Matt and that’s that: The featured speaker at the Maine Press Associations’ spring conference in Augusta next month will be Matt Jacobson.

Jacobson is the president and CEO of Maine & Company, an organization that tries to attract new business to the state.

He’s also announced plans to seek the Republican nomination for governor in 2010.

Camera co-op: In the near future, Portland television stations WCSH-TV (Channel 6) and WGME-TV (Channel 13) plan to share some news-gathering resources. The arrangement hasn’t been finalized, but sources familiar with the negotiations said the two market leaders in TV news are close to a deal to swap video of some news events on a daily basis.

Struggles for Soup and Star: Weekly newspapers in Maine are feeling the effects of the recession. In the wake of the demise (perhaps temporary) of the Katahdin Times in Millinocket, comes the news that Rockland-based Village Soup has cut the pay of all 95 of its employees by 10 percent.

When the Maine Sunday Telegram asked Pat Eltman, director of the Maine Office of Tourism, how she felt about the static level of recreational business activity during this recession-plagued winter season, Eltman sounded an optimistic note.

“Flat,” she said, “is the new up in tourism.”

No hurry: On Feb. 12, the Maine Supreme Judicial Court issued an order in the case of controversial Rumford attorney Seth Carey, suspending his license to practice law for six months and a day and requiring him to get further training in trial advocacy and ethics before he could apply to be readmitted to the bar.

The Maine media missed it.

And, as of this morning, are still missing it.

Stopping the bleeding: Bill Richards has another informative report on the Crosscut Seattle Web site on the Seattle Times’ continuing efforts to rid itself of the Blethen Maine Newspapers.

Richards notes that HM Capital Partners, the company the potential new owner of the Blethen papers, Richard Connor, has convinced to help him arrange financing for the deal, specializes in acquiring “distressed” companies.

The last time the University of Maine women’s basketball team won a game, somebody else was president of the United States. Probably Woodrow Wilson.

Just kidding. It was George W. Bush.

Or maybe the first Bush. It’s been a while.

In any case, this long run of futility – a 16-game losing streak – has finally ended. The Black Bears beat New Hampshire on Feb. 12 by a score of 57-49.

Don’t mess with the college: Pseudonymous blogger T. Cushing Munjoy has posted the letter from Morning Sentinel executive editor Eric Conrad to reporter Joel Elliott, who was fired from the Waterville paper last month, listing the reasons for his dismissal.

Bangor is holding its 175th birthday party on Feb. 12.

Unfortunately, Bangor appears to be lying about its age.

I don’t know if this historical fudging is part of some vain attempt to appear younger and more attractive to the opposite sex. I’m not even sure which sex is opposite. Or if Bangor might be gay. Or …

Never mind.