By: Donald V. Watkins
Copyrighted and Published on January 2, 2022
Yesterday, I received the 365-day analytical report for 2021 that breaks down, quantifies, and identifies the characteristics of the growing and diverse base of readers of www.donaldwatkins.com, our free online news service. I was humbled by the depth and breadth of the website's readership. My readers are located throughout the United States and in many of the 208 sovereign countries recognized by the United Nations.
We started our website in Alabama in 2018 with a readership that was concentrated mostly in Birmingham, Alabama (10,453), Atlanta, Georgia (5,509), Chicago, Illinois (3,855), and Los Angeles, California (2,602). Today, we have a firm and growing media presence in all 50 states. What is more, our analytical tools will allow us to greatly expand our readership footprint in all of the usual swing states in time for the 2024 U.S. presidential elections.
Even though www.donaldwatkins.com is published in English only, our news site has been been visited by thousands of readers throughout Canada, Mexico, the Bahamas, Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago, Barbados, Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Namibia, India, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Thailand, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Egypt, the United Kingdom. Austria, Spain, Greece, Norway, Denmark, Finland, France, the Netherlands, Turkey, Bulgaria, Germany, Hungary, Romania, Croatia, Serbia, and a host of other countries. The feature photo for this article depicts the geographical disbursement of my loyal readership.
[Click here to see the global breakdown of our readership for 2021]
We Are "Unbossed" and "Unbought."
We reached this impressive market penetration in just under four years. We do not sell any advertisements. We do not accept money from political candidates, political parties, political action committees, corporations, or individuals. We are one of the few media organizations in the world that is "Unbossed" and "Unbought."
Like many investigative journalists in authoritarian regimes, we have had to fight efforts by U.S. prosecutors in Birmingham, Alabama, state and federal judges in Alabama, former disgraced Alabama governor Robert Bentley, the Alabama Power Company and its perennial "dirty tricks" operator Joe Perkins, and other vigorous opponents of free speech who were determined to shut us down.
When our adversaries realized that they could not buy us or boss us around like they do with diffident African-Americans in Alabama, they unleashed homegrown bigots masquerading as federal prosecutors prosecutors to persecute and prosecute my son and me. Ironically, top-flight career federal prosecutors in New Jersey reviewed the same evidence in 2015 and 2016. They congratulated me on my international business achievements and wished me success in the future. The New Jersey prosecutors refused to taint their professional reputations by participating in an Alabama-style judicial lynching. The Alabama federal prosecutors and local courthouse crowd did to my son and me exactly what was done to social justice pioneer Callie House in 1916 -- they trumped up bogus fraud charges, railroaded us in federal court, and jailed us.
We survived this judicial lynching thanks to my domestic and international readers and your posted comments. You were there to cut the rope around our necks.
Independent Journalism is Under Attack Around the Globe
Independent journalism is under attack around the globe. The United States is no exception. Independent journalists in America are at risk of imprisonment on bogus charges whether the President is a Democrat or Republican. The portfolio of White House media relations tools has included the imprisonment of journalists on trumped up charges since the day when Woodrow Wilson jailed Callie House.
This is why regimes in Russia, the Philippines, China, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, and other autocrats around the world quickly dismiss any White House criticism regarding how they treat journalists and political dissidents in other countries. These foreign leaders can't stomach the open hypocrisy that flows from the mouths of U.S. presidents who have been jailing independent journalists and dissidents on trumped-up charges for over a century.
The Most Read Articles in 2021
We are releasing the most read articles for 2021, by title, original publication date, and number of views in 2021. This is not the total views since publication. I was pleased to see "Solving The Murder of Army Private Lavenia Johnson" in the mix again in 2021. This article is one of my personal favorites. The top five articles viewed in 2021 are:
1. "The Rothschilds: Controlling the World's Money Supply for More Than Two Centuries," published on December 27, 2019, 131509 views
2. "The Royal Bloodline of Jesus and Mary Magdalene," published on January 3, 2020, 95,242 views
3. "Solving the Murder of Army Private Lavenia Johnson," published on February 27, 2018, 16,022 views
4. "Private LaVena Johnson: An Opportunity for Justice" published on January 8, 2021, 14,054 views
5. "Just Mercy: Guilty Until Proven Innocent?," published on January 12, 2020, 8,205 views
[Click here to see all of the most read articles in 2021].
Our Future is Very Promising
Thank you, my worldwide readers, for making 2021 a very successful year for www.donaldwatkins.com. Despite the non-stop persecution we received from corrupt public officials in Washington, D.C and Alabama who pretended that they cared about democracy and freedom of speech, we will continue to publish the cold, hard truth in investigative news articles of interest to our readers, no matter who our articles help or hurt.
The only commodity that matters at www.donaldwatkins.com is the truth. We don't "twist" it or suppress it for anybody. Since 1935, the Watkins family has been willing to pay any price to report the unvarnished truth on matters that make many public officials uncomfortable. We will continue to do so in 2022 with block-buster articles on a wide range of unlawful public corruption transactions and influence-peddling schemes, from Washington to Birmingham.
Our future is very promising. We have two primary goals for 2022. First, we will launch a Spanish version of www.donaldwatkins.com by mid-summer to capture and grow our Spanish-speaking base of readers in America and around the world. Second, we will align our domestic news gathering and reporting services with a new California-based 501(c)(4) Super-PAC (in formation) to make sure that Independent voters decide the outcome of the U.S. presidential election in November 2024.
Happy New Year!
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