Two months ago, Mary Morgan and her husband, David Askins, founded the Ann Arbor Chronicle, a local online news site. Mary is a former opinions editor at The Ann Arbor News. It's early days yet for the Chronicle, but the general trend of print journalism moving online is accelerating, and we thought Mary could give us a good picture of what such a move is like in the early stages...
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Mary notes the following operational and tactical components that differ from traditional print publications and are a hallmark of many web startups:
- She updates main articles two to four times daily, not unlike a blog. She also has a breaking observations section called "Stopped. Watched." that is updated more frequently based on texts, emails, and phone calls from community contributors.
- The community plays a strong role in the paper. Mary and David provide professional editorial oversight, but other contributors do so on a volunteer basis.
- The Ann Arbor Chronicle's revenue base is local advertisers. Distribution is important for these advertisers, but they are also looking for a local outlet that is relevant to their business.
- Like many startups, Mary and David are giving themselves a 12 month runway to determine the extent to which they can make a go of the Chronicle.