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Hello and Goodbye to the P-IThoughts upon the venerable Seattle daily becoming a Web-only operation.

By Jack ShaferPosted Monday, March 16, 2009, at 6:31 PM ET

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In February, Jack Shafer cataloged the information that doesn't want to be free and argued against foundation ownership of newspapers. In January, he essayed on the newspapers that tried—and failed—to invent the Web.

So, the first assignment I'd give the P-I's home page would be to have it change as many times an hour as humanly possible. Be there with something new every time somebody at a screen wants to have a media moment. Make the site pulse like a good news-radio station, with updates updating the updates from the news wires. Satisfy the readers' need to know but also convey to them that every story is ongoing. (Developing! as Drudge would put it.) Follow the news. Make the news. Be the news!

Next, I'd have the P-I hire as many news-savvy developers as they can. Drop them into "the newsroom," but call them reporters. I'd also have the site hire (and retain) reporters who want to be developers and allow them make the site's pages their sandbox. Allow them to make as many mistakes as they want as long as the mistakes aren't mis-renderings of the facts.

After that, order the kidnapping of Adrian Holovaty, the sultan of microlocal. Holovaty has already mapped Seattle in his EveryBlock site. Put the man in chains and leave him there until he produces an atom-by-atom replica of the Seattle area for the P-I to exploit. Raid the city's two alternative weeklies—the Seattle Weekly and the Stranger—for editorial talent.

Avoid the grandiose, abstract promises that usually accompany a Web launch. Except for Muhammad Ali, nobody has ever delivered on their self-hype. Don't tout user-generated content unless you know what all that user-generated content is supposed to accomplish. (In other words, unless the prominent citizens recruited to write blogs can really write, spike them.) And please, please, please, SeattlePI.com, find a frontman or -woman with a pulse who can convey a sense of terror and discovery. Today's column introducing the new SeattlePI.com by its top hand, Executive Producer Michelle Nicolosi, reads like an advertisement for embalming fluid. Nicolosi writes:

Bottom line: We're going to focus on what readers are telling us they want and on what makes SeattlePI.com essential and unique—within the context of our local news mission, of course.

If the P-I delivers on her vision, it's doomed.

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