We also maintain the server, regularly update the design and aesthetics of the site, and conduct search engine optimization regularly.

We helped The Good Men Project launch the magazine in June and have successfully indexed them with Google News.

In addition, we designed and helped the magazine launch two companion blogs, Good Feed and Dads Good and are working on several others.

My name is John, and I want to make a website for your department. I grew up in a firefighting family. I understand the culture. When I make your site, I’m not going to confuse the ranks or refer to your QUINT (which is probably being used as an Engine thanks to NFPA standards) as a hook and ladder.

(Somerville actually runs a hook and ladder truck still, and it’s fairly new. Brookline’s Engine 1 is a QUINT.)

In the 1990s, just about every fire department got their own website.

Whether it was a folder on the city’s or town’s site or the FD’s very own dot-com, it was an amazing new embracing of history.

Trouble is, a lot of those websites haven’t been updated since then.

Money doesn’t grow on trees, but your police, fire, or municipal department can have a brand new website, done in WordPress, with a modern look. And we’ll teach you how to easily update the site yourself!

Website packages for fire departments

	Lieutenant Grade (Ladder 1) Starting at $500 Includes four pages. For example: homepage, apparatus page with photos of all fire trucks, fire prevention page, and contact page. Includes creation of fire department blog. Can be done in a few days — perfect for small towns and volunteer/call departments		Captain Grade (Engine 2) Starting at $799 Includes Lieutenant’s package plus two additional pages like a roster page and chief’s page.
	District Chief Grade (Car 4) Starting at $1000 Includes Captain’s package plus setup of social networks like department Twitter and Facebook accounts		Deputy Grade (C-2) Starting at $1499 Includes District Chief’s package plus map of firehouse locations, memorials page, online forms/permits, and command staff biographies
	Chief of the Department Grade (C-1) Starting at $1999 Includes Deputy’s package plus incident statistics and unlimited training on how to update the site		Training Officer $500/month Can be added to any package except C-1. Includes up to four station visits and unlimited phone and email support for a month to teach you how to update the site. *Hint: You’ll never have to learn programming code!

Website packages for police/sheriff’s departments

We follow the same basic structure for police and fire departments. For $500, you can have a basic website that tells people who you are and gets your message out to the community.

All packages include the creation of a department blog. Blogs like bpdnews.com here in Boston have become vital instruments of transparency and community involvement. Plus, they’re extremely easy to update once we set it up for you.

Ambulance companies

We offer custom packages for ambulance companies. We take a more corporate approach for private ambulance companies, letting people know where you’re based and what communities you service while providing corporate information and press release sections for the media and investors.

For more information email John Guilfoil or call him anytime at 781-752-9877

CONTACT: John M. Guilfoil, 617-933-8949

November 16, 2009
Renown Boston tech writer Mark Baard gets “Heretical” on BlastMagazine.com

Mark Baard has a knack for fringe science and, let’s say, odd areas of technology.

The renown Boston tech writer and Boston Globe columnist will get to explore Boston’s boldest and outwardly oddest people and discoveries in the world of science, technology, gadgetry, medicine, research, and much more with today’s launch of THE SCI-TECH HERETIC on BlastMagazine.com

“Boston is home to the world’s biggest risk-takers in science. Doctors dosing their patients with “Phase 0″ super-longevity compounds. Cyborgs trolling about with augmented vision and artificial smarts — and tracking chips under their skin. College professors moonlighting as UFOlogists and crypto-zoologists,” quipped Baard. “Now, the only place to meet these people is at Blast, and The Sci-Tech Heretic. I’m here because John Guilfoil knows a bit of our future lies inside all of that ‘crazy talk’ about science.”

The blog, located at http://heretic.blastmagazine.com covers everything from Scooby-Doo’s connection to Cryptology to artificial reality. It is the latest addition to BLAST: BOSTON’S ONLINE MAGAZINE, a 250,000-reader Generation Y-themed lifestyle publication founded here in Boston.

“This is simply a perfect fit for Blast,” said John M. Guilfoil, a Boston news reporter and the founder and editor-in-chief of Blast. “Our readers have a thirst for the latest technology. The weirder, the better.”

“Mark Baard is a name in the field of sci-tech in Boston,” Guilfoil continued. “He adds to Blast his level of professionalism, expertise, and name recognition in the local scene. We’re ecstatic to have him with is.”

“Blast is an outpost for real world journalism, in a world made surreal by out-of-control technology. There is simply no other place in Boston where you will find this kind of reporting, or The Sci-Tech Heretic,” said Baard. “John is brave and smart enough to try something different.”

ABOUT BLAST:

Launched at the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve 2007, BlastMagazine.com, Blast: Boston’s Online Magazine, has grown like a weed for three years. It is a Generation Y publication focused on young, hip Bostonia with a global vision. Blast covers music, movies, tv, video games, fashion, food, sex, relationships, science, health, technology, and more. The site also covers world, local and national news. According to Alexa.org, Blast is the third most followed online publication in Boston behind Boston.com and BostonHerald.com. Blast has more than 100 contributing writers, bureaus in New York and San Diego, and reporters on three continents.

B Media Ventures/Blast Magazine

Blast is a magazine targeted towards Generation Y demographic, covering a variety of issues including current events, trends and fashion, sports, video games, technology, politics, music, movies, theater, culture and sexuality.

We consistently provide new content daily as well as produce a weekly issue continuing running features, columns and scheduled magazine articles.

The magazine is Internet-based and does not charge a subscription fee. As such, we rely on advertising revenue and affiliate links for revenue.

The magazine will model an advertising business model, offering value to the reader by providing premium content at no charge and relying on advertisers to support the content.

We combine the speed and timeliness of the Internet with the quality and nostalgia of traditional print periodicals. Our methodology combines the need for consistently updated, to-the-minute, news articles with the quality, nostalgia and previous success of traditional print magazines, which budget and print stories on a set periodic basis. It combines the successful marketing of blogs with the tradition of quality seen in traditional periodicals into a new media.

Equal opportunity

Blast Magazine does not discriminate on the basis of race, ethnicity, religion, creed, sex, sexual orientation, age or any other measurable demographic.

Employees and interns are hired based solely on B Media Ventures’ personnel requirements and the qualifications of each individual candidate.

This handbook is meant to serve as a guide for corporate conduct is not an exhaustive list of company policies. The company reserves the right to amend this document with proper notice to employees.

Employment

Staff are employed as independent contractors or on an internship basis.

Drug and alcohol policy

Employees who abuse alcohol and drugs (including illegal drugs, prescription drugs and over-the-counter drugs) — either on their own time or at work — can pose significant and wide-ranging problems the company and its publications.

Employees who abuse drugs and alcohol can also make a workplace more volatile and more dangerous, and they can expose employers to legal liability.

1. Alcohol Use at Work

Abuse of alcohol is not allowed during work hours. Employees who show up to work under the influence of alcohol or become such while working will be disciplined up to and including immediate dismissal.

We are (mostly) adults, however, and alcohol may be present at magazine-sponsored social functions or as part of restaurant reviews and magazine features. Use your best judgment.

No one under the age of 21 will be served alcohol at any Blast Magazine or B Media Ventures function.

2. Off-Hours, Off-Site Use of Alcohol

Alcohol is a normal part of adult socialization, as long as it doesn’t affect the employee’s work performance. But when off-site, off-hours drinking begins to take its toll on the worker’s ability to do the job, it will be dealt with.

3. Legal Drug Use

Many people properly use prescribed or over-the-counter drugs, such as sleeping aids, cold medicine, or painkillers. B Media Ventures discourages employees from discussing their prescription or over the counter drug use during work hours.

Legal drug use should not conflict with an employee’s ability to perform all their necessary job functions, which may include driving an automobile.

4. Illegal Drug Use and Possession

Employees should not use illegal drugs while working.

Employees should never carry illegal drugs during the course of their employment.

Illegal drug cases will be dealt with on a case by case basis.

5. Drug Testing Current Employees

B Media Ventures does not conduct random employee drug screenings.

Workplace safety

Employees have the right to a safe work environment. Any hazards should be reported to management as soon as they are discovered.

Violence and harassment

Sexual harassment is any unwelcome sexual advance or conduct on the job. It creates an intimidating, hostile and offensive working environment. Any conduct of a sexual nature that makes an employee uncomfortable has the potential to be sexual harassment. Sexual harassment can also include harassment that is not sexual in nature but is based on one’s gender.

Workplace violence can take many forms and come from several different sources. Violence can be committed by an angry employee, customer or client or by a stranger intent on robbing a business or assaulting its workers. And domestic violence can spill into the workplace.

This behavior is dangerous both to the business and its employees. It will not be tolerated, and employees who engage in such activities will be disciplined up to immediate dismissal. Any employee who feels threatened or harassed should contact management immediately. All reports are taken seriously.

Use of technical resources

B Media Ventures allows its employees to use a variety of technical equipment which can include computers, telephones, fax machines, televisions, video and still cameras and entertainment systems in the course of employment. Equipment is property of the company and employees have no expectation of privacy using them.

Personal phone calls and Internet usage should be kept to a minimum but is permitted as long as the employee maintains the basic standards of journalistic ethics and business professionalism.

Common sense is key. Your job may be playing and reviewing video games, but remember, it’s still work.

Journalistic integrity

Employees who produce content for Blast Magazine are to adhere to all standards of journalistic integrity, ethics and values consistent with any member of the media.

From the Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics:

“Seek Truth and Report It. Journalists should be honest, fair and courageous in gathering, reporting and interpreting information.”

From B Media owner John Guilfoil:

Don’t plagiarize. Your work better be your work and only your work.

Disclose any potential conflict of interest. Probably not a good idea to cover a concert if it’s your brother’s band.

Don’t lie. We’re nothing if not honest.

Never assume something is true. Always independently verify what you write. Especially if it’s in a press release

On the record. Off the record. Make sure your source knows they’re talking to a reporter

Blast’s contributors do music, movies, theater, video games, sports, fashion, sex, food and liquor for starters. We write about some of it too.

Blast is online. Don’t ask for the print edition.

Blast is a form of convergence journalism, looking to combine the quality of print journalism (and print journalists) with the convenience and unlimited space of the web.

Blast offers packages starting at $100/month.

That’s one hundred dollars per month to jack some of our content and publish it in your newspaper, magazine, or online-publication.

In this day and age, balancing content and costs is crucial to the survival of any publication or news source.

You can balance your needs by syndicating from the B\wire — Blast Magazine’s lifestyle news wire.

We can push movie reviews, video game news/reviews, local restaurant reviews, breaking local and national news, and even relationship advice.

On the B\wire, you can access:

• Movie reviews and/or news
• Music reviews and features
• Video game reviews
• Video game news
• Fashion features and trends
• Local arts, ballet and theater
• Science, tech and gadget news
• And much more!

We’re very competitive and will custom build a package for you, no matter how great or small your needs are! Everything we syndicate is priced to order based on your unique needs and usage. Contact us for details!

We can set up a custom quote for you. Our software is equipped to send articles to your online or print system. We can quote you on just one category or the whole ball of wax!

Why WordPress? What IS WordPress?

WordPress is a publishing tool. We can use it to make a website for virtually any company in the world, and we can usually do it for under $1,000.

Why? Because we design the page and give it to you. WordPress is designed so you can easily add text or pages — or change anything you want — without having to know how to program. You pay us to make your website, and it’s YOURS.

E-mails us for more information or call 781-752-9877 anytime.

We also are in the process of launching a website that will let any Blast reader start their own blog!

Wrong.

Blast’s Sachin Seth reports on the world, giving our Generation Y readers world news targeted toward them and written by one of them.