Off the Record

What's new in paperback

"Fair Game: How a Top Spy Was Betrayed by Her Own Government," by Valerie Plame Wilson. (Simon & Schuster, $15.) The columnist Robert Novak ended Valerie Plame Wilson's career when he identified her as a CIA officer in 2003, and she wrote this book both to settle scores and to support her family. After reviewing the manuscript, the CIA demanded many deletions; the book includes the censor's marks as well as an afterword by a reporter who uses the public record to fill in gaps. "Fair Game," Janet Maslin wrote in The New York Times, shows Wilson as "an ambitious, gung-ho professional." Norman Pearlstine was the editor-in-chief of Time Inc. when Patrick Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor investigating the leak of Wilson's identity, subpoenaed the notes of the Time reporter Matt Cooper, and he was widely criticized when he decided to turn them over. In "Off the Record: The Press, the Government, and the War Over Anonymous Sources" (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $15), Pearlstine questions whether the news media have a right to keep their sources secret. READ MORE...

Paperback Row By ELSA DIXLER

AS SEEN IN THE NEW YORK TIMES SUNDAY BOOK REVIEW

Norman Pearlstine was the editor in chief of Time Inc. when Patrick Fitzgerald, the special prosecutor investigating the leak of Wilson’s identity, subpoenaed the notes of the Time reporter Matt Cooper, and he was widely criticized when he decided to turn them over. In OFF THE RECORD: The Press, the Government, and the War Over Anonymous Sources (Farrar, Straus & Giroux, $15, Pearlstine questions whether the news media have a right to keep their sources secret. READ MORE...

Bloomberg L.P. Fills Post, Suggesting Shift to News By TIM ARANGO

The news business may be in the doldrums, but the competition over business news could be heating up.

Bloomberg L.P., the financial data and news giant founded by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York, said Monday that it had hired Norman Pearlstine, the former top editor of Time Inc. and The Wall Street Journal, to the new position of chief content officer.

The move suggests that Bloomberg, whose fortunes have been buoyed by the selling of its hugely profitable data terminals to brokerage firms and investment banks, plans to expand the journalism side of its business.

Bloomberg’s sprawling operation, which includes 2,300 editorial employees, a television outfit and a radio station, has largely been used as a tool for the Bloomberg terminals. But the growth in terminal sales has slowed with the economy and as Wall Street suffers from the fallout of the mortgage crisis. READ MORE...

Pearlstine Leaves Carlyle, Returns To News As Bloomberg’s Chief Content Officer By Staci D. Kramer

Norman Pearlstine is joining Bloomberg L.P. in the new position of chief content officer, partnering with Matthew Winkler, founder and editor-in-chief of Bloomberg News. Pearlstine leaves The Carlyle Group, where he has been senior advisor for telecom and media, and returns to the news world. To run down the familiar list, Pearlstine was editor-in-chief of Time Inc. for 11 years, a 23-year vet of the Wall Street Journal (including managing editor and executive editor), founder of Smart Money and an executive editor of Forbes. READ MORE...

TechSpin: Old Media Still Struggles With Web by Joel Dreyfuss

As seen on RedHerring.com

Old media is still having trouble dealing with the new era. That was the strongest message at the Argyle Executive Forum on Leadership in Media in New York Wednesday. A stellar group of media executives mostly associated with “old media” lamented the end of the days of fat profits and the lack of a clear new business model in the age of the Internet.

Norman Pearlstine of the Carlyle Group told attendees that newspapers enjoyed a brief period of monopoly that attracted investors and convinced many families to take their businesses public. However, he said, for most of its history, the newspaper business did not enjoy the double-digit margins that characterized the 1980s and 1990s. “At the end of the 19th century there were 29 newspapers in Chicago,” he said.

Mr. Pearlstine said that profits soared when afternoon papers died off in the 1960s and 1970s as commuting and reading habits changed. Nowadays most cities have one newspaper, maybe two, often operating under an agreement that lets them share resources like a printing plant. READ MORE...

Carlyle's Pearlstine sees a future for magazines, newspapers by George White

As seen on The Daily Deal

Norman Pearlstine, a senior advisor at the Carlyle Group and former editor in chief of Time Inc., spoke at the 2008 Leadership in Media Forum on Wednesday morning about the future of newspapers and magazines.

"There are still plenty of reasons for owning a newspaper," Pearlstine said. "They remain viable business; they can be profitable; but they won't have the kinds of margins that they [had before the Internet]." READ MORE...

Pearlstine Agrees Newspapers Screwed, But Not All Because Of Craigslist by Michael Learmonth

As seen on the Silicon Alley Insider

Norman Pearlstine, former top editor at both Time Inc. and the Wall Street Journal, and now a senior advisor at Carlyle Group, thinks newspapers are in for plenty more pain -- some self-inflicted.

The main problem, obviously, is newspapers are chained to an inefficient delivery system for content and advertising. But Norm believes newspapers brought some of this on themselves by failing to innovate when they were reaping huge margins from local monopolies in the 80s and 90s. The last game-changing innovation by a major newspaper chain was the launch of USA Today, in 1980. READ MORE...

Review of OFF THE RECORD by Norman Pearlstine Read by Alan Sklar

Sklar is a seasoned pro at reading nonfiction and is undoubtedly one of the best nonfiction narrators in the industry.   With a hint of a rasp, his soft deep voice delivers the text with perfect emphasis and pause.    Pearlstine's lengthy and sometimes nuanced discussions of law and journalism may feel overwhelming to the reader, but Sklar's tone navigates listeners to a much better understanding of Pearlstine's intent. (Publisher’s Weekly)            

Review of OFF THE RECORD: The Press, the Government, and the War Over Anonymous Sources by Norman Pearlstine Read by Alan Sklar

OFF THE RECORD seems like a contradictory title for this memoir, especially since many see former Time, Inc. Editor Pearlstine as the person responsible for igniting the powder keg on the debate about anonymous sources in the post-9/11 era of high scrutiny. It was Pearlstine who chose to hand over the confidential notes of reporter Matt Cooper, setting off the Valerie Plame affair in 2004. As narrator Alan Sklar gives a straight reading, Pearlstine makes some interesting points about the relationship between reporters and sources. The measured tone of Sklar's delivery engages the listener without sensationalizing the material. Pearlstine's narrative is sure to be controversial with freedom of the press advocates. J.S.H. © AudioFile 2008,

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Tantor Media, 2007 • 9.5 hrs. • Unabridged • Contemporary Culture
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Don Corleone Murdoch? By Jack Shafer

As seen on Slate.com

Rupert Murdoch added girth to his distending legend this week by all but sewing up a deal for Newsday and squeezing out of the Wall Street Journal the top editor he inherited.

While Murdoch may stride the planet like a ravenous, mythic beast, can you believe every ripping yarn you read about him? Take, for instance, the opening anecdote in the 4,100-word profile Newsweek published about the media baron on Monday. The story portrays Time Inc. editorial executives Norman Pearlstine and John Huey as slavering supplicants in a May 2005 visit to Murdoch's Manhattan headquarters.

Pearlstine, then editor in chief of Time Inc., and Huey, editorial director, were fighting a grand jury subpoena of a Time magazine reporter and internal e-mails in the Valerie Plame investigation. The company had petitioned the Supreme Court to review the case, and the pair visited Murdoch and his lieutenants to ask for News Corp.'s editorial support of their appeal. READ MORE...