Every day I am reminded just how different this business I have toiled in now for more than three decades is from the one I entered as a wide-eyed kid fresh out of college.
Without question the biggest difference - and challenge - we face every day, one that has shaken the business to its core, is the arrival of the Internet and the explosion of information available to readers every day.
There was a time when we were alone in "publishing" information.
Not anymore.
Today every person with a phone, tablet or laptop is a "publisher."
Information is delivered instantaneously, as opposed to once a day in print.
Today we are leveraging that information by enlisting readers to help us in our daily task of covering the county.
The truth is we simply are not going to be everywhere when news breaks. That is especially true at night and on weekends.
That is why the first thing I did yesterday morning is scan social media for anyone who may have been at the scene of the horrendous fire that took a life in Upper Chichester.
I soon found images on Facebook.
When our reporter Rick Kauffman got to the scene early Monday morning to work on the story, he met a neighbor who had compelling photos of the raging inferno that had consumed her friend's house the night before.
One of those images by Ruth Moton appears on today's front page.
Rick's photos, showing the aftermath of the fire, as well as a bouquet of flowers that was left at the house, appear inside.
The business of journalism has fundamentally changed. From a financial standpoint, it is more challenging than ever.
But from a pure information stanndpoint, people have never had more sources to get their news.
It is my hope that they will still turn to us for what is going on in Delaware County. But we are no longer alone.
Not by a long shot.
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