What are the origins of the CyberIndee?
Six Winona State students founded a newspaper in 1994 after a university vice president censored an article in a journalism lab newspaper. The new paper was produced outside unversity auspices. To denote their defiance of the censorship, the students chose to call their paper the Independent. The Indee, as it was popularly known, switched to digital delivery in 1996. |
Why the name CyberIndee?
When the Independent switched to digital delivery in 1996, the lexicon of the time was to apply the prefix "cyber" to anything web-connected. The name CyberIndee seemed right. It's stuck, although most readers still call us the Indee. |
Some Winona Sate masscom faculty grind their molars at a mention of the CyberIndee. Why?
This is unfortunate. It goes back to the 1994 censorship when some faculty took wrong positions of fundamental issues of student academic freedom and free expression. Their embarrassment lingers. If the grinding seems bad now, you should have been here then. The good news is that there is less gnashing as time goes on. |
Who are the people behind the CyberIndee?
The corporate founders of the Independent were Winona State masscom students Kurt Grunert, Jason Hombach, Alex Lloyd, Jonathan Maze, Elisa McGuire and Dan Spano. These were a remarkable group. The Society for Collegiate Journalists named Spano its national journalist of the year for his role in the Independent. Journalism prof John Vivian served as the group's business manager.
As founders graduated, their places were taken by additional investors. These included Kim Pawlak, then Jodi Benson. Benson engineered the transition from the ink-on-paper Independent to the web-based CyberIndee. Matt Delvecchio later resdesigned the site. As student came and went, Vivian became the thread of continuity. he has guided the project through business-model and conceptual revisions necessitated by changing circumstances. He now serves as editor.
CyberIndee people also included hundreds of students, typically 80 to 90 a year, whose work has been posted on the site. |
I don't like the irreverent, flippant, smart-ass tone of the CyberIndee?
May we suggest you find your happiness as a reader elsewhere. There's lots of dull reading around. |
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Where is the CyberIndee?
We exist only in the ether land of virtual reality. You can talk with us at editor@indee.info |
What is the relationship of CyberIndee and Winona State University?
None. We see ourselves as performing an important service to our readers by covering Winona campuses, but the CyberIndee, in its independent tradition, is not a university mouthpiece. We do provide an important service to student journalists as an outlet for their work. We also see ourselves as a forum for our readers on campus issues. |
Do university administrators like the CyberIndee?
We don't hear much from them. Because so many wonderful things are going on at Winona campuses, we assume they like most of our coverage. When we report inconvenient truths or institutional shortcomings, administrators probably wish we hadn't. But they're big boys and girls who recognize the historic watchdog role of the news media in a free, open and democratic society. Whether administrators like us or not, our job is to seek truth so we can tell truth -- not please the people who run the Winona campuses. They do their job. We do ours. |
Is the CyberIndee political?
Yes, in the sense that we cover politics. The development of wise public policy that affects campus people comes through the dialogue inherent in the political process. You will find us neutral in our news coverage and detached from partisanship. From time to time you will find clearly labeled commentaries in which the site's management takes positions. |
What do reporters do? What do photographers do? What do editors do?
Reporters gather news. Photographers shoot news. Editors package news. Some people think, wrongly, that reporters determine how stories are played and even that reporters write headlines. Not so. The same with visuals. Editors, not photographers, are responsuble for final presentation and captioning. The complexities of producing a newspaper, a news site or a newscast involve many specialized tasks. |
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How can I support the CyberIndee?
Money would be nice, but we don't work that way. No ads. No solicitations. If you would like to support our journalism, we suggest a check to the Adolph Bremer journalism scholarship fund. The scholarship is administered by the WSU Foundation. Bremer scholarships go to students for excellence in journalism. |
Who writes CyberIndee commentaries?
We invite readers to submit opinion pieces. These are posted, generally with the author identified. Editing is light, mostly to comport with Associated Press style and a recommended 300-word limit.
Our editorials, which are unsigned, are the contribution of the site's management to dialogue on campus issues. |
How heavily are contributors' news stories edited for the CyberIndee?
Stories are micro-edited to comport with grammar and style conventions. Because student contributors peddle their work anywhere and everywhere they can to build a portfolio, we recast almost all contributions into a distinctive presentation for readers. We do the same with publicity releases, also to maintain the CyberIndee as a distinctive read. Reporters receive a credit line for their news-gathering, but it would be a mistake to assume the presentation is unedited.
Also, editing sometimes involves adding context and perspective that an individual reporter may have missed from an isolated perspective. Our editing pratices are in the vein of editor-driven news packages. We're more in the spirit of, say, Time magazine than of the Winona Post. |
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How do professional journalists regard the CyberIndee?
Because we're focused on the campuses, we often are first with important stories. Every newsroom manager in Winona monitors us daily for story ideas. We, of course, monitor them too.
Student contributors list their CyberIndee work on resumes in seeking internships and jobs. Many of our contributors over the years now are well into successful media careers. |
Who reads the CyberIndee?
We don't pull the cookie trick on our readers so we have only a general idea. From correspondence we know we're a must-read in important circles. Winona State student senators check us daily. So do several City Council members. Newsroom people on the campuses and off are regulars. In many campus offices we're an 8 a.m. fixture to start the day.
In our early days we had a counter that recorded hits. Most days the range was 550 to 700. In 1998 we dropped the counter. It wasn't worth the bother. Our goal is not to lure advertisers with numbers. We are here as an information service and a forum whether we have a handful of readers or zillions. |
Why so many typos?
Too many thumbs. Gremlins too. We ask readers to alert us to typos, which will be fixed promptly. Our address |
Why does the CyberIndee use vulgarities in stories?
We don't do it gratuitously. You will find vulgarities in direct quotations when they are necessary to convey the essence of what is being said. Our policy is consistent with Associated Press style, which is dominant in U.S. newspapers. |
What is moose milk?
Early he-man miners in the Pacific Northwest hoisted a potent mix of rum, milk and eggs for festive breakfasts when they gathered to swap tales. Or so goes the legend. The potion apparently had origins north of the 49th Parallel.
Moose Milk Dairies is a Minnesota limited liability corporation in search of moose for domestication. Pending finding such creatures, the corporation's enterprises include the Winona campus news site CyberInde. |
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