For those of us watching the “citizen journalism”/”grassroots media” space, the wait to see what Pegasus News
is up to is almost over. The Dallas-based start-up, which first
announced its intention to build a “new” model of hyper-local citJ
website last spring, has finally debuted the first of its offerings.
What’s visible as of today is TexasGigs.com,
a citJ-oriented local-entertainment site covering Dallas. TexasGigs
actually existed before, but as a blog run as a labor of love by Cindy Chaffin
since 2002. Pegasus, which plans to launch a full-fledged “citJ”-based
community news website covering Dallas in the late first quarter of
2006, brought Chaffin on board and turned the blog into a more
complete, citJ-based entertainment website.
TexasGigs will be part of the full Pegasus Dallas site (as yet unnamed) when it debuts. Pegasus president Mike Orren
says he’s also considering other components similar to the music site,
but the next step probably is to launch the full site, which is
meant to be a new model for local online news websites.
A key characteristic of the Pegasus model is to have people like
Chaffin drive the site, while soliciting citizen submissions and
offering lots of opportunities for user interaction. It’s very different
from some other citJ sites like those of Backfence.com,
which simply offers local citizens an easy way to post articles and
photos without a highly visible editor driving things from the core.
Orren says a goal is to work with local media outlets — especially
ones that may have a website but aren’t making much money from it — and
bring them into the Pegasus local website, for example a local black
newspaper.
No one is making money at Pegasus yet, and Orren and his partners are
relying on contributors while waiting for the money stream to begin and
people to get paid. He’s got some students writing for him, as well as
getting musicians to write about the local music scene. When I talked
to him today, Orren had just received his first call from a potential
advertiser.
Orren’s plan is to prove the model in Dallas, and if it works move to
other cites. But he says he won’t just parachute in to a new city;
relationships with appropriate local partners will be necessary for
deciding on entering a new market.
