Virtual ribbons cut, launching 12 stations’ Argo blogs

Published in Current, Sept. 7, 2010
By Karen Everhart

The 12 topical blogs on pubradio websites backed through NPR’s Argo Project are announcing their launch this week, though some Argo bloggers have been at work since late July.

Seattle’s KPLU was among the first Argo stations to launch its blog — Humanosphere, covering global health and poverty issues (humanosphere.kplu.org), with Tom Paulson, a 22-year veteran of the downscaled, online-only Seattle Post-Intelligencer. “Tom was one of the first reporters in the country to cover global health and development, and we are fortunate to have him,” said Keith Seinfeld, KPLU assistant news director and Argo project manager.

Other Argo bloggers are well-versed in blogging and social media, says Joel Sucherman, Argo’s project director at NPR. Anna John, hired by Washington’s WAMU to cover cultural diversity and gentrification issues in the DCentric blog (dcentric.wamu.org), is a cofounder of Sepia Mutiny, a blog and cultural forum for second-generation South Asian immigrants.

Each Argo blog is based on a customized WordPress system built by the project team at NPR. Their home pages feature “sky boxes” of photos touting featured stories. Developers created a “right rail” of blurbs that are filtered to elevate the topics whose popularity is trending, Sucherman said.

Argo’s web developers have added only about one-third of the technical features they plan to build into the blogs, he said. In their next phase, techies will add more ways to interact with readers and engage them more fully. “We want to take full advantage of the audience, their knowledge and expertise."

The beauty of niche sites, such as Home Post (homepost.kpbs.org) covering military life for San Diego’s KPBS, is that the city is “filled with experts with great knowledge to contribute,” Sucherman said. “That’s where we’ll also see real power of these sites, when we tap the community and allow them to participate in a strong way.”

Links to all of the Argo blogs are posted at right.

Web page posted Sept. 8, 2010
Copyright 2010 by Current LLC

Argo’s dozen
‘vertical’ blogs

Climatide by Heather Goldstone
Oceans, coasts, and climate change on Cape Cod
WGBH, Boston

CommonHealth by Carey Goldberg and Rachel Zimmerman
Where reform meets reality
WBUR, Boston

DCentric by Anna John
The changing face of the District
WAMU, Washington, D.C.

Ecotrope by Cassandra Profita
 Covering the Northwest’s environment
Oregon Public Broadcasting

Empire by Azi Paybarah
 Everything you need to know about New York state politics and governance
WNYC, New York

Home Post by Jamie Reno
 The military in San Diego
KPBS, San Diego

Humanosphere by Tom Paulson
Charting global health and poverty
KPLU, Seattle

The Informant by Rina Palta and Ali Winston
 Cops, courts and communities in the Bay Area
KALW, San Francisco

The Key by Matthew Borlik
 Discover Philly’s best local music
WXPN, Philadelphia

Mindshift by Tina Barseghian
 How we will learn
KQED, San Francisco

Multi-American by Leslie Berestein Rojas
Immigration and Cultural Fusion in the new Southern California
Southern California Public Radio/KPCC, Pasadena

On Campus by Alex Friedrich
 Everything higher education in Minnesota
Minnesota Public Radio

EARLIER ARTICLES

Named for the ship sailed by Jason and the Argonauts, mythological Greek heroes who ultimately succeeded in a harrowing quest for the Golden Fleece, the Argo Project is NPR’s first major push to deepen public radio’s local newsgathering capacity on the Web. June 2009

CPB and the Knight Foundation provide $3 million in grants for Argo’s maiden voyage. 

LINKS

Coverage of Argo Project's public launch:

SF Weekly: “What makes NPR's Argo blogs different is that they're not just a collection of radio-style stories uploaded onto a website: They're a truly web-first approach to local news.”

PaidContent “NPR wants to show that with the right resources, stations can create beats of value to the community and in turn increase their own audience and value by using the internet as a platform for original content.”


 

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