Hearne: KCC’s Demise Greatly Exaggerated by…Wait For It…The Pitch

Here’s the deal…

When it comes to lame excuses – like not calling to verify what amounts to a news story-m its, well, kinda lame. Because you run the risk of ending up with egg on your face.

Take Pitch one-man-bandm / editor David Hudnall

It’s not easy being the last man standing at was once Kansas City’s alternative newsweekly of record. Far from it.

Gone are pretty much everybody who mattered at the once thriving tabloid.

I remember when they owned their own cool-looking building on Main Street downtown- a hop, skip and a jump from Bazooka’s strip club. I also remember when they had to abandon ship, the real estate having been sold and the staff a tiny fraction of what it had been. I also remember their credit being so iffy that their moveing company insisted on payment up front at the last minute, and they had to conduct a Chinese fire drill of sorts to get a credit card from the former owner in order to pull off the great escape.

That’s when folks like Pitch publisher Joel Hornbostel and (maybe) foodie Charles Ferruza still roamed the local media mean streets.

No mas, of course, as the only people wringing anything approaching a living out of what’s left of the Pitch these days is Hudnall and his band of merry part-timers and freelancers.

Which is truly sad…but I digress…

Because following a couple weeks of technical difficulties on the KC Confidential website, Hudnall couldn’t resist reporting that we were pushing up daisies or had credit card issues and “the end of an era” had set in.

“I didn’t contact (Hearne) for comment because he never contacts me for comment when he writes bratty stuff about the Pitch…”

That’s pretty much true, the difference journalistically speaking is when I write about the Pitch, I’m generally making observations and registering an (hopefully) informed opinion.

For example, when the Pitch’s parent company went out of biz goes out of biz (along with far more successful alt weeklies like the Village Voice), dumped it off on a pair of unsuspecting locals and their dog, fire saled off the the URL to a software technology company in Germany) and then added a paragraph “word to our readers” at the end of every story beseeching them to  make “financial contribution(s)” in order to keep the Pitch afloat…

New P:itch Owners

Not to mention going from weekly to monthly, along with the layoffs and /or an exodus of pretty much everybody who at one time or another appeared to get a Pitch paycheck…it’s hard not to suspect that the businesses has fallen on hard times.

Just an observation, mind you.

In any case, KCC  is alive and well, albeit on a dialed back basis. And Jack Poessiger, Dwight Sutherland and I stand ready to inform and entertain.

Which of course includes writing the odd “bratty” observations about the Pitch. Including it’s upcoming advertiser kiss up “Best of Kansas City” issue.

Speaking of, bratty?

Being”discourteous, rude, impudent, exhibiting poor manners…that’s what the Pitch is looking to duck in it’s local news coverage? Good luck!

Oh, and duly noted

http://www.mb-kc.com/
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4 Responses to Hearne: KCC’s Demise Greatly Exaggerated by…Wait For It…The Pitch

  1. Non says:

    Glad to see you back!

    But I didn’t see anything David Hudnall has written on the Pitch site or his Twitter account or The Pitch Facebook page. Is this something he wrote to you or one of the writers on this site privately?

    I’d like see what he wrote and how he was wrong since it’s obvious the site is back up and running.

  2. chuck says:

    Why do you get Hacked so much?

    Just curious.

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