Problems at Patch.com

I'll stand by my statement.

Your inability to understand basic business concepts really surprises me -- especially coming from someone who is so political.

David Axelrod -- a former newspaper man himself -- understands marketing and branding.

The 2008 campaign was about building a brand -- brand Obama -- and marketing it to the country.

The Obama people know this and spoke about it internally. Desirée Rogers called the Obama brand, "the best on Earth."

 

+1000

 

You still don't get that hyperlocal thing, do you?

 

As a reporter at one of Schieza's sister papers (the one with the editor with young kids), I can tell you that we are all linked by advertising concerns. People call my office looking for an ad (I am the only full-timer in my office - I share a receptionist with the Chamber of Commerce downstairs) and I send them to the HQ. Our sales rep visits my office perhaps once a week at most.
I am frequently frustrated by decisions made at a higher pay grade (and 20 miles away) that negatively affect my paper (and, by extension, make me look bad). I don't mind having to answer for a mistake of my own, but when the paper is affected by mistakes or decisions made by people I don't even know...
At a Patch site, at least the buck stops with the local editor.

 

I'm fairly certain I'm not out of my depth. Without the brand, there would be no journalism. Journalists work FOR a brand. I'll even go so far as to say that the BEST journalists work for the BEST brands. That's what they aspire to -- or at least did before the whole industry was turned on its head -- and that's what pays the bills.

I just don't get the last part: "Marketing is not a field of study"? Last time I looked, sure it is.

The other is just kind of silly.

 

Information is most definitely a commodity — particularly credible information. It's taken way too long for newspaper execs to fully grasp that.

 

Big shock with things not going smoothly with Arianna in charge of AOL's editorial staff.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2011/06/03/businessinsider-aol-insider-here-are-12-reasons-why-the-aolhuffington-post-merger-is-going-down-in-flames-2011-6.DTL

 

Drudge has had this up all day.

 

To be fair, Nicholas Carlson and Business Insider is to Patch and AOL what Selena Roberts is to Duke lacrosse and A-Rod. They hate pretty much everything both brands do. It's hard to tell what is legitimate criticism from them, and what's simply one e-mail exaggerated to the 10th.

 

Drudge is a whiny little bitch thinking he's still relevant. These days, his influence doesn't go beyond talk radio hosts grasping for a topic.
Put them in a Hell in a Cell, and Arianna crushes him like a bug.

 

Provably false:

 

In Patch's wet dreams, Drudge links to one of their stories.