• PaidContent.org, Tuesday, March 17, 2009 11:15 AM

"Hearst will continue to publish seattlepi.com, but it would be a mistake to think of it as the Seattle P-I Online," says PaidContent.org's Staci Kramer, because the 146-year-old pub is losing 88% of its workforce in the process of moving from print to the Web only. The new seattlepi.com will have just 20 staffers, compared to the 150-plus the paper had before closing operations Tuesday.

Kramer points out that the scaled back operation becomes "a petri dish" for Hearst as it tries to figure out how to make a similar transition in other cities. Many believe the struggling San Francisco Chronicle could be next. Hearst CEO Frank Bennack Jr. said the new Seattle P-I would become more than an online newspaper. "Our goal now is to turn seattlepi.com into the leading news and information portal in the region," he said.

On the editorial side, executive producer Michelle Nicolosi said the new site wouldn't have specific reporters, editors or producers: "All staff are expected to write, edit, take photos, shoot video and produce multimedia," she said, adding that the goal was to determine whether an online-only local news site could turn a profit. On the ad sales side, Hearst execs said the company is assembling a team to sell local advertising on seattlepi.com as well as the digital ad products of Yahoo for display, Kaango for general marketplaces, and Google, Yahoo, MSN and Ask.com for search.

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