Perhaps they might consider becoming a News Paper rather than an Ad Paper and charge readers monthly fees for accessing it on-line? They can call them subscribers!

Let's see: WW is losing revenue is a serious way, so they move into expensive office space in NW. Great fiscal move.

Maybe the head of WW is planning on running for Mayor or City Council soon.

Is ANYONE staying in the inner downtown these days?

No one who bathes regularly.

Scott: They're moving into a building they'll own. It's long-term thinking. And is real estate on 22 & Quimby really more expensive than across from the library? I doubt it (but I don't know). They could move out to Clackamas like the Trib, but we'd all make even bigger fun of them for that, so...

Jack: I definitely remember seeing the publisher's note many times before. Most recently, however, I remember it mainly because of the over-the-top parody in the Mercury... which unfortunately wasn't there this time :(

Well, if Willamette Week moved out to Clackamas they'd still be within the Willamette watershed. It's the Portland Tribune that has so hilariously left Portland.

So WW "will" own the building in NW? Gee-whiz, free weekly papers are more lucrative than I thought. Well, were before Craigslist showed up.

And the Trib moved out of Portland?! That's hilarious.

The success behind Craigslist, is that Craig the founder has kept it simple and almost completely free. Where other CEO's would have started charging for ads, or putting up crazy flashing ads, or regulating content, Craig is just building a free online community.

Talk to any WW employee and they will tell you that the annual "Publisher's Notebook" is the annual time for employees to cringe with embarrassment as Meeker brags about how great the paper is and what a blessing it is to Portland.

Portlandmaps.com shows the purchase was $2,000,000. Seems they might be hedging their bets by becoming real estate developers as their paper dwindles in ads and impact.

He states that the building will be in an area "making the transition from warehouses to all manner of interesting local businesses." A block off of NW 23rd is hardly the gritty, industrial area he portrays.

anonymous -- I work in the same neighborhood, actually, a block or two closer to 23rd than the WW building-to-be. Believe me, the description is accurate.

For the most part it makes the area interesting to walk in, which I do every day when I take my dog for his mid-day jaunt. There are factories, warehouses, chi-chi restaurants, fine old homes, fading squats, interesting, odd-ball retreats (a descriptor I use with all due respect and affection for the type) tucked between rusting metal siding and fading brick buildings, great gardens and more than occasional odd-nervous-making smells (from the industrial area.)

There are moldering warehouses sitting vacant, several within one block of 23rd. Their doorways are favorite camping spots for fellows with shopping carts. Down the street from me one such personage keeps his cat's food and bowl semi-permanently stored under cardboard up under the eves of an empty building. He's a pleasant sort -- and literary. By 5:00 pm, when I pass him on my way to my car he is settled in with cat and book, for an evening's reading.

Should you wish to take a walk in the neighborhood, I advise avoiding some areas of Vaughn. The sidewalk is too narrow, and is mostly covered with broken glass and some kind of weird black soot. Folks who are only acquainted with the more upscale parts of 23rd might not be too comfortable there.

Yes, NW 14th-23rd, north of Northrup, is a very interesting area. "Industrial," "mixed," and "post-industrial" are good descriptors. Of course, now The Lucky Lab is plunking down a brewpub at 19th and Quimby, WW is taking 22nd and Quimby, and the new Dove Lewis animal hospital a couple of blocks away will be accompanied by a new housing development.
For the record, I believe the "weird black soot" comes from the ESCO plant on Vaughn. Others blame the freeway.