Bob Collins
I was pretty sure when I started NewsCut, if I could get four years out of it, that would be beyond my wildest dreams and close enough to retirement that I could scrounge my way to the finish line.
But the pain in my stomach that dogged me the weekend before the first post told me that there was no way it could survive long at MPR News, where that first idea for another blog years earlier, when I was managing editor of our website, lasted four days before the boss, citing a letter he received calling it “juvenile and sophomoric”, pulled the plug. Back then, trolls sent actual letters.
The blog? Citizen Spin.
In a bucket of great ideas — some of which worked, some didn’t — Citizen Spin remains my favorite. It would’ve been a huge hit if we hadn’t been so fearful of failure in the early days of the internet here.
A later boss took a big risk when he created NewsCut.
There’s not much MPRish about NewsCut to the public radio purists who demand something more stately, sober, and academic as befits the dignity of the institution. A little less “public” even, wouldn’t be a bad idea, some of them argue. Admittedly, there are days I tend to agree.
But it’s also important in this business to try new things to not only tell the news but also help people process it, even if it risks failure and the wrath of the purists.
News blogs come and most every news blog in the Twin Cities eventually goes. This is the last of them.
Today, it turns 10 years old.
Posting will be light today as I’m en route to Minnesota. Talk amongst yourselves in the comments section.
