LocalHealthGuide selected to join Seattle Times’ new media project

LocalHealthGuide was chosen to become the fifth local news Web site to join a Seattle Times‘ pilot program to explore how local Web-based news sites and traditional media outlets can collaborate to improve community coverage.

LocalHealthGuide will remain an independent health-news and information Web site but will work with the Seattle Times and other project partners to explore how such a network might broaden and deepen health coverage for communities in Seattle and the Puget Sound region.

The  Seattle Times program is part of a multi-city Networked Journalism project overseen by Institute for Interactive Journalism at American University in Washington, D.C. with funding from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.

Over the past several years, more than 2,500 local and community news Websites have gone online nationwide. The new project seeks to help traditional news organizations and these new media outlets to work together to find ways to work together to enhance community coverage as well as develop new revenue strategies needed to support high-quality journalism.

At the end of the year-long project, the Institute for Interactive Journalism’s J-Lab (Journalism Laboratory) will prepare a report summarizing lessons learned.

The other project partners are:

• Tracy Record, who runs West Seattle Blog and White Center Now.
• Kate Bergman, who runs Next Door Media, which includes My Ballard, PhinneyWood, Queen Anne View, Magnolia Voice and Freemont Universe.
• Justin Carder, who runs Capitol Hill Seattle and helped create Neighborlogs, which is the platform for several neighborhood sites in Seattle.
• Amber Campbell, who runs the Rainier Valley Post.

Other papers that are participating in the project are:

• The Miami Herald
• The Charlotte Observer
• Ashville Citizen-Times
• TucsonCitizen.com

– Michael McCarthy, M.D., Editor

Tags: J-Lab, Knight Foundation, Networked Journalism, Seattle Times

Category: Editor's Blog