I'm at the Kelsey Group's Local Marketplace conference in Seattle today and one of the speakers is Patricia Lee Smith from the Seattle Times Co. She talked a lot about the newly redesigned nwsource.com web site and said something that caught my attention, light of some recent discussion on this blog.

"Targeted advertising is content to (readers) and they welcome it," Lee said.

I tend to agree, but most of what we hear from readers is that all advertising online is created equal (and is evil). We don't receive many complaints about advertising in the newspaper, of course, but many people still feel that content wants to be free - and free of ads.

What do you think? Will you welcome advertising on our site - and other local sites - if it is local and relevant to where you live? (I hope so.)

About 65 people came visited TNT HQ yesterday to learn about our new DIY events calendar. Since the web has brought self-service to banking and airline reservations, why not events calendars?

Seriously though, I think most of those who attended appreciate the control over their events they will have with our new system. Plus, their event will be listed almost immediately online instead of having to wait for the once-a-week GO section to be printed first, where their event make not make the cut due to space constraints. (The online database feeds the print GO section, by the way.)

A question that came up during the session that might also be worthwhile knowing for those of you who use our online calendar to find events, too. Someone asked how the events were listed on the site if a user is browsing by date and/or category (if you search for events, then the relevance of your search keyword determines the display). So we asked the folks who power the site for us (a company called Zvents), and I'll try to translate the explanation:

Essentially, the events are ranked based on page quality and popularity. The most important factor is the popularity of a listing, if the listings have received a substantive amount of clicks. After that, it's page quality. What determines "page quality" you ask? Basically, if there is more content, it has a higher page quality. This would include a fuller description, media reviews, user reviews, all fields filled in (price, web site, etc), pictures, etc.

If you missed yesterday's demonstration and want to know how to submit an event to our calendar, download this PDF tutorial and submission guide.

As readers of this blog, you are hopefully well aware that the newspaper industry is in a state of disruption. Dave Zeeck's Sunday column explained a few of the changes - mostly cuts - that newspaper readers are seeing these days. It's required reading if you are at all foggy on newspaper economics 101. The bottom line: print subscribers will be getting less product for the same price because advertisers are spending less to appear in the product.

I thought I should take the opportunity to explain what these changes will mean for online readers. Since we don't have to pay for newsprint, ink or trucks to distribute the online news, we aren't under the same pressure to save costs. In fact, the online product will be growing and improving. As advertisers shift their spending to digital products, it's our mission to publish the best local digital news and information product possible, which means more attention and resources for the web site (not less).

It also means you will be seeing more advertising on thenewstribune.com, because we can't make more money to offset those print advertising reductions in revenue without increasing the advertising offerings. You have probably already noticed pop-under ads that appear on your computer when you visit our site. They are set to show only one time per user per 24 hours - if you're seeing more than that, let me know.

We are regularly in discussion with our partners in the advertising department about other new and innovative online advertising products. And you will likely see some of them in the coming months. We will strive to balance the need for new revenue with our users' experience since you can't build an audience by annoying them. I also believe that online readers will appreciate more local advertising on our site (some people only buy the newspaper for the ads, after all), but I'll be surprised if we don't upset some people along the way.

This is part of the evolution in media we are currently living through, which is exciting at times, but not always easy.

What I consider the "local webosphere" is filled with blogs and web sites published by smart and creative people writing about (and photographing) local events, issues and topics. A relatively new local blog takes a much more global approach.

The Melon Online describes itself as "open-forum/community for individualized insights, discussion and enlightenment."

On the homepage right now is a post praising the Sci-Fi channel's Battlestar Gallactica as "one of the best and most politically relevant shows." Other items touch on Haiti and Afghanistan and one is a comparison of Gov. Christine Gregoire with past Washington governors.

Considering this mix, it should come as no surprise the site/blog is powered by political science students from a local university, in this case UPS. The cornerstone of the site is the podcasting programs which are taken from the school's fine radio station, KUPS. They feature interviews with professors on all sorts of global policital topics (meaning much of it is over my head). But the content in both the blog postings and podcasts is accessible for a general audience, so I recommend giving The Melon Online a taste.

Erik Emery lays out a nice case for why The News Tribune should add "Tacoma" back into its flag (and name). He wisely ties it into a pretty vibrant conversation at Exit 133 on the demise of the American newspaper, a topic that has been appearing on various blogs and business web sites for about 10 years now. (The drumbeat is louder these days, of course.)

I'm not about to pretend to have any influence here regarding changing the name of the news organization. And I can see both sides. As our editor Zeeck pointed out, staking a claim to an area that includes all of the South Sound made sense from a business and marketing perspective in 1987, and still does. But, as Emery points out, in the digital age, when search powers the web, the lack of "Tacoma" in our name hurts our Google Juice score.

In fact, Emery's example of the U.S. Open was an actual conversation in the newsroom here the day we broke the news. Several people asked me why our story wasn't coming up first on Google News that day when they searched for "U.S. Open Tacoma" because the story was "ours." Well, Google didn't know the story was "ours" and we didn't have "Tacoma" in our headline, our URL or the title of our site. Our headline was "U.S. Open Championship coming to Chambers Bay," which made perfect sense for our local audience. If we had written "U.S. Open Championship coming to Tacoma" our local readers would have laughed us off State Street. (Doesn't the Trib know Chambers Bay is in UP?!)

So, since we can't use "Tacoma" in most of our headlines without looking silly to our local audience, adding "Tacoma" to our name, URL and flag would definitely increase our search performance. Would that bring enough page views (aka advertising inventory) to make it worth the expense of new signs and stationary? And the potential alienating of our suburban markets? That's a question for someone above my pay grade, but the web certainly has changed the dynamics of the argument.

The question of how we will survive in the future remains an ongoing challenge, of course. Online readership is robust – we grew 36% in 2007 and matched that rate in the first quarter of 2008 – but can we find new ad dollars online as fast enough to make up for lost ad dollar in print? That's the challenge. The only sure thing is that newspapers will have to change on every front – news, advertising, online – to meet that challenge.

Let's just say it's not boring around here these days. ;)

But wait - there's more! Yes, we have uncovered even more blog-worthy topics.

Our soccer blog Indirect Kick covers the movements of Seattle's new MLS team, plus other news and notes of interest to the South Sound. It joins the GOALTacoma Blog in that pursuit, but looks like it might be a nice complement to David Falk's coverage of the Tacoma Stars and Tide.

Our golf blog The Green Scene will track developments related to the 2015 U.S. Open and our local pros.

Next up: a blog for all things Tall Ships. Launching soon.

As is customary around the first of every month, I bring you the most popular news stories on our site from last month. In this case, it's mostly sports stories.

And the most popular blogs for the month of March:

1. Seahawks Insider
2. Lights & Sirens

3. Political Buzz
4. Prep Blog

5. Bring the Noise
6. Biz Buzz

7. Mariners Insider
8. Sonics Insider

9. Open House
10. Huskies Insider

11. Inside the Editorial Page
12. Ed's Diner

13. Grit City
14. Word on the street

15. FOB Tacoma

The Tacoma Daily Index published a nice profile of the man behind the year-old Rainiers blog, No Rhubarb!, on its site last week. I especially liked what the blog's creator, Justin Carleton, had to say about the location of the current stadium.

They would never do it, but my best-case scenario would be to tear down Cheney Stadium, not rebuild on that site, and find a place where they could go back downtown or back down to the Hilltop. Be closer to where people are. Baseball is meant to be downtown.

I covered this great local blog last year.