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The story about Keith "Bam" Smith interests us for several reasons, not the least of which is how he died. For today's story, we had a choice of several photos, including one that showed Smith in his casket. We didn't publish that one because we have what is apparently a longtime unwritten policy -- I thought it was written but I can't find it now -- that we don't publish photos of corpses. The general reasoning behind it is that people eating breakfast don't want to look at dead bodies. We would make -- and have made -- an exception if publishing served a compelling civic purpose. (There's that darned phrase again!)

The photo is here. It's not gruesome. In fact, it's an intimate family moment. Should we have published it? I'm beginning to think that we should have. Rob Brown, our photo director, makes the case that it personalizes the man -- and his relationship with his parents -- in a way that words don't. On the other hand, the photo does depict an intimate family moment that could be considered a private intimate moment. (Probably not in this case as the parents consented to the photographer's presence.)

As for that unwritten policy? Rob is in charge of coming up with a written one that sorts through the shades of black, white and gray.

We bought a house in Starmount Forest in 1999. Lovely place. Large lot. Nice view. Little did I know that its history -- like many of ours -- was checkered. Until the restrictive covenant expired some years ago, the house couldn't be sold to African Americans.

Hundreds of homes around Guilford County, including some in the most expensive neighborhoods such as Irving Park, still have covenants that restrict their sales to minorities. The covenants are no longer enforceable. On Sunday, Nate DeGraff writes about the topic.

The restrictions are tucked in yellowing deeds pages preserved at government offices; county officials say they can't remove the covenants without cutting out other records. More realistic is removing the racist language from copies of those documents found online, but even that requires a law change.

You don't have to wait to get a look. Jerry Wolford has produced a powerful multi-media presentation with the facts, faces and voices of those affected.

Sunday update: The story is here.

I'm late on this but we're live blogging the Women's ACC at Sports Extra. Well, they aren't doing the games so much as snapshots from what they see and hear at the Coliseum. Some are sportsy; others aren't so much. It's all good, though.

We're new at this. Let us know what you think and whether it's worth the effort.

As we get into the meat of this three-week span in which people are calling Greensboro "Tournament Town," I must pose the questions that we talk about every day: Are we doing too much or not enough? And its corollary: How much goes on A1?

The three basketball tournaments running back to back to back are news, even if you don't care a whit about the games. Traffic gets snarled, restaurants crowded and hotels filled. (Less so for the women's games, but still....) Yet when is enough enough? We know some readers prefer their front page news pure as illustrated by this comment: "You have a sports section. Use it!"

Our intent is to cover the tournament from both a fan's and citizen's perspective. So, you can easily find information about the basketball action as well the social events. And, obviously, we're doing additional stuff online. (Stuff, Lex, not junk.)

Anyway, we welcome your thinking. We have another two-and-a-half weeks of this.

Ed Cone on the sometimes goofy, often off-point, many times irrational comments attached to letters to the editor:

All this is kind of amusing, but it's also alarming. People aren't discussing issues, they are arguing with phantoms. The more we dehumanize each other, the easier it is to ignore each other.

What he said.

It's not just the letters comments. We deal with this on many of our blogs, including this one. And I'm not talking about what I write. I'm used to people taking my words out of context, ascribing to me opinions I don't have and making baseless assertions about me and the newspaper. No, this is about the ensuing discussion among us all. We've tried to address it with registration, admonitions and deletions. We've tried to ignore comments coming from trolls, but others don't and so the discussion spins on. I've heard from plenty of people who would like to discuss substance, but don't want to enter into the din with the shouters.

I'm not sure what the answer is, but I'm hopeful that as the form grows and matures so will the level of interaction. Meantime, read Ed's air-clearing post. (This post should not in any way tie me to Ed's Kennedy-loving Bolshevik leanings.)

The hits just keep on coming. Jon Michael, an exemplary member of our sports copy desk for almost two years, has decided that he wants to become a chef. Jon has juggled design, copy editing and managing our sports editorial assistants. He has enrolled in the Orlando Culinary Academy in Florida. Perhaps he was inspired by Mel.

So, in the past month, good folks have bailed from journalism to become teachers, chefs and web copywriters. Not a good sign for this trade. I hope it's not something I said! We're busily interviewing.

I don't normally use this space to correct errors unless there is a larger message to communicate. But several of my more loyal conservative visitors have asked about/encouraged/dared me to run the AP's correction on the Bush/Katrina video story that we published earlier this week on page A2. (Seems they think that it doesn't fit our "agenda" to acknowledge that part of the initial report was wrong.)

We will publish the correction tomorrow. It says this:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- In a March 1 story, The Associated Press reported that federal disaster officials warned President Bush and his homeland security chief before Hurricane Katrina struck that the storm could breach levees in New Orleans, citing confidential video footage of an Aug. 28 briefing among U.S. officials.

The Army Corps of Engineers considers a breach a hole developing in a levee rather than an overrun. The story should have made clear that Bush was warned about floodwaters overrunning the levees, rather than the levees breaking.

The day before the storm hit, Bush was told there were grave concerns that the levees could be overrun. It wasn't until the next morning, as the storm was hitting, that Michael Brown, then head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, said Bush had inquired about reports of breaches. Bush did not participate in that briefing.

I hate that AP made this mistake. I hate that this story and correction give more ammunition to those who think all mainstream media types are biased against the president. All of us aren't.

On Friday, we launched our third Hometown Hub, this one in Pleasant Garden.

It joins hubs in Summerfield and Rock Creek, which is our name for the rural-to-suburban transformation going on in Eastern Guilford and Western Alamance counties. We plan to host four more from other communities across the Triad before the year is out.

As envisioned, Hometown Hubs are online communities aimed at providing a place for people to share news big and small with their friends and neighbors. News & Record staff members are not doing the bulk of the writing; you who live in and care deeply about you community are.

"The Hometown Hubs project is our attempt to connect more closely with the communities we serve, to get citizens actively involved in this process we call journalism," said Betsi Robinson, community news editor. "It actually turns the traditional journalism model on its head. We aren't dictating the news to you, or telling you what we think is important for you to know. You, the citizens, are making those decisions. Why? Because you know more about what's going on in your communities than we could every hope to.

A small piece of the internal workings of a newspaper and, occasionally, how we spend our money:

Late Friday afternoon, court reporter Eric Collins and his editor, Janet Brindle, came to me to say that the public defender on this case had filed a motion to close the courtroom when evidence is presented pertaining to the health of the suspect, Eric Booker. Given that the case centered on the accusation that Booker intentionally bit a police officer to infect the officer with the HIV virus, his health is pertinent. And we wanted to hear the testimony.

We called our attorney -- we actually reached him after 5 p.m. on Friday! -- and he prepared a motion requesting the trial be open to the public. Interestingly, state law does allow a judge to essentially close a trial during such testimony. But it is no secret that Booker allegedly is infected. It was in the indictment, and we reported it in our first story about the case last year. Our attorney filed the motion Monday morning.

As it turned out, Booker pleaded guilty to a reduced charge and the original motion to close the hearing ended up being moot. As a result, our motion wasn't heard. We still consider it money well-spent, even though I suspect our attorney, Alan Duncan, probably doesn't need it. (That's a little joke, Alan.)

Two of our staffers won Awards of Excellence in the Society for of News Design's annual competition. Copy Desk Chief Ben Villarreal won for his front page the day before the Burlington Industries implosion. Doug Harris won for his cover page of the ACC Tournament preview section last year. This is the second consecutive year Doug has won.

Here's what design director Bob Williams had to say about the winners:

Ben was recognized for a Sunday A1 that featured a Jim Schlosser preview of the impending demolition of the Burlington Industries building last May. The page's centerpiece achieved powerful visual impact by combining layered information in elegant typographical treatments, a stark photo of the stripped-down building, and effective use of white space and spot color accents.

Doug: The sports staff cooked up a campaign theme because last year's tournament was played at the MCI Center, and Doug's design displayed colorful "campaign" buttons for each team over the Capitol dome in the background. The page, turned sideways, was simple in its approach but had strong graphic appeal and fun content.

This is a prestigious design competition, including papers from all over the world. We're proud that of the 29 winners in the news page category in our weight class, two were ours.

What's to say about this flattering profile on Blue Plate Special? Well, really, "Mr. Rogers?"

I'm getting messages from all my now former friends mocking me about the head and shoulders with this graf: John Robinson, 53, with his thinning gray hair, and handsome, not just wholesome but Mr. Rogers-wholesome face, looks like the kind of guy who'd barely be able to work his e-mail.

The name and age are accurate. The rest is left-wing MSM propaganda that I fully expect to cause a blog swarm the likes of which would make even Dan Rather's head spin. Besides, I'm more in the rugged Mel Gibson mold, aren't I?

More later.

For those listening to the police scanner this morning -- and there are more of you than you'd think -- you may be interested in a note our production director, Jim Schrum, sent out:

At approximately 2:55 AM this morning the fire alarm went off in the main building and our employees had to evacuate the building. The Greensboro Fire Department responded within five minutes. It was determined that the paper shredder had been left in the 'on' position, which caused it to overheat and begin to smoke.

The paper shredder was removed from the building by the fire department, and our employees were then allowed back inside. No one was injured nor was there any other damage to the building or equipment (other than the shredder, of course.)

As a result, some of our papers may have been delivered late this morning. We apologize for the inconvenience.

* Jim's line, not mine

Seriously, the Blue Plate Special article was a fair one that makes me look better and more responsible for our efforts than I am. So, cool!

One comment by Roch Smith deserves explanation. The article says: Though there is interaction between the two groups, from Smith's point of view it is lopsided. 'Local bloggers frequently comment on N&R blogs, N&R staffers only very occasionally participate in discussion on non-N&R blogs.'

While I haven't done any study of our comments on outside blogs vs. bloggers' comments on ours, my guess is that Roch is correct. There are reasons for that.

Many of our bloggers make comments on our sites and others. I do. Lex, Mel, John, Allen, Doug and Mark do. Certainly others. But we must be careful. While our opinions are our own, people tend to think that we are speaking for the entire organization when, really, I am the only one who does that. And, in fact, I don't speak for the editorial board; Allen does.

Dear John,

Cheers to the News & Record's continued objectivity.

Go here for scores, stories, audio, video and photos.

It's nice to be noticed by BusinessWeek, not for our blogs, but for our podcasts, specifically this one.

The BusinessWeek writer's take on RadioFree Sports: A panel of wise-cracking reporters from a Greensboro, N.C., newspaper tell the whole truth about Atlantic Coast Conference basketball and other Carolina sports topics. During a recent podcast, the scribes skewered at least four ACC coaches and offered solid analysis of games from Chapel Hill to Durham. Consult these smart guys before placing your Final Four bet.

Unfortunately, we might have a little trouble getting those wise-cracking nutjobs into the studio this week.

One of the common rhetorical questions editors get from readers angry about something we've published goes like this: "What would you have written if this had happened to your own child?"

The fact is that we purposely try to avoid thinking like that. If we did consider that question, we would violate one of our journalistic tenets, which is not to use the newspaper for personal reasons. Running news through a filter of "would I want this written about my child" distorts reality. Imagine that sort of newspaper: No stories about fraud, corruption, drunken driving or drug use. (Not that my daughter would ever be involved in any of these things.) No photos of athletic short comings or emotionally distraught people. In short, a nice paper celebrating good things happening to good people.

A few years ago, we published a photo of a woman whose who's house had burned down. The look of anguish and fear on her face was palpable. The photo said more about the impact of a house fire than any photo of ashes and charred brick. We got feedback from people asking how we could have published such a photo, portraying the woman in such a harsh light. Yes, one asked "what if that had been your wife?"

Locke Clifford, a prominent trial lawyer and attorney for former Police Chief David Wray, called a news conference late this afternoon and wondered aloud why we would not give him a copy of the consultant's investigative report into doings at the police department. Hear the audio of his news conference.

Here's the answer: We made a commitment to our source not to copy or distribute the actual report.

Clifford is frustrated and I sympathize. He is representing a client, and the city will not give him a report that has helped form city officials' opinions of the former chief and the department's operation. But we aren't the source of the consultant's report, the city is. And it's not our responsibility to distribute copies of it to Wray's defense team.

For the record, he did meet with a few of us today. It was a cordial meeting, and he asked for the report. We said no. We offered to submit questions in writing to him if Wray would consider answering them in an interview. He agreed to take them and discuss them with Wray. We were going to craft the questions over the weekend and send them to Clifford Monday. He didn't say anything about holding a news conference two hours later and calling us hypocrites. Don't know if that means a possible interview is still on the table.

Robin Roger, the UNC grad student doing research on blogs and community, has opened her survey to all comers. It's here. It takes about 15 minutes, she says.

From the first page: Your participation is voluntary. You may stop participating at any time. You may skip any question you choose not to answer for any reason. Your answers are completely anonymous.

As I said before, help the kid out.

My newspaper column:

"D'oh!"

That was my imitation of Homer Simpson when I read in a recent story that only one in four Americans can name more than one of the five freedoms guaranteed by the First Amendment. Adding insult to injury, I suppose, the report also found that most people can name at least two members of "The Simpsons."

Normally, I wouldn't write about the survey because it's hardly surprising. "The Simpsons" is on television every week, and popular TV programs about the freedom of speech, press, religion, assembly and petition for grievance appear as often as the Playboy Channel runs G-rated movies.

But today is the first day of Sunshine Week, in which media organizations, schools and civic groups advocate for an open, accessible government. Tomorrow, the N.C. Open Government Coalition is sponsoring a forum in Raleigh on this very thing. The forum is aptly called, "Are We Safer in the Dark?" Find out more here.

As a basketball fan and high school sports supporter, I delight in Dudley High School's second straight state basketball championship. I just regret that they didn't get more attention for it. We published a story on the front page Saturday advancing the game in Chapel Hill, and Dudley's victory dominated the Sports front Sunday, including a good column by Ed Hardin.

Yet the ACC Tournament muscled out every other sporting event this weekend. Because of the thousands of visitors and the millions of dollars they dropped in town -- to say nothing of the intense games -- the Dudley-Concord game played second fiddle. That's a shame, too, because winning two state basketball championships in a row is like winning the ACC championship twice.

Ed called it right: Some of us in Greensboro don't understand what Dudley means to us. Some of us don't realize that it's our high school teams that give us identity around the state. Our high school team is Dudley and has been for a long time.

Congratulations, too, to the Bishop McGuinness girls, which won the 1-A championship, and Cummings boys, which won the 2-A championship.

Just in case you think that God doesn't have a sense of humor, my daughter was in the paper this morning. We misspelled her name.

Frequent correspondent Perry Keziah of High Point sent along page 216 from this week's issue of Forbes. He added this comment: Why, pray tell, would this be included in an issue devoted to "Billionaires, the World's Richest People"?

Earlier this week, I was on a panel at a journalism meeting -- there are more of them than there are journalism awards and that's saying something -- speaking about transparency. I discussed blogs, interacting with readers and opening up the doors of our operation. Several editors were resistant, concerned about discussions like this, and wondering why they would want to enable that kind of low-level bickering. They were concerned about discussions like this, which start strong and quickly devolve into the same folks saying the same things, all critical of the paper. And they were concerned about discussions like this, which start out on one topic and shift into another that's well-worn elsewhere.

I responded that yes, those things happen. (How could I deny it?) They frustrate us, too. Without question, we prefer civil discussion that moves the ball forward; we aren't the county commissioners, after all. But their concerns miss the point, as do our frustrations on occasion.

With the last week of Tourney Town upon us -- and thinking about the comments of bias because we ran this photo instead of that and focused on this team instead of that -- I will say this in full disclosure:

We have four graduates of 15-seed Winthrop University in the news department. This is relevant now because Winthrop is scheduled to play Tennessee in the Coliseum in about 15 minutes. None will be involved in the coverage of the game, I assure you.

I'll say now, though, that if Winthrop wins it'll get decent play because a 15-seed beating a 2-seed is a good story. And if Southern makes history and beats Duke? Shoot, that'll make the front page. Of course, a 16-seed has never beaten a 1-seed, but still...

A bit of context the letter writers omitted from this letter. The photograph of BC Coach Skinner was 3.5 inches by 3.75 inches and was played in the lower right hand corner of the page. This photograph was the dominant image on the page, taking up 9.5 inches by 12 inches of space.

A day earlier, this photo of State Coach Herb Sendek was the dominant image on the page.

The expression of the main characters in all three photos could be interpreted as a bit crazed in another setting. But on a basketball court one person's wild-eyed lunacy is another's competitive passion. And they are all strong, expressive photographs, capturing emotions that TV watchers saw during their games.

The State of the News Media report is a fascinating read for those of us in the business. This analysis on Editors Weblog is insightful and, for those not in the business, much shorter. It also points out one of the key conflicts that we face.

Instead of continuing to print wire copy from agencies and large papers while struggling to keep bureaus open, regional and local papers should refocus their efforts to cover what matters most directly to their readers: the news that surrounds them. Local papers should cover bake sales and town sports while regional papers hold state governments and major business accountable to their public.

I buy this. But as we've emphasized local news on the front page at the expense of wire news, we've heard from readers that they want the wire news out there. As we've reduced the tabular material that is accessible from many other places, we've heard from readers who want it in their paper. As we dropped the Times columnists, we'v heard from readers who want them in their paper. As we've reduced professional sports coverage to emphasize community and high school sports, we've heard from readers, even though access to pro sports coverage is unlimited on television and the Internet.

When Stan Swofford and Bill Hass came to work as reporters here in 1969, man's footprints were not yet imprinted on the moon and the name Woodstock referred only to a small town in New York.

When Bob Burchette arrived here three years later, President Nixon was preparing for his historic trip to China and a boy named Shaquille O'Neal was born.

I mention that not to make Stan, Bill and Bob seem ancient, but to honor the number of years these three journalists have written stories of and about the Triad. I also mention it to announce -- sadly for the paper and for readers -- that Stan, Bill and Bob are retiring this month.

They, along with a dozen or so other long-time employees of the News & Record, have accepted a retirement incentive offer the newspaper made. I'm going to write a bit more about Stan, Bill and Bob here because they spent much of their lives in our newsroom. But the paper will miss the experience, the skill and the personalities of all the retirees.

Is there a better way to illustrate loss than the head-in-the-hands-photo? Well, yes. Not surprisingly, I like ours best.

Here's hoping that today's paper is the last time we illustrate a Big Four team's basketball loss this year.

Update: For some reason, the photo on our front page of Byron Sanders and Danny Green with their heads in their hands isn't coming up. So this fix will have to wait until someone can figure out what's what.

We didn't review CTG's production of "Beauty and the Beast." CTG thinks we should have. You'll probably read some letters to the editor about our omission. We've gotten one already.

It wasn't personal. I happen to love "Beauty and the Beast," having seen the show performed on stage and having watched the Disney video a zillion times with my then-young daughters. OK, to be honest, I hated the movie with a passion back then, but I've warmed back up to it and the fond memories of when my kids were young and fun. (They are teenagers now.)

Anyway, the explosion of the arts scene in Greensboro has forced us to be more selective in what premieres we attend. When a show is as well-known as this one, we see less of a need to tell readers what it is all about. I know the show is different from the animated Disney movie, but the story is the same. We didn't ignore it, by the way; we previewed it in GoTriad last Thursday.

One letter I've gotten asks this: Please clear up my confusion: Is the News & Record reducing its arts budget? Does that make sense in a town striving to overcome its "Greensboring" image?

We aren't reducing the arts budget, but perhaps we're not expanding it as fast the the arts scene is expanding. We don't feel the need to review every show and performance in town; our readership doesn't demand it. As with everything else, we pick and choose. As for the Greensboring image? Given that we were blamed by City Council a few years ago for creating and perpetuating that nickname -- unjustifiably, I think -- I ain't touching that question.

I will take the word of the letter writer to add that the show is "amazing" and if you want to see it, here are the details.

Our history with Greensboro Mayor Keith Holliday has been more like Brad and Jennifer than Brad and Angelina. Seems like every gathering of more than a few dozen people, hizzoner takes the opportunity to shoot at us, which, incidentally, is his right. We don't take it personally. Most recently I've heard from him -- and a city attorney -- about the police report, requesting we reveal the source and give them the report. (We graciously declined.)

So, I must give credit where credit is due. At the Joey Cheek luncheon today, the mayor took the podium and specifically thanked the News & Record for sponsoring the lunch. Of course, the lunch was sponsored by the paper as a whole, not the news department, but who's quibbling. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Back to Joey Cheek Day, it was a wonderful lunch with a lot of laughs and, better still, a lot of money raised for Right to Play. Look tomorrow for Maria Johnson's story about hanging with Joey Cheek all day.

This story about a student athlete at Tennessee State who was dropped from the tennis team because she attended a newspaper conference reminded me of an interview I had with a prospective reporting candidate a few years ago.

She was a graduate of UNC and had played for the nationally ranked soccer team. I had seen her play; she was exceptionally skilled. (No, it wasn't Siri Mullinix.) I asked her for clips, a common request of prospective hires in the newsroom. She had none. I asked her about working on The Daily Tar Heel and summer internships. She hadn't done any of that.

"When you're playing soccer at UNC," she told me, "you don't have time for anything other than classes and soccer."

I don't doubt that for a moment. We didn't hire her. I still shake my head at how much enjoyment she probably got from playing soccer at that level, but at how little it prepared her for her chosen field.

Thursday, sports columnist Ed Hardin calls it a BC-Duke final. Duke loses Thursday. BC loses today.

Related note: Notice all those empty seats in Minneapolis during the BC-Nova game? Embarrassing. The Little Four at the Coliseum does better than that.

Sunday update: It turns out I didn't have clue about college basketball this year.

My newspaper column

"Some 50 million Americans turn to the Internet for news on a typical day, a new high water mark for online news-gathering that coincides with rapid growth of broadband adoption in American homes."

So begins the latest report of the respected Pew Internet and American Life Project. It traces the continued march of readers to the pot of gold at the end of the news rainbow -- access to information when, where and how you want it.

With the Internet, news about everything and anything is available 24 hours a day. This access expands well past your computer connection. Business people have used PDAs for years to get news and send e-mail. Last week, a local television station announced plans to provide news and video to cell phones. We're working on a similar service.

In a bellwether move, The New York Times will join the ranks of many other newspapers next week when it stops publishing daily stock listings. The fact is that information about stocks and money markets is so prevalent online that readers can easily create personalized stock listings. We plan to offer a customized online news service in mid-April, too.

Greensboro City Council member Sandy Carmany blogs about the city's investigation into the leak of the RMA police report. What a wonderful service she is providing for citizens, and she gives us yet another reason to hope other government officials would climb aboard the blogging bus.

She's angry and frustrated, and, given some of the things she writes, her fellow council members are, too. I absolutely deplore and condemn the irresponsible actions of "the leaker" and the News & Record for their recent release of the RMA investigative report into the problems in the Greensboro Police Department.

In her post, in which she explains why the investigative report should have remained confidential, she says: I wholeheartedly embrace this concept of "the public's right to know" with one important qualifier -- "at the appropriate time." At the heart of that statement lies the question, "When is the appropriate time?"

And then she asks the money question: My puzzled question, both to "the leaker" and the News & Record is, "WHY?" Why did you find it necessary to jeopardize our ability to uncover the truth and mete out justice in this case?

Let's flip this whole police report on its head for a moment. Let's say the internal report said that Chief Wray had done nothing inappropriate. Let's say that the city knew this, but that the chief resigned anyway and the investigation continued. Let's say, again, that the report was leaked to the newspaper. As I'm to understand many commenters here and elsewhere, we should not accept the report and, if we do, we should not report on its contents, even though it exonerates the chief?

That hardly seems civically or professionally responsible, but I admit I'm viewing it as a newspaper editor would. What say you?

As noted elsewhere, we're in the process of moving to a new hosting service. We plan to have it completed this week. While there will be a few -- let's hope it's just a few -- glitches, the move will enable us to add comments to stories, add more blogs and create a decent, non-intrusive site registration system.

The main bug we expect is that some links to our stories in the past month will die. Apologies for that. If you see something else awry please e-mail.

Talk all we want about the police report, I'll bet you that I get more mail about our publishing the "American Idol" Watch on the front page of the local section. (The mail being of the it's-not-news variety.) But now that three of the nine Idol contestants are North Carolinians, including Chris Daughtry from McLeansville, we're thinking it is becoming more and more of a local story.

...now that Cal Thomas has shaved his mustache. On the other hand, if it helps disprove this liberal media business....