In another remarkable sign of the times, local newspapers, once the dominant media powerhouses in their respective markets, are being subjected to raids on their talent pool 

Skip Hoagland
Atlanta.com

staged by competing local websites. Atlanta.com owner Skip Hoagland has been at the forefront of that movement and he just upped the ante with a letter he sent to over 200 employees (including all upper management) at the Atlanta Journal and Consititution today. Hoagland told them, "We are offering independent contractor home based business opportunities for writers, and reporters to produce articles and content for our official website Atlanta.com."

Faced with a dramatic decline in both subscribers and advertising revenue, the Atlanta paper has been slashing payroll for months now. Hoagland has come up with a revenue sharing model that he is using to attract displaced writers and those looking to leave before the axe falls on them. He has already signed up the Constitution's very popular former outdoor editor, Kent Mitchell.

At last month's GeoDomain Expo in San Diego, 

.com city domain owners discussed strategies they could use to position themselves as the successors to collapsing local newspapers. Hoagland shared his battle plan there and he has put it into action with this new overture aimed directly at the local paper's remaining employees. 

In his letter to the newspaper's management and staff Hoagland wrote, "We are simply eliminating everything that starts with letter "P",  except one, PROFIT, to run this successful business model. Eliminated are Paper, Paper Ink, Printing Presses, Postage, Paper Delivery Trucks, Petrol, People, Property Taxes, Property and Buildings, etc. This is why we can share our profits with local independent writers and reporters and offer much more than many other high overhead local and traditional medias would be able to do." Details of the arrangement Atlanta.com is offering are spelled out in Hoagland's full letter.