“They want to do everything,” said one source familiar with the project.

Inside sources have told Off the Record that The Journal has hired John Seeley, the former deputy managing editor of The New York Sun, to lead the project. He is in charge of hiring outside staffers, and getting the section on its feet. The Times reported that a dozen outside reporters could be hired for the project, and sources told us that Journal staffers could be reassigned to the new desk as well. If all goes according to plan, the new section will debut next year.

Mr. Murdoch was an admirer of The Sun, which folded in September 2008. 

In fact, immediately after he took control of The Journal in December 2007, Fox’s Neil Cavuto asked Mr. Murdoch if he planned on poaching reporters from The Times for his new acquisition. He said sure, maybe, but added, “The New York Sun is a very obvious place where are there some very fine journalists.”

A New York news section that reports on local politics and sports is perhaps the clearest statement that Mr. Murdoch is more than a little flexible in moving the paper away from its bread-and-butter business news.

It’s also a clear sign that Mr. Murdoch is happy to bring his fight with The Times right to its backyard. He has criticized The Times’ culture coverage in private meetings with staffers, and it wouldn’t be hard to believe he feels the same way about The Times’ metro desk. Though The Journal’s staff would be far smaller—more than 100 people work on The Times’ metro desk, including more than 60 reporters—a compact staff didn’t prevent The Sun from becoming an important read in the city, thanks to its heavy reliance on (sound familiar, New York Post reporters?) scoops.

“I’ll say the thing I’ve said about each previous Major Initiative announced by Mr. Murdoch—the glossy weekly magazine, the robust culture section, the daily sports section. We welcome competition,” said Bill Keller, the Times’ executive editor, in an e-mail. “We think it’s good for readers. We don’t shy away from it. But press releases aren’t competition.”

The Journal, however, has stopped short of issuing a press release on this one. The project has been kept well under wraps, and only a small handful of people are involved in the planning stages.

“They’re being really secretive about this,” said the source.

Former Sun staffers say that Mr. Seeley, who was the longtime night editor at the paper, could ground the big ideas that came from the paper’s lead editors, Seth Lipsky and Ira Stoll. He was well liked, and a solid editor. Though he wasn’t in charge of hiring reporters, he did hire editors.

“He ran the newsroom from 3 p.m. on, whereas Ira came in first thing and got the ball rolling with counterintuitive and provocative ideas in the morning,” said David Lombino, the former city editor at The Sun who is now working for the New York City Economic Development Corporation. “John would take it over after lunch.”

“He was the one person who was totally irreplaceable,” continued Mr. Lombino. “At the 3:30 p.m. meeting, he would be in there deciding what the front page would look like. He was the point man of putting it all together and he read every story in the paper every night.”

Mr. Seeley did not respond to an email or voice mail.

jkoblin@observer.com

It starts with the ragtag pioneers, moving in with their funky friends and their bohemian pursuits, seeking life on the cheap in some desolate space. Then comes the progression: artists give way to creative professionals, lofts give way to loft-style co-ops, expensive cheese stores give way to more expensive cheese stores. The neighborhood has arrived; there it goes.

Today, we look around and learn that, according to Technorati's 2008 State of the Blogosphere (that word brings back such fond memories!) the Web indexing site now keeps track of 133 million blogs. For some perspective, imagine the entire population of Canada sharing its thoughts on politics, pop culture, and kittens. Now add in France. And Belgium. And New York. And most of Texas.

To paraphrase The Bard: Nobody goes to the blogosphere anymore: It's too crowded.

Today, Media Mob is no more. Make no mistake, observer.com will continue to bring readers breaking media news and analysis from our brilliant, tireless, attractive, and humble media team, but these stories will no longer exist under the old rubric. We'll be breaking our long-practiced omertà in favor of sharing our news breaks and takes via the main Observer homepage.

Media Mob is dead; Long Live Media Mob.

By way of eulogy, in no particular order and with no bias towards author or medium, here are some of Media Mob's 'greatest hits' (and, with that, all mafia puns get whacked once and for all):

- Juicy Bits Surfacing in Rather Case: In 2004, CBS Considered Matt Drudge, Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter Independent Panel

- For an Airplane, a Tragedy; For a Writer, an Opportunity

- Empty Nast Syndrome: Condé Nast Cutting Five Percent of All Magazine Staffs; Future of Men's Vogue In Doubt

- Gerry Howard on Discovering, Editing, and Hatching David Foster Wallace: 'He Was the First Person Who Ever Called Me "Mister"'

- Pure Imagination: In Which a Boy From Alabama Talks About New York, The Times Book Review, and the Future of Fiction

- Radar Shutting Down (Again)

- It Takes a Nation of Nerds to Make Jimmy Fallon a Late Night Host

- Inside the Fox News Green Room in Denver, Close Quarters, Big Stars, and Observer Clumsiness

- Observer Softball Report: What If 9-0 Never Happened?

- The New York Sun Folds

- A Look Back: The Daily Beast's First 100 Hours

- At Jack McWethy Memorial, the Ghost of a Famous Grin

- Breaking: 58-Year-Old Woman Not 25; Or 30; Or 40

- John Updike Dies at 76

- Doomsday in L.A.: The L.A. Times Cuts 150 Newsroom Jobs

- Maureen Dowd: The Mirror Has Two Faces

- Only Connect: Silicon Alley Insider Honors Silicon Alley 100

- Longtime Times Book Review Senior Editor Dwight Garner to Join Kakutani and Maslin in Daily Paper