The Standard-Examiner Wipes the Dust Off Its "Live" Website

Video spotlight on Emerald City's unbudgeted railroad car/Frontrunner information center

As noted in the update to our previous article, the Standard-Examiner has been doing some interesting things with its newly redesigned free online site recently. The most recent case in point: today's hard copy edition carries a front page teaser, with minimal prefacatory text, referring readers directly to StandardNET live for the rest of the story. The topic is that derelict railroad dining car that's being refurbished to serve as a Frontrunner station visitors information center.

Once Std-Ex readers navigate to StandardNET live, the story is presented solely via video clip, sans any accompanying article text. This is highly innovative behavior, we believe, for a news organization whose main product has been the written word for the past 120 years.

This rail car project has of course been a topic of discussion here on Weber County Forum; and it has raised various questions in its own right. For instance, on 11/27/08 gentle reader WhatWardRUin wondered about the ultimate cost to the taxpayers, and the mysterious source of funding. Similar questions were posed by reader Anonymous Employee on 11/29/08. Inasmuch as this project appears to be clearly over the originally announced $35,000 cost estimate, these readers' queries are deserving of answers, particularly since this project has never been approved or funded by the city council, according to our infallible recollection. Yes, there are many questions to be explored in connection with this story. Yes, we all need to know whether Boss Godfrey has squirreled away a secret Pet Project Slush Fund.

Nevertheless, what's most interesting to us at this point to us is the Std-Ex's newly demonstrated interest in reviving its heretofore mostly moribund "live" website. For the past three years or so the site has for the most part gathered cyber-dust. We're therefore delighted to see our hometown newspaper indulging in experimentation and taking more full advantage of this potentially robust online resource. We're eager to welcome the Standard-Examiner into the 21st century. And who knows? At the rate they're proceeding, that day may arrive very soon.