When it rains, it pours, I guess. The second-biggest municipality in Orange County has recently been blessed with several new journalistic efforts talking nothing but Carrboro.
The Carrboro Commons is a project of a class at UNC's School of Journalism. It's not clear to me whether it will be sticking around now that the semester is over. They kicked out a few interesting pieces like a profile of Mike Nelson, a Carrboro High preview, and coverage of growth in Carrboro. I haven't seen the print edition but apparently there is one, published semesterly.
Publishing way way more than once a semester is the news blog The Mill on CarrboroCitizen.com, the new web site of veteran local journalist Kirk Ross. With his experience as a reporter for the Chapel Hill News and as managing editor of the Independent Weekly, Kirk knows both the history and the values of this community well. I look forward to him bringing the good work he has done covering state politics at Exile on Jones Street to Carrboro. In addition to local news, he's also got great coverage of the arts and all kinds of stuff.
And this summer also saw the founding of The Carrboro News, a satirical site about real issues. They had a field day with the Carr Mill dancing ban, but they don't seem to have published any new content since October.
I can't think of any publications similarly dedicated to only covering what happens inside Chapel Hill city limits. Or Hillsborough for that matter...
Issues:
Comments
Hey Orange: thanks for the
Hey Orange: thanks for the shout-out for the Carrboro Commons, indeed an organic effort of my Community Journalism class at UNC that posted its first edition online on Dec. 4. And YES, we DID crank out 5,000 copies of a print version (find it around town at obvious spots) -- thanks to the generosity of retired Hoke County publisher and new Carrboroite Robert Dickson, who saw the rightness of helpng a bunch of kids trying to make community journalism real. In January the Carrboro Commons Web-based version goes bi-weekly, and with any luck, there will be another print version. For a journalism "perfesser," this is as good as it gets!
yr hmble svt
Jock Lauterer
adviser, the Carrboro Commons
Thanks from here as
Thanks from here as well.
Still in build mode as I crank up the journalism thing. The aggregator part of the site is turning out to be fun (for me at least) with a lot of RSS from other locals including the wonderful OP. There's a Technorati Carrboro feed that has proved particularly interesting. Gearing up for regular operations on the 1st of the year.
kmr
This is great stuff - thanks
This is great stuff - thanks for doing this.
I am working with Jock on
I am working with Jock on creating a companion print edition of the Carrboro Commons. Students in my Advanced Editing class will edit the stories, write headlines and captions, and lay out the pages. This version will most likely be available as a .pdf at the Commons site.