Problems at Patch.com

A Patch insider tells Romenesko readers that the AOL-owned hyperlocal news sites plan to cut staff and freelance budgets and start producing “easy, quick-hitting, cookie-cutter copy.” Examples: Best Ofs, and features like “What’s happening to this vacant storefront?”

http://jimromenesko.com/2012/02/08/patch-to-reduce-staff-change-editorial-focus/

 

This is the best comment on there.

 

I agree with this.
If I didn't know someone who was working for patch, or if I didn't visit sportsjournalists.com, I probably wouldn't have heard of patch.

 

I'm not surprised by what's happened. I worked for them a bit and they wanted me to cover high school teams in the middle of nowhere and pay very little. I had to finally say that it just wasn't worth the time and travel. On the other hand, a longtime MLB writer friend worked for them all last season and he was able to do most of his work by interviewing coaches by phone.

They should turn '30 Days To Lose Your Job' into a game show for writers.

 

If true, it is too bad. Not only because you want to see people who want to be in journalism have jobs, but I know it fills a small void in our area because our paper cut back immensely in the local-local coverage of our area. Patch has done a pretty good job of giving some news in our village. Will be interesting to see if what was written above will have an effect on our little local Patch branch.

 

I've noticed of late that the Patch site in our area essentially goes to our Facebook page (on which we share a snippet of the news and refer them to the print product), shares the FB blurb on their site and then asks the question, for example, "Would you like to see a new gym built a Podunk High?" which gets some moderate response.

Way to ride the backs of people churning out blood, sweat and tears with the click of a mouse.

 

Uh, why are you giving away even that much free? I ran a Patch site, so sure, I'm biased, but even the print publications where I am have this sort of gamesmanship with one another because they have slightly different deadlines. (i.e. If one knows about the lead story in the other's paper, and they don't have their own piece on it, they'll definitely play spoiler if they can.)

 

I've definitely noticed a change in coverage from our local Patch sites.

They don't really go after breaking news the way they used to, nor do they cover local sports the way they used to.

 

It's all about the Bleacher Report model. Just do whatever it takes for SEO to get page views.

 

Sad to say, but I think Patch is past even trying to get page views. An LE I know tells me they're heavily pushing "engagement" now (i.e. comments). At least when you're going after page views, you're (theoretically) covering something that's important or interesting. Pizza playoffs might get people to leave comments, but it is neither important nor interesting.

 

Great reporting by Patch.com regarding Caltrans' major fuck-up in Banning over the weekend.

Here's a link to a blog post about the fuck-up, with a hat tip to the Patch editor who did a great job covering it.

http://www.laobserved.com/archive/2012/02/head_rolls_at_caltrans_ov.php

I read the guy's reporting Sunday night and was amazed to see the amount of updates he'd filed. Good job!