Some Complementary Information

How is the Complement doing?  — we ask ourselves, and others ask us.

Last month the site had 338 visitors (not counting the editors), who looked at a total of 1500 different items.  We don’t know how many of those visits are repeats, but we typically get 100-200 visits during the 3-5 days after a new issue is announced, and we are assuming that represents individual readers.  Both visits and views go up during the month if we post and announce something after the first release.

We figure that there are about 600 residents who can and do use the internet, so we think we are attracting a quarter to a third of the potential readership.  Not bad, but we’d like to do better.

Our survey effort attracted  positive results, but not many — only seven responses.  All approved of the number of articles per issue; 4 preferred staying with the monthly format, while 3 were interested in blog approach (articles posted as they become available).  Similarly, posted comments have been favorable and constructive, but relatively few in number.

Although a majority of the articles are written by the editorial staff, we are pleased that we are receiving an increasing number of both solicited and voluntary contributions of writing and illustrations.  And, we encourage more — opening the publication up as a resident forum and platform for presenting ideas and artwork is part of the purpose.

What will the Complement do next?  We’ve reached the point where we have enough material so that it is burdensome to operate on a tight deadline.  Because our format keeps everything on view for 2-3 months, softening the publication date will not deprive a regular viewer of a chance to see everything.  We are not going to a complete blog format, but we expect to add — and advertise — more items in between the monthly issue dates.

You can expect some format modifications, especially in the PREPARE section, as activities come out of the pandemic restrictions.

We are planning to expand our approaches to issue-oriented journalism, while still staying within our commitment to factual information and civil discourse appropriate to the RVM community — see this issue’s example of flashmob journalism, and Asifa Kanji’s capstone article.

Please consider joining our efforts — not only do we feel useful, but we have fun in the process.