ChicagoNow was a
blogging site managed by
Tribune Publishing
Tribune Publishing Company (briefly Tronc, Inc.) is an American newspaper print and online media publishing company. The company, which was acquired by Alden Global Capital in May 2021, has a portfolio that includes the ''Chicago Tribune'', the ...
, owner of the print ''
Chicago Tribune'' newspaper. It featured a network of blogs of international, national, and local interest on a variety of topics ranging from crime to public schools to politics and diplomacy.
Notable ChicagoNow contributors included the staff of the ''
Chicago Reporter
''The Chicago Reporter'' is a monthly periodical based in Chicago, Illinois, USA. Founded in 1972, it covers poverty and race issues. It was founded by John A. McDermott, who sought to create "the nation's first publication devoted to analyzing an ...
'', and
Shimer College president
Susan Henking
Susan E. Henking (born 1955) is an American religious studies scholar. She was the 14th and final president of Shimer College in Chicago, appointed in July 2012 and finishing in 2017. She then served in interim roles at Salem Academy and College ...
.
On August 18th, 2022, the site was shut down with no announcement.
History
ChicagoNow was launched in August 2009.
Its launch coincided with the Tribune company's bankruptcy.
As a newspaper-run blogging community, with the initial tagline "a blog by and for locals", it represented what one observer called "a new value proposition for newspapers".
ChicagoNow utilized
Movable Type as its blogging platform when it first launched but switched to
WordPress in 2011.
The website of the ''Tribune'' daily ''
RedEye
Red eye, red-eye, redeye or variants may refer to:
Related to the eye
* Red-eye effect, in photographs
* Red eye (medicine), an eye that appears red due to illness or injury
* Red, an extremely rare eye color due to albinism
* Red eyeshine i ...
'', which later moved to its own domain, was initially hosted on ChicagoNow.
After the acquisition of the Tribune by Alden Global Capital ChicagoNow was shut down without warning on August 18, 2022.
Reception
In April 2010, the World Editors Forum described ChicagoNow as a "hyperlocal blog network" that has "a personal quality that many larger newspapers lack."
In September 2010, ''
Time Out Chicago'' criticized ChicagoNow for hosting an unidentified police officer in what they called "a hate-filled, racist rant by blogger Joe the Cop, entitled The ghetto shooting template, for three days and counting now." ChicagoNow removed the posts in question, stating that while they don't edit posts, they reserve the right to remove them.
References
External links
*
Tribune Media Group's ChicagoNow 2009 introduction
American blogs
Tribune Publishing
Internet properties established in 2009
Internet properties disestablished in 2022
2009 establishments in Illinois
{{Chicago-stub