Friday, September 8, 2006

Pro-Am Journalism Breaking Out in Knoxville? I like this kind of dialogue... Community blogger R.Neal of KnoxViews posts a one-liner under the heading "Breaking News: Local paper involved in journalism." His full text: "Recent outbreak of journalism in local print media has experts puzzled. No film at 11." The link points to the city's newest "alt" tabloid, Knoxville Voice, and its 2,000-word feature today on local downtown redevelopment deals involving the 1982 World's Fair Park, including the developers' much-talked-about plans to reopen Knoxville's golden Sunsphere, and a promise to compensate the city's arts community for taking one of the park buildings out of the arts-workshop business. Part feature, part commentary (a fine "alternative" newspaper tradition), the story starts gently but closes like this: The Kinsey Probasco Hays deal guarantees that the Sunsphere will continue to drain public funds for the next two decades. As the development deal looms--apparently etched in stone before the public officials hold a vote, with little possibility of a public referendum--the glittering fixture in Knoxville's downtown skyline may come to represent more than just a former World's Fair site; it may ultimately serve as an uncomfortable reminder of the continued gifts bestowed upon private enterprise by elected officials. The publication, KnoxVoice.com, is a new bi-weekly in town. The story's author, Hilary Trenda, was writing for the city's daily News Sentinel (knoxnews.com) just a few weeks ago. While the new tab's website doesn't have a built-in community-discussion forum, the way the older tab MetroPulse did (until a couple of years ago), Neal's short blog item certainly got the ball rolling. While his note was just a sentence long, it quickly generated more than 20 comments on Trenda's article... including: an anonymous "s'n'm" coming to the defense of the maligned local media, complete with links to News Sentinel and local TV website stories. some counterpoint from another local newspaper columnist, Betty Bean, arguing that while other media have reported on the big gold deal, they didn't combine it with critical analysis of previous city deals with the same developer someone else calling the News Sentinel stories "marketing literature" for the project. and... from Bill Lyons, the city development director... a 3,000 word reply to the original KVoice article. (Yep. I love having that little word-counter program on my computer desktop.) Among his observations, figures, clarifications and who-said-what-when comments, Lyons questions how the phrase "sweetheart deal" could describe a "Request for Proposal (RFP) process which drew in excess of 80 visitors to tour the site and nine proposals." I didn't follow all of it. (I'm still pretty new in town.) But I'll be back tomorrow continuing my education. In all of this, I think it's very classy (or very subtle) that KnoxVoice, the new "alt" newspaper in town, doesn't mention that one of the developers mentioned in the story is the publisher of MetroPulse, the older "alt" weekly in town. Or is it just that all of this discussion is aimed at insiders who already know all the players in the game? In fact, as a relative newcomer, that's something I'd like to see in one of these online publications, "alt" or "mainstream" -- Links to background profiles of each public official or city contractor quoted in the stories. Perhaps keeping such a database up to date is too much to ask, but this is a city with a lot of population turnover, and it's easy to feel left out of the game without a program. On the other hand, I don't even have time to read all the things I've linked to here. Hmm. Maybe we can get all the media, political and business leaders to do the job for us... by signing into Facebook. Heh. 11:02:18 PM    comment []

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