by Mark Gardner
The Free Press
This issue marks the second anniversary of the founding of the Free Press. Since you're reading this it means that we've written and edited and pasted up this thing, finished the photo and art work, whisked it off to-and then out of-the printers, dropped it off at your favorite establishment or sent it winging your way through the mails, and have subsequently collapsed in an exhausted heap awaiting the next news lead. Putting the Free Press out is hard work but also a lot of fun. We're heartened by our success at keeping a small paper afloat here. In the two years we've been around, at least five other local monthly or semi-monthly publications have folded. Our survival is cause for celebration,and we invite you to join us for our second anniversary musical fund-raiser at the Re-bar on April 12 (details on p. 4).
Three things keep the Free Press going: a hardworking, dedicated staff; our advertisers; and our readers. What follows is a progress report to readers, donors, advertisers, and all of the generally great folks who support the paper. We'd also like to tell you where we're trying to take the paper, and encourage you to join us in improving it.
First, some words of thanks. We couldn't have made it this far without support from our readers, many of whom subscribe and donate. Subscriptions now account for about 20 percent of all income, not bad for a free paper. Donations account for another 20 percent.
We'd like to be able to depend on donations of real big bucks, but this runs up against one of those little paradoxes of modern life: people with lots of money usually only give it to those who don't need it. Ollie North or ex-LAPD Sergeant Stacey Koon can pull in millions, but we're dependent on support from those pretty much like us: overworked people of modest means who really could use an extra 15 or 20 dollars. So, thanks again to all those who have reached deep into their pockets to help us out. For those who haven't yet, please consider writing that check. Think of this as an appeal for your public newspaper, just like PBS or Public Radio telethons, but hopefully less obnoxious. Or send a gift subscription to a friend stuck out in geographical or psychic Limbaughland.
Many thanks also to our advertisers and our directory members. Ads now account for 60% of our income, which is good, but we'd like to increase that. Unfortunately, a paper as small as ours just doesn't make it onto the radar screen of some advertisers. And given the life span of your average rag, it often seems a risky proposition to carve out a check for some paper which may evaporate by the turn of the month. But we're here to stay. And while we can't offer entr`e to a market just raring to rush out and buy that diamond tiara, we can offer a readership which does more than flip through to the horoscope or the funnies. You'd be surprised how many people have told us they read the paper cover to cover. This paper gets taken home and read and passed around for quite awhile before it ends up on the bottom of the bird cage. If your ad is here, it'll get noticed. And we're cheap, too.
We'd also like to let you know that we're not wasting the money you send us. Although nominally a profit-making enterprise, the Free Press has never made even one thin dime. We'd go non-profit but that would prevent us from supporting good laws or opposing painfully dumb ones.
We eke out our existence from issue to issue, but we always get by because we make J. Paul Getty look like a spendthrift. No fancy paper or four-color graphics. We have no office, only a virtual phone and an e-mail address.
It also helps that most of us work for nothing. With the exception of some of our contributing artists and cartoonists, who get paid just slightly more than nothing, writers, editors and production workers get a big goose egg at the end of the month. Some day we'd like to have enough surplus to pay a modest stipend, but most of us are content for now with just getting the word out.
The positive side of this bare-bones structure is that almost every penny gets plowed right back into production. No junkets to Tokyo or Paris, not even a wage slave to open the mail, every dollar translated into ink and paper.
This combination of dedicated supporters and a masochistic staff have allowed us to make some strides not immediately apparent to the naked eye. We have achieved something a lot of other papers never do: we're financially solvent. Each issue pays its own way (barely), and we have no debt.
For all our shortcomings, we think we have a unique role to play. Our willingness to buck the tide, and to let good reporters write free of heavy-handed editorial influence has already brought recognition to the paper. Mark Worth and Eric Nelson just won First Place from the Washington Press Association for best news story of 1994 in a non-daily paper, a story about Boeing's mistreatment of workers suffering from chemical exposure. And Mark Worth won First Place for editing three issues of the Free Press-the closest thing to a general award given out by the Association.
We didn't win these awards because of our slick production or in-depth reporting about coffee drinkers, but because we actually have something to say. Even though we're just a gnat in the eye of the local dailies, our freedom from the pressures they feel allows us to cover things they can't. The business pages are full of tales of principled editors bailing out of major newspapers because of unrelenting pressure to blandify and shrink editorial and news content. Newspapers are famous for stockholders who demand an exorbitant rate of return. In contrast, we don't care if the Nordstroms ever advertise with us. We don't worry about losing subscriptions or ads from NRA true believers, flat taxers, shopping mall developers, or other misguided folks.
Because they are more attuned to marketing and cozying up to elites with big ad budgets, local dailies are spotty on many basic economic issues, and often miss out on how the new economy is passing an increasingly large number of Americans by. The growth of economic inequality unprecedented in this half century prompts nothing more than a whisper. What passes for labor reporting is a business reporter sent to cover a strike.
Other local non-dailies have their charms but don't do the things the Free Press does as well as we do (and vice versa). The much-improved and now more readable Stranger still doesn't have the column inches devoted to news and political analysis. And just when you thought it was safe to start reading the Seattle Weekly, a shakeup at the top has brought the same stodgy characters back to the helm of that publication, resulting, for example, in a recent cover article trashing the Endangered Species Act. Don't expect to see any articles in the new (old) Weekly questioning economic priorities which bring entire regional ecosystems to the brink of disaster any time soon.
Because we're not beholden to anyone, Free Press writers can say exactly what they want. To paraphrase Popeye, we takes our stands and takes our lumps too. We won't let any imagined far-right political climate shut us down. We think it's important that 50 percent of the public hasn't heard of the Contract on America, and that those who have, oppose much of it. We don't think that wealth is necessarily paired with vision or virtue. We are happy that our stories are not bland enough to make it on KOMO News 4. We are not afraid of Newt Gingrich, or Linda Smith, or John Carlson or Mark Sidran. We are fearless because we literally have nothing to lose. Go ahead, sue us; our pockets are so shallow they don't even collect lint. Besides, we could use the publicity!
We will also continue to rail against the nostalgic liberalism which continues to paralyze politics in this state. Scoop and Maggie are no longer there to bring home tasty morsels of pork, salmon no longer swim in many of the rivers, and cooperation has been replaced by a bitter punitiveness. Washington's progressivism is now not much more than a distant memory. Trotting out Dan Evans in a political campaign and $1.35 will get you a latte and not much else, as the results of the campaigns against I-601 and for the transit plan show.
This is a state whose largest city lets its social policy be set by Mark Sidran, its city planning by retail giants, and whose Mayor cares more about bringing additional cars downtown than building a rail transit system. The state legislature now teems with satanic Christian conservatives. Turning this around calls for the political strategizing of a James Carville, the communications skills of a Bill Moyers, the formulation of an entirely new vision, and unprecedented coalition building.
Despite our strong opinions, we hope to maintain a balance between straight reporting and commentary. We try to be a resource for those who are already politically active, while at the same time providing the facts and analysis necessary for a more informed public debate. We hope not only to preach to the converted, but also to skewer the villainous, and goad the fence-sitter.
Here's what we need to do to really get this paper off the ground. To be truly effective, this paper needs to be fatter, more widely distributed, and published more frequently. No delusions of grandeur here. A monthly paper of from twenty to twenty-four pages of tightly edited prose with a print run of from 15 to 20 grand would be about right.
We also need to broaden the content. We need more labor reporters. Our coverage of minority and human rights and civil liberties issues has been scanty. We need to expand arts coverage, and include provocative essays and criticism. But we also need nuts-and-bolts consumer reporting to provide people with practical resources to ease the trials of daily life. If you can write, think about sending us some of your work.
We are also in desperate need of an art director, as well as a photo editor. And, we need someone who can run Quark XPress, or who is willing to learn. We'd also like to hear from you if you have business and fund raising experience. Or perhaps you'd like to help us organize an affordable public lecture series which would bring the ideas of provocative local and national figures to bear on current issues.
The Free Press is an equal opportunity underemployer. Unlike most "real" jobs, we don't promise you salaries or benefits which never materialize. Not even a gold watch at the end of the line. Let us exploit you, you've got nothing to lose but your free time. Oh, and if you've got a laser printer capable of printing 11 x 17 sitting around somewhere, please send it our way.
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Contents on this page were published in the April/May, 1995 edition of the Washington Free Press.
WFP, 1463 E. Republican #178, Seattle, WA -USA, 98112. -- WAfreepress@gmail.com
Copyright © 1995 WFP Collective, Inc.