The following are samples of texts written by Britt Santowski.
Book: The Three Strategies of the Unstoppable Woman
Feel free to read her book, The Three Strategies of the Unstoppable Woman. Book reviews on Testimonials page.
Articles
Fentanyl death laced with regret: When you don’t get to say I love you
September 4, 2018
Read over 12,456 times
–by Britt Santowski [SPN], all photos from Doug Brown The last time he saw his son alive, they were having an argument. It was a typical fight, like all the others they’ve ever had before. Dad laid down the law …Continue reading
How property taxes are calculated
–Britt Santowski, SPN Wanna do some math? As announced on January 2 on SPN, property values from BC Assessment have been mailed out. In most cases, property tax values are up. In Sooke, property values are up an average of 17%; Continue reading
Sooke PacketNews bought by offshore investors
Sooke PacketNews has been bought by offshore investors, said creator and former owner Britt Santowski. “I won’t say how much money has been paid, but I will say that I’m off on a long glamping vacation with the family,” giggled …Continue reading
More articles online here.
Motorcycle column
Roadkill: dinner or disaster?
AUG 20TH, 2010
If you have committed to whipping down the windy country roads without the protective encasing of a metal cage (e.g. a car), then you really owe it to yourself to understand the nature of any beasts that may cross your path of travel. No one really plans to hit them. And inevitably someone does. You […]
Press release (December 1, 2018)
Local internet news service shifts to subscriptions and puts readers first
Sooke, BC: A local internet startup, Sooke PocketNews (SPN), will begin its fifth year in business by shifting towards a subscription-based online news service, effective January, 2019.
Subscription-based access to SPN positions the reader—not the advertiser—as the primary client. This marks a significant change. With the free newspaper model, news is leveraged to engage the reader, and their participation becomes the product sold to advertisers (the hidden primary client).
“When a service is primarily ad-dependent, its clientele become the product,” says Britt Santowski, founder of PocketNews®. “Look no further than social media. People trade their personal information for a free account. The information they relinquish is then leveraged to sell advertising. When a service becomes subscription based, that service becomes the product and the clientele is truly the customer.”
Sooke PocketNews has plenty of readers. Since launching in 2015, SPN has had more than 5 million authentic article reads (aka hits). In the past year, it has received over 1.8 million hits. Still, though, advertising is hard to sell with mega-corp competitors like Google and Facebook, who can offer advertising at pennies a day, with a product consisting of deeply-farmed personal data.
So, SPN is shifting gears. Starting in January 2019, SPN will put the readership into the driver’s seat and make them the primary customer. The introductory rate will be a mere $0.33 per day (increasing to $0.40 in February). Early birds who subscribe in December will become Charter Members, identifying them as the frontrunner supporters of Sooke PocketNews. And, they will be entered into a special draw.
Besides unlimited access to local political news, local event coverage, and locally-relevant provincial, national and international news, members in good standing will be able to promote community causes and fundraisers, and will be able to submit their own letters and articles directly online. Certain things, like access to weather, earthquake information, job postings, live traffic updates, and the headlines, will continue being freely accessible to all.
SPN was originally conceived with the circular trinity of free newspaper publishing in mind, where the Advertiser pays for the Writer, who engages the Reader, who attracts the Advertiser.
With four years of a rapidly growing readership and dwindling advertising, the future of SPN is on the line.
“Right now, if two of our long-term advertisers terminate their agreement with SPN, we’re done,” said Santowski. “That’s far too much power concentrated with the advertisers. With this shift, if we retain just a quarter of our current readership at a subscription rate of 33 pennies a day, we’ll stay in operation. And, if we retain more than a quarter, we will be able to expand our news services.”
Advertising, which has always been locally-relevant, will continue … but as a secondary service. With this shift to being subscription-based, the readership becomes the primary—and the most important—stakeholder.