Back in the day, back around 1855-1865, the bay area had an actual physical newspaper called the “Daily Citizen” or “San Francisco Daily Citizen” or something. Didn’t last too long.
But these days, the fairly common name Citizen (it made this list, anyway) is back in bidness in the bay area. Check it – here’s the East Bay Citizen.
See? There’s your straight-up prototypical Citizen Journalism right there, with extensive coverage of sujets civiques in San Leandro and Hayward from highly regarded Steven Tavares. Dude’s even got a manifesto ‘n stuff:
“The purpose of The Citizen is to serve the areas of the East Bay that are severely under reported by the local media. The reasons your daily newspaper is sparse devoid of insight or context is either because of financial constraints leading to cutbacks in the newsroom or general dereliction of civic duty (that is the polite way of saying it).”
All right, fair enough.
Comes now the Bay Area News Project (BANP). See? It’s backed by more millionaires and billionaires than you can shake a stick at. Well, next month, they’re going to start up with The Bay Citizen. Here’s their logo:
Question Time. Do you think that there might be confusion between these two outfits, owing to the similarity of the names? I do. Can you imagine how future developments could create even more confusion? Mmmm…
Do you think the person(s) who came up with the name Bay Citizen for the BANP are aware of the online existence of the East Bay Citizen? Yes, of course, how could they not be?
Now, do you think the person(s) who came up with the name Bay Citizen for the BANP bounced the idea off of Steven Tavares beforehand? No, that’s a negatory, good buddy.
And do you think hardworking Steven Tavares is pleased with BANP’s actions? No. (Not saying he’s all pissed off or anything, as he’s manifestly Too Busy To Hate, just saying he’s not pleased.)
All right, Question Time is over. Now, it’s Party Time. Check it:
“The Bay Citizen Just got the green light – our launch party will be held at the historic Great American Music Hall in San Francisco on May 26th. It’s a wonderful venue for what we promise will be an amazing party!”
So, for $50 you can score two tickets and then be able to tell all your friends that you’re a “Founder” of the BANP’s Bay Citizen online venture
Party on, I s’pose.
