UPDATED JULY 10: Tim Sullivan to Courier-Journal

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

Katie Couric, the anchor of the CBS Evening News, agrees with you 100%. So does Conan O'Brien.

Murray Chass has just as many readers as he did when he was with the Times -- more probably. They all followed him to his "blog".

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

You're tilting at windmills now. Believe whatever you want. Objection noted.

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

He'll have as many "readers" at a TV station?

Columns, blogs, and VIDEO FEATURES! Oh my!

I'm sure WDRB's website will soon be "the city's destination website for sports at all levels."

And, who's he going to cry to when this turns out not to work?

Is there a single TV station in the country that is their city's "destination website for sports at all levels"?

Even the local ESPN sites have a local all sports radio station cross promoting them ll day, and sharing talent. How much promotion is this guy going to get from the TV station?

Is there a single columnist who went from being the top guy at his local newspaper and found as big an audience at a local website?

How'd that work out for Tracy Ringolsby?

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

Every indication has been that he and Bozich aren't going to be in front of the cameras during news broadcasts. They're going to be writing for the station's website.

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

there just has to be more to this story. The top 2 columnists at a paper leave the same day? hmmmm..

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

I understand this. And, without a ton of promotion, who's going to find them there?

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

This is what puzzles me. If (and it may be a big if) what people say is true about the little amount of revenue is generated by the online sites, how much money is the station going to make from having both of them just write for the station's website?

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

Exactly, so what are the odds this works?

At first I assumed WDRB was an all sports radio station. Putting two local columnists on an afternoon drive show, I could see.

On the website of a TV station? What's the point?

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

I look it at it another way.

While newspapers may not exactly be solid ground, neither are television stations. I lived in Louisville. WDRB is a respected station and I'm sure they'll give this due time to succeed.

But the bottom line is that if Bozich and Crawford don't bring in more web hits or help their ratings, they'll be out on their ass. TV is ruthless when it comes to that kind of thing. If the institutional goodwill they built at the C-J doesn't translate to their new medium, it leaves them awfully exposed.

More so for Crawford, because Bozich has been around a lot longer in the columnist's role. I hope they both signed some sort of contract before they did this.

I hope it's a rousing success, though, because it'll show there's intrinsic and monetary value to having columnists in the first place. A lot of papers seem to be on the fence about that, with some hacking their columnists.

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

I'm guessing there's probably some demographic differences between a newspaper's web readers vs. those who still read it on dead tree. Print subscribers are likely older for example.

But, does anyone know, or has anyone studied, if the number of hits a particular story, or columnist gets can be extrapolated to how many people read him/her in the paper?

I ask, because people like to say that folks buy the newspaper to read this columnist, or that columnist. But, is it true?

With the internet, editors know exactly how many hits a columnist is generating. I'll bet a lot of folks who they thought were "indispensable" turn out not to draw so many page views. And, unless there's some evidence that people really are buying the paper to read them, I bet a lot of them are going to find themselves expendable, especially if they're drawing large salaries.

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

YF, stick to coffee.

 

Re: Eric Crawford, Rick Bozich leaving the Louisville Courier-Journal

PoO, stick to...

Nope. Can't think of anything your an expert on. Can't think of anything on which you are an expert.