Headlines that warm your alumnus heart

Sidebar: Wondering about the legalities of a mandatory survey triggering letters home. Maybe we’re off base on that?

Not making this up – it’s really called newshole.

PEJ’s weekly News Coverage Index examines the news agenda of 52 different outlets from five sectors of the media: print, online, network TV, cable and radio. (See List of Outlets.) The weekly study, which includes some 1,000 stories, is designed to provide news consumers, journalists and researchers with hard data about what stories and topics the media are covering, the trajectories of that media narrative and differences among news platforms. The percentages are based on “newshole,” or the space devoted to each subject in print and online and time on radio and TV.

The topic beat out other stories for the week, including the economy, Middle East unrest and the 2012 election GOP pregaming:

Coverage of the presidential campaign dropped last week, filling 8% of the newshole compared with 12% the previous week. Last week’s coverage included former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum’s entry into the GOP field and the mass defections of staffers from Newt Gingrich’s troubled campaign.

The index is part of Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism. PEJ said Weiner is the fourth-most covered – err, uncovered? – erected elected official story since measurements began in 2007.

Measurement of the news, perverts.

Whoops! Just an oversight. I’m sure there’s nothing else questionable! Just to be sure, let’s check the story’s lead:

The closet door became unhinged lately when a number of gay men in sports decided to turn the knob and hold a public liberation.

Maybe it’s time to retire literary uses of the closet metaphor.

Outed in the interview, he reviews a couple awkward and painful moments (hearing “Can you hear me now?” as his grandmother was lowered into her grave) in the course of his nearly 10-year stint as the face of “the network.”

Equally disgusting, he discloses an incident where the fear of bad PR silenced a voice known for being heard loud and clear:

Then there were the drive-bys. Marcarelli has a home in Guilford, Connecticut, and five summers ago, kids in an SUV began driving past at night, yelling, “Can you hear me now?” Later, says Marcarelli, “they started screaming ‘faggot’ up at my house. It got progressively more profane as the years went by.” One night, it happened while some friends were over, and he decided to call the police. “As soon as I hung up the phone,” he says, “I realized that in order for them to do anything about it, it would have to become a report that would go into a police log.” Worried about the publicity—and the questions that might ensue if it came out that the actor playing Test Man was gay—he declined to file a report.

Via Gawker

The the fake news hosts’ remarkable talent rivals their major network counterparts. Their interaction with NBC’s “Today” show crew provides all the proof (and laughter) you need to back that statement. [via HuffPost]

• “Couple gets prison for grilling toddler”
• “How could a mother eat her own baby?” and
• “Anatidaephobia – The fear that you are being watched by a duck”

The results are damn funny, or morbid. But mostly funny! Check out Ten horrifying display ad placements from Econsultancy.

Reuters | Tired Gay succumbs to Dix in 200 meters

Click image to increase size

Lamar, best known for placing large billboards on the side of the highway to entertain you in traffic, is asking its local inventory holders to donate space to the “voiceless” Conan O’Brien.

On its own will, the company established aplaceforconan.com. The site serves as an official-ish hub for explaining Lamar’s intents.

If a digital display rotation is not fully sold, Lamar is asking its offices to display dynamic creative that shows Conan’s latest tweet – free.

The odds of catching a billboard with the display depend on how well your market is doing. (We’ll let you cheer for continued recession with Conan tweets or thriving economy.) Regardless, you can see a map of possible places to catch an active billboard here.

[via Lost Remote]