• emedia, Monday, November 15, 2010 12:56 AM

There's been a lot of speculation about what community news outlets like AOL's Patch mean for established local news outlets. Newspaper execs from Hearst and Gannett aren't oblivious to AOL's play in their local markets, but they don't seem too worried about its long-term viability.

Yet in the short term, sites like Patch are a challenge, said Lincoln Millstein, senior vice president for digital media at Hearst Newspapers. He noted that Hearst owns many local newspapers in Connecticut, where Patch and the community site Main Street Connect have also set up shop. While Millstein doesn't see them as a long-term threat, in the near-term they are poaching journalists.

Gannett has successfully executed its own hyperlocal sites such as MomsLikeMe.com and HighSchoolSports.net by starting with a local brand and nationalizing it. Advertisers can advertise both locally and nationally across the sites, Josh Resnik, vice president and general manager of Gannett Digital Network, explained in an interview.

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