Inspired by Zell's comments last night at the Hammer, my LA Observed segment on KCRW at 4:44 pm wonders why anyone sees him as a potential saviour of journalism here or anywhere else. He dislikes journalists, his ambitions are low, and his media wisdom boils down to give readers what they want. But every newspaper in America that limits itself to what he thinks readers want has many fewer readers than the Times mix of today already attracts.

Partly inspired by his call last night for happier, less pessimistic news, which I forgot to put in the earlier post.

Noted: The teen-oriented weekly he mentioned fondly as a model last night is Teen Link, produced by the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. A staff writer emails, "We have teens write stories that matter to them, we edit them to standards and give the paper away at all the high schools."