Dayhoff Soundtrack: AOL’s Patch, a national chain of news websites, comes to the Baltimore ‘burbs

Sunday, October 17, 2010

AOL’s Patch, a national chain of news websites, comes to the Baltimore ‘burbs

Will mass-producing community journalism like Big Macs slay it or save it? (A two-part Baltimore Brew special report.)

http://www.baltimorebrew.com/2010/10/13/18247/

Jason Policastro October 13, 2010 at 8:32 am Story Link 8 Comments and 16 Reactions

AOL is sinking nearly $50 million into Patch, a network of local news websites, including some in Baltimore suburbs.

Baltimore is used to having out-of-town companies gobble up its home-grown news operations. The ranks of the once- independent-and family-owned that are now media properties include The Baltimore Sun(Chicago-based Tribune Co.) and WJZ-TV (one of 28 stations owned by CBS Corp.)

But the latest deep-pocketed corporate ‘playa to muscle into the Baltimore media market, AOL, is taking a different approach. Rather than acquiring an existing entity, they’re quietly building online news operations from the ground up, in Towson and in two dozen other suburban Maryland communities. What they’re creating they callPatch.com, a national network of “hyperlocal” news sites aiming to fill the prodigious news holes created by shrinking traditional media.

In addition to TowsonPatch, there’s a Lutherville/TimoniumPatch andEllicottCityPatch, among the Maryland sites either scheduled or already publishing. Patches have also sprouted in affluent communities in New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut and New Jersey and a growing list of other states...

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Utopia? Dystopia?

Bryan Sears is the immediate past president of the Maryland Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists, and a well-known local political reporter in the Greater Baltimore area.

At points in a discussion about Patch, Sears seemed excited by the idea that a ripple effect from the chain’s rapid expansion could actually benefit journalists in search of jobs.

“There are media companies taking this very seriously. What happens if they [Patch] ramp up and put a lot of reporters in the area, and The [Baltimore] Sun or [Washington] Post decides it needs to respond in kind?” Sears said. “All of a sudden you’ve got yourself a 21st century newspaper war.”

At other moments, he has a reporter’s skepticism that Patch, or any company, has figured out a cure for what’s afflicting America’s Fourth Estate.

“There are two questions as I see it. One, it’s AOL, the same company that had Bebo, the social networking site that no one ever heard of. Have they learned from that?” Sears said. “Two, do they have some magic ju-ju that makes these Patch sites work that the others didn’t?”

In the end, Sears said, he welcomes the arrival of the Patch sites, even though they technically compete for readers with his paper.

“I’m excited about journalists getting good jobs and enjoying the work they’re doing,” he said, “and I refuse to believe that having more reporters on the beat is anything but good for the public.”

And, he added, “I plan on beating them as often as I can.”

[...]

http://www.baltimorebrew.com/2010/10/13/18247/

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