What is Local News? What Should it Be?

What is local media?

What should they cover?

What makes an effective topic?

In the “good old days” (which may or may not have been good), newspapers were the source for news. If something happened across town or across the state, the local newspaper would have a story in print within a day or so.

Then came television. News delivery speed increased… instead of reading about a story a day later, the message could be passed along within hours or even minutes. Local news stations have focused on just that… local news, with a few major national stories mixed in. For more in depth nationwide coverage, there are the national network news broadcasts.

And now we have the internet, with the broad reach and variety of sources making news coverage possible in new and changing ways. With thousands of news sources available within seconds, what defines local? Should a local news outlet spend time on issues without much local impact? Can a Portland news group possibly offer coverage comparable to or better than a news group located near the event?

For some concrete context, last Monday Amy Ruiz of the Portland Mercury made <a href=”http://blogtown.portlandmercury.com/2007/04/today_in_pdx_virtual_edition.php”>a post on BlogTown</a> noting that The Oregonian’s website wasn’t leading with the Virginia Tech school shooting story, but instead notes that the paper had won a Pulitzer Prize.

Is that wrong? What could The Oregonian have said about the shootings that wasn’t already being said in other places, more accurately, and in a more timely fashion?  With thousands of news sources available, should a local news outlet spend time on an event across the country (or across the world) for which they can’t possibly be an authoritative source?