Where do story ideas come from? Often directly from readers.

Debbie Santelli of Tacoma wrote in with an observation/question earlier this week.

I am interested in the recent remodel and re-landscaping at the Wilson High School campus.... I have noticed what appears to be pretty low standards for maintaining the landscape. It is when plants are first introduced into a new location that water and care is vital. Beautiful new shrubs and trees were planted around the perimeter of the grounds and yet, one can easily see that many of the shrubs have shriveled and dropped their leaves. It was quite a long time before anyone appeared to be working on the sprinkler system and, by the time they worked on it, many of the shrubs seem to be nearly dead. The lawn looks as if it is mostly clover and weeds. Over the past month, I’ve noticed a couple of new scotch broom plants thriving.

Who is responsible for the mess that has been made, in spite of the community’s money being poured into the materials at Wilson?

Reporter Kris Sherman is looking into this and thinks she'll have a story soon. Thanks for the question, Debbie, and stay tuned for an answer.

John Henrikson
education team leader

The story of a Maple Valley woman who was found Thursday in her SUV after eight days is a compelling story or human drama that is practically local for South Sound readers. So why did we put the story on page B2 this morning.

That was the question at this morning's editors' meeting. And no one had a very good answer. We posted an AP version of the story online at 3:36 p.m. yesterday, so we knew about it in plenty of time. But this appears to be a case of one falling through the cracks; no one spoke up and suggested we take a look at it for the front page at our 5 p.m. news meeting.

As we often say, the best part of working at a newspaper the publishes every day (and all day long nowadays) is we get another change to get it right today.

A reader recently sent us an e-mail with the subject line: TNT's refusal to use the number of our soldiers/service men and women who have lost their lives in Iraq.

He went on to say:

When I purchase the Seattle PI or Times, they tell me that we are near 4,000 deaths (may have passed that number by now), at the hands of Bush and the oil interests, as a result of our policy to preserve our oil interests in the area.

Why does the TNT not keep us informed as to the number of permanent casualties, deaths, etc. that should be attributed to the war.

He's wrong. We do print the number. It's usually in the paper once or twice a week.

Here's wire editor Kathleen Cooper's response from earlier this week:

The number most recently appeared two days ago, in an A1 article Tuesday. We wrote about the death of Spc. David Watson, a member of Fort Lewis’ 4th Brigade, 2nd Infantry Division. In addition to listing how many soldiers have died thus far (27), it mentioned that 3,799 U.S. soldiers have been killed. That story also included a breakdown of how many of soldiers have been killed by non-combat related causes, since that’s how Spc. Watson died.

We publish this number regularly, though I cannot give you a pattern. We do not make a practice of inserting it into every story we run on the war, since that would seem as though we have an agenda. But we certainly are not “refusing” to publish the number, either.

An issue we run into regularly is the source of the number — the Department of Defense has its own tally that generally runs a few short of tallies kept by The Associated Press, The New York Times and iCasualties.org (a Web site used as the measuring stick by the Los Angeles Times). Another thing we consider is Iraqi casualties, which vastly outnumber U.S. soldier casualties, and the reliability of those numbers is even more suspect. More than anything, the wire editors try to be accurate and fair since we edit copy from many sources.

Lastly, The News Tribune has made a commitment to profiling all soldiers with a Fort Lewis/South Puget Sound-area connection at least once in its pages — not just noting the death but telling the story of the soldier’s life. It’s a commitment that I’m unaware of any paper our size continuing to carry out as the war is in its fifth year.

A reader called our Reader Representative and asked: "Do you know that the phone #'s you run under the horoscope are for phone sex?"

Sure enough, we called Reed Brennan, the service that assembles that page for us, and they checked and found the caller was correct. Apparently the horoscope folks stopped taking calls on the 900 number some time back, but failed to mention this to Reed Brennan. Carmen Dybdahl on our design desk says she'll eliminate the naughty numbers from now on.

Reader Rep called the alert reader back to thank him for the info.

Hopefully readers noticed a big change in the images of thenewstribune.com today. We've moved to a new system of posting photos so we have vivid, rich images on the site and fewer B&W photos. It's a colorful world and it's wonderful to have true-to-life color on our site.

The photo on the left is an example of the old process. The photo on the right is much better. The color is truer and there is good contrast.

Here's what Parade reports is coming Sunday, September 30th:

Take Control Of Your Health
In this special issue, get the tools you need to become a more able, skilled and confident manager of your family’s health. Find out how to get the most out of your doctor’s visit, learn how to take medications properly and understand when you must call 911 for medical help.

In Step With: Christina Applegate
By James Brady
Best known for her 10-year role as Kelly Bundy on Married with Children, Christina Applegate has come back to TV in a new Monday-night comedy series for ABC, Samantha Who? Applegate talks about her transition to film and stage and what she considers the lowest point in her life.

Based on this afternoon's news meeting, here's what's planned for the Wednesday edition of The News Tribune. (Keep in mind that everything is subject to change as news and stories develop throughout the day.)

NEWS

CURFEW: Steve Maynard is working on a story about a juvenile curfew Federal Way is considering in an effort to reduce crime. It’s studying curfews in Tacoma and Auburn and trying to craft one that will hold up in court.

MALL SHOOTING: Adam Lynn is covering the trial Dominick Maldonado, the accused Tacoma Mall shooter. A judge on Tuesday rejected Maldonado's request to dismiss eight counts of first-degree assault.

SPEEDING: Rob Tucker writes about photo enforcement starting again along one of the worst streets in Lakewood for speeding. Thousands were cited last spring for ignoring a school zone speed limit in the vicinity of Lakewood Towne Center.

PCBUDGET: Dave Wickert reports on the 2008 Pierce County budget. County Executive John Ladenburg this afternoon will unveil a proposed 2008 budget that boosts staffing for the Sheriff’s Department, the jail and the planning department.

SPORTS

MARINERS: Darrin Beene is covering the opening game of the Mariners' final home stand. They play the Cleveland Indians at 7:05 p.m.

Each Tuesday, editors gather to discuss what news stories we'll be publishing in the Sunday paper. At today's session I heard a couple of stories that I'm looking forward to reading.

We're working on yet another story about the new Narrows Bridge. This one will focus on how much the new span has improved the commute for those who cross it - or just use Highway 16 to get to the west end of Tacoma. We'll update the progress of getting the pedestrian and bike lane opened, too.

The Business Team is taking a look at new business development on Garfield Ave. in Parkland near PLU's campus and the impact it's having on that community.

Look for those stories, and obviously lots more, in Sunday's News Tribune.

Pacific Lutheran's student chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists has received top recognition from the organization.

According to the news release, 12 campuses were honored as the best in their region. And of the 12 top chapters, PLU was selected as the very best.

Congratulations to the Lutes!

Most of the editors spoke favorably of today's story on the history of statues and Wright Park by Peter Callaghan. Several felt the historical photo really helped tell the story.

Executive Editor Zeeck thought the animal cruelty story was overplayed on the cover of the South Sound section. He didn't think that it was a bigger story than the double homicide in the South End and, therefore, shouldn't have been displayed across the entire top of the page.

The top local stories on Page One of Tuesday's News Tribune:

• Metro Parks has removed Wright Park’s ‘lady in the lake’ as part of a restoration program. The questions remain: who is she and where did she come from?

• The City of Seattle has filed a lawsuit against the Seattle SuperSonics. The suit is in response to the Sonics filing for arbitration over the KeyArena lease agreement. The owners are seeking a buyout of the KeyArena lease on grounds of economic hardship.

• Another Stryker brigade soldier has died in Iraq. Spc. David L. Watson, 29, of Newport, Ark., died Saturday of injuries suffered in a non-combat accident, according to the Department of Defense.

Taking a look at the newspaper from Monday, there was discussion this morning on whether the A1 "teaser" for the Seahawks worked or not. Some editors liked it, others thought the use of the player's arms to form a V looked too much like a W (his head in the middle) or Y (like the 70's hit YMCA).

Several editors liked the two-day series on the Afghan family that has settled in Puyallup. One editor said "the writing took you there, allowed you to share in the story." Another liked that it wasn't too long, that is was "digestible in a reasonable amount of time."

The fair story on B1 was also cheered. Some, however, questioned whether the word "tshatshky" was spelled right; they had never seen it written that way. One editor wished we could have included a photo of the lost and found.

From Saturday's paper, everyone thought Rob Carson and Drew Perine did a great job documenting the trip to Mexico to deliver an ambulance to Ayutla. It was one of the most popular stories online over the weekend and a good use of a blog. Now we're looking for the next opportunity. If you have an idea, let us know.

Selected comments from today's discussion of the paper and website.

We can't say enough about how much we like reporter Rob Carson and photographer Drew Perine's Mission to Mexico blog. It's a departure for us - a more informal way to tell a story. But readers really feel like they are there. Make sure you check out today's online update - which we'll feature on Saturday's front page.

As expected, Craigslist ripoff story was wildly popular among online readers. We wished we would have included some tips from experts on how to avoid such crimes.

We loved the photo sequence on South Sound of a family eating fair fries.

The Seahawks watch film to get better. We read the paper and reflect on it. Highlights from our daily discussion:

Online editor Mark Briggs pointed out that we had a particularly fresh Home page yesterday afternoon. We posted about 10 news updates, a new hot button poll and highlighted our Mexico trip blog and photo gallery. If you haven't been reading the south of the border road trip adventures of Lola and the gang, you're missing a great yarn.

Editors continue to discuss our new style of "teasers" – those promotional graphics that appear at the top of the front page. The main purpose of these promos is to entice newsrack buyers to pick up the paper by highlighting what's inside. Print readers may have noticed that ours have a new look lately. Visuals editor David Montesino cooked up a more colorful, bolder style designed to catch the eye and distinguish our paper from others. Most editors believe the new approach is working.

What do you think?

In an update from Photographer Drew Perine, he tells me that the group didn't get to Ayutla Wednesday night as planned. There were still about six hours away Thursday morning. The town of Ayutla has a welcome ceremony is scheduled for this evening. If everything works out, we will have a great story and photos for Friday's paper about their arrival and the celebration.

Untill then, keep track on the Mission to Mexico blog or browse the photo gallery from the trip.

Some discussion points as we critiqued the Sept. 19 newspaper:

* There was general acclaim for today's reverse-published item from our "Mission to Mexico" blog. Executive editor David Zeeck says it has the quailty of a personal letter written to the reader. Reporter Adam Lynn said the misadventures make it more compelling reading. We agreed that we should reprint the map of the travel route that went with the original story last week. Check out the latest on the blog by clicking here.

* There was some discussion about whether we overplayed the retirement of the Tacoma public works director. Since we can't definitively link Bill Pugh's retirement to recent turmoil at City Hall, editor Zeeck questioned our placement of the story on the front page with the most dominant headline.

* On the Business page, we appreciated columnist Dan Voelpel's update on attempts to thwart the Sound Transit preferred commuter-rail route through Tacoma. We can't write too much about this topic because it has broad interest in Tacoma, Lakewood and other points along the transit corridor.

Communication with reporter Rob Carson and photographer Drew Perine has been somewhat spotty during their trip to Mexico, but I received an e-mail from Drew this morning with an update. They were in Culiacan waiting for the ambulance crew to arrive before they headed out again. Rob's latest blog post will get you updated on the ambulance.

On Tuesday night, their dinner was peanuts, stale popcorn and tequila at the
bar because the restaurant was closed.

Here's a note from Drew:

Very little of interest happened yesterday so I didn't have much to post. We traveled through a flat landscape for most of the day and ate a two-hour lunch in an uninteresting place. Hopefully, today will be better.

No official word yet on when we might arrive.

Drew sent a number of new photos today. Check out the gallery from the trip. We'll keep updating it throughout the trip.

A few tidbits from this morning's critique of the paper by editors and reporters.

Sports editor Dale Phelps points out that headline on Sonics story "Tribe offers land to Sonics" is technically not correct. The tribe wouldn't give land directly to Sonics, but it would give it for a stadium.

Reporter Adam Lynn loved the story on the labor dispute over how caddies are employed - another interesting yarn out of Chambers Bay.

The story on the City of Tacoma installing new electronic anti-speeding signs was No. 2 on our Web site. One advantage of being online is that we can see what particular stories and subjects attract readers. We get healthy online readership on anything traffic/transportation-related. The feedback has influenced our decision to write more often on traffic subjects.

Monday morning story meetings usually run a little long, as editors go over Saturday, Sunday and Monday print editions and our online efforts. Here are some highlights from this morning's discussion.

Sunday's front page story on bounty hunter regulation (or lack of it) was "hugely popular" online, notes online editor Mark Briggs. Reporter Melissa Santos found a compelling topic and broke new ground on it.

Also from Sunday's front page, top editors had praise for D.C. reporter Les Blumenthal's story on states fighting with the federal government over regulation of auto emissions and Kris Sherman's follow up on how Tacoma school officials handled the employment of accused rapist Jennifer Rice.

We hope readers are noticing our stepped up online sports coverage over the weekend, with our new preps page and more updates. We had nice print packages - stories, photos, headlines - out of both Saturday's Husky game and Sunday's Seahawks game. Our sports team works very hard this time of year.

On the Sunday business page, editor Dave Zeeck and others liked Kelly Kearsley's inside look at major new Port of Tacoma player SSA and what makes them different.

Last week, we had a nice front-page story about local folks who found a way to refurbish three police cars and an ambulance for the Mexican town of Ayutla.

On Saturday, 12 folks set out for the 3,000-mile trip from Gig Harbor to deliver the vehicles. We sent reporter Rob Carson and photographer Drew Perine along. They're posting stories and photos on our Lights & Sirens blog.

Click here for a link to a posting about their encounter with an Arizona storm that swept vehicles off the road.

Last night, they reported that they expected to cross the border into Mexico today.

A reader complained yesterday that we're devoting less space to news than we were a year ago.

Which made me curious. Here's what I found and how I responded:

I looked at the last full week (Monday through Sunday) in August this year compared with the exact same week last year (another Monday through Sunday). The Friday and Sunday papers had more news space this year. The other days were slightly larger last year.

But when one adds up the weeks we ran 1348 columns of news (about 26,960 inches of space) in that week this year and 1351 columns (about 27,020 inches) last year. So we had 3 columns, or about 60 inches, more news last year in one comparable week. As you can see that’s an insignificant difference.

Our paper, as is the case with most McClatchy papers, runs about 50-50 news and advertising through any given week, a much more generous margin than the 60-40 (ad/news) ratio one sees in most papers of similar size throughout the nation. Obviously the Monday paper has a larger proportion of news because it’s a slow advertising day and the Sunday paper has a smaller proportion of news, because it’s the most popular advertising day (although the Sunday newshole is always the biggest of the week – about twice the news space of any weekday.

Given that the average 30-minute newscast would translate into a transcript that takes up two or three columns a day, our average of 150-180 columns each weekday and more than 300 on any Sunday means there’s still a heck of a lot of news in the paper on any given day.

Finally, your perception that our pages aren’t “real” in size is relative. The width of American newspaper pages has been shrinking since the 1930s. Ours are the standard for almost every paper in America, including all our competitors. In fact the trend is to even narrower pages, a trend that will continue.

If American papers could I think many would go to the Berliner size, popular in Europe and with consumers tested here – both shorter and narrower than almost every American paper, but not as small as tabloid papers. Often they have somewhat more pages to handle advertising and news that won’t fit on the smaller page, but consumers always favor a smaller paper that’s easier to hold or spread out on a table. There’s no denying that the last and next wave of page-width shrinking saves a bit of paper, but there’s also no doubt that consumers consistently vote for the smaller sizes.

In sum, your perception may be that the paper is significantly smaller than a year ago, and that we’ve somehow cut back on news, but the facts don’t bear that out.

Toll court: Today is the first day people can appear in a special court to fight their tickets for not paying a toll when driving over the new Narrows bridge.

FW teacher: The police officer from Federal Way accused of having sexual contact with a student is back in court today.

Mexico: Several of us are scurrying around today making arrangements for reporter Rob Carson and a photographer (we still don't know which one yet) to leave tomorrow for Mexico.

We decided late yesterday afternoon (we work best on deadline) to ride down with Gig Harbor restauranteurs and local police and firefighters as they deliver an ambulance and police cars to Ayutla, a small town in Mexico. We ran a story about the effort on today's front page.

As of this moment, we don't have airline tickets for their return trip (we don't know exactly when they're coming home), we haven't configured their computers so they can write from the road, and (did I mention?) we don't know which photographer is going.

Lots to do. Gotta run.

Sunday, September 16th:

Is Anything Private Anymore?
By Sean Flynn
Privacy is a withering commodity for all of us. Where you go, whom you call, the Web sites you visit, the e-mails you send—all of that information can be monitored and logged. Find out how to live in this digital world and still maintain a semblance of privacy.

Who Is Most Likely To Succeed?
By J. Max Robbins
The fall season always arrives with new shows and high hopes. With the odds stacked against any new show, here’s what’s worth checking out.

Six Ways To Lower Energy Bills
By Wayne Kalyn
Now is the time to guard your home and checkbook—against rising energycosts. Before winter sets in, learn energy-saving tips that are inexpensive and easy on the environment.

In Step With: Rachael Ray
By James Brady
Rachael Ray takes her shoes off and kicks back. The food star and talk-show host talks about how she got to know food, her show and how she maintains her weight.

At our morning news meeting today, the editors wanted to know what would lead to a fisherman being handcuffed. Thinking readers might want to know also, I asked Russ Carmack - the photographer who shot the photos - what happened last night. Here is the story.

According to Carmack, the angler allegedly violated three regulations: fishing on a closed river, using someone else's fishing license, and having an invalid license.

Staff photographer Janet Jensen’s photos from Camp Goodtimes were named the August 2007 Feature Photo of the Month by the Associated Press Washington State bureau. Jensen's photos along with Debbie Cafazzo’s story from Camp Goodtimes ran on the Soundlife cover on August 26th.

A question came up during this morning’s news meeting about the effectiveness of our top-of-the-page teaser boxes on the front page. The purpose of these teaser boxes is to promote good and interesting content inside the newspaper. To do that well the boxes have to grab readers’ attention with language and visual imagery. We have also used dramatic color combinations to heighten its visual impact. In short, we are trying to bring more attention to more of our stories using the small space at the top of our front page.

Among our computer-related glitches in this morning's paper was a mix up in the back-to-school photos on the Show&Tell page, B3. A duplicate of one of the photos appeared in the space where Larchmont Elementary kindergartener Sean Michael Chamberlin's photo should have been.

I got a sad email from Sean Michael's mom, June Chamberlin, this morning:

I opened up the paper this morning, I saw where Sean Michael was supposed to be.

He wasn't there. He was so sad.

I understand there are boo-boo's every once in a while, but darn-it.

Here's my reply:

Hi June,

On behalf of the paper, I'm really sorry.

The photo mix up was caused by a computer glitch. (I know this won't make sense to a disappointed kindergartener.)

The good news is that we will run Sean Michael's photo on next week's Show&Tell page. Also, if you send your address, we'll print out a good copy of the page that he can have for his scrapbook.

John Henrikson
education editor
The News Tribune

In the meantime, here's the photo that should have run.

Tomorrow's front page likely will centerpiece a story orginating from outside the South Sound, something we don't often do at The News Tribune.

Army Gen. David Petraeus, commander of US in Iraq, testifies today before Congress about the troop surge. That's a big story for a military community like ours.

In addition to the testimony, we think readers want to know how South Sound residents react to that news. Fortunately, we've built a couple of tools to help us gather those reactions.

The first is the TNT Reader News Network. It's made up of thousands of readers who asked to be put on the list of people we email with questions from time to time. Sometimes we're looking for reaction to a news story. Sometimes we're looking for local sources on a story about making back-to-school lunches or backyard landscaping.

We'll be emailing them today.

We'll also email readers who signed up receive our Stryker Brigade newsletter, which goes out to them every time we write something about the military units from Fort Lewis. We're especially interested in how soldiers and their families react to today's news.

If you'd like to join either of those lists, go to the "Member Center" at the top left corner of the home page. Click on "Edit your account," which takes you to our registration page. If you haven't already registered, you'll need to, but then scroll to the middle of the page to sign up for an email newsletter, or scroll all the way to the bottom to sign up for the Reader News Network.

Welcome aboard.

We used the word "flounder" to refer on page 1 to Britney Spears' performance at the Video Music Awards. Some at the morning news meeting questioned whether that should have been "founder."

Here's the last word from copy editor Kate McEntee:

There were questions this morning about the use of “flounder” in the Britney Spears’ teaser today. The word choice was just fine; Karen Peterson (the managing editor) asked me to send this note out.

The stylebook (page 96) says:

flounder/founder A flounder is a fish; to flounder is to move clumsily or jerkily, to flop about: The fish floundered on land.
To founder is to bog down, become disabled or sink: The ship floundered in the heavy seas for hours, then foundered.

Kate’s example: Britney Spears floundered on stage at the VMAs. Her career foundered.

The Webster’s dictionary states:

flounder 1. To struggle awkwardly to move, as in deep mud or snow; plunge about in a stumbling manner 2. to speak or act in an awkward, confused manner, with hesitation and frequent mistakes

founder 1. To stumble, fall or go lame 2. To become stuck as in soft ground; bog down … 5. To break down; collapse; fail

As always, we start our day talking about this morning's edition. Here's a sample of what editors thought:

Toll cameras: Editors praised Joe Turner's work on the toll coverage. DOT is spinning a pretty positive story about the performance so far, but Joe has been uncovering the flaws, including today's report that four in 10 scofflaws get away with it because the pictures from the toll cameras are blurry. They couldn't identify and fix that ahead of time? Stay tuned.

City Hall: Several editors praised Jason Hagey's coverage of the shakeup at City Hall. Nice to see government holding itself accountable.

In Sports, we liked Larry LaRue's story about Jose Lopez's struggles, and what the team is doing about it. A surprising number of people talked to Larry about that.

Check out Scott Fontaine's story about the local faith-based group making a trip to the Dominican Republic to play baseball, and how that trip is really much bigger than baseball.

Ed Murrieta's review of a new Greek restaurant on Sixth Avenue in Tacoma has several of us thinking "Opa!" We may see y'all for lunch there today.

You'll have to buy a print edition if you want to see this - our SoundLife cover today is a poster of Justin Timberlake, who performs Saturday night at the Tacoma Dome. There was no wardrobe malfunction in the making of the poster.

The folks who are organizing the 2008 Tall Ships festival coming to Tacoma for the Fourth of July told us they've just received word that the Coast Guard training barque, Eagle, will attend.

The Eagle is a three-masted sailing barque with 21,350 square feet of sail. Its home port is the Coast Guard Academy at New London, Conn. It is the only active commissioned sailing vessel in the U.S. maritime services. Her surviving sister ships include the Mircea of Romania, Sagres II of Portugal, Gorch Fock of Germany, and Tovarich of Russia.

The Eagle was built in 1936 by the Blohm & Voss Shipyard, Hamburg, Germany, as a training vessel for German Navy cadets.

The ship is a seagoing classroom for 175 cadets and instructors from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy.

In other updates on Tall Ships 2008, organizers told us they have:

- Seven confirmed ships, with "hand-shake agreements" on another 22.
- Four "gun-battle" ships that will stage cannon fights on the water, a popular feature from Tall Ships 2005.
- Plans for education programs at the festival for children 12 and under, after-school programs in area schools leading up to the event and a "Youth on Board" program that will allow 50 young people to board four vessels in Victoria, B.C., and help sail them to Tacoma for the festival.
- Plans for four "villages" at the event, three on the waterfront and one downtown. Each village will have its own entertainment stage, food booths, educational programs and visitor services. A shuttle will run between the villages.

The group has 400 volunteers already, but needs 2,000 to pull off the event. To volunteer, call 253-284-3263 or email organizers at info@tallshipstacoma.com.

The news run this morning looks a little light, but the Puyallup Fair begins today, providing plenty of fun stuff for us to cover.

We'll have reporter Eijiro Kawada covering the cattle drive and parade through town today, and we'll have the first of 17 guest bloggers reporting from The Puyallup.

We're gearing up for the Seahawks opener on Sunday. In addiiton to our regular sports team coverage, we're sending a news-side reporter to Qwest Field to tell the story from the fans' point of view.

And we're putting the final touches on some of Sunday's front-page stories. The centerpiece will be on the 10th anniversary of Tacoma's Grand Cinema, a non-profit success story run mainly by volunteers.

Rugby isn't often a subject we cover at The News Tribune. Compared to some other parts of the world, it is not a sport with a broad fan base in the United States.

The Rugby World Cup, however, which begins today in Paris has an aspect to it that might carry implications beyond the rugby world.

Three international news agencies -- Agence France-Presse, Reuters and Associated Press -- are boycotting coverage of the event because of restrictions being placed on media coverage. Here's the AFP story: Media keep up World Cup boycott ahead of opening game.

Among the restrictions are a requirement that no more than 40 images be posted online from matches in progress and a limit of three minutes on news conference or locker-room video posted online.

American media outlets are chafing at similar restrictions being implemented by the NFL this season. The league is limiting the length of audio and visual clips on media Web sites as well and some restrictions on what can be archived. The American Society of Newspaper Editors has a rundown on the dispute.

The NCAA also has developed some rules that prohibit media from doing certain things. This incident at a college baseball game is an example.

At base is the desire of league owners and organizations to control and ultimately monetize all the images and information coming from an event or game. In the case of the NFL, it has Web sties that in some sense can be viewed as competition for outlets such as The News Tribune and has a TV network that competes against other broadcasters.

From the point of view of The News Tribune and other media outlets the restrictions hurt the public because impartial coverage of what we consider news is hampered. Readers and viewers get only an officially approved view of the teams and events. It's kind of like getting your news about state government only from the governor's office.

UPDATE: A compromise was reached just hours before the competition began. The story from the AP: News Agencies Drop Rugby Event Blackout.

A judge on Wednesday temporarily stopped us from getting Federal Way School District records about an elementary school music teacher charged with inappropriately touching an 11-year-old student.

King County Superior Court Judge Laura Gene Middaugh prevented gave teacher Scott Riley a week to convince her to never let the public see the records.

The TNT The newspaper last month requested district decisions about Riley dating to January. We want to see whether the Federal Way district disciplined Riley and what it's records say about him.

The law requires the judge to release the records unless Riley can meet both parts of a two-part test: That the records are "highly offensive to a reasonable person" and "of no legitimate interest to the public."

Even if the records meet the first test, it's hard to imagine how they are of no legitimate public interest.

We're hopeful, but we shall see . . .

Here's a look at some of the most popular content on our web site last month.

This month we do the top 15 stories and include the number of comments (if any). It's interesting to note that some stories had dozens, but the Seahawks articles had none. I assume that's because there is so much Seahawks discussion happening at all times in the blog and our readers are savvy enough to know it.

1. Eight years of lies undone in one night (3 comments) - Robinson
2. Previous school trouble shown (82) - Lynn
3. Teacher charged with kidnapping (21) - Lynn
4. Free agent Payne could catch in with Seahawks - Boling
5. Teacher in sex case lost jobs before (32) - Lynn
6. Hawks show good and bad - Boling
7. Hypothetically OKC is ready - Williams/Hughes
8. Fitter 'Tubby' brings sexy back to Seahawks - Boling
9. Hackett's status? Well, what day is it? - Divish
10. Squat rookie looks like gem in the trenches - Boling
11. Megachurch in medium city (55) - Maynard
12. Not everyone's having a good time (61) - Beekman
13. Pit bulls attack, maul woman in bed (19) - Otto
14. Holmgren gives Hawks Knoxian stare of disgust - Boling
15. Lakewood shuts four motels (27) - Tucker

Blogs: Our ever-growing stable of blogs drew more than 600,000 page views in August. By way of comparison, a year ago on our site, all blogs combined had 316,000 page views. Here's how they stack up (by page views last month):

1. Seahawks Insider
2. Ed's Diner
3. Lights & Sirens
4. Sonics Insider
5. Bring the Noise
6. Huskies Insider
7. Mariners Insider
8. Biz Buzz
9. Inside the Editorial Page
10. Prep Blog
11. Grit City
12. Open House
13. FOB Tacoma
14. Neighborhood Blog
15. Fly Fishing
16. Editors Blog
17. Get Growing
18. TNT Photojournalism
19. Online in South Sound
20. The Inside Lane
21. Gamers Journal
22. 2010 Winter Olympics

In two meetings this week, TNT editors have flipped through all of the sections published since last Saturday to talk about what worked and what could have been improved. Here are excerpts from their comments:

Wednesday, Sept. 5
Bethel: Debby Abe did a great job of reporting the details of the agreement on a tight deadline.

Stryker: Great photo by Dean Koepfler of the Stryker homecoming.

Sports: Dave Boling's jersey package was really interesting. It was fun hearing from the players. We liked seeing the (outrageous) price of the jerseys in the cutline, and the "Hot Jerseys" list. One editor noted that the "How much" box needed more explanation: what is a 'premier/replithentic' jersey?

SoundLife: Show us a kid who'd eat any of that stuff. While we appreciated the effort to localize a wire piece, several editors with school-age kids thought this package was seriously lacking in reality.

Tuesday, Sept. 4
We liked the lead sentence by Jason Hagey on the Hilltop development story: A coffee shop with a drive-through is "one of modern America's surest signs of progress…"

Business: We liked Devona Wells' story and map showing foreclosures in the county. But the headline erroneously said foreclosures are high. In fact, they are low in this area as compared to other areas. The point of the story was to show where they're happening in the county.

SoundLife: Oops. That giant instrument on the cover is not a cello. It's a double bass. We wrote a correction.

Monday, Sept. 3
Train whistle: Good centerpiece by Rob Tucker on Steilacoom's effort to deal with train noise. The graphic was really interesting.

We liked the back-to-school primer, which offered "something for everyone" in a scannable way.

Sports: We liked the "faces of a nine-game losing streak," especially since Rick White's appearance (but not his performance) changed.

Sunday, Sept. 2
Lincoln: We loved the photos by Russ Carmack, and Kris Sherman's storytelling. Some wished we'd had one "postcard" shot of the whole school.

Bethel: Debby Abe got kudos for her hard work to quickly report and explain TRI pay, which was a key issue in the teacher strike.

Devona liked Debby's story on the TRI pay issue. KP said it was a nice enterpriser. Hunter, who served as Debby's editor on Friday, gave her big props - that story was very complicated, and she reported it all on Friday and wrote it Saturday.

Sports: We thought John McGrath's column, reporting from the future on Jake Locker's success, was hilarious.

Saturday, Sept. 1
One editor who flies frequently with his 6-year-old liked the A1 wire pick on R-rated in-flight movies. Can you believe the gall of the airline guy who says it's parents' responsibility to make their kids look the other way? That guy should be forced to watch "From Justin to Kelly," "Battlefield Earth" and "Who's Your Caddy?" back to back.

Home and Garden: the picture of the helmet-wearng kid is hilarious.

We’re expanding our coverage of the Tacoma Mall shooting trial to include as much additional information on the Web as possible and as quickly as we can.

Staff writer Adam Lynn is covering the trial of Dominick S. Maldonado. He’s filing full stories over the noon hour detailing testimony from the morning session.

He’s updating the Lights & Sirens blog after court recesses for the day in the late afternoon. The blog report covers the afternoon testimony and other information beyond what will be included in our print edition the next morning.

His updated story of the day will be posted on our Web site by 6:30 p.m. and published in the print edition the next day.

-Randy McCarthy, Crime Team co-leader

Photo courtesy of Bob Rudolph

We got several e-mails Sunday and Monday from the local affiliate of Veterans for Peace. They put together an "Arlington Northwest" display at a park along the Ruston waterfront that was a moving display of the cost of war.

They were upset that we didn't ccover the event for our paper, even though we ran a photo from a similar event in California, on page 3 of the Sunday paper.

Here's Managing Editor Karen Peterson's letter to those readers, explaining what happened with our coverage:

Thank you for writing regarding the Arlington Northwest Memorial erected by Tacoma Veterans for Peace over the weekend at Marine Park. The pictures sent to us by a handful of folks show a moving display on Tacoma’s waterfront.

I have been retracing our steps to see how the event fell below our radar.

The first email I found from an Arlington Northwest organizer was dated August 20 and was sent to our NewsTips email address. That should have prompted an editor to add it to our list of weekend events or to pitch it at our weekend planning meeting, but neither happened. Another organizer called our Reader Representative last Friday, which would have been late in our coverage timeline, but should have allowed us enough time to consider coverage.

We should have communicated better about this event within our newsroom. We are already working to improve that process.

In the future, I’d ask event organizers to add calendar@thenewstribune.com to their notification list. That email goes to Mary Anderson, who edits our events calendars. Mary produces a list that we go through on Tuesday afternoons when we assign reporters and photographers to weekend stories.

For veteran or military events, I’d also suggest they contact our military reporter, Mike Gilbert, at mike.gilbert@thenewstribune.com, or his editor, Matt Misterek, at matt.misterek@thenewstribune.com.

Some organizers were especially upset that we ran a picture in Sunday’s A Section of an Arlington West event in California instead of a picture of the Tacoma memorial.

Inside the newsroom it comes down to a right-hand, left-hand error – the staffers putting out the Nation & World page are not the same staffers who track local events. That’s another place we can work to improve communication.

While covering the local event would have been preferable, I’m glad we at least represented the national effort in our paper.

Some readers suggested our paper didn’t cover the local event for political reasons. That’s not the case. In fact, The News Tribune has covered a number of events sponsored by Veterans for Peace and other local peace groups, including a story and photograph we ran Aug. 27 about Peace Fest in Tacoma.

Additionally, our editorial page staff plans to run a photograph from Tacoma’s Arlington Northwest Memorial tomorrow opposite the editorial page.

While we can improve internal communication, I can’t promise we’ll cover every local peace event in the future. Each weekend, we’re able to cover two or three of the dozens of local events happening. We try to cover the most widely attended and the smaller events we think will be of interest to our readers. We also try to spread the coverage around to different groups and local communities.

Thanks again for caring enough about your local paper’s coverage to write to us.

Sunday, September 9th in PARADE magazine:

“It’s Good To Be A Little Wild”
By Jeanne Wolf
Charlize Theron won an Oscar in 2004 for her work in Monster and was nominated again last year for North Country. She is also a producer, fashion icon and determined activist for Africa. Theron talks about how she tries to balance love and family, work and adventure.

How Can We Help Our Nation’s Caregivers?
By Gail Sheehy
The job of “family caregiver” is a position that nobody expects or is prepared for. An unpaid army of 44.5 million Americans is caring for our ailing adults and the numbers will only grow. Find out what we can do to help.

The Simply Delicious®
By Sheila Lukins
Autumn ushers in two of America’s great seasonal rites—football and tailgating. Get some new ideas for hearty sandwiches that are great on the go and easy to eat.

In Step With: Terrence Howard
By James Brady
Terrence Howard has two new films out this month, The Brave One and The Hunting Party. The Oscar nominee talks about how his difficult childhood helped prepare him for such heady roles and why his marriage failed.