Mark Vasto, publisher of the Parkville Luminary, says he's rushing in to fill the void left when, on January 10, New York-based GateHouse Media stopped printing the Kansas City Kansan and became an online-only newspaper.
"The Kansas City Kansan's last headline was 'News will now be only online," Vasto says in a press release. "The Luminary begs to differ."
Over the last couple of weeks, Vasto says, he tried to license the print-only rights for The Kansan and reprint rights for its online content but "was ultimately rebuffed." On Friday, he printed the first copies of the Kansas City Luminary. Vasto says it'll be weekly, and that he'll sell it for 75 cents a copy at 30 locations in Wyandotte County and send it out by direct mail until he can build a subscriber list.
Vasto knows it's a horrible time for newsprint, but he's undaunted.
The former Olathe News reporter (who also contributes to WineS magazine and writes a sports column that appears in more than 230 newspapers through King Features Syndicate) started the Parkville Luminary in 2004. He named it after Parkville's original newspaper, the Industrial Luminary, published by city founder Col. George S. Park from 1853-1855. Vasto designed his Luminary as a broadsheet with an antique feel that's apparently been well-received -- it made a profit in its first month, Vasto says.
He still believes in newsprint.
Of The Kansan's print demise, he says, "This is a sad situation that has been repeated all across the country: an out-of-state corporate media concern comes into a community, buys their local institution, runs it into the ground then shuts it down with little regard for the people who live there. When GateHouse Media purchased the newspaper, their subscribers should have been viewed as an asset, not a liability. They said that their most loyal followers -- paying customers -- were not in their business interests. Well, we don't work for corporate. The Luminary is interested in working for the community's readership. That's how we roll."
Good luck with it, man. We'll be pulling for you.
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