By Sree Sreenivasan
DNAinfo Contributing Editor
The notification came via e-mail from the oldest press club in the United States: "We are pleased and honored to inform you that DNAinfo.com is the recipient of the 2010 Society of the Silurians Excellence in Journalism Award in the category of Online Investigative Reporting/Web Exclusive."
Here was an organization founded in 1924 — John Steinbeck and William Randolf Hearst were early members — recognizing a brand-new website (along with such venerable companies as the New York Times, Newsday, the Daily News, the New York Post and Vanity Fair).
That investigative story, "Inside the DEA and the City's Drug Trade Through an Upper East Side Heroin Den," is just one of the many highlights of DNAinfo.com, which turns six months old this week. Since it has done far, far less self-promotion than almost any startup I've encountered, I thought I'd use this opportunity to take stock of the site's progress.
As the media world undergoes historic upheaval — newspaper circulation is down (most recently by average of almost 9 percent); venerable magazines such as Gourmet have shut down; people you've never heard of are stars on Twitter — it feels like traditional media is batting to stay alive in the bottom of the ninth inning in a game of Us vs Everybody.
Instead of just standing by and taking strike after strike, I wish more journalists would at least take a swing. That's what DNAinfo has done.
At my perch at Columbia Journalism School, where I've been teaching for 17 years, I often get opportunities to work on new projects. But I liked sticking with what I know — teaching digital media and doing freelance tech reporting for TV on the side.
So when Joe Ricketts, TD Ameritrade's founder (whose family also owns the Chicago Cubs and Wrigley Field), met with me to discuss doing something about these changes in the media, I was skeptical. While I admired his life story and track record — using technology in Omaha (Omaha!) to shakeup the securities market to empower the consumer — I wasn't convinced his experiment could harness the upheaval in the news business.
But as we talked, it became clear that Joe's vision of digital, robust, for-profit, local news in a clear, concise format is new and important.
Joe made two key decisions early.
One, the site would be based in Manhattan. Sure, it's the media capital of the world, but it's not the startup capital of the world. And also, despite the heavy media presence here, Manhattan's neighborhoods remain surprisingly under-covered.
Second, Joe decided to put real money into hiring a strong team of professional journalists and technologists. Many media startups these days have only a handful of journalists on staff; the rest of the work is done by citizen journalists and others.
Traditional news outlets are cutting back on their local coverage, and staff their online departments with people who often aren't journalists. Every community needs a thriving press to inform the public and holds institutions accountable — whether in print, on TV or online. DNAinfo looks to fill that role on the Web.
Take a look at the members of the editorial team, led by Managing Editor Leela de Kretser (who came over from startup aggregator Newser and worked for the Post before that) to see the range of experience and skills that they bring to the table.
It might seem like a strange time to go into the media business. But the current atmosphere of great uncertainty is just the right time to experiment with new methods of storytelling, delivery, and revenue models. It isn't “news” that is in trouble — it’s the business model.
The fact is that journalism needs a whole bunch of experiments, at all kinds of levels, in order to prepare for its next phase.
If anyone tells you they know which models will work, they're obfuscating. Scratch that — in keeping with DNAinfo's promise of giving you clear, concise information, let me reword it: they are lying.
Since the site's launch, I've been mostly writing these columns (see list here), learning a lot about the next-generation of news and watching with admiration from afar as the team covers the news, day in and day out. What I teach my Columbia students is at a whole different level now.
Already, we've had a terrific response to our site. Within a week of launching, New York magazine listed us in its "Approval Matrix" (in the correct quadrant — "high brow" and "brilliant." Our goal is to stay there).
Most heartening: a lot of smart journalists with skills that would make them highly employable even in this climate have chosen to work at DNAinfo (and resumes continue to pile up in Leela's inbox).
Your continued attention and feedback are going to determine if DNAinfo succeeds. I decided a year ago, that I couldn't afford to sit on the sidelines — and I hope you won't either.
Let's take those swings together.
Every Monday, DNAinfo contributing editor Sree Sreenivasan shares his observations about the changing media landscape.
