HOPE PAPA H. AIN'T ROLLING OVER ...

Being that Papa H. spent some time as a reporter (for The Toronto Star and Kansas City Star), we feel he'd think this to be priceless. And it is. Read on ...

The online community magazine PasadenaNow.com, recently made headlines when they decided to do something a tad different in the modern news game.

In these days of stringent belt tightening, the bottom-liners are starting to rear their ugly heads in newsrooms throughout the nation. That said, the editor and publisher of Pasadena Now, recently announced that he hired two reporters to cover Pasadena city government — from Mumbai and Bangalore, India.

You read correctly. India.

Starting Tuesday, the dynamic duo will begin sloshing out about 30 Pasadena-centric pieces a week between them. Halfway across the globe.

In exchange, one reporter will make $12,000 a year, the other $7,200, for covering budget battles and zoning meetings in a city of 146,000 best known for the Rose Bowl and Caltech.

Hiring foreign correspondents in reverse makes good sense to head honcho, editor and publisher James Macpherson, 51, a longtime Pasadena resident.

The fledgling two-year old site garners roughly 45,000 visitors a month, but has yet to return turn a profit. Until now, any news coverage consisted mainly of rewritten press releases. He wants to change that.

To his credit, there's a wealth of material available online - city council meetings are webcast and most municipal documents are posted. Truthfully, anyone can write those stories, given they have enough skill and computer expertise.

But is it journalistically ethical? Or bottom-line saavy?

Just how did Macpherson snag his offshoring Clark Kents? They responded to his ad on Indian versions of craigslist.org.

As a result, a male staffer in Mumbai gets to cover city politics over the Internet, while a woman in Bangalore will write features about business and government based on interviews done by staffers in Pasadena, which will be transcribed (in India) and e-mailed to the reporter.

The visionary newsman told MSNBC and Newsweek that the news has already netted him angry e-mails, mostly from journalists. No shock there.

Outsourcing news gathering to a foreighn land. Kinda gives new meaning to the term telecommute, huh?

What's the country coming to? We think most members of the Greatest Generation may be shaking their heads right about now.

I know Papa Hemingway is.
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Take a look at an excellent special report on Indian outsourcing done by ABC News.