good evening i'm will ghost in a welcome to another edition of open source tonight our guest is richard ryan who is the founder of u s one and we are continuing our conversation with him that we began a little while ago and with me is chris grant who is also going to join in the conversation and be talk to rich about some of his experiences as well as the overall mission of u s one and maybe we'll start with just picking up from where we left off well we had a great conversation last time as was mentioned rich ryan is the founding editor and continues to bring us what is known as the publication us one center around for thirty four years i ho many of our viewers have already gotten to know it is not rich has been entertaining us and educating us about the situation of print media today but it occurred to us to ask what was the light switch that went on what gave you the idea the brainstorm to even think of this this type of paper well it was one nine hundred eighty four and i had been involved in journalism quite a bit already i had started out of my hometown newspaper in upstate new york and then on the paper at princeton university were to little bit for time magazine that had done a bunch of freelancing and i was still freelancing in  i was somebody from town topics was on vacation of his in the summer and they asked me if i had any stories to contribute and i said well there is an interesting story going on a battle between the hyatt regency out on  one this brand new hotel and this other new hotel called scana khan which is up in forestall center and i said they're having they're trying to lure companies trying to lure the corporate travel business of these companies and each one will put on this huge party and and a bunch of guys that i know in town will go out to the parties because it's free food and drink and there are all these wonderful young mostly women travel planners from all these companies hang out there and and we walk in and it's it's just a fabulous party it's great and they they have one a month or so and they over do each other every time i we're a princeton newspaper and that's really not a princeton story that's really a group one story a light bulb on off a roof one story and i think and i think barbara was exactly right that if town  topics had started covering all of route one it would it would it would no longer be the town topics that people in the community know enough to be this other saying or get overwhelmed by one business but clearly there was a there was  opening now for route one newspaper which i ended up calling us one and that was one thousand nine hundred four and we're off to the races very very interesting you just talked a little bit about competition and location today there is so much competition for eyeballs as they say readers listeners viewers how tell us a little bit about how the u s one addresses that competition temptations to to stretch route one and us one readership from way north to way south to parts in between and we really try to keep our readership and our stories focused on an area it's about eight miles in radius from the high regency on the corner of alexander road and one which is kind of ground zero for us try to keep everything within eight to ten miles focus on that on  that course so so we're so number one we're doing the same thing that we've always been doing because it it it's a community paper and you don't wanna try to make a community out of something that doesn't work people would figure it out  the other thing is we do have a we do put all our stories online and we we also put our events database on line which turns out to be a as sings change we're getting an audience for our online things that partly doesn't even know about our print newspaper the the proof has come up in the last year or so we have our day by day listings that people always like in the paper what's going on today and we also have it on line and i'll get a call now the papers the as it's going to the printer tomorrow it say for our next issue coming out on wednesday we're going to call tuesday or wednesday say and then and they'll say gee we'd really like to get our event that's happening on saturday in your database and i said well you could but it's too late the paper's gone to the printer the papers been printed it'll only be on line and they say well well that's fine we didn't know you had a paper that's what we want we want it to be on line so there's that there's an audience out there that's beginning to to go to our web site which called princeton info dot com and  they're interacting with us at that level and they're not aware of the newspaper but they're happy to to deal with this on an on line basis and that i think if anything eyeballs we're we're gaining some i've heard you both in print and just in talking with you use this term community journalism and at the risk of not wanting to make it when i think it might be what would tell us what is that a term of art and what does that really mean and how does it differ from washington post journalism if at all well i think you could you could argue that every paper has its community  times has a worldwide community that's it's probably defined by people's intellectual interests and and and so on so so we are a physical community that we're serving a physical community and we are you know mindful of that community space that i think no matter how much how much on line there is how much  social media is going on virtual reality flying all around us i think people are still going to be rooted in the in the in the community in which they wake up live move  about and a newspaper can serve that and if it does serve it it should stick to the community so that's the kind of community we're talking about are we doing collectively are the papers and other media doing a good job and i maybe i'll just focus a little more pointedly on what has also been called sort of hyper local news i must admit i now myself get the weather on my phone because six from nassau up to montgomery and i'm thinking i did that's that's unusual to find something that local and very very occasionally have issues in princeton or plainsboro that are we we have some on line only news outlets and we have a very good one in princeton called planet princeton and crystal knapp runs that and she does a good job of keeping on top of that kind of that kind of news where the minute by minute changes important to you if you live in the community so she's she is doing that exact hyper hyper local thing we are doing that i'd say with our events database keeping it focused on events that that those of us here in the princeton area might reasonably go to not get not get overwhelmed if you go to if you go to facebook for example and look at their events you know what's happening today facebook will throw a million things at you some i think maybe are because somebody paid them to throw that information in front of you and some are just because they're ghassan and they're there they're computer running algorithms and i saw that you had you know you live in princeton but you happened to go up to new brunswick at one point and some now suddenly there through a new brunswick stuff and it's hyper local i think  is a is an opportunity i think many of the communities that we serve also have on line only news sites of that sort they're they're a little hard to to sustain and  the revenue is still there and the people who are running them are still trying to figure out how to make a living doing it not easy in reporting stories and in the u s one focuses mainly on business stories is entertainment  other is there's a creed up there right now about you know about fake news of fake information and whatever you know and most journalists are objective and fair and balanced what is the biggest  what's a journalistic principles for us one and checking facts before writing a story and you know what standards do you hold your reporters to well we try to base all of our stories on facts not not made up facts we want to be real journalism we are not afraid to say we are not we're not afraid of the charge that we're not objective we  we are not objective in the in that we are making decisions subjective decisions based on the community that we serve and for example that the scientists marched on how to march in trenton there asked we can we got a letter to the editor saying this is happening here's the way you can you know if you want to go on this march here's the way you could interact with our group there's a website here some you know it useful information if you're in that and i made sure that got in the paper not because i'm trying to take sides in the science versus but fake science but because i know that our readership a lot of our readers are in that community and they they would find it interesting but the analogy you could use in this whole objectivity thing is if you're a new york yankee fan and went to happen and up in boston and so reading the sports pages say for the sure give the yankees short shrift up and every time every time a red sox does this that or the other thing they're all over the big story well of course they're serving they're serving their partisan and and by and i think the definition there is if you are running one side of the story only and something else comes that comes back with the other side and can't even get in the door of your newspaper that you're probably being partisan you're probably in too partisan and that's i think to fly so does the concept of i think which i'm hearing and makes me think about the concept of fair balance in television and how that's gone by the by the horns you know it's not quite and there was a change in legislation some fifteen or so years ago which loosened the requirements how do you think about that that issue because you you just touched on that but is that something for example if you watch our public television station here in princeton what are your expectations as because you come from a job training in journalism and cetera what what should we be doing in public television to make sure that that we do the kind of job that you're doing pretty well i think being open to the very various sides important and sometimes i think that we  don't do enough of this i think we need to seek out the the under represented side and tell him that it is an issues coming up good and discussed on our in our medium whatever it is print or t v and we're really looking for somebody to represent that other point of view i think that that is one good thing i don't think and i think any any publication or media source in princeton has been so heavy handed that they  would not give the other side of a story however i give one example bruce after him the attorney had a suit against princeton university saying that some other buildings ought to be taxed at the regular property tax rate because princeton in some ways acts as a for profit entity it's got a lot of money going on it's not the old kind of quiet the pro university that you know that that we all remember from fifty or sixty years ago and and i and i think there was an example where bruce whom i never knew until that story came up but bruce was treated sort of like the skunk at the garden party you know there was a there was over the media i think generally he was saying well he's kind of a troublemaker he's not he's not really appreciating the university as much as he should he can't win there's no way he can win and and i said to more of our young reporters i said i don't know if i agree with this guy or disagree with him but let's find out who he is let's just ask him bruce who are you where you from originally how did you get into this line of work what are your goals with this lawsuit you know let's get beyond the legal leads in the back and forth what is it that you see what's important to you and we ran that story in the princeton echo which is another which is our community paper based strictly on princeton and i got an enormous amount of positive feedback people saying gee i didn't really know what bruce's argument was all good to know who he was well that's open the door is point one of the goals of our this this show open source is to try to make sure that we are always give our viewers some information about what they can do  and it depends on our guests so you sort of open the door for me to ask i think we're all familiar with letters to the editor i i read most of them i must say in the case way but what's your advice to a readership of newspapers when we know there's only so much room for opinion what should they do to be active participants in the discussions that you buy by definition are fostering wealth they feel they have something to say something that first of all don't stand on any ceremony there is no ceremony in our business you don't have to submit anything in any particular way however you can get the the thought to us get it to us if it's picking up the phone that you're most comfortable with please do that if it's an e mail that's wonderful too but but definitely reach out you don't need a completed final draft of your argument if you just say i like to write something about how the media could do a better job covering university for example we just talked about it somebody could say you know i've got some other thoughts about the university in the media and town gown relations you know a simple one two or three sentence explanation of what you're up to get it out to the to the editors and  encourage them to get back to you have a have a return return address is always helpful an email or phone we have we have we do still get things one a full ideas and there's no there's no way to reach back to the person and just author of the organisation man back in one thousand nine hundred fifty six huge bestseller one or two million copies talked about groupthink talked about how big companies operate and that research le into where the people in the organizations live which were the suburbs the end of the at the suburbs and they solve the problems of suburban sprawl so they were because the last landscape and then from the last landscape you sa view instead of generalizing from large numbers he takes the large numbers and breaks it down to specifics you know those companies announce flowing twenty million americans big companies and let's let's look at those individual people who are the employee and why what kind of work are they doing are they happy are they satisfied so he really digs in and his his work with the city in the city he really  said it set a tone that still applies today to what makes a city successful what makes even a small town center like princeton what makes it work and what makes it not work why is the heinz plaza between the library and with a spoon grill there why is high plaza so successful what is it about it and and whitehead criteria that he set out he had you in talking about the city and knows manhattan he gave advice that would be useful to the to a person setting up a heinz plaza the people did heinz plaza did it just right that is a fabulous and very successful public space a lot of towns have nothing like it on the strip here is it true that you're doing some writing on this subject i am i am i am working on a biography of of william h white you know and this is my now that i'm thirty thirty three years thirty four years almost thirty four years in the u s one i'm thinking it's time to for me to pull back and let the the new generation i want the younger generation and the new the new group come in and take over more the day to day responsibility so the white thing is my is my diversion and  don't despair number one the there there is still a future in journalism and it's a and whether whether your your stories that you come home to produce whether they're told in a printed version like like the u s one the newspaper or on line or told through social media it doesn't matter the story is there the people's quest for a story is there and i think that the young people are figuring out that they can affect a lot of change it by being journalists then come in and do a story and turn around a narrative and find public opinion reality changing as a result of their stories seeing it seeing it happen how young do you see kids start thinking about writing and we worry telling we had we've had queries from kids in high school certainly wondering if helped me out and did a lot of research and was very valuable she she knew nothing about sports frank the fords of renown sports writer she knew nothing about sports but she had a and i read it as i explained little story that i was trying to develop she she recognized the story she could appreciate a good story so she was helpful at tenth grade low entry barlow talking about the stories and just quickly  lino that us one has an annual opportunity for fiction writers and pellets to get in print so tell us a little bit about that and whether some dates coming up people need to pay attention to yes the two thousand eight hundred summer fiction issue will great who's the senator they can send it to fiction at princeton info dot com there and princeton info dot com is our web site if you go there there be a little block to the tells you about the fiction fiction issu love as many submissions as we can get we try to get as many printed as we possibly can and we give preference to people who either either live or work in the greater princeton business community so our audience are here and to the high school and college papers they have opportunities there this is really for people who are in the workplace and they have they the opportunities for them are few and far between well unlike in a magazine i think that's an mike bloomberg told me years ago when i interviewed him about his bloomberg terminals that he were taking over the world and on the way his billions he said we always have the ski reports and  entertainment items in a small box on our on our member terminal because we know everybody when they're sitting at their desk monday through friday has one little part of their brain saying you know i've got to get out of here pretty soon and i'm looking forward to this weekend so we've got writers we've got all musicians the people in our workforce who are musicians is it's amazing the number of people who are who have this and actors and and as we discovered short story writers and poets you know we're we're trying to hear from them give them an outlet thank you for clarifying that's exciting we should well we want to thank you for coming on and everybody who's been watching make sure you get your writings in to  fiction twenty eighteen somewhere around june first will be a deadline and i'm sure that richard ron will be very happy to read from you read what you wrote absolutely and it was very good sessions we enjoyed talking a lot about what's going on in us one what's going on the world of journalism the impact of social media and hopefully down the road we'll see you hopefully with another with a book out you know on the william white and  edition of open source have a good night