Last Hardcopy Issue Of Iconoclast — Publication Expanding Services On Web

The Lone Star Iconoclast is reverting solely to its online edition, effective after this edition is published, says W. Leon Smith, publisher. The publication is also abandoning Crawford as its hometown.

 CRAWFORD, Texas — The Lone Star Iconoclast is reverting solely to its online edition, effective after this edition is published, says W. Leon Smith, publisher. The publication is also abandoning Crawford as its hometown.

“We are looking for an official city to call the Iconoclast’s home,” said Smith, who explained that at least temporarily that city will be Clifton, Texas, which is a few miles from Crawford. Clifton has been the headquarters for production of the Iconoclast since day one in 2000 when the Iconoclast was founded. Crawford will be dropped on the cover.

After the boycotts against the newspaper that occurred in 2004, international attention turned toward the Iconoclast, expanding the subscriber list into more of a nationalwide appeal.

“We gained subscribers from New York, to California, to Florida, all over the U.S., and even internationally to other countries,” noted Smith, and we continued to publish our online edition.

“The problem we ran into was through the postal service. People afar weren’t getting their papers until sometimes a month or more after we mailed them, which made the news inside often quite old.  Even people in Texas were receiving them late. With this type of publication, timeliness is everything. Our readers could access our newspaper online immediately after we uploaded, so that’s where the attention evolved,” he explained.

“The result has been that the print edition has declined in readership while the online traffic is still strong, depending on what we publish from week to week,” he said. “Therefore, to cut expenses we are now abandoning the actual hard copy, paper editions. We plan to still publish in a ‘hard copy’ layout utilizing flip pages that people can read in a similar fashion to the actual newsprint editions, which is where the attention of our readers has turned.”

“Actual print editions are important to most newspapers,” said Smith, who encourages the public to continue to support their local papers with subscriptions and advertising. “They perform extremely important functions for their communities that are often taken for granted,” he said. “The Iconoclast is a different type of publication whose national distribution puts it in a different category. It is more of a national entitywith little or no local support, which puts it on different footing. That’s why we are taking this innovative approach.”

Smith said that he is making access to the site free, to continue to encourage readership, with a non-hassle attitude.

“It’s beneficial to our readers to not have to put in a user name and password, or to have to pay a fee to read what we write,” he said. “I consider this a vast service for both our frequent and part-time readers,” he said.

“At the same time, we are offering great opportunities in advertising on the site, which will help us pay our bills. These costs include the funding of writers, investigators, interviewers, artists, and much more, so we are hoping that people will take advantage of this opportunity not only to get their message out in the form of an advertisement, but also to help us provide better content editorially. That’s the trade-off,” he added.

“Whether it works is up to the public.”

Smith said that The Iconoclast offers hard-edged commentary that many mainstream publications won’t touch. “We live in the real world and try to convey that attitude in the columns of The Iconoclast,” he said. “I am hoping that we can get the support from our readers through their businesses and promotional advertising to be able to carry on. Advertising on our website is cheap, so we need an abundance of advertising supporters to make this work. We need small businesses and little corporations, which is why the rates are so cheap.”

Smith noted that a current promotion is called the Lightning Bolt Package, which includes a banner ad along with a free half-page ad in the flip page edition for a 13-week run.

“This is something new in publications,” he said. “It’s a super deal for advertisers. We’ll see if it works and if it adds greatly to the traffic of the businesses that are interested in giving it a try. I don’t know where they would get a better deal. This is unheard of in publishing circles. It is our goal to bring customers or patrons to the advertiser while helping to fund our operation at the same time, so I invite those who read the Iconoclast to take advantage of this. It is definitely worth a try. Just call us at 254-675-3634 to sign up.”

Smith said that he encourages Iconoclast readers to spread the word among their friends to visit the site, take advantage of the free news and commentary, and perhaps try to market some of their goods through the inexpensive advertising provided by the Iconoclast.

Regarding the publication home, Smith said that he welcomes suggestions. “Too, I am open to setting up bureaus in various cities inside the United States and even abroad. It depends on what we can afford to do,” he said. “It all comes down to public support.”