For Arlington Patch, it’s police news. On average, the 3-year-old local site — part of a national chain owned by AOL — publishes a lead police story three to four times a week.
Some police news can’t be ignored (“Police make arrest in daytime break-ins”); other times, it can.
As an editor, I took a pass on the story that Patch titled “Masked Man Allegedly Beats Male with ‘Large Piece of Wood’ in Arlington Center Starbucks.”
Why? On Wednesday, April 10, when the report was among those sent to many local media outlets, I was preparing a news feature about the Mystic Wine Shoppe.
I saw the Starbucks report and did not think it was worth publication. I said so on the Arlington List.
Perhaps I was wrong.
A person who posted to the list thought so. Another questioned the depth of the story. Another wrote that I was insulting Patch (nope — just disagreeing).
Yet another wrote that his friend had witnessed the events. That last goes beyond the police source, a turn of events that a reporter always welcomes.
One factor influencing my decision — apart from the fact that I thought I had a better story in the works — is that Patch editors nationwide face story quotas dictated by corporate headquarters. (Read another view here >>) The easiest way for a local editor to fill a quota is to mine police reports.
That leads, as it did last year, to breaking-news alerts about a man reported urinating on the bikeway, surely a Patch low point.
On the upside, Patch gives Arlington news consumers an alternative from the traditional Advocate, owned by GateHouse, whose website tries to keep up.
YourArlington pursues its own goals without corporate influence. Its editor lives in Arlington, knows the town and has his own sense of news.
One wondered on the Arlington list what differing news judgments had to do “with the price of tea in China.”
If you open your eyes and look: a great deal.
This viewpoint was published Sunday, April 14, 2013.
