Ann Arbor/Ypsilanti pushes envelope with news consumption

Wednesday, March 25, 2009 | Source: Concentrate

A media revolution is taking place in Washtenaw County and the first casualty appears to be The Ann Arbor News, a venerable 174-year-old local institution.

Replacing it will be a news website, AnnArbor.com, and a newspaper that publishes every Thursday and Sunday. The Ann Arbor News as we know it will cease to be in July. Booth Newspapers, which owns the paper, plans to continue providing news coverage in the Ann Arbor area.

The purpose of reporting on local news will be the same, but the website's staff will be significantly smaller than the newspaper's current staff. How that reporting is done, what it looks like and how it's presented are still details that are being worked out.

"This is not the end of local journalism in Ann Arbor," says Laurel Champion, publisher of The Ann Arbor News and who will serve as the executive vice president of AnnArbor.com. "This is just a changing in how it's served."

But what happens next for local journalism is not as clear. A number of independent, web-based news organizations have popped up in recent years, including this publication, YpsiNews.com, The Ann Arbor Chronicle and the Ypsilanti Citizen. Local blogish websites, Mark Maynard and Arbor Update, have also surfaced as information alternatives.

Much of the initial conversation in the aftermath of The Ann Arbor News' announcement has centered on how the business model for newspapers is irreparably broken, leaving a huge void when it comes to a community voice and watchdog. Some are not so certain.

"The model of current journalism is broken," says Steve Pierce, owner and managing editor of YpsiNews.com. "It's not unusual that the people who broke that model are running around saying the sky is falling."

Almost in the same breath, Pierce says the recent developments with The Ann Arbor News are a "huge concern for me." Pierce started his website in 2006 after he thought local news coverage in his community was lacking and decided to step up. He isn't a journalist by trade, but his sometimes muckraking site has served as a watchdog of local government and events.

But he concedes the community needs more than just him. He credits The Ann Arbor News for having the wherewithal and deep pockets to go after the hard investigative stories.

"There is no way my little media outlet can afford to do that," Pierce says. "The Ann Arbor News has been willing to spend the money on important fights like the President's house and the EMU murders. Even if The Ann Arbor Chronicle, Ypsilanti Citizen and Ypsi News combined resources there is no way we could take the EMU lawyers to task."

He is currently looking at other avenues to help deepen local pockets, like Spot.us, and keep local media watchdogs barking. Not that there aren't working watchdogs today. It's just that they are more in the puppy stage of life. But they have been able to bark loud enough recently to make local government meetings more accessible and open to the public.

"There is this notion that real journalists are doing investigative reporting, routing out corruption, asking tough questions," says Dave Askins, editor of The Ann Arbor Chronicle. "There is the idea of the Fourth Estate. We aspire to some extent to fill that."

Source: Steve Pierce, owner and managing editor of YpsiNews.com, Dave Askins, editor of The Ann Arbor Chronicle and Laurel Champion, publisher of The Ann Arbor News
Writer: Jon Zemke