Cornwall ON – We made it to our second birthday! Only about 15% of new companies 
make it to their 2nd birthday and I’m very very proud of you our viewers who have made it all possible.
It’s an interesting and eye opening journey this news thing…Since February 9, 2009 the Cornwall Free News has presented 3,257 stories and had over 8,738 comments posted.
That’s a lot of content in a short time!
We’ve had 227, 492 Unique Visitors who’ve read 1, 793, 955 pages and 1, 030, 648 spider bots have indexed our content to various search engines. There have been 117, 147 feeds issued too.
Seawayradio.com played 187 segments of radio in its first year with 29,621 listens, all of those segments btw are available via podcast and for free on iTunes.
54% of you are women with 18% of you being women between 35-44, 13% of you are men between 35-44.
It’s also interesting to see what stuff you folks like to read and what you don’t really care for. We try and cater to that. Recently I was chastised at an event for being a bit gossipy in some stories, but our traffic numbers really jump any time I drop the Goss so what does that say?
Every year I like to sit back and look at where we are and what we’ve accomplished and this year is no different. There are changes coming soon to the Cornwall Free News, and Seawayradio.com and of course this year SeawayTV.com is rolling out too.
The internet is changing. Cornwall is changing, our world is changing and we like to stay state of the art and evolve.
The Huffington Post sold last weekend and Arianna and her people really have changed our industry. We have been inspired by Huffington and they were one of the sites I studied a lot before starting the CWFN.
Ottawa is our number one market and we have been negligent to our Ottawa viewers. This year that’s going to change; same for some of our Toronto viewers and our British Columbia viewers as well. It’s interesting to see the impact we’ve had on the Cornwall Media scene since I started this humble rag.
There’s more local focus. There are 3 penny trader type papers; one of my former employees is now even doing some of the things I asked him to do for us, except for himself now as he’s opened a competing online newspaper locally. If you’ve noticed the improvement in graphics I give all the credit to Kevin Lamoureux of KAV Productions who now is our back end guy handling the graphics and support end of this site.
There are more options here in Cornwall now and more focus on local which is a very healthy thing. I think more cities and towns need to embrace and support their local scenes and grow them.
The bottom line is that I wouldn’t be typing this without each and every one of you that’s read us; that’s told people about us; that’s shared a story or link. One of my former clients complained one day that all of his friends think “I’m a XXXXXXX Idiot” which made me smile as I replied that a year before none of his friends had heard of the paper or of me.
So scars, daggers wounds, and all The Cornwall Free News is alive and well, and ready for year three! Special thanks to our sponsors who help keep the lights one. Please take a moment to visit them and thank them for their support.
I want to thank all of our contributors for the photos, videos, and stories they’ve submitted. (keep emailing them in to info@cornwallfreenews.com)
I want to thank Reg Coffey, the only other owner of this company (no, we’re not secretly owned by any political party or group) whose time and support have been invaluable, and of course I want to thank my wife whose patience while I grow an inkling into a company could not ever have a value put on it.
Onwards, Upwards, good health, wealth, and as the Chinese say…. “may you get what you wish for…”
Jamie Gilcig
Editor – The Cornwall Free News & Seawayradio.com
Congratulations. There are many more years to come.
Happy Birthday Jamie, may you have many many more! We wish you all success!
Congratulations Jamie…….and many morrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreeeeeee!