Victor Luca

It was nice to see Beacon owner John Spring on the front page of Wednesday’s edition gleefully accepting help from recent mayoral candidate Phil Jacobs, contentedly seated atop his expensive new Honda.

Mr Jacobs has volunteered to personally deliver the paper to Murupara twice a week.

Assuming the new bike’s fuel consumption at around 4.5 L/100 km, I figure Mr Jacobs is donating $40 in fuel costs and maybe six hours of his time each week. That amounts to a donation of about $200 per week (assuming a minimum wage). Very generous indeed.

Mr Jacobs is aware of the Eastern Bay app and that there is an electronic version of the Beacon. I use the latter and for the following very good reasons:

1) Saves on cutting down trees unnecessarily and adding to pollution etc.

2) 96 percent of New Zealanders have internet connections. Even in Minginui. And even in the Amazon jungle these days.

3) You can search the electronic version easily, although the search facility could be improved.

4) You can save articles from the electronic version on your computer and then easily refer to them and share. I have an elderly friend who is constantly asking me to find stuff for him because in his mess of paper piles he can’t find anything.

5) Improves the sustainability of the Beacon. I suspect it would be better from the point of view of profit.

Everything is in place to pump out the electronic version already, and no one is taking that away anytime soon.

Unless we have some sort of electromagnetic interference from solar flares, an entity detonates an EMP weapon or cyber terrorism event and the internet goes down.

6) My letterbox isn’t that nice.

7) The electronic version doesn’t get wet.

Some people like to have a physical version of the paper, I get that. But in the absence of getting deliveries of the physical paper, the electronic version is available. For the older sector, it’s a matter of investing a little time and getting used to it.

We are in the 21st century. Surely folk can adapt.