G&Y! want the AP and Rupe to get with it, saying newspapers should thank their lucky stars they are posting snippets of their original reporting. That's a move the online duo says drives thousands of eyeballs to newspaper sites eager to find the full story.
Whatever the outcome of the clash of media titans, there is one company making no bones about how it is taking advantage of the upheaval in the newspaper business. As newspapers either close or scale back coverage, people are being denied their daily dose of obituary news. Tributes.com has stepped up to the plate.This blogger remembers many in his old Brooklyn neighborhood turning to the obits as soon as they cracked opened the Daily News. Some sharpies considered the obits good hunting grounds for apartment rental leads. For others, it was a social thing of catching up with friends during a wake of an old buddy. And of course, the traditional Irish wake was a party with no end and good times had by all.
Garfield Group PR, which is based in Newton, PA, wants those good old times to keep rolling. In a recent release, GGPR neatly summed up how the death of papers denies people the “daily ritual of perusing obituaries in the morning.” On behalf of Tributes, Garfield wants people to know they can stay connected with email “alerts” whenever someone has passed away based on family name and current or old zip codes.
Tributes makes sure people won’t “have to worry about missing the opportunity to leave a message of condolence or to attend a funeral because of missing the news in the paper.”
Tributes faces a bright future as 2.5M Americans kick each year. Another 12K people turn 50 every day.
Tender readers may hesitate before telling an old high school chum that his name is listed on your Tributes alert list. That could kill a beautiful relationship.
And keep my name off your Tributes list. I am shooting for another two decades or so.