Want To Write For The Syracuse New Times?
Posted by Mitch Mitchell on May 3, 2013
Time certainly flies! Back on April 16th we had the second meeting of the CNY Bloggers group, this time at Kitty Hoynes. Many of the people who came to the first one were at the second, along with some new folks. I can’t find the sheet now to list all the new people unfortunately, but it was a good time nonetheless.
There was one guy who made a very interesting impression however. His name is Larry Dietrich, and he’s the editor in chief for the Syracuse New Times. His presentation to the group was simple – write for us! In essence, something he’s like to see is more of a local flavor for the New Times online, and he’s reaching out to local bloggers to help do this.
It’s an interesting concept, one that reminded me of Huffington Post, so I asked some questions and answered a couple as well since I’m familiar with the concept in general. Each person approved would get their own byline and a link back to their blog. One can decide to write new content or post something that’s already on their blog; they don’t have the ability to repost via RSS so it would be a copy and paste situation if one went that route.
This is the kind of thing that takes some forethought. As the New Times figures out just what they really want, local bloggers would also have to figure out a few things.
One, time commitment; if someone is accepted will there be a request for a certain type of regularity that the blogger might not be capable of?
Two, will a blogger be limited to one post a week or can a blogger have multiple posts?
Three, if a blogger disappears for a long time, will they automatically be removed while their content stays?
Four, how many people who write will be allowed to write on the same subject? For instance, within the group are multiple people who write about food, designing and saving money; would those clash with each other, as well as the general goal of the New Times?
Of course the major benefit is potential traffic and notoriety. The majority of local blogs don’t come close to the traffic figures the New Times offers, and even those blogs ranked higher probably aren’t known by as many local people as they are people from around the world (I’d count myself on that one because of a couple of my other blogs). I know a few local people who’d be great writing for the New Times.
There is no pay, which is something that irked a lot of HuffPo writers when the creator sold it for lots of money so you might as well get that delusion out of your head. And yet, if your missives brought traffic to your blog and website… who knows right?
At this juncture I’m waiting to hear from Larry, who said he was going to reach out to me at some point. I’m on the fence because I write a lot already, and yet being able to reach more local bloggers than I do now, even with this blog… that would be hard to turn down. What do you think of this prospect?
Now, I have a lot of history with the New Times–both good and bad. In high school and college (70’s & 80’s) it was the place to check out where the bands were playing and to find a decent apartment. It has always had an interesting take on the local arts and journalism scenes–truly an alternative cultural voice.
But the paper has had its limitations. It has never really covered local political issues well–because they do not have any reporters that actually attend events, hearings meetings. I Have especially noticed this since I’ve become a community organizer. My organization was lambasted in the New Times’ old feature Good week/Bad Week for being impolite because we dared protest at Nick Pirro’s house on a Saturday morning during the middle of the campaign against the Midland Ave. sewage treatment plant. The paper then refused to print our response letter (that pointed out that the staid establishment corporate press gave us far more comprehensive and firsthand coverage than the allegedly hip and alternative New Times.)
And just this past year, the columnist Ed Griffin Nolan used a comment from my personal blog and Facebook account and distorted my entire argument with a current Common Councilor over the architectural styles of Habitat–just focusing on my blog post title in a attempt to foment a personal argument between us–all without talking to me before publication.
All this is prelude to your question–do you want to write for the New Times? The question is fraught with many issues for writers. The New Times is trying to expand its roster of reporters and writers–without having to pay anyone for their work. Ask all the folks who are struggling to find work in journalism–or have been downsized recently–what they think about this situation. If the folks that the bloggers are replacing were unionized, we could legitimately be called scabs.
Sorry it’s taken me so long to get to your comment Phil; been on the road & going back on Tuesday.
I know what you mean about being an unpaid writer; that’s something I’ve thought about. However, there is the other side I mentioned, which is if you don’t have much of an audience that being seen online as a writer for the New Times could boost your profile a lot.
I also remember the issue you had with that guy but I don’t think that was the New Times fault as much as it was the fault of the guy who disagreed and modified what you’d written, even as a columnist for them. However, it does point out one of the issues of having independent people writing for a publication like that; no matter what’s said it’s suddenly “totally true”, without a journalist having reviewed and researched it. And if someone goes overboard in what they write will everyone else suffer because of that one person or are people discriminating enough to realize that, like HuffPo, every writer is responsible for his or her own words?
Still, I had to put it out there. I haven’t decided yet how I feel, but I also know I have time to think it all through. I think it would be a perfect place for someone like you though.
I think that\’s a great idea BUT I’m also an SEO professional. You would severely damage your search engine optimization if you copy content from one site (a blog) to another (Syr New Times). Therefore, any article would have to be original content and then could link to more stuff on the blogger’s site. Otherwise, great idea. I.e. As I wrote about in this blog (link opens new window so user can finish reading the article and check out the blog… etc.). My 2 cents.
Greetings Joe,
I removed the promotional part of your comment; just so you know, since people can look at your link. As for what you said, well, you’re correct and not correct at the same time. Matt Cutts addressed this one specifically and said that the originating source would always get the bulk of the credits and that having one’s content on another site that links back to the original could actually be a benefit sometimes. Adding to that, if your intention was to grow your online presence because it’s nonexistent then it would be a great move to gain publicity and readers; if your content is good to begin with. Exposure often trumps SEO; I’m a SEO professional myself sometimes.
Still, it’s a decision one shouldn’t take lightly. For me, I might want to have a space where I write original items and link back to my site rather than post something I’ve already written in another space; I’d have to think about it more though because sometimes you write something on your site that didn’t get the reaction you thought it should that you think is pretty good, so you could bring new life & attention it with this type of arrangement.
There are a lot of benefits from team work, especially about blogging, but certainly there are downsides too. I personally manage few blogs where mostly guest posts or member posts are published. I’ve never met the writers in person and this is the main downside for me. I personally know, that if I do everything myself, probably results will be better, actually I know that, but a day have only 24 hours and I am human after all.
Carl, since it’s local I would hope that every person would get to meet a representative at the newspaper so both could decide if they wanted to work with each other and to be prepared for it. I did meet the one guy for only for about 5 minutes; if I was serious about it I’d have to meet with someone for at least 15 to 30 minutes before I made a decision.
Mitch. Good reply. Interesting concept exposure trumping SEO. I can see how that would work. I still like your approach of creating new content and then directing it back to your own blog rather than duplicating but you make a valid point. Thank you for opening me up to that idea.
No problem Joe; always trying to keep an open mind. 🙂