AOL | All Things D | paidContent | Ad Age
In its second-quarter earnings report, AOL says Patch "grew traffic and engagement at double digit rates year-over-year and quarter-over-quarter" and that revenue more than doubled in the second quarter compared to a year earlier. Patch is on track to make $40 million to $50 million this year, though it has invested more than $200 million so far, according to paidContent's Staci Kramer.

The company reported in May that its first-quarter revenue was double that of last year's, too, and that its traffic was up 55 percent from March 2011 to March 2012.

In an interview with Ad Age's Jason Del Rey, AOL CEO Tim Armstrong described an upcoming shift in Patch's strategy, expanding from its current focus on hyperlocal news to listings and commerce.

As for the listings business, he was asked if Patch was trying to build a competitor to Craigslist. "Craigslist and other companies like that that sell used merchandise haven't really scaled into communities," he said. "They've been very metro-focused. One of the opportunities for Patch...is the ability for us on the commerce side to offer the people the ability to do listings and other things like that locally."

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AOL
Starboard, the activist investment group that expressed great skepticism about AOL's content-based strategy, lost its bid to place three members on the company's board at today's annual meeting. AOL's entire present board was re-elected, a company news release says. This may mean some more breathing space for Patch, AOL's local-news initiative, which would have been in the crosshairs of any Starboard-affiliated directors. Starboard prepared an investor presentation for the SEC saying it did not believe Patch was a "viable business," estimating it was losing “approximately $79 million to $133 million per year.” Related: Patch reports record audience as AOL faces proxy fight

Patch | The Wall Street Journal
Patch reports today its audience is up 14 percent over last month, with 11.7 million users in May, and that its revenue is up 17 percent over the same period. This news comes at a propitious time for AOL's ambitious local-news initiative: Thursday's annual AOL shareholder meeting will be a showdown between CEO Tim Armstrong and Starboard Value, the activist investment group that's been calling for the corporation to change its content-focused strategy. “We do not believe Patch is a viable business,” Starboard wrote in an investor presentation it's filed with the SEC. It estimated the local-news initiative is on track to lose "approximately $79 million to $133 million per year." Starboard is hoping to elect three directors to the company's board at the meeting.

Keach Hagey reports in The Wall Street Journal that AOL's been catching some tailwinds that might blunt Starboard's attack. Its stock is up 43 percent following a sale of patents to Microsoft, and much of its equity is held by long-term investors (who might nonetheless get twitchy if a frustrated Starboard sells its 5.3 percent share in the company, Hagey writes).

Previously: AOL reports Q1 earnings with progress for Patch as rumors swirl it’s selling tech sites

The Daily Sleepy Hollow | Tarrytown-Sleepy Hollow Patch
Sean Roach, who wrote a buzzed-about cover story about his experience as a former editor of Tarrytown-Sleepy Hollow Patch for Columbia Journalism Review, is a candidate for Sleepy Hollow's Board of Trustees. He took questions about his candidacy from Main Street Connect's Meredith Shamburger last month, including this.

What qualifications make you the best candidate for village trustee? I covered local government for five years as a reporter and have seen decision making in action and understand how local government works.

Roach is running as an independent with two other candidates, one of whom he profiled last year. The elections are scheduled for March 20. "I think being a reporter gives you insight on how things work," Roach says on the phone. His previous political experience consists entirely of a successful bid to be student body treasurer at his high school on Bainbridge Island in Washington state. Roach considered running as a Democrat, he says, but he was worried people would think his earlier coverage favored that party. Issues that drove him to run? "There's a lot of issues in our little village," Roach says. He'd like to engage Sleepy Hollow's Spanish-speaking community, which makes up nearly half the town population. He wants to get a master plan in place for downtown. He hasn't discussed his candidacy with his fellow volunteers on Sleepy Hollow's and Tarrytown's ambulance squad, for which he is an EMT. "If there's one thing I want to stress, it's that I don't talk about politics when I do ambulance corps," he says. Roach isn't sure if he'll go back to journalism or not. Since leaving Patch, he's taken a job as a public relations manager for the National Kidney Foundation, which he enjoys. "I do miss journalism a lot already," he says. He'll look at his options after the election. || Related: Tim Armstrong says he "co-founded Patch because local information and journalism improve people’s lives" | "A Brief History of Hyperlocals" (both from CJR)

Columbia Journalism Review
Sean Roach reflects on his stint as editor of Tarrytown-Sleepy Hollow Patch. The 60-hour weeks were invigorating, he says, even if advertising was a frustration. Rather than feeling muscled by the folks in shiny suits, he wishes they'd asked him for more ideas: "It seemed I could control every aspect of my site’s being, but making it sustainable was out of my grasp."

In many small-town publications there is a thin wall between advertising and editorial. At my previous job, with a twice-weekly newspaper, the wall literally had a doorway that connected the two departments. At Patch, the dividing wall between editorial and advertising seemed so high at times that it was impossible to know where we stood in relation to those on the other side. (more...)

Some reading as you walk the dog:

• More journalists arrested during Thursday's Wall Street protests (The Huffington Post); Full-time journalists in the minority in Occupy arrests nationwide (The Awl)
• On Mayor Bloomberg's handling of media during protests: “To say that the administration has been accessible is not to say that it has been entirely forthright.” (Capital New York)
• Of all things, why focus on Penn State's "handling" of the child sexual abuse scandal? (The Washington Post)
• Can Patch turn its drive-by visitors into regulars? (Nieman Journalism Lab)
• Kindle Fire's small screen doesn't work well for magazines (NPR)
• Breaking News moves into the U.K. (Lost Remote)
• AP takes suggestions on public information requests from governments worldwide (Associated Press)
• Former reporter describes government oppression that forced him to flee Pakistan (Committee to Protect Journalists)
• How Wall Street Journal created 3-D hedcut for Lego story (The Wall Street Journal)

TBD.com
News editor Ryan Kearney came up with the idea of ranking the dozens of Washington, D.C.-area Patch sites and coordinated the four-journalist project. "We throw out a lot of ideas throughout the day, most of which are good for an obnoxious newsroom laugh and nothing more," he says in an email. "Somehow this one stuck. I think we can all agree, though, that a scientifically rigorous evaluation of Patch was long overdue. Also, I wanted to beat Erik Wemple to it."

The main challenge was reading Patch for countless hours. That is not a dig at Patch. Any site becomes tiresome after a while, but there's the added problem of irrelevance. No disrespect to the people of Lake Ridge–Occoquan, but I am not particularly interested in your parental nightmares — unless I'm creating the Patch Awesomeness Index (PAI), in which case I must pretend to be an engaged member of that community. All in the name of science.

TBD.com A&E editor Andrew Beaujon, who wrote the mathematical equation "to determine the sites' respective awesomeness," says Patch's PR person "was chagrined by the piece" and wouldn't let TBD do interviews with editors of the top-ranked sites. They are:

1. Fredericksburg Patch:
"Editor Mike Theis' coverage of the Spotsylvania sheriff's race is outstanding, and the comments boards rock."

2. Ashburn Patch
"Editor Dusty Smith is the rare Patch editor who will stick it to someone."

3. Georgetown Patch
"Shaun Courtney has the joint cased, Patch-wise. She covers the stuffing out of real estate, retail, and neighborhood controversies. If I lived in Georgetown, I'd read this every day."

The Manassas Patch lands on the bottom of the heap. ("A little local sports, a little politics, a little crime, but not much depth on any of it.") I emailed the #1 and #51 editors for their reactions, but didn't get a response. However, Patch VP/Communications Janine Iamunno did send me her thoughts on the "Awesomeness" rankings:

TBD is entitled to their own opinion, of course, just as we're entitled to disagree with it. We're incredibly proud of the work our Patch editors are doing in the DC region and in our 850+ communities./continues

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Adweek | Forbes
The Huffington Post continues to roll out local news websites for major U.S. cities, with HuffPost Detroit and HuffPost Miami coming in November, Adweek reports. HuffPost currently has sites for New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Denver, San Francisco and Washington, D.C. Adweek's Dylan Byers says this renews concerns about what the future holds for Patch, which was supposed to be parent company AOL's star local news project.

Meanwhile, Forbes' Jeff Bercovici reports that Patch is no longer guaranteeing that it will be in 1,000 towns by the end of the year. Growth has slowed in the past six months, with a current network of 864 sites. “Our plan is to continue to add sites where it makes sense,” Patch President Warren Webster told Forbes. “We’re not as focused on 1,000 as a number as we are on smart, sensible investments in communities -- but we expect to be around 1,000 sites by year’s end. ... And regardless we expect to continue to expand Patch into 2012.”

Earlier: AOL says it is "very committed" to Patch investment | Why don't Patch editors start their own sites?