FREE DAILY PAPER BUILT WITH BLOGS STARTS IN BOSTON

Read here [1] about a novel newspaper concept.  Called BOSTON NOW, it will be a free paper which gets its content from local bloggers.  Circulation will start at 150,000.  Bloggers will not be paid to start – but will get their material out to a larger audience than just their blog might hit. Eventually – in six months or so – the publisher intends to begin to pay blog contributors in some manner.   The paper will carry full stories or snips of the blogs, with the idea being that if a particular blog topic grabs you, you can later go on line and read the entire article.

How do you think this idea would work in Cleveland?  What if BrewedFreshDaily, Realneo, University Circle Blog, GCBL, CuyahogaCountyPlanning, NRA(just kidding - but it will be up to the editor), Port Authority and other blogs had a daily print presence?  For a very comprehensive list of local blogs go to Cleveland vs The World [2] and check out the blogroll on the RH column.   Taking topics from the blogs on this list and printing them daily would make a pretty interesting read.  Think enough people would pick up a free paper to generate enough ad revenue to pay for the printing of the paper with a little money left over to pay staff, etc?

The print concept does provide a means for distributing web content to those on the other side of the digital divide – and the idea also attempts to maximize the efficacy of the human effort which goes into blogs   by taking material that is already written – and distributing it to more people.  What’s wrong with that?

This free paper idea will work better in Boston  (if it works at all- there are many with  reservations)  than it would in Cleveland because there are more public transportation riders in Boston than in Cleveland - the free paper give-a-way is concentrated around  bus and subway stops and coffee stores.  People need to get out of their cars – before they get to work – to pick up a free paper.