This is just weird…
I’ll make some calls and see what I can learn, but there’s something rotten in Denmark.
In a manner of speaking.
Because since the dawn of time, the alt weekly (turned monthly) known as the Pitch has been the proud possessor of the website pitch.com. Similarly to how fellow beleaguered local print pub the Kansas City Star owns kansascity.com.
And while clearly both publications have been circling the drain for more than a decade – and the Star had to unload its historic home at 18th and Grand – the newspaper has somehow managed to hang on to, you know its, URL. That’s Uniform Resource Locator (or web address for those of you still tethered to your driveways).
But a funny thing happened recently…
Actually, it’s not funny at all. More like lame, inexplicable and – as I said – weird.
Because a week or two back I noticed that somehow or another pitch.com did not appear to be KC’s skeletal alt weekly’s home.
Had to be a mistake, right? Maybe I hit my head and who knows what’s really going on?
In any case, when I went to pitch.com I got the following:
“We are a new company based in Berlin. Our founding team created Wunderlist and is now working on something new.”
Bound to be an explanation.
I mean, other than the Pitch going down for the count, or something truly unthinkable.
Well, here’s your answer:
“Since sometime in the early 2000s — we’re not exactly certain when — The Pitch has been publishing online at pitch.com,” reads the pubs online explanation. “That is going to change soon. Actually, it has already changed. You are currently at www.thepitchkc.com, which is our new domain address. We’ve sold pitch.com. Soon, pitch.com will take you to a place that has nothing at all to do with Kansas City news, arts, culture, and events.”
Hold it right there…
Pretty much everybody at this tender stage of the game knows the Pitch is on what appears to be its last legs, but they sold off their web address?
Who would even want it? A buncha Germans who own a goofy sounding biz that means “love to hike”?
And how much money was the Pitch able to raise?
I mean, it makes sense that the cash strapped local daily would unload its valuable downtown real estate for however many million bucks to try and keep the wolf from the door.
But that’s real brick and mortar – and location, location, location and all that – but pitch.com?
Unless of course, somebody at the Pitch just major messed up, forgot to protect the realm and some Germans slipped in like thieves in the night and purloined its fabled website. You know, and like now the Pitch can’t afford to buy it back.
Could something as lame as that have gone down?
Anything’s possible, I suppose.
Still…
Two years ago some blogger dude wrote that, “once you start asking for quotes (to sell your site), you’ll likely discover that they vary greatly. You may receive one quote for $2,000 and another for $20,000.”
Well, clearly the Pitch could use 20 grand.
Another website claims they can help people like the Pitch get six-figures by selling their site.
So who the eff knows?
Wonder what I could buy that Tony character’s site for…five-hundred bucks, a couple grand?
