Arianna and Patch.com
February 7, 2011
I’m a big fan of Patch.com and their local news gathering operation – even if they are owned by AOL. It was interesting to hear Arianna Huffington being interviewed today about the puchase of her Huffington Post site by the AOL content empire (at least in their own eyes).
The only AOL division she chose to name while answering question on The PBS Newshour was Patch.com. I’m not sure if it was a random thought, or if I should be nervous that Ms Huffington will start monkeying around with what has become a pretty successful formula for local news gathering.
AOL and Arianna had conference calls with all the AOL properties which will be under her control but singling out Patch.com would make me a bit nervous if I was one of their local editors. I’m not the only one expressing concern.
Only time will tell, but I really hope I don’t wind up reading local news as dictated by the folks in Washintgton D.C.
