'La Opinion,' 'El Diario' Training Local Bloggers in Reporting-- and Sales

By: Mark Fitzgerald ImpreMedia, the big Spanish-language newspaper and digital publisher, early in 2010 will begin training local bloggers in reporting and selling ads, Chairman and CEO John Paton said in a speech to the World Association of Newspapers (WAN) Tuesday in Hyderabad, India.

The hyperlocal coverage initiative of partnering with community bloggers will start at its two dailies, El Diario La Prensa in New York City and La Opinion in Los Angeles.

"Community E-Journalism Media Labs" in the New York and Los Angeles newsrooms will help local bloggers cover "the community at a deep and meaningful level," impreMedia said.

"The focus will be on hyperlocal journalism," Paton told more than 1,500 media executives gathered at WAN's 62nd Annual Congress. News organizations must become hyperlocal, he added, meaning "they will have to harness the power of bloggers."

Chosen bloggers will take part in four-week orientation sessions at the E-Journalism Media Labs." Paton said the orientation will include training in sales, and how to "create mutually beneficial sales arrangements."

"We are deeply committed to providing high-quality journalism to underserved communities," impreMedia's corporate executive editor Alberto Vourvoulias-Bush, said in a statement. "The impreMedia Community E-Journalism Media Labs are part of a larger strategy of working together with independent reporting and blogging sites to make sure that U.S. Latinos -- our neighborhoods and issues-- have a vigorous voice in the new media world."