Supposedly the "Good News" newspaper, it crams in lots of articles about CoS artists, schools, non-profits and writers in the Tampa Bay area. Lots of ads for Scientology-linked schools like Clearwater Academy and businesses run by CoS members. Phrases like "The Basics" or "ARC" are aimed at CoS members.
The masthead (list of staff) has at least seven people with Scientology course completions, (Enter their names at http://www.truthaboutscientology.com/stats/index.html to see the courses)
Editor Angela Lemay, Staff Writer Heidi Lux, Contributing Writer Sirio Balmelli, Contributing Writer Winston Kao, Photographer Brad Kugler, Photographer David Ziff, Technical Director Uwe Stern

The word that is very hard to find in that paper: Scientology.
http://tampabayinformer.com/print/20100415.pdf

It's a Scientology outreach newspaper published by Angela LeMay & her live-in boyfriend, Ken Titzel. The remaining staff are active Scilons.

http://tampabayinformer.com/About-Us/About-Us/

http://www.truthaboutscientology.com/st ... lemay.html

http://www.truthaboutscientology.com/st ... field.html

http://www.truthaboutscientology.com/st ... augen.html

https://www.facebook.com/angela.lemay1 (Ironically, her "friends" are Independent Scientologists).

https://www.facebook.com/kentitzel

https://www.facebook.com/simaenskolfield

https://www.facebook.com/haugendaz

I hope people don't pick it up just because it's "free," and I hope non-Scientology businesses don't hand it out or leave it in their waiting rooms.

I do not think that non-Scientologists would find this newspaper interesting and informative. I think that the newspaper owners know that. Their audience are Scilons, and Scilons only; otherwise, they would not be using typical Scientology terms (ARC and similar shit) that are not known to the general public.

When I was a Scientologist, CoS used to publish their own newspaper whose title I do not remember. Sometimes copies of their newspaper could be found in the Big Blue lobby. It was so boring that after reading one issue I lost interest in it.

Perhaps, CoS leaders came to conclusion that an :“independent” Scientology newspaper could function better than their dull brainchild.

Nope, they do, big time. The public is tantalized by anything that is free, which is why the Informer gets revenue from it's paid advertisements.

The cult had their own community magazine in Los Angeles.. years ago.. the name escapes me.. though I found magazine bins for it on my college campus.. learned that the school had not approved it's distribution (which was campus policy) and they gave me the OK to toss the magazines & their bins into the trash. The magazine has since gone defunct.

There's also a free health magazine distributed in the Los Angeles area heavy on Scientology ads.

You are so wrong. You make the assumption the general public is wise & not capable of being hoodwinked by the cult.

I live in Los Angeles. There are loads of free newspapers & magazines floating about from a variety of New Age & cult organizations, especially those that worship Indian gurus & swamis, Wiccans, Moonies, etc. Obviously, these mags would not have the revenue to publish & distribute on a monthly basis if it were not attracting readers and people willing to pay for magazine ads.

Thanks for the info, I'm going to check out the TB Informer.

I received a promotional post card last fall for Delphi Academy through snail mail. I thought it was unusual because I don't know how they got my name, I've never been "in". Maybe it was just a mass mailing. To the casual observer, there is nothing that says scientology, but if you look at the very bottom left corner it says Applied Scholastics. Then you need a magnifying glass to see "based on the works of L. Ron Hubbard" underneath that. They do what they can to try to be mainstream in the shadow of the Soopah Powah bldg.



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Glancing over the paper the main evidence that $cientology is connected to it is the ads, although one would probably have to have some familiarity with $cientology to perceive that. References in the ads include a book by L. Ron Hubbard, 'The Way to Happiness,' a WISE logo, and an ad for a delphi school. There may be other references in the editorial content but I didn't bother reading any of that to find out.

It does not look like this paper has been published since April 2010. Angela was the competent one at the paper. I don't think any of the rest of them could have kept it going. Angela LeMay has posted on Marty's blog and I think she's an Independent now:

Also I tried to find a complete date in the edition you posted (with year) and couldn't find one. I knew the article about the teacher-astronaut was old because she went to space in 2010 and the article reads as if is it happening now. "Latest news" on the front page of the web page is 2010.

So it looks like this paper went bust when LeMay left? Hoo-Ha. CoS would have shut the whole thing down forever, if it's editor went over to the "dark side"

Here's a current CW-Sceino publication that is also handed out for free:
http://www.thecommline.com/index.php

Frankly, I do not have statistical data showing how successful (or unsuccessful) New Age newspapers are when it comes to the recruitment.

One of my friends is a former member of the Hare Krishna cult. He told me that the rich Indians living in LA donate plenty of money to the cult without joining it (by joining I mean shaving their heads and reciting endlessly the Hare Krishna mantra). With all this money flowing into the cult the cult leaders do not have to have a solvent newspaper to promote their “religion”. An insolvent newspaper will do.

Perhaps, the same is true for a Scientology newspaper -- a single rich donor can keep it afloat even if it makes very little money.

Stepping outside the cult sphere -- my enemy, the evolutionist named Richard Dawkins, has a very rich donor who created for him a university position. Dawkins gets his salary not from the university but from his donor. But this is money wasted because Dawkins’ attempts to promote atheism have failed (the surveys show that the percentage of atheists in English-speaking countries remains unchanged).

One rich donor can make a useless enterprise going, as numerous examples show.

Thanks, Dorothy, for pointing out the demise of the paper. The rag didn't have dates at the top, and that's typical of Scientology magazines. The last edition mentioned Dottie Metcalf-Lindenburger's space flight, which was in 2010.

Another purpose of papers like this is to give "careers" to Scientologists with no college.