Talk:Street newspaper

Dead link

The link for - Upward, New York, New York, USA: USA, monthly, free to the homeless - doesn't work. I searched for it using Ixquick.com, a metasearch engine. I'll do more searches and see if something turns up, so I've left the link in place until further notice. I've fixed the other links, I've not removed anything. Roaming27 14:41, 23 April 2006 (UTC)

Major rewrite

I did a major rewrite of this entry to make the language both more descriptive and neutral and bring the entry more fully up to date. There were a number of links that had been added over the past three years that are updated annually in the referenced street paper directories, so the directory references were updated and redundant and out of date links eliminated. Rchange 06:48, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Three sources that look awesome

Just found three sources, don't have time to look at them and integrate into the article yet, so listing them here so I can check them out later:

• Brown, Ann M. (2002). "Small Papers, Big Issues". Ryerson Review of Journalism. Retrieved 12 February 2009.
• Magnusson, Jan A. "The transnational street paper movement". Situation Sthlm. Retrieved 12 February 2009.
• Heinz, Teresa L. (2004). "Street Newspapers". In David Levinson (ed.). Encyclopedia of Homelessness. SAGE Publications. pp. 534–539. ISBN 0761927514.

rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 17:41, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

(striking out refs as I use them up) rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 19:17, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Done! rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 19:50, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

Here comes more:

• Howley, Kevin (2003). "A Poverty of Voices: Street Papers as Communicative Democracy". Journalism. 4 (3): 273–292. doi:10.1177/14648849030043002.
• Torck, Danièle (2001). "Voices of Homeless People in Street Newspapers: A Cross-Cultural Exploration". Discourse and Society. 12 (3): 271–392. doi:10.1177/0957926501012003005.
• Green, Norma Fay (1998). "Chicago's StreetWise at the Crossroads: A Case Study of a Newspaper to Empower the Homeless in the 1990s". Print Culture in a Diverse America. eds. James Philip Danky, Wayne A. Wiegand. University of Illinois Press. ISBN 0252066995.
• Levinson, David (2007). Homelessness Handbook. Berkshire Publishing Group. ISBN 193378203X. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
  • My library doesn't have this :( rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 16:06, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
• Hanks, Sinead (1999). "The Big Issue and other street papers: a response to homelessness". Environment and Urbanization. 9 (1): 149–158. doi:10.1177/095624789700900112. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |coauthors= ignored (|author= suggested) (help)
• von Mahs, Jürgen (2005). "The Sociospatial Exclusion of Single Homeless People in Berlin and Los Angeles". American Behavioral Scientist. 48 (8): 928–960.

rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 17:47, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

Images?

I'm currently looking for a good lead image (preferably of a vendor); I e-mailed the copyright holder of this image on flickr and am keeping my fingers crossed. If anyone looking at this article lives somewhere where you see vendors regularly (in my area the paper is quarterly and I don't go downtown much anyway), I would love you forever if you could snap a photo.

In the meantime I've put {{journalism}} up just to have something in that nice corner. If I can find a picture, I'll probably switch that template out for {{Journalism footer}} at the bottom (I find the main journalism template a bit big and ugly). rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 16:35, 13 February 2009 (UTC)

"Notable street papers" section removed

Skomorokh tagged this section with {{globalize}}. I'm not totally sure I agree (her rationale was that there are others in Category:Free daily newspapers, but I think a "free daily newspaper" is different than a "street paper," at least how these two respective articles define them), but I removed it anyway, because there's not really good inclusion criteria. To be honest, that list was originally in The Big Issue and I moved it here because it was more relevant here than there...but it's still a very short and somewhat cherry-picked list (I think the inclusion criteria are basically that these are the street papers I know about, or that have articles) so there wasn't much point having it. Maybe we can re-add a "notable street papers section" once we've gotten a better handle on what constitutes "notable" here, so that it's not just a haphazard list. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 01:02, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

I agree this interesting article still needs to be "globalized", most of the text is focused in US. IMHO, there should be a reference to the countries where street papers are published (why just "notable"?), either in this article or in a separate list referred from the article. Just to mention two countries where I've seen these papers: Australia ("Big Issue") and Argentina ("Hecho en Buenos Aires"). Kind regards, DPdH (talk) 01:10, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

It was removed because, as I said, there was no inclusion criteria. They weren't really the "most notable" street papers, they were just the ones that a random Wikipedia editor happened to know about.

As for the other things you're asking for... the Modern street newspapers section mentions some other nations where major newspapers are published. And there is a full listing in the template at the bottom of the article; it has far more papers than the old "notable street papers" section did. As for the focus on the US and Europe, that's because that's where most street newspapers are published. There are very few, comparatively, published in Africa, South America, Asia, and Oceania. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 01:17, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Yellow journalism

Was Yellow journalism "created because the founders believed mainstream news did not cover issues that were relevant to ordinary people"? I thought yellow journalism was created to be sensationalistic and not to provide "relevant news" for the welfare of ordinary people. Also, the Catholic Worker, an example you give of an early street newspaper, does not seem to fit the definitions you give of the organization and goals of the typical street newspaper. —Mattisse (Talk) 03:24, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

I think one confound that makes the distinction confusing is that the definition I've given for "street newspaper" in this article refers really only to the papers started in the last 20 years or so (it's not a definition I've made up or anything; this is simply how every source I have accessed so far classifies them). The 19th- and early 20th-century papers mentioned in the Historical section were not necessarily "street newspapers" per se, but the sources I've read do mention them as relevant predecessors to today's street newspapers, which is why I included them in the article even though they don't fit the same model as the papers today. If the Catholic Worker mention here is problematic I can probably copyedit it out, since I don't think the source says a whole lot about it. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 04:37, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

I think you are right. The earlier papers, eg the Catholic Worker and others, were started for more overtly political agendas than purely the welfare of the homeless. I doubt, although I do not know, that the Catholic Worker sought to include the homeless as writers, or in other ways into their organization, as you suggest modern street newspapers are doing. —Mattisse (Talk) 04:55, 19 February 2009 (UTC)

how does this compare to NP gleaning, where larger papers purposely print more copies than they can sell, to give extras to homeless in underpasses, who sell them for profit? I know Houston Chronicle does this, to the benefit of increased readership numbers to report to advertizers. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 15.203.233.78 (talk) 17:08, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

Numbers

The article says, "Since 1989, the concept has spread to include at least 100 papers[15] in over 30 countries." So this would be an average of three newspapers per country. Then the next statement is "In 2008, an estimated 32 million people worldwide read street newspapers, and 250,000 poor, disadvantaged, or homeless individuals sold or contributed to them." That is a big jump. Next, the article says, "By the 21st century, street papers had been started in many major cities worldwide.[17] There are now street newspapers in Canada; in European nations, including France, Russia, Germany,[note 3] and Sweden ..." etc. This just needs to be smoothed out a little, so the numbers match up better, or are accounted for without strange juxapositions, I think. Actually, I have an idea, which I will try out, and you can revert if you do not like. —Mattisse (Talk) 22:28, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Well, it's definitely not an average of 3 per country; lots of countries have just one real street newspaper (at least, only one that's big enough for anyone to know or care about), whereas others (like the US and Germany) have tons. The total numbers reported in most of these sources are, as far as I know, based mostly on the membership of INSP (the International Network of Street Papers), which would make them all underestimates...but they're the only numbers I have ever been able to find. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 22:30, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

No, I realize that. I reworded it to account for the escalation, hopefully OK with you. —Mattisse (Talk) 22:35, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

Your edit looks good; now it's more specific that these numbers are all from different years and are specific to those years (whereas my previous wording might have suggested that these are all the honest-to-goodness final figures). rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 22:36, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

• I wonder if you could justify a fair use rationale for the Hobo News masthead.[1] Or maybe it isn't copyrighted. —Mattisse (Talk) 22:44, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
  • It would certainly spruce up the section. I can post a question to wherever the fair-use people hang out. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 23:01, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

More sources

On a related note, that page links to something that might be a useful source:

• Green, Norma Fay (23 July 1999). "Trying to write a history of the role of street newspapers in the social movement to alleviate poverty and homelessness". 4th conference of North American Street Newspaper Association. Street Paper Focus Group. Retrieved 13 March 2009.

It's more Norma Fay Green, who is already cited a lot in this article, but I'll take a look and see if it has anything new. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 23:08, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

More:

• Harris, Timothy (14 September 1997). "Strength in Unity: Street Newspaper Must Not Be Its Own Enemy". Founding Conference of the North American Street Newspaper Association. Real Change. Archived from the original on 3 November 2005. Retrieved 13 March 2009.
• Harris, Timothy (21 October 2003). "Up From the Streets: Some Basic Tips on Organizing a New Street Newspaper". Street Paper Focus Group. Retrieved 13 March 2009.

Also, for information on particular papers (which can go in the small articles for them), there are several case studies at the Street Paper Focus Group. They appear to be written and self-published by grad students, so they might not fully meet our RS standards (although, to be honest, they might still be more accurate than stuff in mainstream newspapers...although who knows, I don't know anything about these people's reputations), but they would at least be a start.

• Dodge, Chris (1999). "Words on the Street: Homeless People's Newspapers". American Libraries.
• "Employment and Poverty Among the Homeless - Work For The Homeless". Library Index. Retrieved 13 March 2009. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
• Hsu, Huan (10 April 2007). "Not All the Peddlers of Seattle's Homeless Paper Are Homeless". Seattle Weekly. Retrieved 14 March 2009.
• This is basically a syllabus of a seminar course on street newspapers at U. Washington in Seattle. Has pdfs of a bunch of papers and book chapters, some might be useful. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 22:49, 21 March 2009 (UTC)

It is very interesting what you are turning up, related to this article! —Mattisse (Talk) 00:31, 22 March 2009 (UTC)

rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 23:20, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

More stuff:

• Nelson, Tara (9 August 2004). "Street journals: news, dignity". Seattle Times. Retrieved 25 March 2009.
• Grenee, H. Fields (6 August 1996). "Street Papers To Link Together". Seattle Times. Retrieved 25 March 2009.
  • Founding of NASNA

rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 13:30, 25 March 2009 (UTC)

And goodness gracious, how did I miss this:

• INSP library, has links to 8 or 9 articles and several books. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 14:38, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Comments

The article would benefit from more concrete information. Too bad there aren't articles on some street newspapers. Just superficially looking, there does not seem to be much available. That link you gave above could possibly be parleyed into an article or so. —Mattisse (Talk) 23:34, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

I can try taking a look back through some of the book sources. I have been wary about including a lot of hard data on anything, since a lot of these sources are from the mid/late 90s and numbers from back then would probably be meaningless...if those sources do have numbers, I may have just glossed over them last time I read through, and only taken the more general information. I might be able to look some more over the weekend. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 23:42, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

• " ... within the community of homeless individuals and service providers." - Is there just one community? —Mattisse (Talk) 23:34, 12 March 2009 (UTC)
  • How about just "within homeless communities"? The bit about service providers is clarified at the beginning of the Description section, and that amount of detail probably isn't necessary in the lede. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 23:42, 12 March 2009 (UTC)

EL

The recent NYT　report I just added to the article also has this interesting little thing (an "audio slide show", pretty much the same information as the article itself but with pictures, and it has some vendors talking about stuff):

• Lorber, Jamie; Crowley, Stephen (12 April 2009). "Writing on the Street". The New York Times. Retrieved 13 April 2009.

Wasn't sure if it's appropriate or not to include as an external link (and I'm not sure if this link is permanent), so I'm just sticking it here for now. Any thoughts? rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 19:46, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Only sold by homeless people?

It's my understanding that a "Street Newspaper" also refers to "alternative" publications such as "Gig Guides" and "Socialist Action" type publications, which are not generally distributed by the homeless, but are typically distributed "on the streets" (rather than through traditional sources such news-stands and bookshops etc). Perhaps this should be reflected in the article somewhere? Commander Zulu (talk) 08:50, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

I might have heard that usage in spoken English once or twice, but as far as I can tell all the written sources I've seen only use it to refer to papers sold by the homeless, poor, or refugees; I haven't seen any that refer to alternative papers as street papers (they're generally just called "alternative papers" in what I've seen). It might merit a single disambiguating sentence somewhere, but I'd have to find a source that supports that usage. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 13:58, 14 May 2009 (UTC)`

Street press, which is an Australian term referring to publications which would include "street newspapers". I think a disambiguation of some kind is order, so I'll take the liberty of adding one unless there's any major objections. Commander Zulu (talk) 04:17, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

I don't think a whole paragraph on Australia is appropriate for the lede, per WP:UNDUE. I've reverted your edit for now so the kinks can be worked out more here. Also, it's not appropriate to put "in the US" in the first sentence, because the term is not only used in the US--most countries where these are published call them street papers. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 04:31, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Have you got a suggestion on how to work this? At the moment the article is very US-centric, and I think it needs to be acknowledged that, in at least one first-world country, "Street Newspaper" doesn't refer to "newspapers published for, by, and about the homeless". Commander Zulu (talk) 04:33, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

The article is not really US-centric, it's got sources about European street newspapers as well and it addresses some differences. The reason it focuses on North America and Europe more than other regions is because, as you can see from Template:Street newspapers, almost all street newspapers are from those two continents; the number of street newspapers elsewhere simply pales in comparison.

As for your stuff about Australia...that's simply a different topic which happens to share the same name, so the appropriate thing to do is not to add a whole paragraph of content, but a dablink. Something like this:

This article is about homeless newspapers. For other alternative newspapers, see Street press.

rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 05:30, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

That works :) Commander Zulu (talk) 05:41, 15 May 2009 (UTC)

Individuals are People

I changed all the references to "individuals" to "people," and someone else reverted because they didn't like that. "People" is the plain-English term for multiple human beings. "Individuals" is corporate/legal/nonprofit jargon. It is only necessary when making a distinction such as "individuals and groups" or "individuals and businesses." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.231.6.86 (talk) 18:28, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

It all depends on the context. If you have an article where you say "homeless people," "poor people", "these people", over and over again (as your edit did), it comes across as condescending and distancing. "Individuals" is not just corporate/legal jargon, it's also regular usage and simple to understand. If you think it's being overused, the appropriate measure is to go through and selectively replace some occurences with synonyms, where it doesn't really change the tone; simply doing a global find-and-replace to replace every instance with "people" makes the article no better than it was before, and possibly makes it worse. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 18:37, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

If you think that it is distancing to call people "people," particularly in comparison to "individuals," then I doubt there will be much room for me to advance my point of view about this article. I will just count my blessings that at least it's not "persons." —Preceding unsigned comment added by 163.231.6.86 (talk) 21:12, 14 May 2009 (UTC)

relevance and collection für bibliogafie?

Like: Lee Stringer - Grand Central Winter 1998, "Grand Central Winter": ??--Siebzehnwolkenfrei (talk) 14:54, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

I don't understand what you're asking. rʨanaɢ (talk) 15:01, 16 March 2011 (UTC)