1. Toward A Free Press: An Online Publisher’s Toolkit

2. Why we do it? “Quit counting fans, followers and blog subscribers like bottle caps. Think, instead, about what you’re hoping to achieve with and through the community that actually cares about what you’re doing.” Amber Naslund, Social Media Today

3. Why do we do it … again? Intent – What is your intention with an online news site? What am I interested in? What do I love talking about? Need to balance intention against financial viability

4. Who the $#%$ are you? Christopher Spencer: Born in El Dorado, lives in Fayetteville A journalist since 1998 Worked for the El Dorado News Times, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and The Morning News of Northwest Arkansas Publisher of Ozarks Unbound (June 2009), The Food File.com (April 2010) and Ballotbucks.org (April 2010) 500 to 700 hits a day 75 to 100 hits a day

5. My intent Love politics and love covering creative folks – Ozarks Unbound [Broad group, but affluent – lower financial viability] Holding politicians accountable – Ballotbucks.org [Very focused niche group – high financial viability] Love food, eating, watching people make food – The Food File [Medium focused group, but trendy now – reasonable financial viability]

6. State of Hyperlocals Block By Block: Community News Summit 2010 Sept. 23 – 24. #bxb2010 Patch, American Towns, Everyblock – Larger scale attempts to get in the game Local efforts: Ozarks Unbound, Fayetteville Flyer, Arkansas Blog (Arkansas Times), Argenta Times (defunct), The City Wire (Fort Smith), First Arkansas News, Monticello Live, Newport Independent, Washington County Observer

7. The Internet – No. 3 with a bullet Source: Pew Research Center

8. Low cost means lots of competitors Less about flash and bang and more about endurance Need to make viewing your site part of their daily routine. Been in the game for more than one year and seen several sites emerge and flame out.

9. My tools – The Heavy Lifters Server account - $15 a month with Fused Networks 30 Gigs bandwidth and 3 Gigs disk space. Need a free ftp program (i.e. Filezilla)

10. My tools – The Heavy Lifters WordPress (The central wheel) An amazing Content Management System: Free and Priceless 36 active plugins right now making my site do what it does. All are free.

11. My tools – The Heavy Lifters Open Office (Equivalent to Microsoft Word) I write in WordPress but Open Office is great free software for word processing

12. My tools – The Heavy Lifters Gimp (Equivalent to Adobe Photoshop) Use it daily to process, retouch and remix images Ethics on images – Be sure you follow copyright on the images. Google images, istockphoto

13. My tools – The Heavy Lifters Google Reader (Equivalent to AP Wire) My personalized wire service. An area on my site dedicated to headlines from other sites, called Clipped Fresh

14. Secondary Tools - Occasionals Audacity (Equivalent to Garage Band) For audio remixing. Use it about once a month to remix interviews or sound I gather

15. Secondary Tools - Occasionals Inkscape (Equivalent to Adobe Illustrator) For vector-based graphics – creating a square or other design

16. Secondary Tools - Occasionals Scribus (Equivalent to Adobe Indesign) For document layout, print layout

17. Secondary Tools - Occasionals Cyberlink Director ($70) For editing video. Do use this often, but only superficial features

18. Social tools – Bring the Party Flickr, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube Perfect for pushing out content – headlines and interacting with readers, bringing new people to the site through organic searches

19. Actual Tools – The Hardware Still camera/video camera, voice recorder, tripod, iphone, press pass, business cards

20. Final Cost -$570 and hours of investment in your community Price Tag A laptop $70 – Cyberdirector $200 – Camera $200 – iphone $40 – Voice recorder $15 – Tripod $10 – Name with lanyard $35 – business cards $570 - Total

21. The Revolution? Who is ready to give the Jonesboro Sun the first competition they’ve felt in 50 years? Let’s plot our media domination together Any Questions?