WHEN WEEKLY NEWSPAPERS first appeared in Dufferin in the 19th century,

and even when the Orangeville Citizen made its debut in the 1970s, things that were written and published locally were almost entirely confined to those who somehow came in contact with the printed product - generally those in the local trading area or those who grew up locally and wanted to stay in touch with the "old home town."

That, thanks to the Internet generally and search engines like Google particularly, is no longer the case. Now, as perhaps excellent news to our advertisers, the Citizen and most of The Free Press and Economist can be read at least nationally and to a lesser extent worldwide.

We don't always think of the scope of our readership. Thus it came as a surprise to columnist Eric Nagler that someone in Africa had been able to read his column the day it was published.

More recently, we were the ones who broke the story about natives claiming title to Dufferin's wind as a resource, to the lands within the Haldimand Tract, and to the wind turbines in Melancthon. We thought of it as a local issue, as anyone

could have picked up on it by diligently researching the Web, but hadn't. Turns out, despite the current focus on the native claim in Caledonia, the "local" turbine issue is of national interest.

Since our story appeared, the article's writer has been contacted by such as CBC and other mainstream media, as well as by a native newspaper in the Canadian West, and by a couple of prospective wind-farm developers.

Reporters are news writers, not news makers, so the writer has dutifully relayed sources to writers from other media so they could do their own research.

The turbine story is being considered "major." It should be noted, however, that Google has indexed a number of other stories from our website, www.citizen.on.ca

Those have ranged from a session on communicating with children through a form of sign language to ones about attitudes on biosolids.

Whether you're advertising with us or appearing in the news, you should be aware that your story is being more widely read than our circulation figures would indicate.

We remain a community newspaper, but it turns out we're more than just "local."