What is the longest word in the dictionary? To some people, the answer might be ‘government’.
While the Internet has made it easier for more people to get access to government information, it can still be a challenge to find something specific or make sense of what information is there.
Rich Vivone thinks he has found the solution. For 16 years, he’s been delivering to loyal subscribers his almost-weekly newsletter (minimum 40 per year), entitled Rich Vivone’s INSIGHT into Government: Alberta’s Independent Newsletter on Policy and Politics.
“Its name is Insight – that’s exactly what it is,” explains Vivone.
“We try to explain to people what’s going on, we usually take a whole bunch of stuff, put it together and give it a context.
“People who read our newsletter are more interested in a perspective rather than me taking one incident and writing about it.”
With more than 500 issues under his belt, he’s developed a whopping stash of information.
Vivone recently compiled all his newsletters since July 1989 onto a cross-platform PC/Mac CD-ROM.
In fact, some of his newsletters predate some of the software he uses, so he had to scan in a few issues.
With the expertise of Peter Johnston of PSC Consulting Ltd, they’ve created an electronic resource in Adobe Acrobat PDF format which uses the freely available Acrobat Reader. Subscribers can read entire issues by volume, or search the database for a specific item or topic by keywords.
His subscriber base is broad, including people who do business with government and even government departments themselves.
One provincial employee noted that his department had a challenge tracking down information from one of its own press releases from a year ago. Staff were thrilled to be able to retrieve the relevant information from a back issue on the Insight CD, simply by typing in a keyword in the search engine.
So why are Vivone’s clients willing to pay $270 a year to get his product to their desktops? With a retention rate of more than 95 per cent, they are obviously finding a good value.
Vivone says his service goes beyond what’s offered on government websites. “We explain what this means, where it’s going and why and where it may end up after a while,” he says.
Vivone stresses the importance of perspective, but he likes to out the facts.
“Sometimes I lean left, sometimes right,” he admits, though he’s been told he has found a nice balance. He usually limits his publication to six pages.
“My newsletter is designed to be read in 15 minutes. There’s no advertising. We don’t owe anyone anything. The best week is when you get attacked by both the Liberals and the (Klein) government – then you’re OK.”
In one edition, Vivone commissioned an independent rating of provincial government websites.
The agriculture department’s website was cream of the crop, while both the environment and health departments were under the weather.
Vivone is no rookie, either – he’s been steeped in Alberta’s political scene for more than two decades.
He’s worn the hat of journalist, campaign strategist and executive assistant to a provincial cabinet minister.
Vivone says he’s made an enjoyable living publishing his newsletter.
Asked about his subscriber numbers, he replies with a grin: “I make more money than the premier.”
Web Watch:
www.vivone.com
