xena ibrahim. lisa frazier is the publisher of "bay area citizens." paul connelly is the senior vice president of the tcc group and he manages the challenge fund for journalism, one of the largest sources of grants for journalism. now on the back row, crank aaron is the senior director of the free press, a group working to increase government funding for the media. frank frankle is a journalism professor at stanford university. next to him is ron dellens, the mayor of oakland. he has served 14 houseyears. next to him is a former writer and publisher. he and embed the publisher. next to him is david calloway, editor in chief of marketwatch.com. next to him, sandy close, the director of new american media. she is also my executive editor and i get to hold the microphone up to her. let's begin the discussion. >> thank you. let's start with a question that is on many people's mind. with cutbacks and technology shifts, what has that done to the quality of news, barry parr? >> when i worked at the "mercury news" back in the 1990's, we were trying to compete