School is on! We can check to see how the various sports teams are doing. That's the reason for outstate towns having to continue with their schools, right? Sports? Not much of an exaggeration. I have been around sports emotions a lot in my life. I emailed a friend with a question this morning:
Does the new Morris paper come out today? I wonder if the Minnewaska football game will be in it, or if the holiday caused a printing plant complication. If the game isn't covered, the paper really ought to use its website to handle this, but it won't.
I got a prompt response:
A Morris paper came in the mail on Saturday, which puzzled me, but then with no mail yesterday I suppose they wanted it to get out. There was no mention of the MAHS/Waska game, but lots of coverage of Hancock sports.
Is it even worth the trouble to check the newspaper's website? If the 'Waska game cannot be covered in print this week, couldn't the newspaper be considerate enough of its community to slap some coverage on its website? I mean, their site is perfectly set up to handle this. Why not follow simple reasoning?
We see pieces on the editorial page all the time about how newspapers are so essential to our rural towns' vitality. For democracy. But one of our political parties - the Republicans - do not care about democracy. Our congressperson voted against certifying the 2020 election results.
But my primary thoughts here are about sports. Jim Morrison got weary of even dealing with sports issues. It's easy to develop that kind of attitude. But the Tigers had an exciting season-opening win on Thursday at Minnewaska, 40-20. Must have been lots of highlights. Wouldn't it be wonderful to see a reasonably thorough review with players' names on the paper's website? Just click on "sports" and the appropriate headline ought to greet you. Should be totally user-friendly. The newspaper can go on selling its print product.
I am sure that a full week from today, we will see the obligatory summary on the newspaper's pages. But that is ridiculously too late. Anyone disagree with me?
It's not as if the paper does not have this resource called a "website" with its sports link. I click on the link and what do I find? This is insulting to us all: it's all UMM Cougar stuff, as if these are the only teams we should care about. I shake my head. My attitude is formed mainly on the idea that UMM takes care of its own reporting and outreach on its own website. The coverage on UMM's website is as thorough and dynamic as you would want.
So heck, why do our local legacy media companies - newspaper and radio - feel they need to bend over backward for UMM? Let's give credit to Deb and Brett at the radio station for making a far superior effort with its website relative to the newspaper. The newspaper? I might suggest that some harsh words are called for.
I know of one former MAHS administrator who would be emotional over these issues. He would argue that for the paper not to have full coverage of Tuesday night games in Thursday's paper would be so unforgivable, something like the death penalty should be called for. Some of the critics including people in high-status professions could use foul language when assailing the paper and yours truly on such matters. This was when the paper published twice a week on Tuesday and Thursday.
Today it's once a week and the paper is typically smaller than it ever was when we were twice. We sort of sleepwalked through that adjustment as if we didn't really notice. But now? There's a holiday like Labor Day and everything just goes to hell?
I was hard-pressed up until today finding any media coverage of Tiger volleyball that had individual stats. Maybe the current paper has some. But the timeliness issue rears its head for all teams. I just don't think it's asking too much. I know, I know: the Anfinsons don't want to give "content" away.
The radio station has lately made us jump through hoops getting access to content on its site. You must realize that these legacy media businesses desperately try to keep systems going where they make money.
So the paper deprives us of MACA coverage on its website while inundating us with UMM Cougar coverage. Do you suppose they just take the Cougar coverage off the UMM site? I have been too lazy to confirm that. Whether they do or don't, all that Cougar coverage is not needed for the community's benefit. The UMM fans need only go to UMM's site to be satisfied fully. Which is wonderful. We want UMM and its constituents to be happy about everything.
What a shame the newspaper can't make the very simple effort of slapping a football game summary, a 40-20 win, on its website. The website is dormant, lifeless.
My friend Del Sarlette says he emailed Deb at the radio station about some of the new funky stuff on the radio station site, set up I'm sure to get a trickle of revenue for the station.
We are in the age of the world wide web, so we needn't be dependent on the legacy media businesses. They have a right to try to survive in the new economic climate. But the school sports constituents deserve to be served in the best way possible.
Change has been happening. We have had our eyes opened big-time by the "YouTube geniuses." Oh my. But more work remains to be done.
The people involved with the Morris paper would be incensed reading what I have to share today. Why?
- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com
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