That's not a headscratcher. Get into their heads and ask yourself, "Why would I write/report on these guys?" I can think of one HUGE reason why you wouldn't--

That's not a headscratcher. Get into their heads and ask yourself, "Why would I write/report on these guys?" I can think of one HUGE reason why you wouldn't-- because it's a better source of news with a bunch of links to stories from OTHER news entities. You don't see people reporting on Google News except to say how evil and unfair they are. Not many news outlets do the "hey look, it's a great new way to get news!" stories on Google News. If you want legitimacy, I'd do this. Create a "submit this" widget for your site and promote it to the news folks using your site. Add a "Leading Chicago News Outlets" block somewhere on your site (prominently for now, you can fade it away later) and say you'll give people who install that widget placement in that block. Send any "partner" site who installs the widget a weekly report of the traffic you're sending them. Then, when you talk with advertisers, call these people your "news partners" and describe the widget relationship. It'll seem pretty legit. Toss in a anchor link to your site within the widget code (outside of any javascript) with the right anchor text ("Chicago News") and you'll rank #1 for the search phrase chicago news before you know it (bonus!).