Put Down That (Staple) Gun
With the “neighborhood yard sale/missing cat” method of publicity, in November 2007 every telephone pole in a one mile radius of CD News world HQ was stapled with a poster inviting all to a new web site — www.CentralDistrictNews.com Then a mystery to most of us, now we’ve come to expect CD News to be everywhere, and if we hear a loud noise or observe an event that isn’t covered in CD News, we may wonder whether it actually happened.
CD News originators “CDGuy” (real name Matt) and “Scott” (real name Scott) are, by education and experience, in the field of internet application development, not journalism. Yet, their curiosity about their neighborhood and the desire to connect residents through local stories make CD News irresistibly readable. Seeing something new or interesting on the street, — butcher-paper in the window of a formerly vacant storefront, or a Land Use application sign — brothers Matt and Scott Durham will find out what the story is and then let the rest of us in on it.
Time and again CD News has been on the spot with notebook and camera to give immediate coverage of some of the neighborhood’s most wrenching incidents with more complete information than is provided by more established news sources.
Scott and Matt started the site as a “beta” for a software platform they are developing — as part of their “real” job. They didn’t expect CD News to be so popular. Or so time-consuming. They are having fun doing it,and as members of the community, they are rewarded by the new conversations and connections that are started.
Scott told SPCC Newsletter that it’s good to find that CD News is getting contributions from a range of residents of our diverse neighborhood. There are on-line conversations among people who may not be talking face to face. Yet, it would be good, he says, for the frequency of stories and comments from long-time residents to be greater.
The aim of CDNews is for even more neighbors to put their fingers to the keys and post stories, pictures, and comments. The more you use it the better it becomes. It may even entirely replace posters on telephone poles.