Written by Jonathan Walker
Farewell then The Stirrer, an independent news website which is closing after four years.
The Stirrer covered Birmingham and the Black Country, reporting mainly on politics.
It's been a huge success in generating original stories, becoming required reading among the West Midlands' political and media classes and developing a loyal community, which hangs out at the site's active forum.
Editor Adrian Goldberg was less successful in achieving what I understand was his original aim, which was to earn a living from the site and, eventually, to employ others.
Adrian was a journalist working for the BBC before he left to launch The Stirrer. He's now quitting the site to head back to the BBC as a Radio Five Live presenter.
Partner in crime Andy Goff - known to The Stirrer community as "webmaster" - is apparently standing down at the same time.
Adrian was a pioneer in setting up an independent local niche news site.
The site failed to follow conventional wisdom in many respects, calling itself a web site rather than a web log or blog, and providing readers with a forum rather than a comment facility.
But the forum was a great success, allowing readers to break stories - which Adrian could then promote to the front page - rather than simply responding to stories published by the site's official writers.
It is currently being used by members of The Stirrer's community who want to create some sort of replacement for the site once Adrian and Andy Goff quit.
Again, I am not sure a site which simply allowed reader comments on stories could ever create a community with this level of cohesion and loyalty (although forums do have downsides, such as a high barrier to entry - you need to register - and a tendency to be unfriendly to newcomers).
One thing the end of The Stirrer does demonstrate is that getting to grips with internet publishing or "social media", finding and exploiting a niche, building a community and being entrepreneurial doesn't in itself answer a question most journalists need to face at some point, which is how to pay the mortgage.
4 days ago