- by Dan Degenstien, Apparent Editor
November 18, 2022
This coming Monday, the 21st, will be the first time in about five years that we don’t send the newspaper to everyone with a cooperating mailbox in 18 towns. Below the Flag, the name of the newspaper on the front page, we show all the towns we distribute to. Only now, as I am writing this, is it occurring to me that we neglected to include Buena Vista and Findlater in that list. I’ll add them. As memory serves, in 2017, this totaled around 4900 mailboxes. It has since settled closer to 4300, and now we will let the people decide how many we send. We now have subscribers or advertisers in most of those places, so the names will stay there.
Print Subscribers
Anyone subscribed to the Print Edition will get it in their mailbox and will also have access to the website and digital edition. We will let you know how to access these in the coming weeks. Your subscription begins November 21st, 2022, and will last until December 1st, 2023.
Digital Subscribers
Any Digital Edition subscriber will have access to the website and digital edition. We will contact you in the coming weeks to explain how to access everything. We are still working out the details, so the website won’t require a login until we finalize it in the next few weeks. Your subscription will be for 12 months starting from the day we restrict access to the general public.
Newsletter Email
All the previews of our stories and Town and RM display ads will be available to anyone who signs up for the free newsletter.
Community Service
We charge Towns and RMs to print their ads, but we know that it’s a community service they rely on to distribute information. We have been including these ads in the weekly email at no extra charge for several months. So for people that can’t afford or don’t want to subscribe to the paid editions, we will continue to display all public notices or legal ads from Towns or RMs.
Mixed feelings
In the last five years we’ve had almost no positive feedback, but on the other hand, we had very little negative feedback. So that tells me we were doing a great job. Call in if you disagree.
Sharing feelings about a product or service is important to both the consumer and the seller. But when there is a barrier to making those feelings known, like the effort of making a phone call or sending an email, laziness almost eliminates all motivation.
Happy people don’t usually take the time to give praise. They are too busy enjoying things, skipping through parks, and loving their pets, friends, and family (why are they in that order?). I understand this, and it’s fine. But humans have a Negativity Bias. They generally fixate more on negative feelings or events. So as a result, unhappy people tend to let you know how they feel.
Skew Canadian
We have had very few examples of negative feedback. We have had a few more examples of criticism followed by a compliment. The way, after you get back from the grocery store together, your father-in-law says you’re not a very good driver, but the car you bought is very nice. He has no filter, though, and in his case, he is saying two separate thoughts back-to-back, like, “How many bridges are there in Saskatoon?...there’s too much snow on the roof!” I think our customers are polite Canadians, so it’s hard to get a good read on consumer response. Suffice it to say almost no feedback equals good feedback. We don’t email Google to tell them we like their search engine. But if it stopped working, they’d surely hear about it.
Also, I have yet to hear that the letters from Peter Foster are annoying anyone. I’m surprised.
