Four more years?

I first began pitching newspapers to post richly visual, highly interactive news releases online a little over four years ago.

The concept made so much sense to me, and seemed to hold so much potential for building readership and revenues, that it was inconceivable to me that they wouldn't do it.

They haven't. It's been four years of pitch-in-a-ditch. A complete and utter strike-out.

Two major newspapers use our online technology to enable builders and public relations firms to submit news releases to appear in print, as paid adicles. That's all the progress I have to show for four years of effort.

At the rate at which newspapers are adapting to change I'm not going to make any more progress in another four – or fourteen – years. I'm a patient man, but I'm as likely to listen to newspapers whining for four more years as I was to go along with Nixon's Four More Years pitch. Not likely.

I'm confident that readers, writers, editors, builders, management firms, real estate professionals and audiences yet to be discovered will be delighted with what we're building at HousingNewswire. Rather than waiting for newspapers to wake up to the opportunity, we'll take advantage of it ourselves.