Reflecting with The State Worker

As I arrive at my new homepage-away-from-homepage, the top story grabs my attention: SEIU staff and state worker blows, accusations . Since I am now a regular site visitor, I instantly relate and am compelled to read more about the story. A local well-known figure and television show host in the area was caught up in a fight at a union hall last week. The coverage by The State Worker is terse but gives me all the info I need to know: who, what , where, why, and affiliation. Because there were two television news stations on scene to report from the event anyway, and The State Worker was "out of town when the altercation became known," Ortiz provided a brief synopsis of the incident on The State Worker, but then linked full stories by CBS 13 and KCRA Channel 3 in the same post. What I also liked was links to the television program that the involved state worker was a part of. As a frequent visitor of the site, I am happy to read about a little drama involving state workers - It makes me forget about the budget deficit for a few minutes.

Coming to the site because of the topic at hand (Ken Hamidi gets in a fight), I stumble upon The State Worker due to searching Google for more information regarding the incident. I am distracted slightly by the glowing Drexel University ad to the right of the page, but I quickly recover from my ADD and see the headline to the story I was searching for in the first place. Although I think the actual information and depth in the story is void, I appreciate Ortiz posting links to the TV stations' stories about the topic. Although I am unfamiliar with the site, I am familiar with the names and organizations that The State Worker mentions, and that is what ultimately hooks me in. I am impressed by the fact that The State Worker seems to have all its bases covered in regards to state worker-related news.

Here I come - a long-time reader of the Sac Bee, but because my family just recently bought me an internet connection at home, I have stumbled onto Sacbee.com . Curious to see what the hell they have to put on the net, I root around and find Jon Ortiz (a favorite writer of mine) and some "blog" called "The State Worker." As a 30-year veteran state worker, I wanna see just what this internet site is all about. At first, I am unsure of what I'm reading. But after reading the short story and the reader-submitted comments, The State Worker grows on me a little bit. I am turned on to the fact that it is a website entirely dedicated to issues and news stories directly related to state workers like me. I also like that I can speak my mind and interact with other state workers who feel passionately about the same things I do (or things I hate). So far so good; I think this site just might actually be growing on me.

Back to reality, my conclusions are as follows:

* The post serves well to each of the three audiences - the news story is just too tempting and juicy to pass up.

* Because of the nature of the story and the highly opinionated responses already on the blog post, I think there is high probability that each of the three types of readers will come back to the blog because purely to see how the nature of the comments on a particular article have evolved.