More TriCityNews reaction

By Michael Becker | Published: December 26, 2008

Pat Thornton at The Journalism Iconoclast reacts to Anil Dash’s post about TriCityNews. Dash, you may recall, won­ders whether the alt weekly is really a “news“paper at all or just an adspace. Thornton agrees with Dash and chides the New York Times article’s author, David Carr, for “not prov­ing that the triC­i­tyNews serves its com­mu­nity well.” He goes on:

Most peo­ple in a com­mu­nity aren’t adver­tis­ers, and they are served by qual­ity edi­to­r­ial con­tent. Maybe the triC­i­tyNews is a fan­tas­tic edi­to­r­ial prod­uct, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

But, as com­menter Michael Josefowicz on Thornton’s post points out:

if you fol­low the money, wouldn’t most busi­ness peo­ple at most news­pa­pers agree with “I don’t want any­thing that detracts from the paper and the pres­ence of those big, beau­ti­ful full-page ads” and “busi­ness sense” and “run­ning lean” and keep­ing adver­tis­ers happy.

Bloggers out there are harp­ing on the TriCityNews’s pub­lisher for being proud of his big, full-page ads and for not men­tion­ing his jour­nal­is­tic con­tent, but when we really get down to it, aren’t all news­pa­per busi­nesses equally in love with their ads and their adver­tis­ers? Ads, after all, do pay the major­ity of a newspaper’s bills. Why should the jour­nal­ism ide­al­ists out there exhibit the TriCityNews as an exam­ple of greed­i­ness or of not serv­ing a com­mu­nity need when it’s basi­cally oper­at­ing under the same busi­ness prin­ci­ples as the big guys?

All of this really turns on Carr, who didn’t give his read­ers a crys­tal clear vision of what the TriCityNews pub­lishes on the news side of the aisle. Perhaps he and the pub­lisher talked at length about the paper’s jour­nal­ism, but Carr did not include that in his story, and so we must speculate.

I sup­pose it’s good that the industry’s still strong enough to reject a story that offers a glim­mer of hope because it’s lack­ing a few details. When the jour­nal­ists start accept­ing any story of hope with­out ques­tion­ing it, then you know the indus­try is in deep trouble.

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  • joemomma
    Check out Dan Jacobson's radio interview with CBS radio here: http://www.wcbs880.com/pages/podcast/91.rss

    Just scroll downt o about the middle of the page. Very interesting and gives you some good insight into the paper's success. Most interesting comment from Jacobson in the interview is that triCity's content, first and foremost, is why the paper has had such success.
  • I"ll take a look at it (or a listen to it, as the case may be). Thanks!
  • Jen Kitts
    Anil Dash is obviously not familiar with Tri City and therefore shouldn't make statements like

    "Most people in a community aren’t advertisers, and they are served by quality editorial content. Maybe the triCityNews is a fantastic editorial product, but I wouldn’t bet on it."

    Tri City is by no means a penny saver like Dash claims. In fact, it is the only "news" paper in Monmouth County, NJ (actually of of NJ for that matter) worth reading. I'm an avid reader and have been for a long time. It's been great to see where they began at I think 12 pages to their most current issue which was 76 pages.

    Tri City's off-color commentary on everything from creative local business, art, music, local politics, architecture, urban redevelopment, etc. is refreshing to say the least. Perhaps Dash should pick up a copy before commenting on it's editorial. I compare it to the Howard Stern of the print world although not quite that extreme but definitely edgy. Some people don't like filthy language but I always laugh at some of the language I see in Tri City. They tell it like it is without fear of losing advertising (I've heard story's, whether true or not, of some of their advertisers bailing on them because of what they read in the paper). And I only wish more media would do the same.
  • It's just a shame the paper "shuns the Web." If it didn't, more of us
    people commenting on the situation would be able to see the paper and
    know more about it.

    As a reader, do you miss having a Web site to read the paper on, or
    are you content with the print edition?
  • Jenn Kitts
    I'm definitely not missing an online version of the paper. THe best part of picking up the paper for me each week is going down to the local coffee shop, sitting back in one of their big comfy couches and diving into a copy of Tri City. It's about the overall experience, not necessarily getting Tri City online which would be more convenient but not quite as fun. Tri City is not just a regular newspaper. It is very opinionated, very funny, and often very controversial. I think ultimately if the paper were online it wouldn't be as much fun for me. I look foward every week to my coffee shop relaxation with TriCity. Of course I could just bring my laptop but I've been doing this for so many years before WiFi that I'm used to it. I think Tri City's philosphy of keeping their content in print only is smart because they encourage their readers to get off their asses and support the local businesses that carry TriCity. You lose that with the web.
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