04/25/09 EXTRA! EXTRA! - An Open Letter To Greenwich Time Managing Editor Bruce Hunter - That Is If He Still Has A Job At Hearst Newspapers

Dear Bruce,

It Is Time To Stop Worrying And Learn To Love The New Mobile Newspaper

Bruce It Is Time To Stop Being A Media Wimp!

If you want to save the Greenwich Time, go buy An iPhone and learn to love it, then get all of your reporters to join Facebook, FriendWise, FriendFinder, Yahoo! 360, etc.

For the next 90 days only read the Greenwich time on your new iPhone.

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Ever since our high school days it has been said,"A democracy cannot function without a free press."

O.K., Greenwich Roundup knows that, and you won't see another word about this in this article.

The point of what follows is practical.

The Greenwich Time is in this unbelievable business morass, an indescribable battlefield with the economy. ex-Greenwich time bloggers and other citizen journalists.

How dose the Greenwich Time get out of this horrible downward spiral?

This catastrophe has been caused by the Greenwich Time’s stubborn refusal to consider any news-gathering and -analysis model other than the one that they were used to.

Editors like Bruce Hunter wants to continue relegating his customers to the role of passive readers instead of engaged users.

Everyday Bruce Hunter And The Greenwich Time makes the same old mistake.

They misinterpret the limitations of their print past as prescriptions for their media future.

The Greenwich Time of the 21st century is one that is blogged—and that's not a not a negative thing.

Bruce Hunter needs to create an environment where Greenwich Time content is merged with his users’ own experiences and viewpoints; and then synthesized with the original reporting from Hearst Newspaper employees.

Postmodernism came to literature in the ’80s, and Postmodernism is coming to the Greenwich Time now

A new engaged Greenwich Time should use it's professional college educated journalistic past as the starting point for a more engaged local consumer.

Greenwich Roundup is not saying the the professionalization of journalism that took place in the white-collar-college-kid 20th century should not get thrown out the window.

To see this in action, just take a look at the case of Chauncey Bailey, an Oakland, Calif., reporter who was killed in 2007 for his reporting about the Your Black Muslim Bakery.......

A team of fired journalists banded together like in Ex-Greenwich Time Editor Joe Pisani's blog "our Greenwich".

Just like how all of the bloggers at "Our Greenwich" had all been in some way downsized from the Greenwich Time.

There was a group of California journalists who's previous places of employment in traditional media outlets had came to an end. They started working out of the nonprofit Center for Investigative Reporting at Berkeley.

Later they advanced the story about Chauncey Bailey death in a way that has led to the resignation of the city’s chief of police and the uncovering of a much more vast conspiracy than even Mr. Bailey was thought to have uncovered.

PLEASE SEE:

Articles on Editor’s Killing Made a Difference

When Chauncey Bailey, the editor of The Oakland Post, in California, was gunned down in broad daylight on a city street 18 months ago, it was not the end of his journalism. In some ways, it was a new beginning.

After his death, a group of reporters — some retired, some out of work — with support from foundations and the University of California, Berkeley, banded together to continue his investigation into a local business called Your Black Muslim Bakery and to look at any role the bakery may have played in Mr. Bailey’s murder and at the role of the police in its investigation.

The group, named The Chauncey Bailey Project, has had a deep impact on the city’s public life, broadcasting a jailhouse videotape that suggested a wider conspiracy in the murder and which the police seemingly ignored, and helping force the resignation of the Oakland police chief, Wayne Tucker.

The group has said that much of its work is done, but it says it will not shutter the operation completely until the investigation of Yusuf Bey IV, a son of the founder of the bakery, has been completed. Mr. Tucker suggested that an indictment was likely during a news conference after his resignation and that it would show a larger conspiracy in the murder of Mr. Bailey. Mr. Bey has denied culpability in the murder in an interview with one of the reporters on the project.

Rebecca Kaplan, a City Council member, publicly credited the group of reporters with airing the police’s dirty laundry.

“Even if everything was an honest mistake, the Chauncey Bailey case is shining a light on what we need to be looking at,” Ms. Kaplan said.

Robert Rosenthal, the executive director of the Center for Investigative Reporting, a nonprofit organization based in Berkeley that became the headquarters for the project, said the participants came together in part as a result of the decimation of local media, which precluded large-scale investigative work. .....

HOWEVER THE FAILED BLOGGERS AT

"OUR GREENWICH"

HAVE CONTRIBUTED VERY LITTLE

TO GREENWICH JOURNALISM

Ex- Greenwich Time Editor Joe Pisani's "Our Greenwich" Page
It’s a dog’s life - I still remember the day, a long time ago when I believed in the inherent goodness of the workplace, that my boss stood up at a staff meeting with a remark...
3 months ago

Sarah Darer Littman - Politics Above the Parapet At Our Greenwich
A new day - I woke up this morning to a snow covered landscape; the kind where everything seems new and fresh and even the ugly is temporarily made beautiful. And so i...
3 months ago

Christina Ciocca's Page At Our Greenwich
Why Tradition Just Might Be Worth It - “Mumming might as well be a cult,” my 17-year-old sister, a non-Greenwich Academy Girl, told me over the weekend. “It’s dark, it’s all the same music ever...
4 months ago

Joy Haenlein's Our Greenwich Page
Mr. Himes goes to Washington - In introducing our new congressman in South Norwalk last night, Stamford Mayor Dannel P. Malloy talked about the decision Jim Himes made two years ago to ...
5 months ago

Susie Costaregni's Our Greenwich Page
OUR JOE PISANI - Out there … The Toast and Roast Dinner to honor Joe Pisani, former editor of the Greenwich Time/Stamford Advocate, took place last week at ...
5 months ago

For far too long, the focus at the Greenwich Time has been on modifying the model that local publishers and editors grew accustomed to: subscriptions plus newsstand sales plus advertising would, in the math of the Greenwich Time media, equal profits.

In a Time magazine cover story on the death of newspapers, Walter Isaacson falsely argues that online journalism had devalued its product by focusing too much on advertising.

However Mr. Isaacson argument is tempting to Greenwich Time editor Bruce Hunter, because it is so simple. Just start charging for Internet access.

His solution—charging users in micro payments for content—is not a new one, and merely attempts to impose an old solution on a new problem.

The New York Times and other newspapers tried this in the past. All of these schemes to nickle and dime their customers have failed miserably. The New York times recently drooped it's Times Select program.

Please See Time Magazine Article:

How to Save Your Newspaper

During the past few months, the crisis in journalism has reached meltdown proportions. It is now possible to contemplate a time when some major cities will no longer have a newspaper and when magazines and network-news operations will employ no more than a handful of reporters.

There is, however, a striking and somewhat odd fact about this crisis. Newspapers have more readers than ever. Their content, as well as that of newsmagazines and other producers of traditional journalism, is more popular than ever — even (in fact, especially) among young people.

The problem is that fewer of these consumers are paying. Instead, news organizations are merrily giving away their news. According to a Pew Research Center study, a tipping point occurred last year: more people in the U.S. got their news online for free than paid for it by buying newspapers and magazines. Who can blame them? Even an old print junkie like me has quit subscribing to the New York Times, because if it doesn't see fit to charge for its content, I'd feel like a fool paying for it......

.....Henry Luce, a co-founder of TIME, disdained the notion of giveaway publications that relied solely on ad revenue. He called that formula "morally abhorrent" and also "economically self-defeating." That was because he believed that good journalism required that a publication's primary duty be to its readers, not to its advertisers. In an advertising-only revenue model, the incentive is perverse. It is also self-defeating, because eventually you will weaken your bond with your readers if you do not feel directly dependent on them for your revenue. When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, Dr. Johnson said, it concentrates his mind wonderfully. Journalism's fortnight is upon us, and I suspect that 2009 will be remembered as the year news organizations realized that further rounds of cost-cutting would not stave off the hangman......

TIME MAGAZINE SOLUTION IS PART OF THE PROBLEM

It Is Not That The Free Content That Is The Greenwich Times Problem

The Problem Is That Bruce Hunter Has To Change His Platform And Presentation.

Just look at Time’s 25 Best Blogs of 2009—a list that included such “blogs” as the Huffington Post, Talking Points Memo, and Mashable.

First of all this list could have been written almost anytime in the last five years.

Second, Bruce Hunter and the greenwich Time needs to stop calling media outlets that started online just a bunch of blogs.

Bruce Hunter needs to understand that the word “blog”— is now so broad that it is almost almost meaningless.

The Huffington Post and the other so called top blogs are essentially online news organazations with a national focus.

In westchester there are non-print news papers like Larchmont Loop.

Here in Fairfield There Is Westport Now, which like the Huffington Post is profitable and not firing journalists left and right.

But old school newspapermen like Bruce Hunter consider these news organizations cute little blogs that have nothing to do with real news gathering.

In The Last 48 Hours

The Greenwich Time's Sister Newspaper

The Westport News
Has Published These Articles About Westport Online

Web site teaches financial and social responsibility
Westport-News - ‎Apr 24, 2009‎
He and his wife are raising five kids in Westport, with a sixth on the way, and at first they gave allowances, but that didn't exactly give the kids the ...

Tziolis excels in backstroke and butterfly
Westport-News - ‎Apr 24, 2009‎
By Megan Laney At age 11, Stefan Tziolis joined the Westport Water Rats at the YMCA, beginning a remarkable swimming career that would be filled with ...

In The Last 48 Hours Westport Now

Has Published These Articles About Westport

Comings and Goings: Jd's Cosmetic Essentials Closed
Westport Now - ‎3 hours ago‎
Jd's Cosmetic Essentials at 62 Main St. in Westport has closed and a sign on the front door said it is undergoing renovations and will reopen May 8. ...

Learning the Dangers of Water Runoff
Westport Now - ‎6 hours ago‎
Jo Ann Davidson, a member of the League of Women Voters of Westport, demonstrates the dangers of water runoff to a young visitor today at the Green Earth ...

Westport Community Theatre Curtain Call
Westport Now - ‎19 hours ago‎
The cast of “The Little Dog Laughed” was greeted with enthusiastic applause tonight following the play reading at the Westport Community Theatre production ...

Hearst Cuts 44 Jobs at its Connecticut Newspapers
Westport Now - ‎20 hours ago‎
Hearst Corp., publisher of The Westport News and other local newspapers as well as dailies in Stamford, Greenwich, Bridgeport and Danbury, eliminated 44 ...

“Around the World in 80 Days” Opens Playhouse Season
Westport Now - ‎20 hours ago‎
The Westport Country Playhouse opens its 79th season tonight with “Around the World in 80 Days,” adapted from the book by Jules Verne. ...

Bayberry Lane Home Becomes Weekend Art Exhibit
Westport Now - ‎20 hours ago‎
An unoccupied Westport home at 54 Bayberry Lane is the venue of a weekend art exhibit called “House Project” by the Westport Arts Center. ...

Westport to Receive $101756 for Energy Efficiency Projects
Westport Now - ‎Apr 24, 2009‎
M. Jodi Rell announced today that Westport has been designated to receive $101756 in federal stimulus funds for energy efficiency projects. ...

Police Charge 23-Year-Old in Library Riverwalk Crash
Westport Now - ‎Apr 24, 2009‎
A 23-year-old Monroe man drove his car the wrong way down Westport's Main Street

Thursday night, struck a parked car, and eventually careened through the ...

There is a reason that Westport Now is profitable and will be laughing all the way to the bank, when Hearst Newspapers wants to start charging for content

Bruce Hunter and the other old school Newspaper editors treat thier so-called news webites like a red headed step child.

Unfortunately, Bruce Hunter's focus is on the dying Greenwich Time printing unit

The day Bruce Hunter charges for content on on the Greenwich Time is the day that Joseloff, Gordon of Westport Now starts to set up shop in town.

Right now the http://www.greenwichnow.com/ points to Greenwich Blog : The Blog of Greenwich, Connecticut :: USA and Greenwich Roundup is more than sure that Vivian Chaunu of 30 Stonebrook Lane in Cos Cob would be more than happy to entertain offers for GreenwichNow.com.

If Bruce Hunter decides to start charging for online access to news at the Greenwich Time, Greenwich Roundup thinks that it will be almost impossible to reach Vivian at 869-1196, because the phone line is going to be busy with cash offers.

If Bruce hunter decides to start charging for content at the Greenwich Time, probably the best way to nake an offer to Vivian will be via her email account at vivian@chaunu.com

Bruce Hunter should give up on this idea of bring premium access to the Greenwich Time

The brain trust at the Greenwich Time will not be able to come up with a premimium acess plan better than the failed TimesSelect project.

Bruce Hunter should forget about the money losing New York times and start following Googles example of matching advertisers with users.

This will slowly help break the growing, primacy of Google in raking in Greenwich Internet ad dollars.

Bruce Hunter should improve the effectiveness and better target the Greenwich Time ads instead of engaging in the phony dichotomies that have Hearst Newspapers beating their heads against the wall:

paid content versus advertising;

print versus digital;

professional journalism versus “user-generated content”;

blogging versus reporting.

Enough already deliver the readers to your advertisers and the problem is solved.

The cover of Time promoting Mr. Isaacson’s article was conceptually frustrating in several ways. It asked how to save print newspapers instead of how to embrace the web.

About two years after The New York Times and The Washington Post debuted their own independent Web sites (that wasn’t until 1996!), two Stanford students, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, launched a search engine called Google.

It would be a few years before Google graduated from being America’s favorite search engine to arguably the single most powerful force in Fairfield county journalism.

It began with the debut of Google News launched in September 2002. The threat, that a news site bringing together content from across the web would break loyalties to hometown homepages, was obvious.

Traditionally, news readers first pick a publication and then look for headlines that interest them,” according to Google News’ “about” page. “We do things a little differently, with the goal of offering our readers more personalized options and a wider variety of perspectives from which to choose.”

But it was a revolution in online advertising a year later, with the advent of AdSense in 2003, that a less public but more serious threat to the revenue models that were widely thought would soon support journalism online began to grow.

Advertisers and Web sites signed up for AdSense because it made advertising easy and cheap. Google’s program matches text, picture and video ads to the particular site’s content and users. Publishers earned money from clicks or “impressions,” or loads of an ad on the site. But Google essentially cut the revenue of newspapers by adding themselves in as middle men.

Right now if you look at newspaper and publishing houses, they do make money with digital advertising,

The challenge is that revenue decline on the print side is moving faster than the growth of online revenue. That leaves a gap. A sizable gap. That’s what you see for the major newspapers.

Google eats away at everyone’s profits.

Yet Bruce Hunter and the Greenwich time is stuck in the mud. Just Go to the Greenwich Times closed news archive page and you will see that they want $2.95 per article.

Bruce Hunter is making Chicken Feed off of tens of thousands of archived articles, when he could op3n the archive submit it to search engine databases and make a killing off of targetted adsence ads.

NOTE: This Article Is Under Construction,

Please return Later For The Rest Of The Story.......

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