In Apparent Snub to State’s High Tax Rates, “Maine Times” Relaunches After 20 Years – From Delaware

A new “Maine” paper claiming the name of an oldie but a goodie has announced its creation – as a Delaware corporation.

The who, what, why, when and where behind the revived Maine Times and its stated mission of “high-impact journalism” from Delaware is a definite head scratcher.

The new corporation filed March 28 in tax-friendly Delaware, doing business as Maine Times.

If the name rings a bell, the original Maine Times launched in Topsham on October 4, 1968, eventually becoming the state’s leading liberal “alternative” publication.

The weekly paper, which through its rocky history closed several times amid scant advertising revenue and lack of subscriptions, finally went out of print April 25, 2002.

The original Maine Times was founded when John Cole, then editor of the Brunswick Times-Record, and Peter Cox each chipped in $25,000 to start a publication they envisioned covering statewide controversial issues.

“The Maine Times was unusual, maybe unprecedented, in terms of an alternative newspaper because it had statewide circulation,” Richard Karpel of the National Association of Alternative Newsweeklies said when it went out of business.

In its earliest days, the paper took on everything from timber harvesting and land development to overfishing and government corruption.

The paper always fantasized it was the only game in town, gleefully ignoring the state’s largest daily, the Portland Press Herald.

Other Portland-based alternative papers have tried and failed at the same rate over the years, including Casco Bay Weekly, Portland Phoenix, and Portland Daily Sun, to name just a few.

The Portland Press Herald has outlasted them all, although under its latest ownership it has languished in the face of declining subscriptions and ad revenue, losing top managers, and recently laying off 50 workers.

So, now emerges a new iteration of the alternative Maine Times – yet strangely based outside of the Pine Tree State, according to a posting on JournalismJobs.com.

“Maine Times is published by Maine Times, LLC, a Delaware-registered company operating independently,” the jobs website says.

The guy behind the startup venture is identified in an April 12 GoFundMe kickoff campaign as David Lide.

Though Lide, 32, now claims South Portland as his base of operations, he originally hails from the south. He ran a small county paper in Arkansas five years ago.

Lide comes from an old southern newspaper family and said he draws his ink-stained inspiration from his ancestors, such as William Woodruff, who founded the Arkansas Gazette.

Lide is bullish on the Maine Times venture no matter how daunting getting it underway may end up being.

“Give $20 and be a founding donor,” he says on the fund-raising site. “Your donation is the start of David’s journey to success.”

As of April 14, David’s Journey had a sputtering start, showing its first—and, at that point, only—contribution, a paltry $25 from “anonymous.”

The MaineTimes.com claims in the fundraising campaign to be “a new, statewide newspaper ready to investigate stories that matter.”

“We will report using print, online, podcast, newsletter and social-media platforms,” its fundraising pitch promises.

Publisher Lide said the paper, allegedly to be sold in stores as well as through subscriptions, is trying to raise $100,000 to get off the ground.

“The public has already been sending critical news tips requesting that we investigate a number of serious concerns,” he claims.

The paper’s LinkedIn site was “prepared with the assistance of AI,” Lide said. “However, Maine Times does not permit AI-generated content in our journalism.”

Now that’s a classic – announcing a company’s formation openly using AI – and then underscoring in italics that AI will not set the tone for real journalism.

AI or no AI, Lide has an entrepreneurial spirit. He’s even been a heavy-equipment dealer, in Panama City, Florida.

But above all else he’s trying to spin his limited journalistic experience as having briefly run a small paper and a few online news sites, describing himself as a “media veteran.”

Lide reports the Maine Times website is “under development.”