WiserEarth Editors

As per Bowo's go ahead, below is a working copy (for your edits, comments, etc.) of an email to send to the WE editors group:

Greetings from the WE Editors Journalist Team:

We are now officially commencing the editorial process involved in publishing WE's first newsletter and invite WE Editors to participate in the discussion.

Ideas for initial stories include: (I have indicated possible reporters and we are soliciting volunteers and suggestions)

1. Interview with Paul Hawken and/or WE staff, about WiserEarth's development, origins, and direction (Kerry)
2. Spotlights on a few active groups or prominent members of WE that are not staff (Deborah?)
3. Tips on using WE (Iframe, research, communication, brainstorming, making friends, etc., upcoming  features(Bowo?)
4. article relating to the philosophy of WE; ie. merging of social and environmental responsibility, key issues in environmental and social justice news, nonprofit networking (Kerry)
5. a letters to the editor section
6. resources that have been found or posted on WE 
7. Diagram (or word clouds?) detailing important connections that have been made on WE, ala Muckety: http://news.muckety.com (Deborah)
   
8. Guest Column: Testimonials and/or success stories from editors / group admins / newcomers / active community members? (suggestion?)
9. Overview of email campaign: highlighting some of the responses.... (Camilla or Peggy write?)

We are aiming for an early April launch.

Join the discussion on story ideas, format and promotion  here.

Thanks for your input

Deborah and Kerry

hallo all~

I jumped in here, but @Angus and @bowo, I am also thinking about the thread over at Initial Newsletter (meaning the link to the discussion above ;) )

I am not a journalist, but I think newsletters are great for many reasons. And, if they are consistent, they make fantastic archive materials. So long as there is the easy opt out of receiving and visiting it at will on the site, I think that it could and will do lots. There is the issue of total email overkill, but newsletters are still useful and practical and engaging. Hoorah! for this!

So, would I be right in thinking that the newsletter would have consistent sections each month? I have some thoughts on the content outline posted, and here is my version of the sections:

1. "Front Page" (sorry for print terminology, but you know what I mean!)

for the launch newsletter the content above looks both awesome and fitting

2.Spotlight

To me, this can help for the now missing spotlight that used to sit on the index page. How is the spotlight picked?

3. Tips and Tools

Mandatory, I think.

4. WE philosophy in action - which is also somewhat what was listed in Guest Column description. I think I would really like to see the guest column be a freer guest column. So long as its topic was WE, I think this would be lovely to leave open. WE is very diverse.

5. Letters to Editor - (would love to know how many letters WE editors get!) Are there any letters around already...sorry I am asking for links instead of looking....) Could this Letters from the editors? Meaning, If there is a section to the editors, could the responses not only address any issues but take a chance to talk about the way WE is running from this angle?

[6]. ??As a librarian I understand and like this content, but I would house it in an existing section so that its contextualization is apparent. That way it is a resource for someone, for groups, and not just a resource. How would it be picked?

6. Diagram

Yes! I love this. Resources fits here too.

7. Guest Column - annotation in #4.

8. IT - I would imagine that a section like this is broad enough to satisfy all the info people out there (like me!). It could have everything from campaign updates like the email campaign to system stats, technical problems to updates that are in queue, new widgets, semiotics etc.

thanks for listening to me thinking...

~h

Thanks for thinking it out h.

Like the "consistent sections across issues" idea, and expand-section-as-needed approach.

As for your question regarding how 'Spotlight' content (Today's....) in the homepage was chosen, there really was no methodology. One day it can be based on a group that was recently active, another day it can be based on an upcoming major event (e.g. world social forum), or it can be a request from our friends (e.g. 350.org's campaign), or it can simply be based on an excellent resource / organization / area of focus that people should be aware of. A general rule is that, all featured content should center around one theme each time. Featured people on the other hand is a selection of members with complete profile (real photo, about section filled out), and either was active recently, is doing interesting work, have many people and things in their network, comes from outside of US/Canada, etc.

Btw, I was in charge of picking out and updating these for the past 5 months or so. But as you can see, we're doing some revisions/experiments with the homepage, so whether this will make it to the 'final' version or not depends on feedback, stats and design consideration.

As starters for the "Letters to Editors" section, perhaps we can feature some responses from the email campaign/blast (as Deborah is suggesting in the wiki's comment section), and publicize the editors(AT)wiserearth(DOT)org address in the first newsletter issue so members can get in touch with editors. If any editor do receive letter in their personal inbox and the sender is ok with it being publicized, then we can use that too.

My 2 cents for the moment.