It's a breathtaking double-cross, even by San Francisco standards: A newspaper left for dead by a philanthropist billionaire, who, in partnership with a university, public radio and even perhaps the New York Times, has transferred his affections to the Web.

Wow, some nutty investor is actually buying into that harebrained scheme to turn the money-bleeding San Francisco Chronicle into a (purposely) nonprofit paper.

San Francisco Chronicle journalists are trying to talk investors into buying the foundering daily newspaper and restructuring it as a nonprofit, writes the SF Appeal. Who are the ink-stained wretches courting?