Yesterday The Eagle launched an electronic version of the newspaper - clickable images of the actual newspaper pages that allow readers to zoom in and read stories, look at photos and view advertising from the printed edition of the paper. The “e-Eagle” is available for now at no cost, but within a week or so, it will require a subscription and log-in.
You can find the e-Eagle from the Kansas.com home page each day by clicking on the link near the top left-hand rail.
News reports in recent months indicate that across the nation, numbers of golfers are declining as people give up the game because they lack time to play. Here’s hoping that the people who are quitting are the ones who keep spitting sunflower seed shells on the greens.
A couple of readers have written to ask us to move the Faith & Values section, published Saturdays, in front of an automotive advertising section that currently is positioned in front of the Faith section. They want to know why a news section would be placed behind advertising, and wonder what message it sends about how we prioritize faith news.
I think it sends a very strong message that The Eagle publishes a section with faith news, and devotes the front of a section to it. Last week I was looking at several newspapers from larger cities, and they all gave faith news a single page (or three-fourths of a page) inside an entertainment section, or on the back page of the section. One reader wanted us to remove entertainment news from the back of the Faith section, feeling that it devalued the religion stories.
I don’t see it that way. Entertainment is an important topic for thousands of our readers on the weekend, and that content is important to help people plan their free time. We chose to make faith stories a higher priority and give them a more prominent position. I think that speaks volumes about our priorities.
The section is behind the automotive advertising for a key reason - advertisers pay most of the newspaper’s costs for gathering and printing news, including for a prominent position such as the automotive section. Without those advertisers, we wouldn’t be able to offer the range of content we do on Saturday: news, sports, home and garden features, religion, and entertainment.
We have to find a balance of meeting the needs of readers and advertisers both. In addition, automotive advertising is very popular with readers, especially on Saturday. Faith & Values is right behind that section, so it shouldn’t be very hard to locate. Nor should our priorities for topics we consider important to cover.