The East Bay Express has a nice, gossipy piece on new Planet publisher O'Malley (last item)

O'Malley has big dreams for her little paper. She plans to dump all the Associated Press fluff that no one reads and replace it with freelance essays on gardening, architecture, pets, and other pursuits for overeducated Berkeleyans. Promising to model the Planet after journals like the Anderson Valley Advertiser and I.F. Stone's Weekly, O'Malley intends to beef up the op-ed page into a spread of as many outrageous screeds as will fit in each issue -- friends say she's a controversy junkie, loves nothing more than a good rant, and is convinced her readers will, too. "Controversy fills papers," she says.

Truly! The best part of the Planet was always the op-eds.. although it may be emblematic that cranky op-ed letters are the best Berkeley has to offer these days.

There's also some interesting City Hall gossip, if you're into that sort of thing.Email This Post!