MISCmedia for 1/15/01
For the 'Record'

LAST THURSDAY, we talked a bit about the end of the Seattle Union Record, the little paper formed by then-striking Seattle Times and P-I workers.

I said then that the Union Record was about two-thirds of the way toward becoming the real opposition daily this town (heck, any town) needs. There oughta be a way to make something like it that can survive as an ongoing venture. (The UR relied on volunteer help and "sympathy ads" bought by other unions, tactics which obviously wouldn't work on a permanent for-profit paper.)

So here's my not-at-all-modest proposal for a new local daily, based on the UR format:

• A free tabloid, published weekday mornings. (The UR came out three afternoons a week.)

• Distribution centered within mid-Seattle at first, then spread out steadily across the Puget Sound region.

• A single daily print edition, going to press at midnight during baseball season, 11 p.m. the rest of the year.

• Tight integration with a website that will offer around-the-day updates, plus additional details and items that don't make the print edition's tight space.

• A small core staff of editors, beat reporters, photographers, and feature writers; supplemented by (adequately-paid) freelancers contributing columns and features on niche topics.

• A 24- to 28-page editorial hole (non-ad space) in the print edition, tightly formatted, with a balance between brief news-summary items, personal-essay columns, and narrative-based feature stories. (Imagine a cross between a local Christian Science Monitor, the freebie subway newspapers of Philly and Toronto, and the old KIRO Radio News Fax).

• Tight quotas on "listings" material (weather, stock prices, sports stats, etc.). Most of that can go to the website.

• No unsigned editorials. When opinons are expressed, they should be clearly identified with their expressers.

• Few or no institutionally-generated features such as polls, "Front Porch Forums," and the like.

• Brave and progressive local coverage that's neither ambulance-chasing dumbness nor Chamber of Commerce propaganda. Coverage that, to name one aspect, remembers there are many local residents who aren't affluent white baby-boomers.

• A heavy Seattle emphasis. The local news coverage would be as focused on the city as suburban papers are on the suburbs. (This focus would also make the paper a better ad buy for small retail busineses.)

• News coverage people will want to read, not just feel they have to out of some sense of civic duty. The important-but-dry stuff, the PR announcements and press conferences and council meetings and economic-survey results, will go into news-brief summaries. This will free the bulk of the staff's efforts for mini-feature stories, narratives that are relevant and/or interesting. (Like an alterna-weekly's features, but chopped up into daily doses.)

• A certain "spunk." Not that hyperaggressive capital-A Attitude we see far too much of on TV and the Net, but rather a personal, semi-informal stance toward the news. This paper wouldn't be an Institution speaking in a stilted, formalistic tone, but in something at least a little closer to the individual styles of each writer (while still adhering to the highest fairness-'n'-accuracy standards).

• Eventually, a second section offering extra feature coverage of a different topic each day of the week--sports; business/personal finance/labor; home and food; ideas and books; arts and entertainment.

A (non-strike) daily paper isn't a zine. Even a tight-and-taut li'l free daily like the one I'm outlining here would require a full-time staff of at least several dozen, and enough operating capital to keep it going until it proves itself as an ad vehicle. (USA Today took three or four years to become consistently profitable; some bigtime magazines can take up to five years.)

But I'm convinced the potential is there. The UR proved there's reader interest in such a paper. By reaching readers who've become turned off from the standard cookie-cutter U.S. newspaper, it would provide an alternative for advertisers who like the dynamic and semipermanence of print but don't generate enough business from placing ads mainstream dailies.

Given the right people and enough time and money, such a paper could become successful enough that the Newsaper Guild would be able to demand (and get) its rightful share of that success.

So who wants to help me get this started? Lemme know.

TOMORROW: Lynda Barry's Cruddy is anything but.

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