The Gotzborg Eagle
The Gotzborg Eagle was a state-owned news publication that published irregularly from June 2004 to August 2006, and from July 2010 to May 2011. Its publication was discontinued on both occasions as the Royal Government decided that it was no longer required due to the availability of independent, privately-owned, news services to provide coverage of Gotzborg news and events.
History
On June 14, 2004, the Gotzborg Eagle published its first article, concerning the Gotzborg tourism industry, beginning a permanent shift by the Royal Government from updated the "News" section of the then HTML-based national website to the news blog medium, which was becoming more and more popular in the micronational community.
Hosted on Blogger, the Eagle initially published articles written by King August Charles II under a generic pen-name ("The Gotzborg Eagle"). On July 8, 2004, George Santos was appointed as the Eagle's first editor, and he began writing occasional articles alongside the King. During these initial months, only a few articles were published each month.
By September 2004, Santos had left the publiacation and Angel Davis had joined the staff as a writer. Through her efforts the Eagle was propelled into the mainstream as a high-volume micronational news publication, as Davis wrote numerous articles each month. While Davis' publication frequency would wane in the following months, she had nonetheless cemented herself as a fixture in the organization, eventually becoming its Editor in June 2006, replacing Ernest Wilde in that role.
April 2005 White Paper
In April 2005, the low volume of publication by the Eagle's writing staff often caused frustration for His Grace Liam, who was, as the Deputy Vice-Minister of State for Communications and Information, the minister then responsible for it.
Sinclair published a White Paper on the Gotzborg Eagle that month, using it as a platform to criticize the publication as "an anaemic national news service." He also called the publication a "failure" despite the best efforts of then-Editor Wilde to spur the writing staff to produce articles. In order to recover from the perceived failures, Sinclair's White Paper proposed six mandatory actions for implementation, as well as three optional ones. These actions were generally meant to integrate the Eagle with the national economy, to redefine the role of editor in the maintenance of the news service, and to increase the frequency of publication of articles.
A review of the Eagle's compliance with implementing the mandatory actions was set for June 2005, though this was delayed due to the Ezboard Data Loss Incident at the end of May. Ultimately, the review was postponed indefinitely when Wilde resigned as editor on July 23, 2005. Wilde briefly returned as Editor the following month, stating that his communique had been misinterpreted as a letter of resignation, but published only two further articles for the Eagle before falling inactive after August 7, 2005.
In the end, the White Paper's policies were never fully implemented due to the lack of staffing resources and Sinclair leaving the Ministry of Communications and Information to become the Minister of State for the Home Office.
2006 Dissolution
On July 14, 2006, Sinclair, now again serving as the Deputy Vice-Minister for Communications and Information, ordered the dissolution of the Eagle. In justifying the dissolution, Sinclair noted that the Eagle had not published new articles in several months, and both Wilde and Davis had fallen inactive. On July 17, the Eagle's wind-up was completed, and all operations were ceased, with any employees still listed on its payroll released from their positions.
The dissolution created a void insofar as the Kingdom no longer had an official news source. This led to a proposal by Hugh O'Neill suggesting that the Royal Government let a contract to allow private organizations to compete for the ability to run the Eagle on its behalf. In the end, however, the proposal was not accepted.
While the Eagle was no longer operational, its infrastructure and identity were used by King August Charles II to publish two further articles during July and August 2005, after which the Eagle's infrastructure was finally shut-in, leaving news coverage of Gotzborg events to privately-held news services such as the Coprieta Standard.
In total, fifty (50) articles had been published by the various writers and editors of the Eagle.
2010 Return to Print
When the Royal Kingdom returned to activity following the Hiatus of 2007 to 2010, the privately-held services that had previously covered news and events in Gotzborg were no longer in operation. In order to inform the micronational world of ongoing developments as the Royal Government worked to bring the micronation back to life, the Eagle returned to print, under the editorship of Sinclair. The Eagle published irregular articles from July 2010 to May 2011 (generally once or twice each month), at which point it was again dissolved.
Editors & Writers
During its operation, the Gotzborg Eagle had four editors, as follows:
- George Santos (July 8, 2004 - September 21, 2004);
- Ernest Wilde (February 23, 2005 - June 9, 2006);
- Angel Davis (June 9, 2006 - July 14, 2006);
- Liam Sinclair (July 26, 2010 - May 14, 2011);
In addition to the aforementioned individuals, King August Charles II was also a writer for the publication.
