Henri Gendreau (left) of The Rambler and Dwayne Yancey
 of Cardinal Press at Dwayne's retirement gig.

A Step Forward for the Region's Journalism

 It strikes me today as Cardinal Press announces its new publication in this region that we've come a hell of a long way from the time 57 years ago when I first sat at a typewriter in the sports department of the Asheville Citizen.

The evolution has gone something like this: lead (hot type), to paper (cold type), to digital-plus, to digital only, to non-profit.

The two new publications announced this week--Cardinal and The Rambler--will be all digital and they will be structured completely differently from the newspaper, which inadvertently inspired them. 

Henri Gendreau's Roanoke Rambler is an investigative/literary weekly publication that is up and running. Cardinal Press was announced today as an internet-only alternative to the Roanoke Times, though it will not compete for ads. The publication has business support and is non-profit.

These types of publications are springing up all over the country and they are likely the future of journalism, a welcome evolution. It is considerably less expensive and environmentally sensitive to produce journalism on the internet only.

Print publications spend gazillions of dollars on printing and mailing or hand-delivering and neither of those will be an issue for the online-onlys. The issue will be staffing. Cardinal plans to begin with a full-time staff, small but experienced.

Both new publications say they will depend heavily on freelance writers in a market that is saturated with them (us, actually, since I'm a freelancer). The pay in this area ranges from nothing at all to about $500 for a feature story. Gendreau says his publication will pay $100 for news stories and fiction. Cardinal has not announced its pay schedule. 

One of the very real drawbacks to opening a new publication is paying writers. What are they worth? What will they cover? How much expertise do they bring? When and how will writers be paid? They are all questions to be answered, but so far both the new publications are heavy with former Times journalists, which is a good thing.

I want to sincerely welcome both new publications because every locality needs a brisk, competitive press. Roanoke is lagging without competition for its ever-shrinking daily newspaper, but this should pump up the volume a bit for everybody. It will also put some of The Times' journalists, who went for a decade without a pay increase under Warren Buffett's company, in a better position. My guess is that there are a lot of quiet smiles around The Times today.