Here’s one way to make local journalism pay: charge city-council candidates for covering them. Cambridge Chronicle reporter Erin Smith says Neil McCabe, who puts out a newsletter called The Alewife, did exactly that. And the Chronicle has an e-mail to a candidate, purportedly written by McCabe, with all the details.
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It is customary to refer to that business model as “the advertising business”.Besides being poor form, it is usually unnecessary to pay cash to journalists for favorable coverage. Merely stroking their egos at irregular intervals will often suffice,especially when the stroking is done by candidates for high office.
The Cambridge Chronicle might possibly engage in unethical practices in not covering candidates. Read how the Editors try to answer questions on why they didn’t include a candidate in their paper’s coverage of the election. My favorite is the last part when the editor locks the blog and asks to be called with any more questions.http://blogs.townonline.com/campolitics/?p=2791#more-2791
Anonymous 2:17, what’s your point?I’m totally willing to believe that lots of papers are either inept or sleazy in how they cover local politics. But by leaving an obvious e-mail trail, Neil McCabe has made himself look inept, sleazy, *and* not possessing the sense god gave a goose.