Media

People are either loving the nod to Thomas Pynchon (specifically, the first line of Gravity's Rainbow) or hating it.

One person took issue not with the Pynchon reference, but with the subhead: "But it was not a huge meteor."

Interestingly, online, the Globe went all boring, replacing the Pynchon with "Meteorite alarms residents in Russian city."

Benzaquin, also author of a book on the Cocoanut Grove fire, was 90.

The Channel 7 reporter has been stationed on Plum Island since yesterday. This morning, she reported from a porch that had waves crashing into its base as debris from destroyed neighboring houses floated out to sea.

Then her signal went dead. Anchor Adam Williams then assured viewers: "Our crews don't stand in areas that are dangerous or are susceptible to any damage."

We learned 30 or so minutes later that Tran was safe, as she reported - by phone - that she had moved to a new location. In fact, she was inside, inside a house whose owner assured her it was designed to handle these conditions. Then she casually mentioned she was hearing "booming" from where waves and debris from destroyed houses were crashing into the house's foundations. Williams asked if she was sure she was safe.

Maybe the same person who thought it would be a good idea to have Williams and Lisa Hughes anchor the news while standing outside in the station parking lot. Williams, being a man's man, of course, just stood there without a hat. They finally got him back inside, and by the looks of things just in time - his face was bright red.

"a totally clueless action by the media."

As has been well reported by several news outlets (and on this blog), a total travel ban is now currently in effect in Massachusetts. Yet, at least one of the local stations is continuing to broadcast traffic reports.

Channel 7's Nancy Chen just checked in from a hill in Worcester. Drink! Then she bent down and picked up some snow to make a snowball. But, darn, the snow was so dry, it just disintegrated. So we'll rate than a half drink.

Frank Solensky photographed the bread aisle at the Somerville Stop & Shop this evening.

Meanwhile, Channel 5 reporters tonight warmed up for their team coverage of Snowpocalypse '13. With no snow on the ground to fashion into a snowball, Sean Kelly started a report by holding a tree branch for emphasis. Jack Harper, however, found a sand or dirt pile with a thin coating of snow, to which he could point with the ruler he of course happened to have. He was showing how high snow got in the Blizzard of '78 or something. And Ed Harding urged viewers to charge their tablets and phones now, so they can keep watching Channel 5 online if need be - apparently not thinking that if the power goes out, those viewers won't be able to use their WiFi to watch him.

Come snowmageddon or aquapocalypse, Fred Somers is ready.

The Dorchester Reporter has hired an outside editor to keep tabs of its coverage of the 1st Suffolk Senate race of Linda Dorcena Forry, whose husband, Bill, is publisher of the paper and the Boston Haitian Reporter and Mattapan Reporter.

Michael Jonas, executive editor of CommonWealth magazine, and a long-time Dorchester resident, will review the paper's coverage of her race this spring to replace recently resigned state Sen. Jack Hart.

[Jonas] will be reviewing the Reporter newspapers' coverage of the campaign for the First Suffolk State Senate seat, receiving and exploring reader feedback, and publishing his findings in a regular column and online at DotNews.com.

WGBH says its hiring the former WTKK talkers to talk away between noon and and 2 p.m. on weekdays on its "Boston Public Radio" show. The move frees up Callie Crossley and Emily Rooney, who currently hold down the microphones then, to do other things, although the station says they'll continue to get some words in edgewise on the show. 'GBH adds that Edgar B. Herwick III will continue to contribute to the show after the changeover on Feb. 25.

Blizzard of '78 aftermath in Revere. Photo by Jessica O'Brien. Posted under this CC license.

On the 11 o'clock news last night, Bouchard seemed worried that, after two years of little snow, we wouldn't know how to deal with the foot of snow the National Weather Service now says we could get, starting as early as Thursday night.

Does he have a point? Should the French Toast Alert Level be raised to Orange? Or will the genes from our collective history (35 years ago today, folks) kick in?

MIT's Center for Civic Media has started analyzing Globe datelines and presents some preliminary results.

H/t Bostonography.

A couple of UHub correspondents who actually watch Channel 25 in the morning report Gene Lavanchy was chatting with one-time state Rep. Maryanne Lewis about John Kerry becoming secretary of state. The topic of whom Deval Patrick should name as interim senator came up. Lewis cracked something like "There's a lot of talk about him possibly appointing a woman... So I think Barney Frank is a likely candidate." And they both had a good chuckle.

Oh, snap: The Globe cautioned readers of its story about the Notre Dame football player with the fake dead girlfriend that

Now, it appears Te'o's inspiring story was a hoax. According to a report on Deadspin.com, a website that has broken some high-profile stories but not an outlet regarded for journalistic standards, Kekua never existed.

Of course, the Globe was as invested in the Te'o story as every other media outlet in the country, but really?

Nicole Oliverio at WHDH tweets the driver of one of the station's news vans had just gotten on I-93 south when she realized somebody was on the roof. Seems somebody with places to go but no way to get there had climbed on somewhere between the station's Government Center offices and the I-93 ramp.

The guy surprisingly wasn't hurt. Said he needed a ride, but didn't have $$

Cambridge's Culture, which bills itself as "the word on cheese," is seeking an editor. Think you're gouda 'nough? At least five years' print experience required.

Compare this screen grab from WHDH's report on the annual L Street plunge with this photo of the same swimmer.

So tomorrow's your last chance to listen to Braude and Eagan in the morning, at least at 96.9.

WHDH's Ryan Schulteis just did a report from Bridgewater, where he shoveled some slush to show us that, yes, it's wet. He was followed by the station's standing-on-the-side-of-a-highway reporter, Victoria Warren, who held a snow brush throughout her report, but didn't use it.

For some reason, reporters stationed at Gillette Stadium are doing their reports without hats on. Only Channel 4 weatherman Joe Joyce was dressed sensibly, with a hat on, as he stood in front of the WBZ Accuweather Mobile Weather Urban Assault Vehicle with the LED readout.

All Access reports.

NorthEndWaterfront.com introduces us to Bostoniano.

This year, the Globe named Olympians Aly Raisman of Needham and Kayla Harrison of Marblehead as its "Bostonians of the Year." Both are outstanding athletes and, no doubt, role models for us all, but Raisman lives in Needham and Harrison comes from Marblehead.

Past winners have included US Attorney Carmen Ortiz, who at least works in Boston; Scott Brown, who, granted, famously campaigned in South Boston; Elizabeth Warren, whom I once saw in Roslindale; Paul Pierce, who plays basketball in Boston; and Bruce Marks, who helped build low-income housing in Boston.

Ed. note: After I tweeted about this, Doug Most at the Globe replied: "Just to be clear. Under your premise, as "The Boston Globe," we should only cover Boston's 21 neighborhoods. Not an inch more." No, there's a wider world out there, but just to be clear, Marblehead is not Boston. How about "Globe Person of the Year"?

Ladies and gentlemen, your new Boston Globe editor: Brian McGrory.

Dan Kennedy interviews Michael Morisy at MuckRock.com, which a new foundation that will focus on crowdfunding freedom-of-information reporting has named to its donation system.

Some Globe columnist or an actual Gloucester seafood guy?

John Carroll, who still gets ink on his fingers, reports on a new classified-ad-like thing in the Globe's G section: "Blog" posts from advertisers, complete with underlined blue hyperlinks (sadly, the Globe has yet to perfect that print-to-Web interface or figured out QR codes, so you'll have to type the URLs in yourself).