Two rare exceptions are Drag Racing Online and CompetitionPlus.com.
Don’t take the publishers’ word for that; just
take a look at all the ads on these pages. So many advertisers
are climbing aboard that one editor has begged his contributors
for extra editorial material to wrap around the commercials.
You and I benefit because additional ad revenue pays for
more and better photojournalists to bring back stories and
photos. Technical breakthroughs are shared almost as quickly
as they develop. Should one of us ill-informed columnists
make a mistake, it’s often caught and corrected before
serious harm is done. Your electronic letters to the editor
are received instantaneously, and possibly posted within hours
— sure to be seen by influential racers, promoters,
sanctioning-body officials and industry leaders.
ADVERTISEMENT
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Onscreen readers further benefit from the competitive natures
of these two publishers. Neither would admit to it, but you
can take the word of someone who’s known Burk and Bennett
for two decades. Because a screen page can be “reprinted”
on a moment’s notice, the desire to scoop each other
— as well as the fear of being scooped — is ongoing
and relentless. Electronic publishing is a 24-hour-a-day occupation,
with updates appearing continuously.
The price is right, too: We’d have to pay about five
bucks for a January- or February-dated print magazine that
still can’t say who won last season’s points chases.
Last but not least, e-zines are saving trees in rural regions
like mine, in northern California. Calaveras County’s
largest landowner is Sierra Pacific Industries, the logging
giant famous for clear-cutting thousands of acres into bare
dirt. SPI’s big trucks run right by my place all day
and night, April ’til November, loaded down with the
raw material necessary for making paper.
That’s another reason why this 55-year-old dinosaur
is glad to get his drag news right here, anytime, free of
charge — and free from political and corporate meddling
by some sanctioning body or media monopoly. The 21st century
reminds me of the Golden Age, except that I don’t have
to wait ’til Wednesday to find out what happened on
Sunday, nor fork over a quarter. 
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