Kirkland blogs fill the local news gap with the decline of newspapers
For the record:
The National Review Online article quoted below references Kirkland Views, a local Kirkland blog. The article discusses changes in local newspaper coverage in general and includes blog comments made by readers of the conservative magazine. An argument is made that bloggers are filling the demand for “hyper-local” news once covered by local newspapers. The article, and our coverage of it, do not imply, nor should the reader infer any statement about the quality of our local newspapers. The author uses the examples below, as evidence of how people are changing the way they choose to receive their news.
National Review Online has posted an article by Mark Krikorian, dated December 31, 2008, in which two local Kirkland blogs are mentioned. The article discusses the financial difficulties faced by local news papers and the resultant changes in local news coverage.
The discussion centers around how local coverage by small newspapers is diminishing as they struggle to remain profitable. Many small newspapers are relying on wire services for stories and “articles” promoting local businesses rather than covering the local news. The argument is made that the business model of traditional newspapers is difficult to sustain because of enormous costs they incur that online competitors do not share. Among the various perspectives given was one from a reader of Kirkland blogs. The reader says he/she is better informed than ever by reading local blogs and other online media:
I’m not so sure that local bloggers “can’t” cover things like city council meetings. My hometown is Kirkland, WA, where we used to have a local/regional daily paper that I liked very much, but it became toast two years ago.
Today, Kirkland has a vibrant local blogging/reporting scene that’s done entirely on a volunteer (and somewhat advertising-supported) basis. Kirkland Views is the hyper-local must-read for news about public hearings and city council goings-on, and it even carries “letters to the editor”. And the Kirkland Weblog covers lifestyle and some local business news. This isn’t even to mention the Seattle-based Crosscut online newspaper, which has a more traditional model (if something invented in 2007 counts as “more traditional”). Of course, there are lots of local Twitter feeds that get me information in real time as events unfold, usually reported by eyewitnesses. And the city itself uses opt-in email lists to inform people about upcoming hearings, results of past ones, and even online surveys.
So I’d have to say that I’m better informed and involved now than I ever was, and that’s without paid reporters for a daily newspaper covering my town in depth.
You can read the entire article here.
Posted by Rob Butcher on Thursday, January 1, 2009 at 8:15 am
Filed under Headlines · Tagged with Blogs, Headlines, Media
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Hi Rob– I was the person who sent that note to Mark Krikorian (he got my gender wrong but that’s okay
, and I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank you personally for your efforts.
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Congratulations, Rob. You deserve the recognition. Your well written posts keep all of us informed about the issues unfolding in Kirkland. It is a huge commitment on your part and I appreciate it!
Happy New Year!
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Blogs are one of many resources for information. But they are complement to, not a substitute for, trained journalists working in a supportive media environment. The impending downfall of the Seattle P-I is a tragedy for the area. I never saw comparable in-depth factual coverage from blogs or local television news or talk radio regarding the arrogance at the Port of Seattle or the criminals employed in the King County Sheriff’s Department that have cost us taxpayers millions of dollars. That coverage was the result of months of hard and courageous work by reporters and editors. Work that resulted in changes that will lead to some reforms. Don’t understand why anyone would pay to subscribe to a daily paper? Who’s going to offer the checks and balances and do it in such a way, i.e. fact gathering, that it produces the means to make changes. An online version alone of the daily newspaper will not offer the same ability to support that sort of investigative journalism. A resource-strapped blog, a guy behind a microphone, and a get-me-something-with-a-visual tv news crew won’t pull it off. Weren’t able to afford a subscription to the P-I or Times? Hell, use four grocery coupons from the Sunday paper each week and you’ve paid for your subscription. Given what paid journalists have supplied us as taxpayers with watchdog services, how could we afford not to subscribe?
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The PI was responsible for it’s own demise
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Any details, John?
I don’t disagree that the PI probably made some mistakes. But I think readers who care about oversight share some responsibility if they choose not to subscribe (presuming they agree some of the investigative coverage by the PI or Times has value).
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Honestly I do not subscribe to the PI or the TImes because I do not want the print version. I prefer online and would be happy to pay for it if asked. I pay for my online access to the Wall Street Journal, the Economist, the Financial Times and Cooks Illustrated among others. Why, because they give me the option to. I know I am in the minority, but I prefer vetted journalism and am willing to pay for it, but like online. I disagree that blogs and online sources cannot be good sources of hard core investigative journalism though – have you seen Pro Publica? http://www.propublica.org/ or on a local note – http://www.crosscut.org – they often have good stories – although recently they have had financial troubles as well. Society is just going to need to figure out an effective way to pay for online access to quality journalism. And I think there are people who will pay, but who just do not want the print.
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It would be great if more people were like you and willing to pay for online. I’m still not sure elimination of print is a good thing even if that were the case though. Michael Pollan was on KPLU this morning talking about the need for new approaches and suggested something like iTunes for the news. People pay a small amount for the articles they care about. That’s intriguing. But one of the great things about print, in my opinion, is that I stumble across things I wasn’t aware about in the first place. That’s not happening in the case of an iTunes approach. And while possible online, it’s more time consuming and I find it to occur less often.
Thanks for pointing out the two sites (correction for others interested though is that it’s crosscut.com not .org). I’ll start looking at them more often. Pollan mentioned the possibility of coming up with a non-profit based local news entity supported by wealthy backers. Great if it can happen. But I still like some of the features of print to go along with online. I think more sources of news is better for a democracy than fewer. And I can’t taking the laptop to the bathroom.
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The idea of paying per story is not new and is a model that works ok, but as you pointed out is not great for getting a sense of the bigger picture. People can now subscibe to their favorite papers on the Kindle and that is doing ok. The argument about missing things your eye would see in print is valid. When doing legal research I can often find the perfect case on lexis or Westlaw, but you miss some of the connections you used to find when using the old print books and indexes. A mix of both can be good. TechFlash has some interesting ideas on how the PI could be managed online. It will be interesting to see how this all shakes out.
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