Secrets of the City

This isn’t a me thing. It’s all about you. And while I will, regardless, do the job of scouring the World Wide Web for interesting stories, we really need more voices here, not just in comments, but in posts. For most of you, your comments are just secondary reactions, once you’ve seen the post. But I want to feel you at the source. I want to see you fill this page with what you find interesting, local, relevant — not just on open threads. Open. You see it. Something stirs. You share. We discuss. Open.

Hell, most of you are already doing the work. Time to share.

Emily Says So offered a great roundup last Thursday (and I’m not just saying that because she mentioned MNSpeak).

Is That All You’ve Got? has been offering great health care roundups (which I’m trying to lure here).

Lazy Lightning, now a regular stop, today offers a look at City Council wages — good MNSpeak fodder for conversation.

And Killing Batteries is offering all kinds of advice on how to deal with detainment and bribery (or even arrest) while traveling.

I’m thinking any one of these could have made a great MNSpeak post… kind of.

In these trying times, when page views can mean the life or death of a publication, many online newspapers are resorting to disruptive practices to increase numbers without considering the overall user experience. However, according to Ed Kohler — better know as (and for) The Deets — “they may also be driving away some of their most loyal readers as they become fed up with jumping through more and more hoops with no additional benefits.” (Kohler echoes Marco Arment’s Nov. 8 post about paginated articles.)

How do you feel about having to open multiple pages in order to read a full story? Certainly, one of the benefits of online news is the ease with which stories can include referential links to relevant news and/or back stories. But is this being abused when the so-called links are simply a continuation of the story, necessary for a clean read?

Let’s be fair, though, if we’re going to dis this practice, then what’s the solution to secure the publications’ survival. And let’s be honest, haven’t newspapers been taking these kinds of measures, in one form or another, since their inception? Let’s talk supplements, supplements, supplements. Let’s talk page jumps. Weren’t we just as annoyed having to flip through page after page to continue reading?

But more importantly (in that kind of ego-centric way to which we’ve all grown accustomed), what does this say about MNSpeak? The links certainly don’t gain us any page views, so the intention is good, but the format is certainly based on having to go to multiple pages to get a full story. Is this too disruptive? Or is this beautifully exploiting the power of the web?

With the recent updates to Secrets of the City, including MNSpeak’s reclaimed front and center position, we’ve been planning on expanding both the breadth of topics covered and the number of voices contributing to MNSpeak’s posts and comments.  So now seems to be the time to transition our editorial leadership from Max Sparber to Cristina Cordova.  Max has been the man for more than two years now and has brought humor, journalistic chops, arts sensibilities, and all-’round coolness to the position.  We expect no less from Cristina, and welcome her back from a sort of hiatus since her earlier stint editing The Rake and Secrets of the City. To MNSpeakers: Please continue to check out Max’s stuff at his blog, Sailor Martin and MinnPost’s Daily Glean.  On this site, expect to see some resurrected MNSpeak features like 7 Quick Questions and the local blog aggregator, plus regular posts by new contributors who know their stuff in areas we’ve traditionally under-covered (sports, music, out-state news, etc).  To everyone else: please submit a post, keep the comments coming, or just lurk around.

Is something a little different about MnSpeak today?

Well, we thought 24 hours was enough public beta testing, so we launched the new site.  Most stuff seems to be working, except for the stuff that isn’t.  Let us know what you think because we’ll be tweaking quite a bit for the rest of the week.  Some things to look forward to this month: The return of 7 Quick Questions and the Local Blog Aggregator.  The happy hour database should be completely filled in over the next few days. Note: Archives from the Rake can now be found at archives.secretsofthecity.com.

Brian Lambert reports, and Tom Bartel confirms that he’s no longer able to pay the bloggers of Secret of the City. Max + Today’s Talk continues, Brit Robson keeps the T-wolves blog for the rest of the season, Dude Weather also keeps rolling. So what of the other blogs do you want to see continue? And how/where should they live? Does this tell us anything about the sustainability of a get-paid-to-blog model locally?

This was pretty much bound to happen sooner or later.

Two people who founded MNSpeak/Secrets of the City/Talk were the subject of articles recently. This one, from the New York Observer, asks Rex Sorgatz the tantalizing question: “As a straight man, how can you justify hosting a Gossip Girl viewing party?” This MinnPost post provides an update on Chuck Olsen of “UpChuck” fame, on his newly revamped MN Stories project.  [Update: Gawker really doesn't think very highly of Rex.  In the last two days, they've had two posts about him, one titled the Last Hurrah of Microcelebrity.]