Browncoat
Senior Member
I live in rural Ohio, in a county of roughly 50,000 residents. The county seat (in which I live) has a population of about 18,000. Scattered about are several smaller communities. As I have written here before, this past summer, I was a photography intern for the local newspaper. I have since "graduated" to being an official paid freelance stringer. This newspaper, for as long as I can remember, has been referred to by most as the "Daily Mistake". There are always several misspellings among its pages, and poor writing and coverage of local events in general.
Even with the decline across the board of the newspaper industry, most local community newspapers boast around 80% readership numbers according to a survey I read. Firsthand knowledge tells me this particular newspaper has a circulation of around 11,000...which is about 22% of the population, just to put things in perspective. There was even a scandal reported by a larger regional paper a few years ago that stated this local paper was inflating circulation numbers in order to keep advertisers from pulling out. The local paper is in bankruptcy. Again, that's nothing shocking considering the industry as a whole is in decline. Many large, even national papers, are in the same boat. Even the New York Times owes more money than it could ever possibly pay back.
I am seriously considering entering the news business.
My idea is an online only news outlet for local events. Articles would be crowdsourced by local writers living in the various communities, in addition to a small (perhaps 3 people?) full-time staff. I already have several interested candidates, and putting all of this together online would be easy. I figure after a few months, we could start approaching local businesses for advertising revenue.
At the risk of sounding pompous, I honestly feel that within a year, the current newspaper would be out of business. Mostly because I've lived in this area for most of my life, and I know the community longs for a better news source. Yes, this would be a massive undertaking in the beginning, but I believe it could be profitable in fairly short order. The hardest part is going to be getting enough contributors in place among the various communities to cover everything that goes on.
Thoughts?
Even with the decline across the board of the newspaper industry, most local community newspapers boast around 80% readership numbers according to a survey I read. Firsthand knowledge tells me this particular newspaper has a circulation of around 11,000...which is about 22% of the population, just to put things in perspective. There was even a scandal reported by a larger regional paper a few years ago that stated this local paper was inflating circulation numbers in order to keep advertisers from pulling out. The local paper is in bankruptcy. Again, that's nothing shocking considering the industry as a whole is in decline. Many large, even national papers, are in the same boat. Even the New York Times owes more money than it could ever possibly pay back.
I am seriously considering entering the news business.
My idea is an online only news outlet for local events. Articles would be crowdsourced by local writers living in the various communities, in addition to a small (perhaps 3 people?) full-time staff. I already have several interested candidates, and putting all of this together online would be easy. I figure after a few months, we could start approaching local businesses for advertising revenue.
At the risk of sounding pompous, I honestly feel that within a year, the current newspaper would be out of business. Mostly because I've lived in this area for most of my life, and I know the community longs for a better news source. Yes, this would be a massive undertaking in the beginning, but I believe it could be profitable in fairly short order. The hardest part is going to be getting enough contributors in place among the various communities to cover everything that goes on.
Thoughts?