captivated handwringing members of the dead tree media across California, which — according to the Examiner's legal team — makes this scheme especially nefarious.

It's been a rocky year or so in local media and it doesn't look like the power plays are quite over yet. Expect this all to end when we have one unified web portal for the SFWeeklyGateGuardianExaminer.com tucked safely behind a paywall.

S.F. Newspaper Company President Todd Vogt spoke with CBS5's Joe Vazquez today, in an attempt to either clarify or obfuscate (we're still not quite sure ourselves) his company's reasons for bringing Michelle Shocked back to San Francisco for a free concert on Pride weekend, just months after she went on a confusing anti-gay rant onstage at Yoshi's.

According to Vogt, Shocked — or her representatives — initially attempted to purchase ad space in SF Weekly's annual Pride Guide. "For all the money in the world," Vogt told CBS5, "we weren't going to take some hate mongering homophobic ad."

When Shocked claimed she truly wanted to apologize for what happened at Yoshi's in March and clarify the situation, Vogt went a different route and the concert idea was born. "So we talked," Vogt explains, "and we decided the only way we’d do this is if you’d come to San Francisco, put on a free show, be honest and up front about it. She spoke to her people and decided to do it.”

A newspaper man with a strict bottom line turning down ad dollars and committing to spend money is already starting to raise a few eyebrows: Chloe Harris of 7x7 says calling the whole thing, "Disingenuous...Notorious" (as we did) is putting it mildly. Or, as San Francisco Magazine Editor-in-Chief Jon Steinberg phrased it: "#NotWorthItTodd."

If the story were truly about Shocked's mea culpa, as Vogt says, then an Examiner Op-Ed and an interview in the Weekly would have been a much more cost effective way to give the rambling stage performer a platform to speak. (Not to mention, Shocked herself seems to have already moved on to the Bradley Manning issue, anyway.)

Likewise, Vogt says the timing at the tail end of Pride Weekend is purely coincidental although he and his staff decided it was a perfect fit for the event. Shocked has implied on Twitter that she won't be paid for the gig, but there's always the matter of venue costs and event permits, not to mention the cost of flying SF Weekly's music editor to L.A. to do the interview. A venue for the concert still needs to be negotiated and Vogt says it is unclear whether the plucky provocatrice will even show up.

Update, June 19th: Vogt jumped on Twitter earlier today to make an apology and accept all the outrage that has been directed at him in the wake of the concert announcement:

We're not quite sure what this means for the free Shocked concert, as we're still trying to parse the singer's breakneck Twitter feed, but we'll be sure to update you when we know more.

Update, June 19th, 6 p.m.: Apparently Vogt was apologizing for this whole debacle. The Michelle Shocked show has been cancelled.

Previously: Michelle Shocked To Promote Herself With Free Concert During Pride, S.F. Examiner Op-Ed
All Michelle Shocked coverage on SFist
[CBS5]

For this week's cover story, SF Weekly investigates allegations of mistreatment among performers inside Kink.com's armory, where the company shoots everything from panda porn to bondage to foot worship. The company has generally been held in high regard for its tough ethical standards and clearly defined rules designed to protect both models and directors in an industry that is, by definition, meant to show pain on screen. But several former models interviewed for the Weekly's story claim that they were coerced into rough performances or left with lasting injuries only to be blacklisted or be paid hush money to keep quiet.

In response to the piece this morning, Kink.com claims that many of the accusations in the Weekly's article are false, calling it "shoddy journalism" that could have easily been cleared up with a few calls to the company. "Today the SF Weekly chose to knowingly and carelessly publish a cover story with serious flaws and dubious sourcing," Acworth wrote in an email sent to media outlets this morning, "— including forged emails and false accusations." [See below for the full text of Acworth's open letter.]

Still, the Weekly piece is an interesting look behind the scenes at the Armory as pornographers and BDSM performers grapple with the term "ethical porn." The company itself has been famously open to the public: those model's rights and director's rights are posted visibly on the site, and the company recently saw the release of a James Franco-produced documentary at Sundance. Openness alone can't protect everyone in the industry, however: As Princess Donna, one of Kink's best known performers and directors, described her first BDSM shoot with a New York company on page four of the article:

"I was crying and crying, which was not against their shooting rules. There was a male dominant and a male videographer and a female photographer. I kept looking to her to save me, you know? But then I realized, that's what safe words are for, and it's my responsibility to say what I can and can't handle."

Or as one former Kink.com cam girl defined it: "It's really easy to make ethical pornography. To make unethical porn, you have to actively do something fucked up."

Acworth's statement in full:

Today the SF Weekly chose to knowingly and carelessly publish a cover story with serious flaws and dubious sourcing — including forged emails and false accusations. Despite the fact that we proved, to the satisfaction of the journalist, that major factual problems existed with the piece, the article was run with few changes.

The story "Gag Order" paints a bleak picture of life at Kink. It’s not rooted in reality — nor in the tenets of ethical journalism. When we originally agreed to speak with the Weekly, they began asking questions that, to those of us who work here, did not seem to have any basis in fact. When we asked for support of those claims, the Weekly quoted emails they'd received from a source who'd originally tipped off the investigation. The emails turned out to be forged, and the journalist admitted to Kink management that the emails were fabricated.

We invited the journalist in to review the original emails on our servers, and speak with several of our employees about some of the other accusations. She was visibly distressed to find out that that she'd been lied to, and we suggested that she contact other people to verify the rest of the claims.

Though we'd been told repeatedly that it was a tight deadline, we expected that it would be held until the rest of the claims in the piece could be double-checked for veracity. Unfortunately, only hours later, the piece went live. Sections related specifically to the forged emails were excised — but there was no further verification of other, similarly sensational claims in the article. In fact, there was no mention of the forged emails, or the fact that readers might have good reason to question those other claims as well.

Instead, "Gag Order" is rife with inaccuracies, misrepresentations and sometimes blatant falsehoods. Many of them could have been disproven (or proven, for that matter) with a simple phone call. To a doctor. To a director. To other models on a shoot. A review of our HR records could easily have shown that models who were allegedly “blacklisted” after a complaint continued to work with us for months afterward. Models who were supposedly “paid off” for silence could be checked against actual payment records in accounting. There are many such examples. Unfortunately, none of that was pursued.

We understand that as a company that employs over 130 people and shoots over 1000 scenes a year, that we can't make everyone happy. We're not perfect, and we do our best to correct mistakes when they happen. We don't expect everyone to love us or what we do, and we don't expect that everyone will think a BDSM porn company can have ethics. What we do expect is that a major alt-weekly, upon realizing that there was at least one major source with an agenda and outright fabricated claims, would hold a story until other sources could be verified as well.

We were told repeatedly that this was a tight deadline, but that's no excuse for shoddy journalism. We welcome the chance to engage with the Weekly now that said deadline is past. In the meantime, we ask that they take down the story in its current form, and work with us to correct it. We also expect an apology.

Peter Acworth
CEO and Founder, Kink.com

SFist also reached out to SFWeekly and author Kate Conger about the piece. We're told the Weekly is currently working on a response to Acworth and we'll update when we have more. In the meantime, Conger says her article does not mention the emails Mr. Acworth described in his statement.

Update: The Weekly has posted their response to Acworth's letter, noting that no one at Kink saw drafts of the article which Conger began researching back June of last year. As for whether the story "paints a bleak picture of life at Kink," the Weekly maintains the piece is balanced with both positive and negative stories: "I don't think it paints a bleak picture at all. I think it points to the extreme differences in experience from one model to the next. Several longtime models and directors are quoted about their positive experiences at Kink." Click through for the full, point-by-point response on the Weekly.

Previously: Kink.com CEO Arrested For Coke Possession, Investigated for Firearms

Today the San Francisco Weekly could be changing hands to become part of a new local media three-way with the San Francisco Examiner and the San Francisco Bay Guardian. According to multiple sources close to the deal speaking with the SF Appeal, the official announcement could come sometime this morning. Additional sources at the Examiner also confirmed the sale to SFist.

[Note: see updates below for official confirmation.]

The Appeal first reported the potential sale of a major local print publication back on December 20th of last year when Todd Vogt, President, Co-Owner and Publisher of the Examiner and the Bay Guardian, claimed to be making the announcement that day. At the time, local media players speculated Vogt's San Francisco Newspaper Company would be buying either the Weekly, the East Bay Express or the Bay Area Reporter to round out its trio of local holdings. (The independently owned Express was quick to point out that they were "definitely not for sale.")

Vogt, who has a fascinating twitter feed, has been vocal about his love of disposable paper printing. (And of SFist, but that's neither here nor there.) As he explained in December, the buyout would "give us, by far, the greatest readership, reach and audience in the Bay Area, effectively covering every demographic in every corner of The City." Be afraid, Chronicle.

As for concerns that local media consolidation could be a bad thing, the other bigshot newspapermen in the Bay Area don't seem too worried. Earlier this week former Chronicle Editor-at-Large, current executive chairman of the Center for Investigative Reporting, and the guy who once had a crossbow hanging in his office at the S.F. Examiner — Phil Bronstein told the Appeal, "The Guardian was failing, and probably the Weekly was failing. Separately all three would fail, if together they don't fail have you gained anything or lost anything?"

The S.F. Weekly staff apparently had a mandatory 9 a.m. all-hands meeting this morning, and we're told there will be a similar meeting at the shared offices of the Ex and the SFBG later this afternoon. The last tweet from the Weekly's twitter account, which is usually pretty talkative on Wednesday mornings when the paper goes out, went out about 8 a.m. this morning.

We will, of course, be updating as we know more details.

Update 10:45 a.m.: Seattle Weekly, another former Village Voice paper, also confirms the deal by way of an announcement that their own publication has been sold to Washington State's Sound Publishing Company. Readers and media watchdogs will remember Village Voice Media sold off their nationwide chain of alt weeklies back in September. The 13 papers became part of the employee-owned Voice Media Group while Village Voice Media kept their sketchy Backpage.com classified ads site.

Update 11 a.m.: Voice Media Group confirmed the sale in a release sent out later this morning. Vogt's San Francisco Newspaper Group will assume operations of the Weekly as of today. "This is a strategic decision aligned with the long-term business goals of VMG," Voice Media Group CEO Scott Tobias said. "Todd Vogt is known for his expertise in the local paper space and he is a great choice to take ownership of SF Weekly."

Voice Media Group will continue to run the 11 remaining papers including the LA Weekly, OC Weekly and the Village Voice.

Update 12:15 p.m.: In the Examiner's own announcement of the sale, Vogt spoke highly of the Weekly, saying it "occupies a distinctive niche in San Francisco, and we’re determined to strengthen its position. They already put out a high-quality paper, and we’re going to make it even better.” The Weekly will eventually move in with their former Guardian rivals in the office they share with the Examiner at 225 Bush Street. Printing will move to the the Examiner's facility in the Bayview.

Meanwhile, improving the Weekly apparently involves cutting some employees. As SF Weekly's music editor Ian Port reports that there will be layoffs in every department at the paper. Our well wishes go out to colleagues currently spending their day interviewing with new bosses:

There will be layoffs here at SFW, in every department, we were told. We'll be interviewing w/ new bosses to see who stays.

— Ian S. Port (@iPORT) January 9, 2013

We're doing away with our weekly roundups in which we read the weeklies for you because, well, reading is hard! No, but seriously, it's usually the cover pieces that are of worthy note in either the Weekly or the Guardian, and these cover pieces are going to be judged by the average Dick and Janet on Market Street by the quality of the cover art each of their respective art departments chose. Without further ado, our new feature in which we pit the rival papers against one another and judge them by their covers.

SFWeekly: Andrew Nilsen's stark red cover design illuminates Peter Jamison's cover story this week. The piece examines just how hard it is to actually convict someone of a hate crime, even in a town full of minority groups. The cover, meanwhile, appears to depict a menacing skinhead's silhouette. The thin question mark on the mysterious assailant's forehead evokes a Manson-esque swastika, but the punny title (Dickens even, yeeesh) and the red background are about as subtle as that baseball bat. We give it a C- for sensationalism and uninspired clipart selection.

SF Bay Guardian: Yikes! This disaster of a Photoshop job you see on the right goes along with a pair of food policy articles: one about California's food aid shortage and another San Francisco's "food divide". (Not a general food shortage, mind you, but a shortage in food aid). It's not the most easily compelling story to begin with (so many numbers!), and this ill-conceived cover isn't helping. Is someone locking up our produce? Is this another thing about surcharges on paper bags? Why don't the chains fall down? Extra credit awarded for managing to sneak in the quaint line: "Here's something to chew on with your bagel and coffee—" right at the beginning of a print article, but overall we give it a D for the misguided concept.

Honorable Mention: The East Bay Express, a companion to many a transbay commuter, has "SEX" emblazoned in big, red letters on the cover to go along with Rachel Swan's piece on polyamory (which includes a nice section with Sex at Dawn author Christopher Ryan). The cover probably won't be winning any design awards, but you know: Sex sells free newspapers, as it were.

In SF Weekly's cover story this week, Peter Jamison takes a look at the bonuses that city workers can get just for doing their jobs. It starts off with a sentence about poop though. More specifically, it starts off with Andrew Clark, an engineer with the city's largest sewage treatment facility. Clark takes pride in his job even though it smells pretty bad, so he's fairly well compensated for it with a salary that's just a tick under 6-figures. But Clark also gets an additional 7.5 percent bonus for being certified for hazardous-materials management.

That seems like a good thing for someone who handles hazardous materials for a living, and it is - in fact, he's required to have that certification to hold his job in the first place. But that's what bothers Jamison - that this premium pay is being dished out by a city with huge deficit even though the work itself is not necessarily "premium". Not all premium pay bonuses are superfluous - Nurses who take undesirable shifts get increased wages, for example - but especially bothersome are "standby hours" where city employees can make up to half their normal rate when they're not even on the job (although they'd be on-call, at least). So, eliminating premium pay entirely seems a bit unfair, but where's the public debate on this?

Weekly newspapers aren't just free gift wrap, they also contain articles and sexy back page ads. Here's what you'll find on streetcorners around town this week:

SFWeekly

The Weekly's big story takes a look at Sofia Coppola's journey to "Somewhere". Somewhere being the title of her upcoming film which is shot somewhere other than San Francisco. Actually large parts of it are being shot inside LA's infamous Chateau Marmont where, among other things, Sofia celebrated her 21st birthday (although she apparently didn't remember that fact).

Sofia's youthful indiscretions aside, Karina Longworth's piece describes the upcoming film as "defiantly austere, the most challenging Coppola has made to date." It's largely inspired by (and makes prominent use of) the Phoenix track "Love Like a Sunset" - which is handy because Thomas Mars, Phoenix's frontman, is responsible for both that particular track and Sofia's two young daughters.

Starring Stephen Dorff as a "depressed, withdrawn movie star", Somewhere sounds like it lands near Lost in Translation's style of semi-true fiction. (Dorff lived at the Chateau for two months when he was 19, and other parts of the film are largely based on Eleanor Coppola's memoirs.) The rest of the piece is probably a better fit for an LA audience or rabid Coppola fan, but there is this wonderful quote from Dorff about his process:

You know, dressing to play a woman, [like] in I Shot Andy Warhol, it's a piece of cake for me. I look in the mirror, I look like a girl, I just find a voice, walk around in some heels and do it.

It's Wednesday and thank god the weekly papers are out, because how else would you stay dry in this terrible downpour? (Seriously though - grab one of each, it's really raining out there.) Once you're somewhere dry and safe for newsprint, here's what you'll be reading assuming the ink is still legible:

Judging from the cover shot, SFWeekly is leading off with a piece on another indie-film biopic of Edith Piaf. Actually though, Ashley Harrell's Killer Instinct piece is about Samantha Spiegel, a 19 year-old fashion design major from Academy of Art with the peculiar hobby of mailing letters to convicted killers like Charles Manson, Richard Ramirez (aka The Night Stalker) and Richard Allen Davis. Spiegel says she was once engaged to John Mark Karr, the man who falsely confessed to killing Jon Benet Ramsey in 2006, but ended up in rehab after Karr brainwashed her into becoming a "slight pedophile."

Now she's at Academy of Art, doing totally normal college girl stuff: She's really interested in fashion ("she even studded the leather jacket she is wearing"), 1970's girl-punk group The Runaways ("Cherry Bomb" is her favorite) and she dishes about Karr in dorm-room therapy sessions with her two roommates who talk about him like he was just any old jerk of an ex-boyfriend. The kind of jerk that makes one recruit children for a sex cult, that is.

Will SFist and other blog content soon be available in print form at a newspaper box near you?

According to a story in yesterday's , a fella in Chicago is going to bring the blogosphere to newsprint, starting in the Windy City and right here in San Francisco. The project, The Printed Blog, hits the streets on Tuesday.

Blogosphereans that we are, we do occasionally glance at our soon-to-be neighbors on the sidewalk, the print media. And that's how, while munching a burrito the other day, we came across Matt Smith's SFWeekly column puncturing the optimism of those who argue that blogs may improve journalism. Smith characterizes one such optimist -- Michael Hirschorn of The Atlantic -- as either drunk, sex-addled, ignorant, or nuts.

We agree. Most bloggers we know -- and in fact most people, real journalists included -- have at least two of these characteristics at any given moment. Let's see if they shine as clearly in the print world.

Photo by Salim Virji. Some rights reserved.

Not long ago, Leanne asked readers to weigh in on Zipcar vs. City CarShare. The subsequent brand-identification debate was not quite as acrimonious as the typical Mac vs. PC debate, or even the heated Wrangler's vs. Levi's debate we once overheard in the Houston airport.

We're not sure what the above photo means in the context of the car-sharing debate. Are we seeing, as with SF Weekly and the Bay Guardian, a national chain using unfair tactics to crush the local competition? Or does this photo simply show that, again as with SF Weekly and the Bay Guardian, most people don't distinguish between the two companies and even their customers can't always remember which is which?