From Rodney Van Meter via Dave Farber’s IP list, here is news that could make local news reporters nervous:
“The website Pasadena Now, a local online news source, has created a stir by hiring a couple of reporters to report on Pasadena City Council meetings. Why the stir? Well, the reporters live in Mumbai and Bangalore. They’ll watch the meetings over the Internet, arrange interviews via phone and videoconference, and write one or two 500-word stories a day, for the princely salaries of $12,000 and $8,000.”
It raises obvious questions though – while the outsourced Indian reporters don’t cost that much, they’ll lack the local context for everything they report. Meanwhile the tradition of training reporters by starting at smaller papers would suffer if this takes off, resulting eventually in an overall loss of journalistic quality. Also that price of $12,000 isn’t really saving that much versus a very junior part time local.
Lance Wiggs 
Isn’t this typical of Management By Excel Spreadsheets? That is, you look at editorial as a straight cost only, as they’re not direct revenue earners like sales people.
Somehow I’d have thought the sales guys need good stuff to sell, but perhaps I’m being naive here?
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