Dishing with Blogger Daryl LaFleur

The Zoning Board of Appeals and the landfill lawsuit, regional waste management alternatives, Citizens United for a Healthy Future and sixties-activist Saul Alinsky, "Poisoning the Well"--should officials attempt to discredit citizens with whom they disagree?




kudos to independent journalists; happy father's day
the zba and the regional landfill, creative thinking about regional waste
planning board member "poisons the well"
Notre Dame Charrette

The Local Buzz in Chrysalis Mode--Saulmon Speaks

Greg Saulmon, editor of the Local Buzz, a free newspaper focusing upon politics, civic affairs, and the arts in western Massachusetts, was initially taken aback when his employer, Mass Publishing, an affiliate of the Springfield Republican, announced that the monthly print edition of the Buzz was being discontinued. The Local Buzz Blog would stay as a location on MassLive. Should buzz-meisters Saulmon, Bill Peters, and Josh Thayer be pounding the pavement in their daddies' wingtips? After sleeping on it and suffering the requisite dark night of the soul, Greg realized that he was was actually being granted an amazing opportunity.

When we spoke with Greg Saulmon on March 2, he had already submitted a proposal to the parent company for reinventing the Local Buzz as a cutting-edge, web-based publication. Details? Well, Greg isn't showing his hand right yet. But he suggested that exciting developments are afoot....

That subject being off the table, we proceeded to have a fantastic discussion about the changing face of journalism and what that might mean to the Pioneer Valley. With Bloggers such as The Northamptonist actually walking the beat, attending meetings, and working the community in real time, should the cubicle-based scribes at the dailies be worried? How can collaborative information-gathering deliver niche information to the community--such as, say, the locations of stores that sell live bait for fishing? Do newspapers really need to employ trained reporters to cover "ice cream socials," or can that type of reporting be off-loaded to the greater community, freeing up newsroom resources to cover hard news? Why are certain newspapers having such a hard time understanding that a website can be much, much more than a simple copy-and-paste from the print edition? Can social networking part the "Tofu Curtain" (AKA the Holyoke Range) that separates the upper valley from Holyoke and Springfield?

Well, Extra, Extra; Read All About It. Wanna Meet The Press? Listen in.

Use either these direct links to download or play in quicktime, or use the embedded flash player to listen directly from this webpage.

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Hey There Analog Bob-Meet the Press!

This just in from City Councilor Bob Reckman concerning the first meeting of the Best Practices Committee:

"The location of the initial meeting of the Ad Hoc Committee on Best Practices has been changed. The committee will meet in the BPW Board Room, which is located in the Department of Public Works at 125 Locust St., Northampton. The building is across Rt. 9 from Smith Vocational. We are trying to arrange for the meeting to be broadcast live or taped for later showing. We do not know yet if we will be successful. The public is cordially invited to attend."

Uhh, Bob, could we have a date and time? As for "taping" the proceedings...we hope you are succesful. But ya never know, one of them new-fangled digital documentarians might just choose to cover the event....