Earlier this month the Seattle Post-Intelligencer became an online-only publication and reduced it’s staff by eighty percent. They essentially evacuated the entire economy class of a Boeing 757 and left only the 20 first class members to stick around.

The change is drastic. The PI is one of the first major newspapers to make such a bold decision. The digital-only publication will struggle with revenue strategies, and The PI Twenty will have to become ironmen of multimedia, athletes proficient in beat blogging, social media, web video, photography and more.

As its former competition, The Seattle Times, is left with the burden of gathering “all the bright red boxes that held the product of its deceased rival,” skeptical journalists are placing bets on just how long the PI will survive.

The answer is easy. As long as the readers want.

Blog For Us

It all started back around January 2006. That’s when the Seattle PI began inviting readers to blog for them.

“The idea behind the reader blogs is simply to give readers a place where they can write about their passions,” said SeattlePI.com Executive Producer Michelle Nicolosi.

In three years the site managed to attract more than 150 readers to blog for the publication. For free.

“We don’t pay reader bloggers, but we do bring them other advantages,” Nicolosi explained. “There’s millions of people blogging in obscurity around the world. People who blog for us find an audience right away, because we put their work in front of our four million unique users every month.”

It’s no wonder the folks at the PI feel like they no longer have to cover everything themselves. They’re essentially running a journalistic Habitat for Humanity, encouraging volunteerism and community building. There are dozens of blogs for every niche from graceful aging, Seattle food, Washington trails and dogaholics to rebuilding the economy and garden photography. There’s even a blog called “Jobless in Seattle.” (Authored by a former PI staff member, perhaps?)

But is there such a thing as too many blogs? Too many niche topics? For Nicolosi, each one of the blogs isn’t designed to be read or liked or appreciated by everyone.

“Some people want to read video game reviews, some people want to read about cooking and fashion and being single in Seattle — some don’t,” she said. “What I’m trying to do is put together a great mix of content so that no matter who you are, there’s something here of interest to you.”

As for PI staff-produced blogs… there are only eight.

Once A Newspaper… Always A Newspaper?

The “Blog For Us” feature on SeattlePI.com may become a main source of life support for the 146-year old “paper.” Reader bloggers help the staff cover topics that they would not have otherwise been able to cover. But such a system raises questions about ethics, transparency and objectivity.

Should the PI thrive and turn a profit off of reader blogs? Should the PI even keep the same name? It’s a non-newspaper that hosts blogs run by non-reporters/editors.

Tim Shisler, multimedia travel journalist and adventure-enthusiast, speculated on his blog about citizen journalism and the changing landscape of media:

A majority of the thinking has been around one central thought: are citizen journalists really doing any reporting that doesn’t directly reflect their own personal agenda or interests? One of the greatest things about journalism is reporters are supposed to be objective, and even though they may hate going to city council meetings, they still report the news. So as the PI goes to an online only format and reduces it’s news staff from 165 to 20, I can’t help but wonder what the quality of news will be. I want to say great, but who’s going to ask, ‘what’s you’re agenda and personal gain if writing a free blog for us?’ They need the content too bad, and have no money to pay a reporter to get it.

“We have a fairly elaborate screening process,” Nicolosi said. “We ask readers to describe the blog they’re proposing, we take a look at their writing, we do a background check, and more. If it all looks good, we sign them up to blog.”

Background checks on hundreds of blogs? It’s mind-boggling to imagine the amount of requests that The PI Twenty receive on a daily basis from readers who want to blog. And yet, the PI claims it responds to every request. Every single one.

“We have an email set up for reader bloggers – blog@seattlepi.com,” Nicolosi said. “We check the inbox a number of times a week and follow up with everyone who writes in.”

This, by far, is the strongest evidence that the organization is no longer a newspaper, where such a promise would hardly last.

Trend Watch 2009

SeattlePI.com is not the only news site that boasts reader blogs. Nicolosi recalls the practice being encouraged as early as 2003 by Rob Curley, who was then still at The Lawrence Journal-World. And in 2005, Norwegian Daily Verdens Gang (VG), attracted over 25,000 bloggers. Today, newspapers like The Sun and The Telegraph offer readers the freedom to publish their own stories under the paper’s name.

Just last week, The Cincinnati Enquirer admitted it would have to rely heavily on the help of local bloggers to stay afloat. In return, the “Enky” would offer links and prominent placement in exchange for a partnership and/or ad-sharing. Their strategy, according to rival Cincinnati City Beat, is to have a “blogger pull plan” where local blogs are fed to the site not only to supplement content but also fill content holes (particularly in entertainment).

For those closely following the Seattle PI or Cincinnati Enquirer, a looming concern will be how the sites regulate misinformed or questionable content from reader bloggers. The Telegraph’s experiment with user-generated content, for instance, produced “some very unsavoury characters,” such as members of the far right, anti-abortionists, europhobes, and members of an anti-feminist “men’s movement.”

Moderators are the most predictable solution.

A Win/Win Situation

As of Sunday, March 29, SeattlePI.com’s page views have dropped 20 percent since the abolishment of its print edition. It sounds like failure, but to the The PI Twenty it’s a sign of success. “Experiment a lot, fail fast,” is their motto according to Nicolosi. Tumbling web traffic is expected and, frankly, a non-issue at this point.

Instead of fretting over stats and analytics during this transition period, the Seattle PI listens to what the reader wants. When the reader complains, that’s when they’ll start sweating.

“We had a party for our reader bloggers a few weeks ago to thank them for blogging for us,” Nicolosi said. “They’re a great group of people and a diverse group of writers.”

A chance to blog for a top newspaper website that gives you high traffic and invitations to parties?

No wonder readers love the Seattle PI.