b-What?

Today is day #2 of existence for the Baltimore Sun's new daily tab, which is succinctly called "b," and has been appearing in orange boxes and the hands of orange-clad hawkers all over downtown. Yesterday and today both, I took copies of b from these folks and read them on my walk to work, which is probably sorta dangerous, but I've come out of it unscathed. I usually do the same thing on Wednesdays, walking to the Board of Estimates meeting at City Hall, with the newest copy of City Paper.

A little background about b. A couple of months ago I wrote an article about the Sun's latest round of buyouts (which you can read on my google pages), in which I reported the launch of b as basically just part of the Tribune Co.'s ongoing efforts to break the union at every one of their papers, especially the Sun. I got in a small bit of trouble over it, though, because the source of my reporting was the fact that b tried to hire me, at a significant pay cut, to write copy for them, and there were some questions about whether what was said to me about the job and the publication was said in confidence. Long story short, I beat the Sun to the chase, using what some considered to be shaky sources, in telling their own employees about b, and the union got mad, gave the business office hell, and they no longer will return my calls seeking comment.

Anyhoo, what I find interesting about the new tab's coverage is that I thought it was going to be a youth-marketed arts & entertainment publication meant to tout Baltimore as a place to live and work while exploring the news here. Instead, today's issue leads with a 2/3-page color photo of police searching for weapons in the weeds behind a rowhouse in Patterson Park, paired with the 42-pt bold headline, "Girl, 14, fatally shot," over a 250-word brief about a recent murder, with a heavily-featured pull-quote from a construction worker who was near the scene, that reads, "I'm done with Baltimore. I've seen more violence here than in New York, and I was there seven years."

WTF?

And it only gets worse. The next 8 or so stories in the first 4 or 5 pages of b are as follows:
* A bizarre "blog" entry by columnist Lori Barrett that veers wildly between details on her experiences working for the wasteful federal government, the ambiguity of Baltimore neighborhood designations, and the proclivity of crime news in local media outlets.
* A two-page cover feature written by Jordan Bartel, who is a nice enough guy and a friend of a friend who I've met a few times, back when he used to be arts ed at the Carroll County Times, about acts of violence posted on YouTube, and how they're just an extension of Jerry Springer style voyeur violence culture.
* The "60 seconds" news brief section, in which 3 out of 4 stories are on rape and murder.
* An AP wire item about tensions in the crabbing industry.
* A Sun short news item about a Parkville gun store that is responsible for selling lots of guns to bad guys who commit murders.
* Another Sun report about a shooting murder in Columbia.
* A Sun short item about last week's fatal West Baltimore crash that killed a 3-year old toddler.

WTF??

Is b obsessed with violence? Why do they think that young people really want to read about murder, rape, and death only? What about the pope's visit today to DC? What about the food shortages? Why do they bury all the A&E stuff (which is all metromix.com wires from Tribune affiliates, anyway) in the back? Is b piggybacking on the popularity of City Paper's "Murder Ink" column, or the snarky blog Baltimore Crime?

Does anybody have a clue about the editorial mission of this tabloid?