Here’s part of what the Weekly wrote, for those of us in the building blocked from their website. And for those of you outside the building who can’t be bothered to pick up the Weekly.

Should you care if the nation’s two biggest urban-weekly chains merge? That depends on how you feel about Seattle Weekly. This newspaper has been in the Village Voice family since 1997, when 48 local Seattle Weekly co-owners sold it. Papers in the Village Voice chain have operated with a great deal of independence, while New Times papers are to varying degrees aggressively centralized in editorial approach and lean business practices. The Bay Guardian is doing the key reporting on this issue because it is fighting New Times’ SF Weekly and East Bay Express, which are squeezing the Bay Guardian for readership and ad sales. In Seattle, aggressive tactics by a merged company controlled by New Times could be trouble for The Stranger, the smaller, locally controlled weekly here.

You bet.