The804.com–Richmond VA Real Estate Blog

Now that the SEC results are official for the Richmond Mayoral race, I’ve compiled all the numbers by precincts (adding precinct station description so that you can see how your neighbors voted).  See Special Section: The Race for Richmond Mayor 2008.  It’s been a pleasure tracking all the great stories and analyses over the last six months.  There are a ton of smart and involved people in this town.  This was the most covered mayoral race in the history of Richmond (anyone want to dispute that?) primarily because of that Internets.  No, we don’t need less bloggers.

With the success of the mayoral special section, I have come to see the light on the value in clustering major stories into a single repository.  Some stories take weeks, months, and even years to develop.  It’s nice to have one location to track the evolution of a story or major trend.  Looking back at the archives, here is the inaugural list of “special reports”:

• Index page…as long-term major stories develop, expect new sections.  Also, archiving mini-events that get lots of coverage (ie, Folk Fest, NASCAR races, etc)
• Circuit City Been tracking this story since the failed Blockbuster takeover.
• Mayor Election 2008
• Obama at the Richmond Coliseum It’s a beautiful day…
• Richmond Baseball Chronicles the exit of the Braves to Gwinnett and the quest for a new team and ballpark (including the latest Shockoe Bottom movement).
• Richmond Grocery Wars With the addition of Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s, we are seeing the mother of all grocery store battles.  Add a Wegman’s and you have Armageddon.
• Richmond Media The evolution of Richmond media, both old and new.  Like all newspaper companies, Media General is going through an industry seismic shift.  This special report also pays attention to alternative media sources in Richmond.
• VCU Twin Scandals The Chief Rodney Monroe Degree scandal and secretive Philip Morris contracts.  Not a banner year.  Should have been.
• Vice President Tease: Tim Kaine and Eric Cantor…Rove vs Kaine I hate being manipulated by campaigns with these trial balloons (and grab for free earned media)…sidebar: Karl Rove calling Richmond a Podunk town…The McCain campaign dissing Northern Virginia as not the “real Virginia.”…Who the hell does the GOP strategy? 

Media General-Richmond.com stories have been compiled.

notes:

• Brilliant move by MEG.  The domain and SEO placement alone was worth the price (which hasn’t been revealed btw).  Gatewayva? Inrich? Yuch.  The city paper finally gets the crown jewel of domain names, the city name itself.  Only a few major national papers have this kind of asset:
  • Boston Globe Boston.com
  • Charlotte Observer Charlotte.com
  • Cleveland Plain Dealer Cleveland.com
  • Newark Star-Ledger NJ.com
• In the end, I think they’re going to just switch out inrich for Richmond.com.  Basically re-point the DNS, re-do the masthead/graphic logos, but keep the content management system/design of the current inrich (for better or for worse). It’ll be interesting to see whether Franklin Street can maintain the official RAR/Central Virginia Regional MLS ,  Retail Merchants Association, and Richmond Tourism relationships.
• I hope they keep the Richmond.com article archives.  If I were in charge, I would combine all the existing Brick, Mashup, and Richmond.com content and place it on the legacy Richmond.com CMS platform (ie, still keep a “separate” “alt-weekly” website).  Since Richmond.com will be getting imported to the mother ship, I would re-brand this new site using the existing Brickreloaded.com, mashuprva.com, or a recycled inrich.com domain name (or, maybe, come up with something brand new). 
• The content partnership between competitors Chesterfield Observer (especially this one.  bad blood here), Henrico Citizen, and WORKMAGAZINE will probably go away.
• Will the next mayor keep “Ask the Mayor” on this platform based on the new ownership (or rather, vice versa)?
• With my research work on the ButtonALL search engine (ie, building city search engine channels), I’ve sort of become an expert on city media demographics around the country.  For a town the size of Richmond, the scope and breadth of our media (mainstream, alt, indie, and blogs) is simply amazing.   You don’t see our kind of media ownership diversity anywhere except for much, much larger cities like NYC and Seattle.  Richmond.com itself was an over-achieving oddity.  Many of the Associated City websites are more or less advertising landing pages with very little content.  In its tenure, Richmond.com under Whitlock did an admirable job with its original articles and partnerships.  It’s definitely going to be missed, but our media ecosystem should be able to fill the void.
• Who will pick up the alternative media slack in the 804?
  • I’d like to see the one-year old RVANews take it to the next level.  Already, their article on this purchase has engendered the best reader dialogue/gossip.  Having followed the mayor race closely, I think their coverage has also been a real asset for Richmond voters.  The RVANews group (which includes the neighborhood blogs) is truly independent, lean (ie, built to last), and very likable.
  • Style Weekly recently re-modeled themselves with a new website design (this has been in “beta” for way too long).  They will be an even bigger player now that they’ve finally added reader comments and cleaner RSS.  Of course, Landmark’s on again-off again fire sale needs to be resolved.
  • The Richmond blogosphere is fairly healthy.  Once January 1 rolls along, expect River City Rapids (whose voice has been missed) to return with a vengeance.  Weekly Rant is a great calendar option/alternative now that Richmond.com will be folded into Things to Do.
  • Richmond BizSense is doing yeoman’s work on business news.  I think they’re actually doing a better job with business news than the TD itself.  Once the economy picks up, I can see a phase 2 pulp weekly for this outfit (like the old Richmond Inside Business).
  • Don’t overlook the television and radio stations.  CBS6 under Mark Holmberg has turned around their website with solid, original newsreporting (their VCU scandal coverage is a standard).  NBC12 is doing fantastic work with politics.  WRVA wants to be a player.
  • The darkhorse (or sleeping 800 pound gorilla) in all this is Richmond Magazine. On November 24, they will be re-launching their website.  I’m crossing my fingers and hoping they open up their articles and archives vault.  In terms of original reporting and stories (especially Richmond lifestyle), they are elite.  Of all the players, they have the content infrastructure to fill the Richmond.com void right now.
• Seeing Media General’s Terms and Conditions up makes it official but weird (sort of like when the bar at Kingsmill added Stella Artois on tap)

A couple of notable acts added

• David Allen Coe @ Toad’s…Longhaired Redneck is one of my favorite songs of all time ’cause I can sing all those songs about Texas…
• Dropkick Murphies @ Toad’s…Scorcese knows how to score a film.  When I think of Goodfellas, I think of Layla.  When I think of the Departed, I think of Going Back to Boston.
• Hometown debuts of GWAR and Lamb of God @ the National…Also, nice to see the National occasionally book local acts (Farm Vegas and Culdera)
• The God awful cover band trend continues…
• Red Jumpsuit Apparatus @ the National…Recently added.  I’m not a huge fan but the kids love em.
• BTW, JayZ and Sheryl Crow, hope you guys are having a great time in Virginia! 

http://richmondgoodlife.com/music.htm

I’ve got all of the Virginia newspaper Presidential endorsements up on the Good Life with links (source courtesy of Editor and Publisher…though I’m the a-hole that tracked down all the hyperlinks).  Here is the tally:

McCain, 11 | Obama, 6 | No Endorsement, 4

notes: 

• keep in mind the oligarchy of VA media ownership (Media General owns a slew of these papers all endorsing McCain. It was very interesting  to see the conservative-owned Landmark–Va. Pilot/Style Weekly– stay on the sidelines).  In this awful time for newspapers, does it even make business sense to endorse at all (you’re bound to piss off 45-55% of your readership either way)?  Major city papers like the Roanoke Times and Fredericksburg Free Lance Star also stayed neutral.
• the intensity of McCain support was less than emphatic at times.  One conservative paper in Northern Virginia declared neutrality simply because of the Palin pick.  The Daily Press endorsed but then followed up with a heavy disclaimer.  Even the mighty TD’s endorsement was wimpy.