Oh boy, the blogs are coming along painfully slow for me these days, I must admit. I thought when I first started doing these that I would be religiously noting everything we do here. After all, I kept a journal—as most writers do—for many years. How hard could it be? Well, I guess I found out.
But truth be told, what we do here is hard work that requires much focus. Glamour? Hardly. Turning around a new magazine every three weeks has its challenges for sure, but I couldn't see me doing anything else. Today is “social media” day for me. A day where I check in and see what's going on and how it relates to what we do here.
This is especially important because right now we are in the process (as it seems we always are) of evaluating what is working in the magazine and what is not. By the way, if you would like to help us out with this, inbox me at lgotto@lehighvalleystyle.com. I always appreciate your feedback and try to respond to every one I receive.
I spend a lot of my time thinking about you—our reader. I hope that in this world of multi-layered media content and stimulus, that we still provide something in our magazine that you just can't get anywhere else.
And I worry. I worry about lots of things—mostly about the state of Journalism, in general. Woodword and Bernstein cared about what they wrote. I care about what I write. I think that matters. Does anyone care to read a feature story anymore, or do you just want us to tell you where to eat and shop, and keep the stories short and snappy? Could you see yourself reading Lehigh Valley Style entirely on your iPad or even your Smartphone if we developed a digital edition you could access through a pay wall on our website? If we developed an App for LVS, what would you like it to do?
We are working on some really great stuff this year. Dare I share—and reveal cherished elements of our editorial calendar that only we know? What I can tell you is that right now we're working on developing several ongoing series for the magazine, such as Style Soiree and our LVS Investigates series. In our May issue you will see one of the most beautiful dinner parties we ever received from a reader who conceived the party and then had it photographed.
On the more serious side, I just finished my second LVS Investigates story. The subject for April is solar power and who is using it in the LV. The first installment of
Investigates on local people who donate their time in Haiti was very well received. Also, in that January 2013 issue, was our profile of world-renowned photographer Larry Fink. If you didn't catch it last month, it's a great read by one of our talented writers, Steve Piccione.
On the horizon, we will be doing a story about social media usage. Right now we are on a time cusp with social media—most of our kids grew up with it but we didn't and now we're just trying to play catch-up. Do you have any concerns about your kids' social media usage? Perhaps, you have concerns about your own usage? If you do, please inbox me. I am looking for interview subjects.
One day the population will only read in history e-books about the days before social media and they will most likely think, “Wow, there were days BEFORE social media?” While to me this is somewhat a daunting thought, I can't help but think about the excitingly creative times we live in. I feel fortunate to be here right now.
How do you feel? What do you think?
