October 07, 2004
Alas, 'Communique' Not Selected As Awards Finalist
Reader Contributions Down The Drain!
In a longshot stab at wider recognition (although not any sort of financial reward), we entered this site into consideration for the Online News Association's annual Online Journalism Awards. Today, the finalists for the awards, whose winners will be announced in the middle of November.
We entered in two categories: General Excellence (small sites) and Online Commentary (small sites). For reference, this July post indicates the specific items were submitted for consideration.
For the relevant General Excellence category, screeners selected as finalists: Center for Public Integrity, Congressional Quarterly, PBS Frontline/World, PBS P.O.V., and Ventura (CA) County Star.
For the relevant Online Commentary category, screeners selected: Dan Gillmor's eJournal, Mark Glaser, and Pressthink by Jay Rosen.
Our thanks to the readers who generated the $200 in entrance fees we needed in order to participate, especially since they in effect tossed their financial contributions for those fees into something of a black hole.
We always knew it was, at stated above, a longshot. But snagging a finalist spot certainly would have been a nice way to cap off the end of this site's run
Comments (8)
Adrian Russell-Falla on 07 Oct 2004
b!X, another small injustice. you shoulda won something there.
but please don't give up, man.
you just need to pitch a deal -- in person, not online here -- that will work for you and make business sense to any of a handful of local print pubs. all the people of Portland would benefit hugely. I don't think it would be terribly hard to pull off.
you know you can call on plenty of experienced help to work with you to put that pitch together, and even help deliver it if you like, just for the asking, right?
Adrian Russell-Falla
Organizer, GoPotterGo! PAC
www.gopottergo.com
The One True b!X on 07 Oct 2004
In the many months since the drop-dead date was announced, I have yet to envision, hear, see, or encounter any plan which would generate the minimum $1500/month required for Communique to remain my full-time endeavor and yet also not come with strings so firmly attached that they would fundamentally change the nature of what it is Communique does.
I have always indicated that this entire project is an experiment. Sometimes, experiments fail. In this case, not (to my mind anyway) from a creative sense, but certainly in a financial viability/sustainability sense.
My conversations about possibilities have not been restricted to those that have appeared publicly here. They have, however, had many months now to amount to something useful.
Come the month of December, I need to be working somewhere like everybody else. The intervening time doesn't really appear to be adequate to both starting to figure that out and trying to find a funding solution for Communique which by now would have been clear in the past half-year if it existed.
Elaine of Kalilily on 07 Oct 2004
I don't get it. The winners are all associated with pretty much mainstream media. There are no independent webloggers on the winner's list. Obviously there was no real category for something like Communique. I think b!X is a couple of years ahead of his time. The rest of the journalism "industry" hasn't "gotten it" yet.
There are lots of us who think Communique should have won -- but I guess it's in a class by itself.
Meanwhile, b!X, while it might not be possible to continue this Communique as you want it to be, you would do a service to your community by taking Adrian Russell-Falla up on his offer to help you figure out how to earn money writing a syndicated column for other publications -- or some permutation of that. It's not your ideal situation, but maybe it would be tolerable if you can continue write honestly about subjects you really care about.
The One True b!X on 07 Oct 2004
Well, see, this is where we cross into where people misapprehend some things. While what's been done here has become something in which other people have found some sort of value, and while I don't at all disparage that fact, there has never been any motivation here other what doing what satisfies me.
Writing for anyone other than myself has never been anything but a personal disappointment.
I don't say that to whine about not being able to do it. I say it simply as an explanation of what this is all about. While not at all true for all things, some things in life should remain "pure" or not exist at all.
In this case, both for better and for worse, "pure" means writing what I want, when I want, in any way I choose to do so. Writing for other people in other formats (formats, which, to take but one small aspect of the larger picture, don't allow for instantaneous, unedited, and public feedback) doesn't accomplish that.
GeneralPicture on 07 Oct 2004
In a nutshell, your site deserved the highest honors they had to offer.
Adrian Russell-Falla on 08 Oct 2004
b!X, I do get it, about your motivation.
I'm not suggesting you "write for someone else".
I'm suggesting:
a) you carry on doing what you like to do, exactly the way you do it now.
real-time, no publication deadlines, full free instant commenting
that's the formula for success in the space!
it's what built you a readership franchise they'd kill for
-- and would cost them tens of grand yearly to try to replicate
--- and they KNOW they'd likely not succeed -- for cultural reasons
b) you allow other print publications to:
license your content
display a positive relationship with the Portland Communique brand
(gaining positive PR for good corporate citizenship)
gain traffic on their web sites -- controversy draws readers
example: William Safire and David Brooks doing Op-Ed for the NYT
you might also carry small ad banners for their web sites
there's lots of technical and brand management possibilities to accomplish this stuff in a way that drives a clear net gain on a business basis for them, and gives you the freedom to carry on doing what you want to do.
remember that a) newspapers are fighting a global trend of declining circulation, b) they have to throw money at their web presences already -- and c) compared with any possible internal source of content, or external [paid] promotion that pulls equivalent online views, you are going to be DIRT CHEAP. plus, there's zero extra editorial overhead dealing with you, precisely because you'll be truly independent.
sure, there's a chance there's no-one at any local paper with enough imagination and balls to think a bit outside their usual boxes -- but I doubt it, given a good pitch. they're not all morons. and you know full well that mainstream media are currently consumed with trying to figure out how to coexist/survive in the new World With Blogs.
why not try? what is there to lose?
best,
Adrian Russell-Falla
Organizer, GoPotterGo! PAC
www.gopottergo.com
Elaine of Kalilily on 08 Oct 2004
If Adrian is willing to help you figure out how to go in that direction, indeed, what is there to lose????
Jeff on 12 Oct 2004
Damn, they should have had a "micro sites" category, based on who qualified for the "small sites." You were up against the Sac Bee! (I still remain hopeful that at the eleventh hour you'll get a pot of cash.)