Patch Hit by Massive Layoffs; Many Boston-Area Community Sites Now Running without Editors

A national network of news sites that has been struggling of late--and was a frequent source of restaurant news for this blog--was hit by a huge round of layoffs that has left many community sites (including a number in the Boston area) running rudderless without their editors.

According to a number of sources, including an article in MassLive, Patch Media Corp. told "hundreds" of its employees yesterday that they were being let go. As a result, community outlets of the Patch across the country are now more or less on autopilot, showing local and regional articles on their pages, but with their editors laid off. Below is a running list of local Patch outlets that are now apparently running without editors (please post comments below if you know of any others that need to be added):

Back Bay (Boston)
Beacon Hill (Boston)
Bedford
Belmont
Beverly
Braintree
Brookline
Burlington
Canton
Charlestown (Boston)
Concord
Danvers
Fenway-Kenmore (Boston)
Hingham
Jamaica Plain (Boston)
Lexington
Lynnfield
Malden
Melrose
Milton
Needham
Newton
North End (Boston)
Norwood
Peabody
Roslindale (Boston)
Somerville
South End (Boston)
Stoughton
Sudbury
Swampscott
Wakefield
Waltham
Watertown
Wellesley
Weston
Westwood
Weymouth
Wilmington
Winchester

An article in the New York Times from earlier this month mentioned that Hale Global, a company that specializes in turnarounds of troubled businesses, took over majority ownership in Patch from AOL a couple of weeks ago (AOL bought Patch in 2009, about a year and a half after the company was initially formed).

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New Boston Globe Column: Dinner with Cupid

A new dating column has been started by the Boston Globe. Dinner with Cupid, which will run on a regular basis both on Boston.com and in the Boston Globe Magazine, will allow singles to be paired up on blind dates, with the newspaper covering the cost of the meal. In return for the free meal, participants who are chosen have to tell the Globe how the date went, with their comments being posted in both the magazine and on the Web site.

For more information on this new dating column in the Boston Globe, please go to the following link:

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/magazine/articles/2009/cupidteze/