While this is not great news, it opens up an opportunity. I would bet that most of your readers are middle-aged. However, if there are any hungry young English or journalism majors you know, please consider an independent path and contribute to blogs such as this, Karens Johns' and Watching Phoenixville. The Phoenix made a decision several years ago with the loss of Bill Rettew and then Karin Williams that they had no interest in either objective nor community focused journalism. Kids, there are at least a half dozen great stories which are crying out for exposition. If you have time if you are home from school or back home from some happy valley, go down to Irish Joe's or talk to the old guys in your neighborhood. Go to these stupid council and committee meetings and try to put something together. Write about it. Post it. Hone your skills and help out the old folks at home. Pad your resume with something you can point to. Take a chance. We need your eyes, your words, your talents.

I am completely open to allowing an independent type that would like to follow one single issue to post on this blog under his/her own byline.

We need something like this for Phoenixville:

http://www.whatsthe422.com/

How did it work out that the worst one is the last one standing?

There are no English or journalism majors that desire to come to Phoenixville to write because they don't want to put up with the constant scrunity of the town. Why work in a town that doesn't appreciate it's own newspaper? Instead of accepting it like it is, everyone has something negative to say about the newspaper. It is ridiculous to hold the newspaper to lofty standards on an every day basis when they are/were fighting like hell to survive. But no, it is easy to run a blog like this one and beat the crap out of it on a daily basis. There are some people who are actually relieved that this has happened, because now they can move on and not have to deal with this daily scrunity. Now that you are left with a weekly paper filled with old news, you'll beat it into the ground to where there will be nothing left. What did you prove then? I guess the public will have to rely on blogs like this to stay informed and deal with your point of view on matters. Oh yeah, what a way to go! Thanks for your continued support of being a problem and not a solution.

It would seem to me - without ANY knowledge of what is going on down there - that NOW would be a good time to attempt to make the Phoenix an on-line only daily.

The advertising they currently have will have to go somewhere,why not on-line...and providing a "canary in the coalmine" measure of the potential viability of such an animal?

The cost of "putting out" an on-line daily...other than writing, photography and web talent...HAS to be less than a print version by ALOT.

Does it mean that the reading public will have some "habits" to change? It will....

....but the alternative of not having a "local newspaper".... in a town continually "on the edge" of either success or failure, with a local political machine that favors politics over "doing the right thing for all".... seems to be more of a crime than just a shame.

A daily on-line Phoenix coupled with a once a week "wrap-up" in print....could be a workable alternative.

Thoughts?

I too would welcome an "independent type" that would like to follow one or more issues to post on the Watching Phoenixville blog under her own byline.

How about it Ms. Williams?

May 21 8:51 am
I am thinking there are no English/Journalism majors willing to come to work at The Phoenix because they could make more money flipping burgers at McDonalds.
It isn't the 'scrutiny' of the people at all. A good reporter loves the energy derived from making people think. A bad reporter....well you get what you pay for, hence the last man standing.
If you want to blame the downfall of the local paper on someone, look to the lazy cut and paste reporter type who sits and writes what is handed to him rather than going ot to get actual news. Good journalists have come and gone, and none have gone because of intense scrutiny, lol

Will the Mercury pick up the local school news,events such as the "dogwood festival", obits,etc?

I think it is safe to assume that the Mercury will not be covering Phoenixville as much as it should and that the town may need a different avenue in which to get its news. I hope the Barry Cassidy Report is still on PhoenixvilleNews.com site.

The "last man standing" is gone as well. There will only be an editor to do everything. Lots of luck with that.

Thanks to the anonymous reader who plugged our site in the third comment. We'd absolutely love to expand our coverage into Phoenixville, but we'd need more reporters to do it. There are only a few of us, and we're all fitting our reporting work into the spaces around our day jobs, families, etc. As it is, we haven't been able to cover Collegeville nearly as well as we'd like. Phoenixville is an even more demanding beat.

Anyone who might like to join our staff should send a letter of interest, a description of their background, and some writing samples to whatsthe422@gmail.com.

From the looks of the latest articles of local interest it would appear that Dennis Wright, Barry Sankey, and Barry Taglieber are the only members of the reporting staff now.

Everything else is either from the wires of AP or other Journal-Register papers.