News-Record.com

The Web site is not the only place where we're reaching out for more community voices. We're creating a weekly page in the newspaper for high school students that will be conceived and written by them. While I suspect I don't have many 14-18 year olds in my readership, if you know of any who might be interested, please pass this information on. Here's how you apply:

Write a letter explaining why you want to be a correspondent and what experiences you could bring to the page. Include a couple story ideas and a writing sample, too. If you're a photographer or illustrator, include samples of your work. Include your name, address, phone number, e-mail address, school, age, grade, and the name and number of a teacher who can serve as a reference.

Deadline is May 31. Send applications to Amy Joyner, News & Record, 200 E. Market St. Greensboro, 27401 or e-mail her at ajoyner@news-record.com.

And, anticipating a question I always get whenever we announce something specifically targeted to a demographic group, no, we're not going to start a section for political conservatives. :)

Correction: The deadline is Feb. 28.

One of the biggest complaints we've gotten from bloggers is that our links rot. Essentially, we feared that our ancient, archaic -- did I tell you that it is old? -- publishing system would be dragged down by the load times on ever-lengthening index pages.

Here's the good news, it's been resolved. Link to your heart's content.

The bad news is that when we get the new publishing system, which now appears to be in early March, all the old links will rot. Once we pass that milestone, though, all subsequent links to pages created within the new system will remain connected forever.

Yes, the archives issue is still out there, I know. We're taking small steps.

After less than one day, the letters-to-the-editor blog has more comments than I got in my first month. I think this one has potential to keep otherwise productive people occupied for hours debating world and local affairs. I love it.

I don't post this to incur the wrath of the blogosphere, but I suspect I might. Instead, I ask for information.

There are so many interesting blogs out there with so much to say. Some days I have time to scan through them, but most days I don't. I'm glad they're there and growing. I believe they are helping build community.

Occasionally, some bloggers have things to say about the News & Record. In the past week, I've read posts and conversations about our policy on anonymous sources, archives and questions about news judgments, possibly ours. Both questions/concerns were easy to address from the newspaper's standpoint. But no one actually asked. And I was either too busy or too late or the discussion too far along to answer.

In this week's Yes! Weekly, I was interviewed for a story about the Manlin Chee ad and complaints about how the newspaper treated the advertiser. It was an easy story -- rather than investigate the claims of the ad that Chee was railroaded by the feds, the weekly could write about the newspaper instead. That's fine, but it came about from a blog posting by Daniel Bayer with some vague accusations. I read it at Greensboro101. Bayer didn't seek explanation for the newspaper's action. He just emoted. No one sought out the newspaper's version until Yes! -- I love writing that name -- did.

We're not immune. Charles Davenport Jr., who writes an Op-ed column in the newspaper, took us to task this week for setting a goal of making sure that a third of our new hires are minorities. He states as fact several points that, well, aren't facts. Did he ask any questions of the person who came up with the minority hiring goal -- me -- so that he could inform his opinion? No.

UNC journalism professor Phil Meyer, in his book, "The New Precision Journalism," talks about the importance of reporters using the scientific method. "It means treating journalism as if it were a science, adopting scientific method, scientific objectivity, and scientific ideals to the entire process of mass communication."

Reporters in the newsroom are expected to check information -- that's what we were doing when we wrote about the Manlin Chee ad that got Bayer so upset -- and gather as much information as possible before they write. That way we can help the reader get as full a picture as possible. That's why we occasionally take longer to publish than perhaps some wish.

I understand that it's our responsibility to monitor and inform commentary about the paper. That's part of the concept of transparency. I don't want to get into the discussion of whether a blogger is a journalist. That seems beside the point by now. But this is a significant difference between traditional reporters and some bloggers. How can we keep up with the number of bloggers increasing daily? And how can we extend our efforts at transparency when we can't keep up with the discussion because it is happening in so many places without our knowledge? And what is the blogging presumption about asking for information first?

Jim Denery, one of our copy desk chiefs, writes a weekly note to our copy editors. He devoted this one to libel. I thought it is worth sharing, just to let you know some of what we consider before we publish.

As interesting as I'm sure you'd find it, I'm not going to recount the history of court cases that form libel law in its current state, although I've always found it a little interesting that the cases that yield decisions that generally favor the media have a name something like "New York Times vs. ..." while the cases that go against the media start with something like "Alton, Ill., Telegraph vs...." While some may assume the quality of the journalism is a function of the paper's size, I think it could very well be the size of the legal defense fund that made the difference.

I'm also not going to go into any great depth on this because that's really a job for a lawyer -- if I were a lawyer, I'd probably be working days (it's now 12:41 a.m.), and my dad would certainly be happier (Occasionally, he yells, "Serenity now." It doesn't work.).

I'm just going to give you some of the basics that I culled from a few of the old textbooks I recently found in our basement while thinking I was unpacking the good china. That means we're dealing with info that's more than 20 years old, so take this more as a way to open a discussion on libel and consider some guidelines. When things get dicey, we'll have to get a lawyer with an extremely joyful father to set us straight.

First, what is libel?

"Libel is defined as defamation in writing," according to "Newsgathering" by Ken Metzler.

Allen Johnson breaks the news that Bill Snider is retiring after 50-plus years at the newspaper. Bill's final column is Sunday. He's a heckuva newsman, steering the paper and helping steer the city, through some of its toughest times.

Jack Betts, an editorial writer at The Charlotte Observer and a former editorial writer here, wrote this in a review of Ed Yoder's book back in November. "In his Greensboro days, Yoder was mentored by the estimable Bill Snider, like Yoder a graceful, literate writer whose axioms about editorial writing are memorable: "There's nothing like knowing too much about the subject that more quickly spoils a strong editorial," he would say. "And editorialists are often unsure what they really want to say -- newspaper deadlines being daily and unforgiving -- until they 'run it through the typewriter,' another Sniderism."

Bill an even better person than journalist. He deserves to take a rest, play more tennis and visit with the grandkids. But I hope he comes back and visits.

Did anyone learn who won the Super Bowl from their morning newspaper?

The debate around here on Friday when we were planning the weekend papers centered on Monday's front page. Does a photograph from the Super Bowl dominate the front page or do we just direct readers to the Sports section?

Traditionally, the News & Record -- and most other newspapers -- has centerpieced the Super Bowl on A1. After all, it's a pseudo-national holiday, and there's nothing much else going on Sunday.

We decided not to, focusing instead on the Greensboro Jaycees and the impact of their charitable giving. We stripped the news about the Super Bowl in a one-and-a-half-inch box across the top of the page, promoting coverage in the Sports section. As we continue to emphasize local, exclusive content, it is difficult to allow the Super Bowl to dominate the front page, even though it is "the way we've always done it." The Jaycees story, while not overly dramatic, tells how money raised in the community is being returned to the community.

Right or wrong call?

The New Yorker has a compelling piece by Nicholas Lemann, dean of the Columbia University journalism school, about the perceptions of newspaper bias. It accurately captures some of the befuddlement editors have over the claims that newspapers take an obviously liberal slant on the news. Because much of the discussion on this site seems to veer back to this topic, enjoy. An excerpt:

At the (Chicago) Tribune, James Warren, the deputy managing editor for features (and a regular guest on Fox News), told me, "There is a consensus in newsrooms, and it's distinctly left of center. I suspect an overriding majority of the newsroom voted for Kerry -- though up on the executive floor, a majority voted for Bush. But people don't realize the huge amount of content out there that's pretty value-free."

He picked up the Metro section of that day's Tribune and showed me the front page. "Look at this! I'm not sure how ideology plays into the governor closing a dump." He picked up the Tempo section, which had a cover story on luggage with rollers. "I think the reporter who wrote that is liberal," he said. "I think she voted for Kerry. But how does that play into this piece? They don't realize that ninety-nine per cent of folks in journalism aren't opining or covering the White House."

More than a year ago, I ran into Mike Barber in the returns line at Lowe's. He told me that he wanted to talk with me about investing in a weekly newspaper. I said I had all the newspaper I could handle right now. He said, no, I'm thinking about investing in one. I said I'd be happy to talk with him about it but I needed to ask him a question first: Are you an idiot?

He laughed and reminded me that he was a county commissioner, after all. He never called me to follow up. He ended up being an investor or advisor or some such to the Greater Greensboro Observer for a while. Now we report that the weekly tabloid is done for.

Even though hope springs eternal for publishers in Greensboro, it's a tough market. Competition is fierce, advertisers are hardly abundant and quality costs money. Good luck to Ogi and friends. I hope they land on their feet.

The parlor game of trying to figure out the identity of Woodward and Bernstein's "Deep Throat" has never interested me much. Seems like more of an inside-the-Beltway obsession. But I know many people who like to play it. Editor & Publisher is collecting nominations. The speculation that it is former President Bush is intriguing.

Update: The early leader is Chief Justice Rehnquist, although I like the nomination of Richard Nixon himself: "He was so self-destructive."

Dang! Sally Buffalo, our assistant features editor, is leaving to become assistant city editor at the San Luis Obispo Tribune on California's Central Coast.

Not to get into a discussion of the attractions of Greensboro, Sally's leaving for the beauty and excitement of Big Sur country, and that's a tough battle for us to win. First as an editor in High Point and now on our Life staff, Sally made the paper better.

In the this-means-nothing-but-still department: We repeated Monday's stock tables in Wednesday's paper by mistake. It was a human error, one that we thought we had safeguards to prevent, but a safeguard failed.

We got fewer than a dozen calls.

Newspaper editors have talked for several years about the possibility of eliminating the stock listings under the assumption that customized stock information is so easily available online. The money and space taken by the listings -- two pages and change in the News & Record -- could be used for other content. Some newspapers have even done it. We've resisted the temptation on the belief that we have many readers who don't have Internet connections.

Maybe the change in the market wasn't that noticeable. Maybe people just didn't bother to call, which, given their vocalness on other issues, doesn't seem likely. Or maybe the number who use the listings is truly dwindling.

We've been getting phone calls about the quick cutaway from the Duke-Carolina game to the WFMY-TV late news. The buzzer sounded, the camera focused on UNC Coach Roy Williams, who had paused and looked to one end of the court as if something was happening and, blink, here's Kent Bates and Sandra Hughes beginning the newscast. What was he looking at? Was a foul called? Was the game even over?

Jeff Carlton on our staff made a few calls. His take is here.

Check out the photos while you're at it.

"In fact, there's nothing wrong with buying a newspaper and not reading it at all. People who don't really need glasses get them to look smarter. Bachelors who don't really need dogs get them so they look adorable to single women at the dog park. How many of us have cobweb-covered treadmills taking up space in the basement? And they cost a lot more than 35 cents."

That's one of 11 steps in John Kelly's guide to reading The Washington Post (via Romenesko).

I would have added a 12th step: "Don't take everything in it so seriously. Sometimes stories are written, photos are taken, and games are played just for fun, to give people a reason to smile. If you don't think those occasions are funny, fair enough. But the world won't end. Just turn the page." Of course, this might fit better as part of Step 6: Be skeptical.

Update: A reader weighs in on why the Post's online edition is better than the newspaper's print product (again via Romenesko. If you pull it up you have to go way down the site).

Personal note: The Battens and the Grahams may not need your 50 cents, but I do.

Matt Welch, a columnist for Reason, interviewed me last fall for a piece he was writing on objective journalism and the sea change the business is facing. Given that the piece is really about national election coverage, I doubt that the editor of the no-Washington-bureau, no-national-correspondent News & Record was the best interview choice.

Makes no nevermind. He got what I told him right.

The striking thing is how much has already changed in our work between the interview and the magazine's publication. (It's the Feb. 5 edition but it came out sometime in January.)

Staffer Lex Alexander hadn't produced his memo, we hadn't embraced our course, and, well, I knew about a tenth of what I know now, which is about a tenth of what I should know. And, even since then, our editorial folks have gotten into the blogging act, we're experimenting with Podcasting, and we're learning from some of the best thinkers in the biz.

Just more evidence of the speed of change.

A couple months ago we conducted a contest that asked readers to decorate Martha Stewart's prison cell. Some readers were offended that we would make Martha the subject of such attention. But it was all in fun, and more than 100 people sent in decorated drawings, many of them creative and clever.

The contest was popular enough that we decided to do another. But with whom? It had to be someone who has captured the public's imagination, in that "love-him-or-hate-him" way. Michael Moore of "Fahrenheit 911" was a natural. He's a purposely polarizing figure who seeks fame and, perhaps, notoriety. So, we offered readers the opportunity to give Moore a makeover, on paper, of course. To assist, we're helpfully published a line drawing like a coloring book drawing of Moore in his boxers.

We knew we would have to dodge the brickbats. One reader e-mailed me to complain that we are making him look at "that slob" every morning. Another called saying that making fun of another person is disrespectful and unchristian. A third said, "As it says in "The Little Prince," "it is only with the heart we see rightly, what is essential is invisible to the eye." You tread on thin ice when you diss one of your blue county's heroes."

The contest isn't political, by any means. We're trying to lighten the readers' day and give them something to have fun with, not unlike doing the crossword. With Moore and Stewart, we had personalities who have inserted themselves forcefully into the public eye and who, through the power of their personalities, have divided the nation into two sides. OK, that may be a slight overstatement, but you know what I mean. Very few people are neutral on Moore or Stewart.

Only three days of fun (or looking at the slob) left. Look for the final results on, when else, Oscar Sunday, Feb. 27.

UNCG mailed my daughter a glossy brochure last week soliciting her interest. What struck me wasn't the aggressiveness of the school -- she is in 10th grade -- but the headline: "The impact of one, the power of many."

I wish I had come up with that. The slogan describes the path the newspaper is exploring this year. Last month, I wrote about our initiative to transform the newspaper and www.News-Record.com into a virtual town square, a trusted place where people can get the news, share information, talk to each other and us, and engage in building community.

Our idea is to make the paper and Web site a true marketplace of information and ideas, not just ours, not just community leaders, but yours, too. That means that we need to include many voices and take our lead from readers.

As in any town square, your voice can be as loud as you want it to be, if you want it to be.

The impact of one, the power of many.

We continue to learn by doing. In Sunday's paper, we published Margaret Moffett Banks' investigation into St. James II. David Hoggard raises a variety of questions and issues concerning what the city and city leaders knew and when they knew it. Hearty discussion ensues, including comments from City Council member Tom Phillips.

We post primary documents between the city and the St. James property manager, documents which Banks used in her reporting. They enhance the evidence driving the discussion, and we should have thought to do it yesterday. We will in the future.

Our reporting continues in tomorrow's paper.

The race was on to determine whether business or NASCAR snagged our next blog spot. The winner is business. Check out Biz Buzz here.

I've told the writers that it's OK to link out to business stories on other sites, even of local competitors. We have to if we want to live by the motto on the top of the page: "All the buzz about business." The business staff -- e-mail addresses of all are listed on the right of the page -- is especially interested in hearing what works best on the blog. Don't be shy.

Oh, the NASCAR blog? Check in tomorrow.

Mark Binker, who covers the Guilford County Board of Commissioners and who shares authorship of Inside Scoop, is going to become our reporter in Raleigh, keeping an eye on the legislature and state government. Eric Dyer, who has been in Raleigh for six years when he wasn't following John Edwards around, will work out of Greensboro as a general assignment reporter.

The changes won't take effect for several weeks: Eric needs to show Mark the ropes in Raleigh, and we need to fill Mark's slot on the county.

Guilford County commissioner Skip Alston has lumped the News & Record in with city of Greensboro workers -- or maybe it's the other way around -- as being the reason St. James Homes II failed.

Thus far, he hasn't cited inaccuracies in our reporting, only that we are targeting St. James II for scrutiny because it involves African American managers.

There's one simple reason we're writing about St. James II: Money. Specifically, $1 million of taxpayers' money that was spent to renovate it with little to show. And now city taxpayers will spend another $400,000 to buy out and demolish the complex. Race has nothing to do with it.

It's not the first time Alston has blamed the newspaper for coverage of the problems at St. James II. In April 2001, after another string of stories about the condition of the apartments, Alston pointed at us. Here's part of the story we wrote then about his pledge to Greensboro City Council to fix the apartment complex:

As threatened yesterday, we've launched our NASCAR blog, called The Spotter. It's hosted by assistant sports editor John Newsom.

"As the name 'The Spotter' implies, I'm the guy standing on the roof of the grandstand, looking down on the spectacle below. So what you'll get from me is not the pit road view but a more of a several-stories-up look at the sport from a fan's perspective."

We venture boldly yet softly into podcasting by bringing you GoRadio, a podcast radio program that allows you to listen to this week's Go Triad Magazine online. As Nicole Ortega, one of the hosts of the program, says, "We recorded it right here inside our building. It is a podcast that can be listened to online or downloaded into a personal music player."

This has great potential for us, given all the interviews we do of newsmakers that "readers" may want to hear.

Special thanks go to Nicole and Jeri Rowe, editor of Go Triad and co-host of the podcast, and our technical wizards: Taylor Webster, Kevin Lockamy and Herb Everett.

You know the morning's not going well when the basis of information for a story is wrong. The Big Four men's basketball schedules that we printed on the front page of the Sports section today are incorrect.

At least it wasn't all our fault. Yesterday afternoon, we set up a graphic with the ACC men's basketball schedule rotation for the next three years that the league sent out via e-mail. Then the league decided the schedule doesn't work for all schools for all three years. So the league sent another e-mail advising everyone of this. Some papers got the e-mail. The league sent ours to Sports Editor Joe Sirera, who was out of the office for the rest of the day.

We've advised the league of other, more universally used e-mail addresses. We'll officially correct the story in Saturday's paper. We regret any inconvenience it caused. (It will relieve my Carolina graduate wife who thought it was grossly unfair that UNC had to play Wake at Wake two years in a row.)

We wrote about this in Friday's paper, but not to the extent that I can here. Below are our winners in the North Carolina Press Association annual contest. We aren't in the business to win awards, but it's nice to be recognized by our peers.

Staff -- 2nd place in Public Service for our Project Homestead reporting
Judge comments: Project Homestead had all the earmarks of a sacred cow. The low-cost housing nonprofit run by a politically powerful minister was seemingly above scrutiny. Reporting by the News & Record changed all that, revealing widespread corruption and promoting corrective action. Where other systems and agencies had failed to protect the public interest, the newspaper succeeded despite pressure from many directions. This work is an excellent example of holding power accountable.

Dustin Long -- 1st place in Sports News Reporting for Daytona 500 coverage
Judge comments: A very impressive job of mixing enterprise and profiles and breaking news and advances to give readers an amazing amount of coverage leading up -- and then following -- NASCAR'S biggest race. The writer showed versatility and expertise in a variety of story forms.

Tim Rickard -- 1st place in Photo Illustration
Judge comments -- Carries a punch!

Mike Kernels -- 2nd place in Lifestyle Feature Writing or a story on the SUV
Judge comments: Reporter pulled readers in with description of places. It made you feel you actually were there. Good job on bringing readers on what could be a boring subject for some readers.

Lorraine Ahearn -- 2nd place in Serious Columns
Judge comments: Ahearn's columns are well-reported. They ask a question by telling a story, rather than presenting "the world according to me." Her columns present ethical and moral questions without identifying them as such.

Ed Hardin -- 2nd place Sports Columns
Judge comments: Hardin shows the range one expects in a quality columnist. Not to mention courage: He called out Coach K and got it exactly right. His fishing and snakes column was a real gem. Very personal, but a great story, too.

Rob Daniels -- 3rd place Sports Columns
Judge comments: Wonderful mix of columns showing emotion ranging from outrage to laugh-out-loud humor. Anyone who would try to write a column in "Dr. Seuss" voice deserves an award!

Todd Graff -- 3rd place in Sports News Reporting for CCG coverage
Judge comments: A very thorough, well-executed package leading up to a major golf tournament, using a strong mix of story approaches and graphics.

Stan Swofford -- 3rd place in Investigative Reporting for Project Homestead
Judge comments: No flashy layout -- just strong reporting that detailed the conflicts of interest and power plays that helped insiders and hurt those most in need of services.

Staff -- 3rd place in Sports Coverage
Judge comments: Comprehensive coverage of Chrysler Classic elevated this paper above the rest of the field of entrants.

Tim Porter has been analyzing Philip Meyer's "The Vanishing Newspaper: Saving Journalism in the Information Age" chapter by chapter.

I haven't read Dr. Meyer's book yet -- and I emphasize yet -- but I've been following Porter's deconstruction closely. Dr. Meyer, a journalism professor at UNC, apparently has done what so many other media watcher haven't: Substantiated his conclusions with research. (Updated correction: Meyer's not a Dr.)

In brief, Meyer argues that there is a connection between quality journalism and profitability. He is looking to save "the social responsibility functions that have been traditional for newspapers." As Porter describes it: Quality journalism = credibility and influence = readership = profits. And the converse as well: Reduce quality hurts credibility which hurts circulation which hurts advertising which hurts profits.

There's a lot of stuff in the book. But I am struck by this conclusion by Porter: And, in a period when sources of news and opinion are at once exploding in number and narrowing in focus, I believe credibility counts most of all. This argues for greater transparency by newspapers, more interaction with the community and further dissolution of the barrier between the producers and consumers of news.

This is the path we're taking. By Porter's description of Meyer's book, it looks to be a long journey. So far, though, it's been fun.

If winning three out of four Super Bowls qualifies the New England Patriots as a dynasty, then Susan Ladd is a true emperor.

Susan, the editor of our Life section, won her third straight editing award from the North Carolina Associated Press last Thursday. This is no small feat. Only one editing prize is given each year, and hundreds of editors in North Carolina are eligible. (Other awards we won on Thursday are listed here.)

Because I want to bottle what Susan's got -- being a superb editor of good writers is harder than it seems -- I asked around.

"She has a remarkable ability to substantially improve a story in such a subtle, unobtrusive way that the writer feels that he made the changes," said Stan Swofford, who in addition to being one of our best reporters was one of our best editors a few years ago. "No doubt some of her editing talent was honed when she was a darn good reporter."

Indeed she was.

Chewie expresses legitimate concern over the level of discourse -- keeping it out of the gutter -- on comments in the Letters to the Editor blog. She's echoed by Hoggard. Chewie notes correctly that just a few weeks after we enabled comments on individual letters, Editorial Page Editor Allen Johnson felt the need to implore respondents to refrain from personal attacks.

As someone who has been on the business end of such personal attacks, I sympathize. To some, yelling is better than talking and attacking is easier than listening. They don't understand that they undermine their credibility and, as a result, people move on.

When we opened these doors, we knew we would get some of that. We get it in the newspaper letters, too. We want to be a safe environment where ideas are welcomed as well as challenged. It shouldn't be ground visitors fear to tred.

That said, I've been mostly pleased with the discussion. I'd guess that 90% of the letters have gotten a reasonable, respectful response. And even with the remaining 10%, such intense heat occasionally produces light.

We're watching this closely. A town square encourages many voices and, now and then, cacophony results. We don't want to limit the discussion. I'm optimistic that calm heads will rise above the hot ones.

Guilford County Commissioner Skip Alston is a smart, articulate politician. He's always quotable and usually accessible. But not now, and, surprisingly, not on this topic.

Curious at the lack of response by Greensboro City Council last week when Alston accused city employees of racism, reporter Matt Williams starting calling council members to ask why. (Alston also accused the News & Record of racism, also without specifics.)

Before the long holiday weekend, Matt had reached some of the council members, but he hadn't heard from two of the three African American members, whose opinions we thought might inform the story. And he hadn't heard from Alston. We decided to hold the story over the weekend so that Matt could do more reporting. (We accidentally published a draft online Saturday morning and quickly removed it.)

We wanted to make sure that Alston had a chance to respond to the council members, who were generally dismissive of him. This would allow Alston to provide any context and proportionality he saw fit. It would fill out the picture and make the story comprehensive, which is one of our aims every day. And we wanted to be fair to him.

Matt continued to try to reach him Monday and Tuesday. Alston knew what we wanted. He chose not to return Matt's calls, which is certainly his right. He doesn't have to talk with us, although we are one way he can speak to the citizens he represents.

We decided we had given him plenty of opportunities to respond, and we published the article today.

I've already gotten one e-mail about the article, suggesting that we let it go. Here's why we haven't: Accountability for your statements, particularly when you're accusing people of reprehensible behavior, is vital for anyone, especially elected officials.

Roch Smith and I shared a nervous laugh -- at least mine was nervous -- about the interviews for the stories by J-Lab. The reporter asked me about competition a couple different ways. I resisted the notion that Greensboro101 is a competitor, at least in the traditional definitions of the term.

I don't know about Roch, but I'm not sure what winning looks like, or even if there is such a thing as winning. The Web changes the nature of competition for news. Do I worry that he may break news on his site? Not any more than I worry about any blogger breaking news. Do I worry he may have more citizen voices? There are plenty of voices to go around. We're both working hard to build and improve our sites.

In short, it is so early in the life-cycle of 101 and our Town Square that positioning ourselves as competitors seems short-sighted. Both of us benefit from a dynamic and robust civic-oriented cyberpresence, and I suspect we will for a long time. When I told the reporter that our site and Roch's site are both trying to help the community understand the news and engage in civic discourse, I meant it.

We may evolve into more traditional competitors when the smoke clears. Or not. We may be simply two players on a very crowded stage. There's little to stop anyone else from becoming a blog aggregator and accepting user-generated content. We learn from what Roch's doing, and we'll learn from others breaking in. Is that competition? Maybe. I prefer to call it learning. Regardless, it's good for Guilford County readers.

Lex introduces our citizen journalism. Check it out. And write your own.

Our Sunday Sports section was named one of the top 10 in the country for our circulation category in the Associated Press Sports Editors annual contest. (They don't rank them by number.) The daily Sports section was an honorable-mention choice, which basically means top 20.

Other top 10 winners include The Charlotte Observer for the daily section and The News & Observer for Sunday section. The Gaston Gazette was cited for both Sunday and daily sections. (Charlotte, Raleigh and Gaston are in other circulation categories.)

I admire the openness, facileness, brain power and articulateness -- gasp, that word again -- of Bill Keller of The New York Times. I've read the exchange he's had with Jeff Jarvis and now this with Jack Shafer. To run an operation like the Times and then to correspond with so many voices out there astounds me.

"The credibility of the serious press is under assault on several flanks. There is a debate underway, sometimes silly but sometimes profound, about whether it is possible or even desirable to have an impartial press based on robust, empirical reporting and fair-minded analysis. There is some confusion out there about how what we do differs in kind from Fox or Instapundit or Rush Limbaugh. We should be in that conversation. At least we should try to engage those who seem to share a genuine interest in a well-informed citizenry -- those who are not driven by sheer ideological (or commercial) malice."

What he said.

A long-time American journalistic tenet is to monitor power, described in "The Elements of Journalism" as "watching over the powerful few in society on behalf of the many to guard against tyranny."

Related to that, a generation of journalists was taught by Woodward and Bernstein's Deep Throat to "follow the money."

Those two principles bear on the most recent Skip Alston tempest on St. James II. (Inside Scoop has a good description of Alston's comments last night.)

But first, to dispense with Alston's singling out reporter Matt Williams as a racist. Alston gave no specifics. Matt never talked with Alston about St. James II because Alston never returned his phone calls. Alston's history of painting his critics and in our case, questioners, as racist is long and well-documented. I regret he feels the need to paint a reporter who is doing his job, attempting to ask tough questions of powerful people, with such a reprehensible label.

Here's the deal: Elected officials control millions of millions of tax dollars. Journalists track how that money is spent. In a small way, this watchdog function is one of the reasons we exist. It's not something that many citizens have the time and patience for. We do.

As a result, over the years we've incurred the wrath of some public officials as we've written about the expenditures of Project Homestead, the city's role with the local hockey team, bonuses and raises given to county employees and, now, the oversight of St. James II. To a newspaper, it comes with the territory.

For public officials, accounting for the taxpayers' money comes with the territory, too. Alston doesn't have to answer our questions about the proceeds of the rent money he collected from St. James II tenants. He can continue to distract the discussion by accusing city employees and newspaper reporters and editors of racism. But I have to wonder how well it serves the public he represents.

Regular visitors to this blog are familiar with the items in this column.

It's been busy around here lately. Let me bring you up to date.

Last December, we published a two-day series on discipline problems in the Guilford County public schools. A few days later, we sponsored a standing-room-only community forum on the topic in Finch Chapel at Greensboro College.

In the series, the state's character education program in the schools was cited as an effective method of addressing the discipline problems. We decided to take a closer look at the program, which teaches right and wrong to students.

The result of that examination is the special report by Bruce Buchanan on the front page today. And, as with the discipline series, we're sponsoring a community forum at 7 p.m. Tuesday at Penn-Griffin Middle School in High Point.

We don't have Double Doppler or Super Doppler or Super Double Doppler. We don't have Trueview or Skycast. We don't have "team coverage." We don't talk about "precipitation events" when we don't know whether it will snow or rain.

We do have cool jackets with our company's name stenciled in, but you have to buy them.

In this morning's paper, we don't have an article about the snow or sleet or whatever it is out there. That's purposeful. The frozen precipitation event occurred after we went to press. By writing about it last night when it was only raining, we'd have had a story that told you less than you'd have known simply by looking out the window when you awoke.

With the rise of the Internet, the Weather Channel and frequent break-ins on local television channels, the newspaper is probably not the first stop for people interested in severe weather forecasts. There are too many other places that can give you more up-to-the-minute predictions. (Their accuracy is an entirely different matter.)

We acknowledge that. We spend less time and space writing about weather than we did five years ago. (I know; I've ordered up more than my share of weather stories. Once, when I suggested we write about the heat, an editor looked at me and said, "It's August in Greensboro. It's supposed to be hot.") We have the standing weather report on the back page of the local section and the weather at a glance on A1, which, at my house at least, covers most of the weather forecasting needs.

Of course, when the weather causes destruction or major inconvenience, we'll write about it and provide information on useful services, such as how to drive in the snow and the city's street scraping routes. We will also continue to write about upcoming weather if it appears as if it is going to be significant, like, an extreme precipitation event. I'm not guaranteeing that you've read the last story on the rush to buy bread and milk, but you are seeing fewer.