The Little Red Paper That Could Chugs Along
By Alicia Dorr in News on Mar 14, 2007 6:29PM
It's official: The Red Eye is the Wave of the Future (TM)! For all the yada yadas about selling the Trib, reporters having to beg for food on street corners, and the inarguable lack of print news readers, the Red Eye seems to be doing OK — the paper will soon have a Saturday edition.
Beginning the first Saturday in May, readers who can't get enough of the celebrity gossip, that dude with a bag on his head, and what could possibly be one of the most powerful columnists in Chicago, can get the paper at their door, free of charge.
During the week you can't swing a drunk cat without running into thousands of free copies with the Sudoku half finished, and some people are even paying $1 a week for the Red Eye to be delivered to the rock they live under, but apparently, the readers have demanded more. According to the general manager, the paper's advertisers and readers have been in need of more Red Eye, so they're gonna get it.
To be honest, we don't really think we will be ordering the free service, even though we realize we're losing money if we don't. But we want to be clear that is because we are lazy, not because we wouldn't pore over it, digest it and finish half of the Sudoku puzzle. In all honesty, we think the Red Eye actually has improved since its 25-cent debut when it sent the Red Streak crying for its mother.
Whether you like it or not, the Red Eye is in touch with its 685,500 readers, and it is touching more people daily (allegedly). We don't really care if you're on the bandwagon or not, we just think it's time that everybody faces the fact that the Red Eye is the Wave of the Future (TM), and it's not going anywhere anytime soon. Now give us back that damn Sudoku, or we'll never shut up about it.
Image via Notonlybutalso.typepad.com.
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