December 11, 2005 (Kearny, NJ). KearnyOnTheWeb (KOTW) was founded in 2000 and since then has grown by word of mouth. Its founder was a visionary. The purpose of the website was to provide a forum for information about the Town of Kearny and its neighboring towns, Harrison, East Newark and North Arlington. The site’s popularity grew when a message board was offered.
Today, the message board (now called the Discussion Board) is the most visited part of KearnyOnTheWeb. That fact should be no surprise since that is the area of the website where folks can exchange ideas and discuss issues effecting our community. As everyone knows, the Discussion Board is moderated – posts are reviewed by KOTW before they are allowed to be posted.
Why would anyone want to spend time monitoring posts? Why would anyone want to spend money every month hosting a website such as KearnyOnTheWeb? The reason: Someone has to keep our Democracy alive. The Internet is a great tool for doing that. When local newspapers only cover half the story or miss the story completely, KearnyOnTheWeb is there to fill in the gaps. Some wish that KOTW would go away.
Some simply want the status quo to continue and dread the dessimination of information. KOTW does not impose any views. KOTW however encourages those who have information to share it. I can assure you that KOTW is not going away anytime soon. KOTW however needs your help.
I have put together a series of flyers which I have PDF’d (see the section after this article) and make available to you. KOTW’s goal in 2006 is to increase its readership. In order to do so, I need to advertise. I would like to get some volunteers to download the flyers and make copies and go door to door to distribute them. Will it make a difference? Yes. Remember how you found KOTW? A friend, a neighbor, a co-worker or an acquaintance told you about the website with the Message Board, "They got some good stuff on there.".
Eventhough KOTW has existed for over five years, there has never been a news story about the website in the local media. The history files of KOTW tell us that the major newspapers in the West Hudson area visit our site. Why? Because they are looking for material for their papers. They however have never published a story about KOTW. Their story writing has however been influenced by posts to KOTW.
Our elected officials, I suspect, also check out KOTW. Sometime back, Kearny’s Mayor Santos read from a post by former Councilman Mangin during a council meeting but Mayor Santos was careful enough not to mention KOTW’s name in public. KOTW was a "local blog". Well KOTW’s Discussion Board is not exactly a Blog but it’s close enough. Why not mention KOTW by name? Your guess is as good as mine.
Are you ready for the challenge of distributing flyers? Our Democracy depends upon you, your friends and your neighbors. If you feel frustrated by the status quo then you need to do something about it. Start by spreading the word about KOTW and you will be surprised by the results. I promise to be fair in allowing residents to express their views, if you promise to spend some money making copies and spreading the word about KOTW. I promise that you and your neighbors will have a voice. Not everyone has the time to go to a council meeting, a Board of Education meeting, or a Urban Enterprise Zone meeting but they most likely have the time to log into KOTW and read about the issues effecting their community. They may even have a great idea about how to address a particular issue. That is Democracy at its best. So are you ready! Start with distributing 20 flyers to your neighbors.
Click on the links below to get your flyer. Print out a copy and distribute it. The flyers are in PDF format.
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