Thanks much to all the locals who participated in this episode of NPR's On the Media:
The Inheritance Of Loss
May 29, 2009
It seems like every week a city in America loses its newspaper. We decided to focus on one, Seattle, to find out what happens afterwards.
It's a great discussion of the new local media landscape here in Seattle and a great listen for anybody thinking about jumping in with an independent, local, online news effort. Two voices deserve special thanks for their part in the program.
Tracy Record of the West Seattle Blog once again says exactly the right things about what her online news business is building and the way journalism is being shaken by new tools and, more importantly, new focus on community news.
Eli Sanders of Seattle's alt weekly the Stranger, meanwhile, deserves bigger thanks for, one, mentioning the neighborhood news blog that I run at capitolhillseattle.com or, as Eli referred to it, the "Capitol Hill Seattle Blog." Don't know you Eli, but thanks! Surprised to see how many more people than usual have come to the site since the broadcast and online posting having searched for "Capitol Hill Seattle Blog." For two, Eli made a few points about the online local news trend that are easy to refute -- blog fodder!
Eli isn't necessarily wrong that neighborhoods with higher income levels seem to be on the forefront of the neighborhood news blog revolution here in Seattle but he conveniently ignores the fact that three of the strongest news sites in the city represent areas considered 'under-represented' in other aspects of society:
We're proud to note that two of those three are part of the Neighborlogs family of independent local news sites -- both CDNews and Aurora|Seattle are growing, important community news sites and join the effort running down in Rainier Valley (Wordpress, btw :) ) in covering diverse communities that defy conventional wisdom that only the wealthiest areas will be represented in the digital news future.
Interested in starting a local news site of your own? Register for the Neighborlogs beta.
