Out of kindly regard and neighborly respect, we turn our attention briefly to Jim Newberry’s new media empire. About an hour ago, they bombed Facebook with a shock and awe-like attack of updates.
The internet is difficult to use and takes some time to understand, especially when you’re just getting started.
As such, we’ll refer Jim Newberry’s coal-powered staff to a couple of Facebook Pages “Best Practices” guides… there’s the official Facebook guide (PDF) and there’s also this one on scribd which reads, right up front:
Status Updates Status updates are the bread and butter of Facebook Pages. They are your primary source of communication and through likes and comments the primary source of interaction by your fans. Here are some tips for getting the most out of your updates:
• Update Frequently – But not too frequently – You want to find that happy medium where your fans are engaged but not turned off. Your updates will appear in your fans’ home feeds, so you should provide content that will be of interest to them. You want your page to be active, since it in turn reflects on the activity of your organization, but you don’t want to appear spammy.
We really want you guys to succeed but we fear the community’s patience runs out before the coal money does if you keep that up. So take this as some helpful and constructive criticism.
Also, for those of you who aren’t reading their site (and how can you not be? That’s where everyone’s getting their news now), you missed a stirring defense of Beshear’s Obama Snub, a CentrePointeless essay from Harold Tate, and all of the college baseball news you could ever want (covered no where else, thus fulfilling their mission by filling a void).
There was also a new “lexplained” (about the garbage truck drivers and LFUCG investigating comments made about them) which didn’t quite fulfill their mission as it came a couple days after the Herald-Leader explained basically the same thing.
We hope Jim Newberry’s new media empire continues its exponential growth and that it hones its best practices going forward.
After months of debate, recriminations and even a court fight, a string of historic buildings on West Main Street known as Whiskey Row has been saved from the wrecking ball — fittingly, perhaps, by people with ties to Louisville’s bourbon industry.
An investment group that is headed by developers Steve Wilson and Laura Lee Brown and includes the Brown Forman Corp., has agreed to pay $4.85 million to acquire preserve five of the seven buildings that had been slated for demolition in the 100 block of West Main.
Laura Lee Brown is a member of the Brown family that controls the distillery company.
The deal also allows developer Todd Blue, whose company currently owns the buildings, to demolish the two easternmost buildings, though the Main Street facades of those two structures also will be preserved.
“These architectural treasures, once the center of Louisville’s historic bourbon industry, are now saved for future generations,” Mayor Greg Fischer said at a news conference Monday on Main Street across from the buildings. “This is a very good day for our city — and a very good day for Louisville’s historic fabric.”
Nothing of consequence!
But seriously… awesome deal and lovely move by the Brown family.
–WRITTEN BY MEDIA CZECH, rescued from the great Blogger rapture of May 12th, 2011.
Jim Newberry’s new Digital Media Empire to Crush the Souls of the Unbelievers is off to a wildly successful start, as it has become the go-to online destination for Lexingtonians to catch up on college baseball and horses that won a race ten years ago. We mentioned this Monday, but I think KY Forward’s “civility pledge” deserves another look:
The KyForward team is committed to developing a Civil Discourse pledge for ourselves and reader-responders to our website. We recognize the importance of changing the tone of the conversation around public issues and believe that solutions can only be advanced when all voices are respectfully heard so that workable compromises can be forged in a free society. We understand that the compelling issues we face today have no easy fixes, but that a democracy requires “common views of common” people and thoughtful dialogue is the best way to find the common ground.
Here is an example of a pledge developed by the Arizona Humanities Council that we think covers the principles we would want to embrace.
“I pledge to engage in the basic principles of civil discourse: to respect diverse points of view, listen with an open mind and speak with integrity. I call upon all civic leaders to meet the challenge of solving difficult social issues by adhering to these principles, thereby creating a better world for ourselves and future generations.”
— Arizona Humanities Council
What should our Civil Discourse pledge say? How would you write it? What kind of pledge would you like to sign – and would encourage others to sign?
For now, let’s look beyond the odd Arizona reference or the familiar KY Forward call for other people to do their work for them. Civil discourse, changing the tone, respect, thoughtful dialogue… heck yeah that sounds great!
But it kind of reminded me of an email that Jim Newberry sent out to his supporters just before he was unceremoniously fired by the citizens of Lexington in his blowout loss last November. You may remember these excerpts from this oldie but goodie:
Subject: Liar
*****
Let me be clear: Jim Gray is a liar, pure and simple.
*****
Jim Gray is like a spoiled child…
*****
Jim Gray stands alone … a liar … delusional … debasing himself…
*****
Jim Gray is a liar.
Civil discourse, FTW!
I wonder what Ernesto Scorsone thinks about Jim Newberry’s commitment to civil discourse?
Oh, that’s just crazy talk. KY Forward is possibly the most important thing ever, the beginning of a great and powerful empire that will launch Jim Newberry back into relevance and power. No lie. Or delusional debasing, we swear.
Anyone who suggests that Jim Newberry and his deep pocketed coal baron buddies aren’t out to get the Herald-Leader is, well, as far as we can tell, probably working for Jim Newberry and KYForward.
So what would already be terrible news is now also unfortunately timed news:
The Herald-Leader announced more cuts to its work force Monday. Publisher Timothy M. Kelly said the newspaper’s revenue trends “remain negative year-over-year. … As a result, we must continue to look for ways to offset shortfalls by managing expenses.”
The company will eliminate 15 positions, including four that are vacant. According to Kelly, voluntary severance options will be offered in some work groups; others will be involuntary. The affected employees and work groups, which are in the newspaper’s advertising, news and operations divisions, were notified Monday.
It’s a damn shame.
And its downright sad that Newberry has created this KYForward outfit to attack the local paper as though it wasn’t a true treasure.
Better source of news? The man is literally unbelievable.
So our thoughts go out to the folks at the Herald-Leader.
And our congrats, once again, go out to our new neighbors at KYForward.com. Apparently doing the bidding of King Coal really was the smartest way to go.
Victory on this day goes to Newberry, Clabes and all the opposite tenets of good journalism.
Lexington’s New Media Overlord of Vengence, Jim Newberry, is now well on his way to putting his digital bootheel on the throats of the doomed Herald Leader and Jim Gray. After the massively successful launch of kyforward.com yesterday, Jim Newberry couldn’t help but strut. As his pal Ashton Kutcher once said, the revolution will be tweeted, and that’s exactly what media revolutionary Jim Newberry did:
“Lex news with attitude”! Can I get a “what what”, Jimbo?
See, yesterday’s Kutcher video made me suspect this, but now it’s official. Jim Newberry is Poochie:
Sure, we can talk about the foreshadowing of his redemptive slaying of the Herald Leader (“a better source of news”) and Mayor Jim Gray (“Articles not always positive, but always constructive.”), but I’m having way too much fun acknowledging the fact that the man who cheered on the destruction of my block has become Poochie the Dog.
If you can find this video somewhere, you are a saint:
Executive: We at the network want a dog with attitude. He’s edgy, he’s in your face. You’ve heard the expression “let’s get busy”? Well, this is a dog who gets biz-zay! Consistently and thoroughly.
Krusty the Clown: So he’s proactive, huh?
Executive: Oh, God, yes. We’re talking about a totally outrageous paradigm.
Meyers: Excuse me, but proactive and paradigm? Aren’t these just buzzwords that dumb people use to sound important? Not that I’m accusing you of anything like that. I’m fired, aren’t I?
Executive: Oh, yes.
(“The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie Show.” The Simpsons, 1997)
Note to the staff at KY Forward. If you want to keep your job, don’t you DARE say that to Newberry. He’s a thin-skinned New Media Overlord of Vengeance, after all.
Schankula and I stopped updating perhaps the longest post in B&P’s history yesterday because Jim Newberry’s New Digital Empire of Ashton kept crashing, as well as crashing the router of all 20 people going there.
But it appears to be up for the time being, so… I think we’re just going to keep updating it today, if you’re into that type of thing.
In the meantime, BOW TO LORD KUTCHER!
P.S.- Here’s how they plan on not paying the 14 white folk on their staff. Check out these advertising rates:
Warts and broken images and all. And even a tired reference to sausage factories. Anyway… we’re only just starting to click through, but join us, won’t you, dear e-reader? In fact, you can leave comments to express your opinions and thoughts on this great new “online” development in our “comments” section below which allows you, the reader, to communicate with us, the writers because in this new age of digtal ones and zeros, we can turn the “traditional” news “relationship” into a real “conversation,” a sort of, shall we say, overt community.
Enjoy!
***UPDATES*** The Editor’s Welcome A few things here. First off, from everything we’ve read and heard about Ms. Clabes, she’s a dedicated journalist, a good person. So, we’re pretty sure she’s coming at this project with genuine intentions.
When you first visit the page, you get a welcome message from her. It’s sprinkled with buzzwords but makes a few points.
“We won’t do what others do enough of.”
Fair enough, but it’s never quite clear what others do enough of that they won’t be doing, or what’s left over after that. Like… if you want local news, there’s the Herald-Leader. If you want murders and car crashes and the weather, there’s the TV stations. If you want basketball, there’s Kentucky Sports Radio. If you want local contemplations there’s ACE and North of Center and Progress Lex and a bunch of blogs like the Streetsweeper and the Pigs in the Parlor and so forth. If you want politics… well… what’s wrong with you? Why do you want politics? And if you want drunk people with lots of money dressed up at parties, there’s Tops in Lex. And if you want horses, there’s Blood Horse… and so on. So it goes. What’s left? What will KYFORWARD.com do?
“We will not allow anonymous posts, and we’ll ask everyone to consider our Civil Discourse pledge.”
Okay. We’ll consider it.
“Our business model requires advertising and sponsorships.”
The most fascinating part! Obviously that rift between total Coal-powered editorial control and actual journalism put a kink in their original plans, as reported, and may well account for the delayed launch. So now there is advertising? Where is it? And what are the rates? Or is coal really still keeping the KYForward on?
All good stuff here. Race, gender, good stories well told.
Starts off with:
Honesty, integrity and respect in all we do
Ethical behavior in all aspects of our lives
Honesty. Integrity. Ethical Behavior.
That just returns us to that original question… who’s paying for this project that fills the void-less voids of Lexington?
*CONNECTIVITY* Well… someone forgot to bring the power cord to the coffee shop and this computer sure isn’t powered by wind or the sun, which actually turns out to be prefect timing because…
KYForward is dead. Apparently 5s of people all loading their site occassionally over the past 20 minutes proved too much for their servers and they’ve crashed. Or… they pulled it because they forgot to put the advertisments on each page. (Really… I didn’t see a single advertisement. If coal keeps the lights on… who’s paying the electricity bill over on S. Broadway?)
So… since neither I nor KYForward have any power, just watch their video again. It’s very local. Full of local content. Lots of local people doing local things with local stories and local flavor.
UPDATE #4,978: Schankula and his dead computer have left, but Media Czech is here to bring you the rest.
The site is back up (THANK GOD), so let us continue.
The front of the site continues the “Local Local Local!” focus of the site, as you learn the fastest Derby time in history and learn about a girl from Texas who attended the Derby this year. They also ask us what makes Lexington special, because I guess they wanted to know.
UPDATE #13,987: In the “Downtowns” section, we get this message:
On this section front, we’ll focus on downtown Lexington, the heartbeat of the region, as well as the other downtowns throughout – quaint, vital, full of character and heritage. Downtowns define a place, giving us a sense of place and identity. We’ll look at downtown living, the downtown business community, the downtown opportunities for dining out, entertainment and arts and culture.
What do you want to know about our Downtowns?
I already know about downtown Lexington. Why do you want me to do your work for you?
UPDATE #29,784: WHO WE ARE!
Are you ready to meet their GIANT COLOSSAL staff that must cost tons and tons of mysterious money to pay? Jim Newberry, it’s time for your close up!
Judith G. Clabes, Publisher and President
Jim Newberry, Chair:
Jim is a Hiseville native whose early interest in politics and public affairs led him to a political science degree from the University of Kentucky where he was student body president. He graduated from the University of Kentucky College of Law and became an executive officer in the office of the Lt. Governor before establishing his own law firm in Lexington. He then became a senior partner with Wyatt, Tarrant & Combs. He served as Mayor of Lexington where he emphasized the future of Lexington’s economy – horses, health care and high tech. As a private citizen, he has been and is engaged in many community and statewide service activities. He is currently serving as Executive-in-Residence for Economic Development with the UK College of Agriculture and as a principal in Limestone Partners LLC, a private equity firm. He is a co-founder of KyForward.
Scott Lowery, V.P., Business Development and Advertising Joseph A. Clabes, V.P. external affairs; founder Track Kitchen Mark Boxley, Executive Producer Gene Clabes, Senior Editor Emily Hagedorn, Asst. Executive Producer/Reporter Jon Hale, Sports Reporter Ben Cannon, Reporter and Producer Amanda Duckworth, Equine Reporter Jill Seelmeyer, Reporter Megan Tritschler, Office Manager Cyndi Goyer Greathouse, Account Executive Debbi Morris, Frugal ForumDebbi Morris, Frugal Forum
What, they don’t list their funder who’s bankrolling all of this? What an odd omission, isn’t it?
UPDATE #37,093: Now, for those of you counting, that’s:
14 staffers.
14 white people.
Now that’s community!
UPDATE # 41,094: It crashed again. It’s been crashing for everyone. Be patient! It’s worth the wait, no?!
UPDATE #x(y) * 10 to the 26th Coal Power Joe’s doing writing about a real issue now, so allow me to continue the glance through. Why make multiple posts when we can put all in one place?
One thing that strikes us and most everyone we’ve heard from is the design and content. It goes without saying so I won’t…
…except to say that the putting aside the blogger templates that festoon Ace and this site and several other pre-existing outlets that cover local news and views, the KYForward site is lacking in layout. To be fair to WebMedley, it seems like they’ve done some good work in the past (we enjoy their skinning of BP’s twitter feed — we probably would’ve put an image of millions of gallons of oil spurting into the sea) and who’s going to argue with Calipari’s site? Love the guy. But KYForward unleases a website that looks cutting edge if it was 2003. Whether it’s ProgressLex or North of Center or the old ACE site or even the local TV affiliates, this site is confusing. And it literally provides more questions than answers.
As Allison pointed out…
his “open letter” from the editor (there’s one for every category) seems like it wasn’t fully fleshed out. The last question reads as if the writer wanted to say more, but didn’t know how to express it.
“Open Letter from Judith Clabes, Editor & Publisher editor@kyforward.com
Our schools – at all levels – are important institutions, crucial to the survival of democracy. How do we understand our educational system better, how do we achieve excellence, how do we assure a brighter future for all children.
How can we help explain all this to our readers?”
See what I mean?
Indeed.
And I’d link to that page or any of the pages but alas… KYForward.com is still non-functioning. Somebody blow up a mountain and get that site up again!
UPDATE on the Staff Site’s still down but somebody still has a couple tabs open! So there. This internet thing is tricky.
As Joe noted above, KYForward has some real heavy hitters, least of all Mr. No Consequence Newberry.
Also, as noted above, their values include “honesty and integrity” and they will not accept anonymity.
Except that no where on the site (as far as we’ve been able to load the durn thing) is it stated who is funding this mess.
Apparently anonymity is acceptable for the moneybags behind that bloated staff.
Also overlooked… hiring family members. There’s three Clabes on staff. Nothing wrong with that really, they all seem qualified. But odd. When do the Schankulas get their big payout? That’s what I want to know. Or, heaven forbid, the Sonkas. That would be downright dangerous.
And while we haven’t gone through the entire list with a diamond-cut comb (or, well, a highly compacted coal comb), one name certainly jumped out: Megan Tritschler.
Maybe it’s a different Tritschler but it’s worth noting, given KYForward’s apparent Big Coal Funding, that there’s a Ronald Tritschler here in town who works as an attorney for the Webb Companies (they of the failed CentrePointe project, the failed Victorian Square and Festival Market complexes, the brilliant Lexington Green business deal, and the failed World Coal skyscraper… aka, Phoenix Park).
Mr. Tritschler was previously renowned here on this site as being the first of the Webb cavalcade to donate to the Jim Newberry Mayoral machine… and he maxed out to the cause while serveral other Tritschlers (though not a Megan) also tossed Newberry some serious coin. That can all be read about here.
On a personal note, though, Megan’s beat and background does sound interesting and we hope all is better on that front. Both Joe and I have been there.
UPDATE #How long is this thing? That anonymity thing. Again.
They don’t allow anonymity. But they do. Witness their “FixThis” section.
KyForward’s “Citizen Ombudsman” will be your advocate with governmental agencies, corporate and utility bureaucracies, and others when appropriate public interests fail to respond to public needs, whether an individual’s, a neighborhood’s or a whole community’s.
Can’t get a pothole fixed?
An eyesore cleaned up?
Contact: fixthis@kyforward.com
But wait… who is the “Citizen Ombudsman” and why don’t we know their name?
Do they not really work for us?
Are we not the citizens? Shouldn’t the citizens know who their ombudsman is?
And more to the point… we can’t think of a single eyesore in Lexington that needs cleaning up. Nope. Not a single one. Drawing a complete blank.
Nope. We got nothing. Our anonymous “Citizen Ombudsman” has a pretty easy job.
Also… we’re pretty sure that “FixThis” doesn’t actually provide a new service that no one else in Lexington already has covered.
It’s called “311,” kids. I used it once to fix a broken sidewalk on Euclid after watching a stranger (no, he wasn’t drunk) fall and slash his elbow. Called 311, thing was fixed the next day. Crazy.
An eyesore. That’s going to keep us up at night.
UPDATE #What, you’re still reading? Okay.
Either KYForward has totally crashed or somebody over there pulled the plug.
We’re not sure and, well, we have other things to do, so… for now we’ll stop.
We’ve emailed the FixThis guy or gal. We finally found an eyesore that they might be able to fix.
It’s called KYForward.com.
UPDATE: THE FIXTHIS GUY OR GAL REALLY WORKS! The site is back up on KYForward day 2! Our eyesore complaint worked. Sort of. Still an eyesore, but now a functional one… like the equivalent of turning a fenced off empty and wasted block downtown into a not fenced off empty and wasted block. Like a park. Like a really boring park.
So KYForward is back and so are we. Let’s continue.
Advertising!
The site and their 14 staffers aren’t paid for by Coal Industry Bigwigs… it’s all being paid for with advertising!
Advertising!
So let’s look at the advertising on this amazing new source for local… what would you say they should be a local source for?
As Joe pointed out, you can give the KYForward ad rate card a gander to decide where you want your ad and how much it will cost you for two views per day or whatever their average is going to zero out at.
And then on the site there are these hilarious advertisements advertising advertising space on KYForward and your ability to buy the space and advertise there because their advertising works so well that you clicked on their advertisement encouraging you to advertise so what’re the chances that when you buy advertising space in the space where you clicked their advertisement about advertising that other people will click your advertising picture and buy whatever you are selling.
You see… KYForward is powered by advertising, not by mysterious multi-millionaire coal barons.
Get it?
KYForward has the word ‘forward’ in it and by moving your business ‘forward’ you are making money. Forward… that means good, growth, benjamins.
This one’s our fave. “Advertise where people now get their daily news. Here.”
Somebody call a lawyer cause that right there is what they call “False Advertising.”
And it’s false on two counts.
First of all… no one is getting their news at KYForward.com.
Second of all… we’re not sure there’s actually any news at KYForward.com.
But enough of the advertising advertisements… let’s look at who’s already jumped on the KYForward juggernaut with big massive ad buys to keep this upstart “internet startup company” (to coin a phrase?) afloat and it’s bloated staff paid…
Oh. HorseAidLive. They bought an ad. That’s awesome. Good cause. Who knew horses could play guitar?
But wait. Hold the phone!
It looks like Horse Aid Live isn’t actually really advertising on KYForward… they’re actually getting free ad space (subsidized by King Coal!)… either that or Ms. Clabes is paying her self because Horse Aid Live is run by Judith Clabes… the same Judith Clabes who serves as the non-Newberry honcho of KYForward. Look it up.
On top of that, both KYForward and Horse Aid Live share the same Ms. Greathouse — employee for Clabes at KYForward, board member of Horse Aid Live.
So… I’m sure that was a tough ad sale. A lot of dealmaking involved.
Any other ads on the site? Oh… there’s this one!
Well that’s great.
We like philanthropy. We like the public good. That’s a great initiative. And it’s cool that KPI bought some big time ad space on KYForward.com, the place where everyone is now getting all of their news.
I mean, we’ve been giving them a hard time but… what? What’s that?
Oh you’ve got to be kidding.
The Kentucky Philanthropy Initiative is another Judith Clabes operation! Look it up.
So… all of the advertising on KYForward.com — which Judith will remind you immediately upon arriving at the site is THE ONLY WAY THEY PAY THEIR BILLS — is actually just incestuous in-kind ad-buys by Clabes own other organizations.
That’s just sad.
UPDATE: Newberry’s Coal-Powered Army Marches On… We thought about just starting a wiki to detail the glorious insanity of KYForward.com, but why bother. Maybe if King Coal cut us a big check, we’d do it. Anyone? Anyone? Newberry?
But, yes, KYForward.com is all about local news! Let’s look at the local news.
In the Non-Profit Connect section, KYF aims to “connect” their scores of readers (this is where everyone’s getting their news now, right? The who’s who, what’s new, what to… oh, wait… that’s that other website) with worthy local non-profits. Great idea, heart in the right place, but let’s see what they’ve chosen to highlight…
HORSE AID LIVE Needs a filing cabinet for the office Contact Cyndi Greathouse, Executive Director, at cgreathouse@houseaidlive.org
Well doesn’t that look familiar! So Cyndi Greathouse, the shared employee of both Clabes’ Horse Aid Live and Clabes’ KYForward has self-selected this as the first local non-profit to highlight.
What we don’t understand, though, is how Horse Aid Live has money to buy advertising at top rates on Jim Newberry’s totally not Coal funded KYForward.com… but can’t rub two coins together to get a filing cabinet. Bit odd.
That said, since we’re connecting people to non-profits, in the spirit of cooperation, let me direct anyone with $25 and a desire to help to Craigslist here or here. It’ll cost you less than buying an ad on KYForward.com. And it’ll be for a better cause.
Moving on. Where’s the other local stuff?
There’s a very sweet (and positive, as is their mission) story about a girl from Texas going to a horse race in Louisville. Finely written, good story, but… not exactly local, right?
There’s a very long story about a radio announcer for horse racing. It seems interesting enough. Didn’t read the whole thing cause, well, it’s really long. But these kids can write. It’s not their fault where they’re writing. And this one is at least local (radio announcer moves to Lexington… scroll down.)
Over in the “Debbi’s Daily Deals” section (which doesn’t appear to be “daily” yet), we find helpful links to deals at local businesses like GNC, Walgreens, and Kroger. And if you “like” Swiffer’s facebook page, you might get a free swiffer (and maybe you can help Swiffer clean their kitchen in Frontierville).
In the town-and-gown coverage, there’s a brief but incredibly helpful for, I think we can all agree, damn near everyone in Lexington article on how to join a University board. Perhaps they’ll follow it up with how to get a plum position at the college of Agriculture. (And credit where it’s due, this one is indeed local.)
In the “Faith And Values” section, they’ve got some socialist blame-America first propaganda on allowing illegals and anchor babies to destroy the fabric of our Republic that would make B&P blush. And it’s local. Best thing on the site!
There’s also a nice column from Rabbi Marc Kline, reminding us to love our neighbors and to love strangers. And he’s right. Even though Jim Newberry argued that homosexuality should still be illegal, and even though King Coal sucks money out of communities and destroys the environment, we still love them, and we love KYForward, our internet neighbors. Without them, we would be nothing. Or maybe not nothing, but at least very quiet. Kline is local, so this one checks out! Local!
Which makes us think. Is this like one of those “hyperlocal” sites the j-school brains and twitterheads are always talking about? Hyperlocal. Like really, really local? You know. Like hyper local. To the extreme!
And finally, there’s the government section. Here we find an exclusive interview with Mayor Jim Gray and LEXplained… which aims to fulfill, we gather, KYForward’s mission to deliver the news that no one else delivers — here the police and fire pension is “lexplained.”
It’s actually not a bad read. Again, we’re struck that a lot of the writers here are obviously good and talented people who can’t be blamed for their new bosses misguided attempt to attack the Herald-Leader on behalf of agenda-driven millionaire backers. The article goes on for a long time and maybe could have been shorter (if only to keep the “e-reader” from scrolling into KYForward website design emptiness), and technically… the Herald-Leader’s done a pretty good job of explaining this issue already (and I’ll assume that KYForward never uses the HL as a source for information whilest writing their articles, right?).
Annnnnd… that’s all. We’re all localed out. It feels like we’ve been lost in a localsplosion of localmation. We’ve met so many local people, seen so many local sites. And all of it filling a void where no one knew anything existed.
Or is it a black hole? Is that where we’ve been?
Is that what KYForward.com really is? A region of the internet where not even light can escape, and all are sucked in?
Trying to tap into the spontaneity of Twitter and Facebook, Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the House, will announce his campaign for the Republican nomination for president on Wednesday by way of the two popular social networking sites, his spokesman, Rick Tyler, said in a Twitter post on Monday.
Just like Jim Newberry, Newt Gingrich is totally jumping into this Web 2.0, twatter and MyFace stuff that the kids are into, and like totally elected Barack Obama and toppled the dictator in that one Muslinist country.
Even though the launch of Jim Newberry’s new digital media empire has been delayed 9 days due to King Coal Baron Joe Craft having cold feet about bankrolling it, they’ve now officially thrown the first punch at their “competition”, the Herald Leader.
Behold… whatever the hell you call this:
I… I don’t even know what to say. Jim Newberry has rendered me speechless with this impressive display of “locally owned” social media prowess and Ashton Kutcher. And it only took them three months to put this video together!
What happened to former Lexington mayor Jim Newberry’s new digital media empire of vanquishing enemies, KYForward.com? It was supposed to launch this week, but is still pointing to a GoDaddy page.
Well, the word on the street is as follows. As we speculated, we hear that King Coal Baron Joe Craft was indeed the deep pocket funding it, but he is now having second thoughts. Just like his display in the Kentucky Coal Lodge, Craft wanted total veto power of KY Forward’s content. This revelation apparently didn’t sit well with a certain non-Newberry contingent of the Newberry Empire, and now they might be going back to the drawing board.
And believe me, if there is no deep pocket funding their website and really large staff, there’s no way that KY Forward can work.
We’ll update you if we get more information confirming this one way or the other. But in the meantime, some of you might want to make arrangements for some kind of Newberry Schadenfreude Party.
UPDATE: Now the word from the KYForward crowd is that it will launch “later today”. The plot thickens!
SHE WON'T GO!
KentuckyElection.org
BONNIE PRINCE BILLY
