We want you to have your say

I thought residents all over South Fulton might want to learn about one of the features of our Web site that you may not be familiar with. It is one that is designed to guarantee that you have a voice, that your voice will be heard and one by which you can exchange ideas and discuss issues affecting you communities among yourselves.

Our interactive Web site, www.thecitizen.com, is continuing an expansion process designed to bring the 1st Amendment into your homes and businesses and enable you to send your thoughts and opinions right back out into the world. We have incorporated features that let you communicate with each other, having essentially established a means by which you can develop your own community forum to exchange ideas and opinions specific to your community and your future. The state of affairs of your city is an example of this, as is current proposal to create two new cities in unincorporated South Fulton. Significant to all this are the increasing numbers of registered users each month, along with their own blogs, that are flocking to the Web site.

We are seeing rapid growth in the use of the Web site since it went truly interactive beginning a few short months ago. For example, we had 39,589 unique visitors in January, 95,301 visits and 4.98 million hits. In the first seven days of February we had 11,000 unique visitors, 22,000 visits and 1.3 million hits. By the way, businesses such as our that employ 30 people with 30 computers, all visiting the Web site during the month, still counts only as one unique visitor. So we know the numbers are out there and growing because people are not only visiting the site but are commenting on articles and editorials and other Web site components, not to mention posting their own comments and exchanging communication with others. It takes the idea of a Letter to the Editor to a whole new dimension, whether your blog carries your name or any pseudonym you choose. And as for the topics you address on our Web site, the sky is the limit.

We have begun running an illustrated mock-up of our Web site on page 2 of the South Fulton Citizen. It provides a detailed explanation along the left column of the many features and access points that will assist you in creating your own personal and community forum. This is important to us because our readers are important to us.

One of the areas we are currently working to expand has to do with the mass of photos we take but cannot run in the paper. For example, I’ve taken hundreds of photos at the Fairburn Festival of Arts, Antiques and Music, at the Union City Christmas Parade, Palmetto Days and Serenbe’s Illumination Event. Yet the available space on newsprint usually means only one or two photos can run. In the future, you’ll be able to access the photo gallery on our Web site and download and print any or all the photos we take an these events.

In all, these additions to our Web site are intended to provide you with the kind of access to your newspaper that far transcends anything that can be put on newsprint. Our desire is that you will not only be informed but that you have a real-time venue to participate in the affairs of your communities. We want you to have your say.