My area is blessed with a great hyper-local news source. Red Bank Green is in its third year: http://www.redbankgreen.com/

What seems to be missing in almost all of the dialogue about how to improve the current online journalism business model is any discussion about an effective open source software platform that would provide a set of standard relatively simple tools to build a community news website. As it stands, an online publisher is either faced with something of a franchise model which tends to generate a generic Golden Arches of local news, expensively having to re-invent the wheel, or as is evidently the case at the West Seattle Blog, using a blogging platform such as WordPress which has serious limitations. And please spare me suggestions to look at open source options such as Campware’s Campsite, or Props, or Drupal with the extensions du jour.

I tend to agree with Jonathan Weber at New West that a for-profit model is the best, particularly in the long term. But it should also be noted that there are interesting things going on in the emergence of Low-profit Limited Liability Company business structures currently only allowed in Vermont and yet to be challenged by the IRS. L3Cs allow for a streamlined process of grant revenue and are almost custom tailored to incubate small business startups operated in the public interest. Such a structure could be very effective in funding open source software related to local online news production. Seems to me what’s happening with L3Cs should be on the online journalism community’s radar.

One of the other things missing in the discussion, and this relates to advertising, is the idea that maybe it’s time for local news sites to split the entry point, and therefore the type of content, based on visitor geography. What’s meant by that is if you’re a site publisher in a small town in Colorado, and you run a display ad for Big Bob’s local hardware store, the value of a site visitor from the same town as Big Bob is worth more than some kid in Bulgaria, and the CPM ad rates should be completely different. On the other hand, if the same small town is near major ski resorts, then out-of-area visitors are worth more on the CPM rate for a Bed-and-Breakfast ad than is a local resident. Current technology doesn’t always allow for a perfect filter of site visitor geography but it’s good enought to be useful. News site publishers should have such a common tool available if they want to use it. They shouldn’t need to think about how to build the raw mechanism. Instead, the decisions should be about who coming from where gets pointed to which content and how to provide it.

Thanks for the story and insights. A few of my observations won’t suprise you, I don’t think…

Hanging tough has always been standard operating procedure for independent websites and media makers. In fact, we launched when the dotcom bubble was in the middle of bursting and confidence in anything online was plummeting (we’ve never published, skipped a print version entirely, so we were in the bubble itself). So I know about tough and often tell folks that one “dotcom year” is like 100 “people years.” It often felt that way. But ’nuff ’bout ‘tuff…

The new positive I’m observing… after nine years finally, is that LakewoodBuzz.com is getting more UNSOLICITED inquiries from advertisers who get it than ever before; and those that simply can’t afford ad buys in Cleveland, Ohio’s mainstream media, such as The Plain Dealer and local television.

With the current economy, all of it’s getting more interesting for online and offline media! Independent websites will survive as long as their makers stay focused and committed. And maybe get a bigger piece of the pie in what is a marathon, not a race for those of us who have been at it for some time.

All the Best,
Steve FitzGerald
Immediate Past President
SPJ Cleveland Pro Chapter
LakewoodBuzz.com Creator
steve@lakewoodbuzz.com