by Erik Sass - Although the sale of big regional and international dailies -- including the Financial Times, South China Morning Post, and Las Vegas Review-Journal-- has dominated headlines recently, as the year draws to a close dozens of smaller newspapers are also changing hands or going out of business much closer to home (if you happen to live in one of the affected communities). These deals represent big changes in the local media landscape, as small-town dailies and community weeklies come under the same pressures that disrupted their bigger peers. In the acquisition category, this month Adams Publishing Group -- which publishes community newspapers in the West, Midwest and Mid-Atlantic regions -- acquired Defiance Publishing Co., which publishes several local publications in Ohio including The Crescent-News and Crescent-Extra. Previously this year Adams acquired four local newspapers in Idaho as well as The Post Community Media Group, which publishes local newspapers in southern Maryland.

The American Catalog Mailers Association (ACMA) today issued an appeal for help in fighting an Alabama regulation levying taxes on catalogers and online sellers. All businesses doing $250,000 in annual business in the state will be affected. “Currently, no group or organization is stepping forward to oppose this,” says an email bulletin sent by ACMA President and Executive Director Hamilton Davison. Davison is hoping for pledges of $20,000 from 20 member companies of his association to mount a legal effort against the Alabama law, but he welcomes support from all remote sellers affected by the law. Should it go unchallenged, he is fearful that other states will follow the initiative that runs counter to the Supreme Court's 1992 Quill Corp v. North Dakota decision, which limits sales tax collection to businesses with locations inside a state.

The Department of Justice is asking the Supreme Court to refuse to hear Apple's appeal of a ruling that it conspired with publishers to raise the price of e-books. The antitrust ruling against Apple -- issued in 2013 by U.S. District Court Judge Denise Cote and affirmed this year by the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals -- was "supported by overwhelming evidence," DOJ says in Supreme Court papers filed Dec. 23. Apple "orchestrated the publishers’ conspiracy and actively relied on their collusion to achieve its business ends," DOJ argues.

The American Catalog Mailers Association (ACMA) has launched an effort to obtain a Negotiated Service Agreement (NSA) for a bloc of its members that would give them preferred rates on parcel shipping. NSAs are awarded only to customers with massive annual mail and package volumes. Potpourri Group, which owns more than a dozen catalog brands, is the only cataloger ever to have secured one. ACMA VP of Industry Relations Lynn Noble, formerly product manager for catalogs at the U.S. Postal Service, believes sufficient precedent exists for a group of catalogers to come together on a deal. “If you look at companies like Etsy or Overstock, the big aggregator websites, they've been able to pull contract pricing together for their third-party vendors,” says Noble (left). “All of those wanting to take part in the deal will have to submit their individual numbers, but it's the baseline performance upon which the deal is predicated.”