Newser is an American
news aggregation website. It was founded in 2007 by journalist/media pundit
Michael Wolff and businessman
Patrick Spain
Patrick J. Spain (born 1952) is a serial entrepreneur. He is currently the co-founder and CEO of First Stop Health, LLC., a Chicago-based provider of telemedicine services. He is also the Executive Chairman and co-founder of the news curation sit ...
, the former CEO of HighBeam Research and Hoover's.
Newser's president and editor-in-chief is Kate Seamons, formerly of the ''Chicago Sun-Times'', who joined the site in 2007 as managing editor. She was promoted when founding editor-in-chief Caroline Miller left the organization at the end of August 2010; Seamons became president in December 2012.
History
Newser launched in October 2007 at a party at New York's Waverly Inn and was lauded as "
Drudge-like" and "innovative."
Newser's tagline, “Read Less, Know More” embodies the idea behind the site's creation. The website utilizes human-powered aggregation; its staff of editors and writers curate approximately 45 stories each day and present them in a two paragraph, multiple source format.
In February 2009, ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' threatened legal action against Newser for trademark infringement and posting a photograph without permission. Newser removed the photograph in question, calling its publication an editor's mistake.
In June 2009, Newser received $2.5 million in first-round funding, mainly from a collection of individual investors.
In April 2010,
The Wrap
''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the ...
's Sharon Waxman accused Newser of not providing sufficient links or credit to original sources.
Michael Wolff was named editorial director of
AdweekMedia on October 4, 2010, a position he held for a year. Patrick Spain stepped down as CEO on October 18, 2010 but returned to the role in March 2012 following Newser CEO
Elisabeth DeMarse’s move to TheStreet.
In 2011, Newser was in talks to purchase and merge with
Salon.com, but the deal ultimately fell through.
Newser was hoaxed by
Triumph the Insult Comic Dog
Triumph the Insult Comic Dog is a puppet character created, puppeteered and voiced by Robert Smigel. As his name indicates, Triumph's comedic style is almost exclusively insult comedy. A Montenegrin Mountain Hound, Triumph often puffs a cigar, ...
during the
2016 presidential election. Newser was featured as a site that published a story about fake "
Trump
Trump most commonly refers to:
* Donald Trump (born 1946), 45th president of the United States (2017–2021)
* Trump (card games), any playing card given an ad-hoc high rank
Trump may also refer to:
Businesses and organizations
* Donald J. T ...
TV" auditions.
Features
User interaction is handled by several third-party
widgets including
ShareThis
ShareThis is a technology company headquartered in Palo Alto, CA, with offices in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. It offers free website tools and plugins for online content creators. ShareThis collects data on user behavior, and provides thi ...
,
AddThis
AddThis is a free social bookmarking service that can be integrated into a website with the use of a web widget. Once the widget is added, visitors to the website can bookmark or share an item using a variety of services, such as Facebook, MySpa ...
, and the
Disqus commenting widget.
"Newser by Users" was a feature from 2010 to 2012, which allowed users to write and upload stories directly to the Newser website without editorial review.
"Off The Grid" was an occasional Newser blog by founder Michael Wolff that was written between 2008 and 2010.
References
External links
*{{Official website, http://www.newser.com
American news websites
Internet properties established in 2007