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Three years after he got national attention and local criticism for outsourcing some local coverage of Pasadena to reporters working in India (and then in-sourced again), James McPherson says his new Pasadena Now web video channel will also hire in Asia. From this week's Los Angeles Business Journal (not online yet):
For his web TV station, he'll pay employees in India and the Philippines to sell advertising and edit video at wages as low as $4 an hour....Today, Pasadena Now employs five local "stringers" — Pasadena-based freelance reporters who attend events, take photos and conduct interviews — and five international writers who construct stories from the information provided by the stringers.
McPherson says he needs to go cheap in order to make a profit. He also cites competitive pressure from the AOL Patch sites that are opening across the Los Angeles basin. For what it's worth: in the three years since Pasadena Now first hit the news, I can't remember hearing a single thing about its content.
Patch note: Local editor Sara Catania said Friday on Twitter: "It's been seven months since the 1st West Coast Patch launched (in Manhattan Beach). With today's launch of Venice Patch the CA total is 32."