Part II of a Two-Part Series

In the world of Richmond media, Jim Bacon occupies a unique place. A former publisher of Virginia Business, the Media General publication that chronicles developments in the Commonwealth’s economy, Bacon launched an online magazine called Bacon’s Rebellion in 2002. That publication’s tagline is “The Op-Ed page for Virginia’s New Economy.” Bacon had a long history in traditional public affairs and business journalism, starting his career as a gumshoe reporter in western Virginia. Through his online magazine and blog, Bacon and his stable of writers (this writer included) offer up perspectives on politics, public policy, economics and the media. He also is the co-owner of the VA Newswire, a business “intelligence” operation that gathers and summarizes relevant corporate-focused nuggets from media sources.

With his combination of experiences and personal connections, Bacon speaks with some measure of authority on the local Richmond media market. Turning his eyes to his one-time colleagues, he asserts that “The Times-Dispatch is a middling paper that management is trying to make better. But management has an up-hill job – the newspaper is under tremendous pressure to cut costs to offset stagnant circulation and advertising revenues.”

Bacon believes that the daily paper gives the city of Richmond an inordinate amount of coverage compared to other localities in the metropolitan area. He says “city politics gets lots of ink – county politics gets ink only when there’s a scandal. I read the newspaper more carefully than most people, and I don’t know who my county supervisor is. I don’t know who the chairman of the board of supervisors is. Other than the occasional zoning dispute or the latest flap in the school system, I know next to nothing about the major issues facing the county (through reading the Times-Dispatch).”

He notes that, “to me, media bias, which does exist, is less a problem than the media’s unwillingness to cover key issues at all.” In the case of Metro Richmond, Bacon sees the mainstream press as slanted against folks south of the River and west of downtown. To him, “If there’s a bias, it’s in favor of covering the city and ignoring the suburbs.” Despite his criticisms, he is skeptical of the usefulness of a news council as a response to shortcomings in local news coverage. Bacon notes, “If other people want to form a news council, that’s fine for them. I’m not interested.” Bacon prefers an alternative medium to perform the watch-dog functions of a news council – blogs.

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