buzz buzz

This KC Buzz blog is getting really good. Especially the posts by DeAnn Smith. These dishy, inside-baseball tidbits are exactly what I'd hope to see in a newspaper blog. Hell, it's what I hope to read in the paper, but almost never do.

DeAnn is sort of a polite acquantiance of mine, though there was a time when we just plain didn't like each other. She was my main competition on the KC School District beat when I wrote for the Pitch. She's a tenacious reporter (she won an IRE before she came to KC, which is a HUGE deal). I scooped her a couple of times, but only once did I dig up info that she didn't know about (Elma's lawyer). She knew pretty much everything, but for one reason or another she couldn't get everything into the paper. With this blog, though, it looks as though she'll have an outlet just report and report and report. I hope the other contributors step up with the same moxie.

And if any of you at Der Buzz are reading this, especially Keith Chrostowski, can I risk appearing arrogant and offer a suggestion?

The thing about blogs is that it's a community. We read one another's stuff and we link back and forth. I think it's cool that you're linking to these various polls and stuff. But when a local blogger steps up with something really solid -- like Tony Kansas City's interview with Mark Forsyth today, or his killer immigration editorial yesterday -- you'd be well served to give a nod to it. This is something the they did at the best newspaper blog I've ever read -- Philly Daily News's Attytood (it appears to have disappeared from the 'net) -- did quite often, to great effect, IMO.

I know my opinion plus a buck will buy you a small coffee at Broadway Cafe. But what about Rupert Murdoch? Regardless of how you might feel about the journalism his companies produce you have to concede that he knows how too make money on information in the rapidly changing info age. He recently told a conflab of newspaper editors that the audience of the future is resistent to detached news sources, the God's-eye-view persona of the old newspaper. What he seems to be saying is, "Get out there and mingle with your audience."

I guess what I'm saying is, if you really want to be a part of the local blogosphere, this community, our community, you really ought to do as we do: join the party, share the love.

Just my two cents. I hope you don't take offense. I'm really digging the blog.