Picture of change


Knoxville attorney Herbert S. Moncier shows his joy at the jury verdict as the media wait to talk with him outside Chancery Court on Tuesday afternoon. Moncier represented nine Knox County citizens in the suit over the sunshine law. Photo by J. Miles Cary / Knoxville News Sentinel The camera wielding woman in the foreground is Knoxville News Sentinel online editor Jigsha Desai. She was getting react to the jury verdict that found the county commission had violated the state open meetings law. The lawsuit, one of the most intently followed stories of the year in the Knoxville area, had been brought by the newspaper.

And it marked an innovative experiment with bloggers. Because of the newspaper’s conflict of interest, Editor Jack McElroy  enlisted the help of three bloggers to help cover the trial and the newspaper’s coverage. They did many posts, one live-blogged several days in court, one did podcasts and questioned our motives, one did daily no-holds-barred critiques of the coverage. The three bloggers were David Oatney, Russ Hailey, and Russ McBee and it was good stuff. And, of course, they weren’t the only ones blogging it.

Jigsha Desai did daily video coverage of the trial as part of a package that included stories updated several times a day by reporter Jamie Satterfield and photos by several staff photographers throughout the trial.

But this front page photo says it for me in how this business I’ve been in for 30 years is changing.

(News Sentinel photo by J. Miles Cary)

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