The word circulated last week that Greg Johnson, Frank Cagle and a few other liberal weekly columnists were departing their column space from the local daily paper. While, it is sad news that Johnson and Cagle will not be in the local paper, I hope they will find another venue to post their content.

While Editor Jack McElroy published  here a short explanation in today’s paper, what McElroy did NOT say, BUT I highly suspect is that the columnists were not achieving a sufficient number of clicks and online views or reads. Even for the Mega Bullhorn of Truth, I track the unique ip address visits, the page views for myself and my strategic partners. Those web stats can be tracked by month, day, week and even down to the hour. It is how the definition of high traffic website is determined.

While the newspaper business continually moves to a digital, social media platform, it is the reality that the ROI (Return On Investment) and the KPI (Key Performance Indicator) are determined for all paid staff, even the weekly columnist to determine the ones that stay and the ones that will go.