{"id":18684,"date":"2017-08-02T08:59:27","date_gmt":"2017-08-02T14:59:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lastbestnews.com\/site\/?p=18684"},"modified":"2017-08-02T08:59:27","modified_gmt":"2017-08-02T14:59:27","slug":"great-falls-site-joins-independent-online-news-team","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/2017\/08\/great-falls-site-joins-independent-online-news-team\/","title":{"rendered":"Great Falls site joins independent online news team"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Martin<\/a>

Martin Kidston<\/p><\/div>\n

Montana Today added a third contributing news source to its team on Monday when we welcomed Jenn Rowell of The Electric in Great Falls to our daily e-news publication.<\/p>\n

Rowell, a former reporter with the Great Falls Tribune, was laid off by Gannet\u2014the paper\u2019s owner\u2014last October. As I did after leaving the Missoulian, she would spend her nights, perhaps sleeplessly, considering her next move, which led her to launch\u00a0The Electric<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The site went live earlier this year. You can read about her efforts here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

As many of you may know by now, Montana Today represents a unique collaboration between the state\u2019s independent news sources\u2014independent meaning we\u2019re not corporately owned, but rather we\u2019re funded by readers like you and our local sponsors.<\/p>\n

That collaboration began in January when Missoula Current asked Ed Kemmick at Last Best News in Billings to consider a mutual publication, believing it would help us reach new markets, gain new readers and access more content. You can sign up for Montana Today and Missoula Business Weekly\u00a0here<\/a>. You can also contribute to Missoula Current\u00a0here<\/a>\u00a0or to Last Best News here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Missoula Current has funded the effort over the past six months while Sherry Devlin, a longtime editor and reporter, has assumed the leading role as Montana Today\u2019s primary editor. Each morning, she curates the daily content from the Missoula Current and Last Best News for publication in Montana Today.<\/p>\n

Our first issue of Montana Today went out\u00a0Jan. 16. For us at the Missoula Current, it was a fine improvement over our old method of distributing our daily content, and the results proved our early assumptions correct. It also marked a new era in the evolution of Montana\u2019s independent news media.<\/p>\n

\"CapreAir_Variable\"<\/a><\/div><\/div>To me, it means we\u2019re coming together, we\u2019re organizing and we\u2019re growing stronger because of it. This benefits you, the readers who have made this all possible.<\/p>\n

While there are now three independent news sites operating in Montana, I believe that number will grow in time as credible reporters launch new sites\u2014reporters motivated by readers looking for something more, including local ownership, local news and local production.<\/p>\n

For smaller news organizations like the Missoula Current, which doesn\u2019t turn 2 until January, the collaboration between partners is not only a novel concept, it\u2019s somewhat essential in today\u2019s world of journalism.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s no way we alone could compete with the likes of the Missoulian, the Billings Gazette or the Tribune\u2014each being an established brand that enjoys a multimillion-dollar operating budget and a corporate safety net. But as a team spread across three of the state\u2019s largest cities, and with a growing list of readers looking for quality, change and locality, it\u2019s beginning to look possible.<\/p>\n

We have big plans at Missoula Current, and we have large ambitions for Montana Today. Because of that, we\u2019re excited to welcome The Electric into the mix. In our world, three is hardly a crowd.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Montana Today added a third contributing news source to its team on Monday when we welcomed Jenn Rowell of The Electric in Great Falls to our daily e-news publication. Rowell, a former reporter with the Great Falls Tribune, was laid off by Gannet\u2014the paper\u2019s owner\u2014last October. As I did after leaving the Missoulian, she would […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":97,"featured_media":18685,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3864],"tags":[6095,136,4045,5393,6094],"class_list":["post-18684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion","tag-jenn-rowell","tag-last-best-news","tag-missoula-current","tag-montana-today","tag-the-electric","prominence-category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18684","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/97"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18684"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18684\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18689,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18684\/revisions\/18689"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/montana-mint.com\/lastbestnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}