News (or mad?) scientist won't workship at local-local-local altar

Glynn Wilson's comments about the Newhouse's Advance Publications dominating media in Alabama caused
The Locust Fork News-Journal's entry on How the Internet Changed the World, For Good and Bad to turn up in must-reads this week.

I was thankful for a reminder to look at this man's effort to create a "wide open independent weblog for big news and the big picture."

"It is my educated opinion that most newspapers will never get past the ink, paper and delivery truck economic model and figure out the Web economy, so new news organizations will have to be built to replace them. That’s one of the reasons I started the Locust Fork News-Journal four and a half years ago, to start experimenting with how to do this. It is still a work in progress."

Unlike many who are experimenting with news, Wilson does not see hyperlocal, or even local, as a key to success. Instead, he suggests we think about this:

"The Web has the potential of a global audience. But you can’t build national and international traffic by spending more time covering local news and sports and by forcing people to sign up to read your site. It just won’t work. That’s why I have kept my site open and free and focused more on national news."

Visit the post for more on how he got to that attitude and a quick review of Internet's role. Visit the site to see how his experiment is going. Feel generous? Donate a "road trip," "tank of gas," "carton of ACLs, " "3 month server bill" or just pick up the tab for a 12-pack Yuengling Black and Tan. OK, I admit there are sponsorships and ad placements possible.