Yellow Star Publique
 | |
| Chief Editor | Frederick Falcon |
|---|---|
| Editor | Howard Strawberry |
| Editor | Sammy Cloud |
| Editor | Cathy Oakpipe |
| Staff writers | Tanya Shurova (seasonal) |
| Photographer | Daleside Cooperative Photographicals U.V.I. |
| Categories | Current Events, Investigative Journalism |
| Frequency | Daily |
| Format | Thick-papered stapled 50-page color magazine |
| Circulation | 27,772,555 (2027) |
| Publisher | Independently by the Spruce Street Workers United, Distribution 020, as well as licensed to international printers |
| Founder | Frederick Falcon |
| Year founded | 1996, as High Hills Publique |
| Company | Spruce Street Workers United, Recreation 712 |
| Country | United Valleys |
| Based in | 11 Spruce Street, Crabapple Cove |
| Language | Valleysian, English, Yu-yu Swanese |
The Yellow Star Publique began in July 1996 as the High Hills Publique, a Valleysian daily tabloid that focused on celebrity gossip and entertainment media. Early publications were received harshly by the general public, and popular media figures criticized the publication for an alleged bias against "those of wealth and authority," which led to a younger and more socially conscious readership than initially intended.
During the regime of Evgeny von Patton, two High Hills Publique journalists died under suspicious circumstances. The first, Cole Hughes, an AusValian-born staff writer, drove his put-put-bike off the June Magpie Bridge on 2022 August 9, dying of his injuries. Medical first responders noted that Hughes repeatedly muttered a name to them that was not his own before succumbing to his injuries and passing away at 19:90 Mariner. Later, Blue-John Rosewood, a recently-promoted editor, was found dead in his bedroom on 2024 June 18, with the points of his ears clipped off and a fatal bullet wound in his head. The mercenary authorities' coroner ruled it as likely suicide, claiming his ears were clipped in an act of depressed self-mutilation as a "self-hating elf," as the young editor wrote several scathing articles against "Pan-Feyism" and other elven-interest movements.
As several businesses in Crabapple Cove began to be seized by their workers in desperation under an international blockade and live-fire civil conflict, the magazine's co-owners Frederick Falcon and Howard Strawberry sold the company to the staff for the price of one Free Florin (the currency was under heavy inflation), leading to the rebranding in 2025 January as the Yellow Star Publique (the yellow star being the symbol of the revolutionary opposition) which restructured the magazine to be a politically-focused current events editorial. The move has been successful, with circulation tripling by the winter of 2026 and the conclusion of the country's socialist revolution.
Journalistic practice and ideology
The magazine has become explicitly left-wing in bias since the 2010s, and the magazine previously accepted a reputation of being anti-establishment and counter-cultural. Currently, the magazine is more known for the alleged "cheerleading" of the new regime, the publishing of heavily opinionated articles presented as fact, and an over-reliance on "hatchet jobs," or negative stories that attack a person or group's character. Despite these criticisms, the staff has a dangerous but respected international reputation for their ability to find and dig up factually accurate "dirt" on anything and anyone.
Notable contributors
Foreign Policy Chair Reggie Bayside had a popular column in the magazine during her professional wrestling career from 1999-2004 called "Edgy Reggie," which was a launchpad for her later career in representative politics. Tanya Shurova, a freelance journalist from Varangia, has received several international awards for her investigative reporting, all of which were received for Yellow Star Publique or former High Hills Publique contributions.