New York Observer goes 24/5

The Observer has a new website design, new blogs and a new plan. Starting in August, it'll cost you a buck to read each week's stories online. Or you can pay $32 for a year, or a hundred smackers for a lifetime subscription. Until then it's free. What will stay free are five "Daily Observer" weblogs with permalinks and the aim to break news. One of them, Media Mob has a fresh post today reporting that the NYT is close to sending Broadway reporter Jesse McKinley to Los Angeles to cover televison, and that the NYT first took runs at hiring columnist John Lippman from the Wall Street Journal's L.A. bureau, Vanity Fair contributing editor Seth Mnookin and the Washington Post's Lisa de Moraes. The other blogs cover New York politics, real estate, brides and all-purpose city gossip under the Daily Transom banner. Says the editor's note: "These will kick up the metabolism of The New York Observer to at least 24/5, if not 24/7."