ChicagoNow Celebrates Its First Birthday

One year ago today, we flipped the switch and held our breath. Would it work?

The answer is a resounding yes.

At launch, ChicagoNow was home to 70 fantastic blogs. Our goal, as we wrote in our staff post, was to create an authentic, online town square. A place where Chicagoans could talk about the real Chicago.

This video highlights our launch week:

One year later, more than 300 local bloggers call ChicagoNow home. Every day, the bloggers collectively post more than 150 entries to the network. Our users respond with hundreds of comments, retweets and Facebooks posts. And on Saturday morning, our bloggers take to the airwaves on WGN 720's ChicagoNow Radio.

We've also partnered with several media companies, including N'Digo, Today's Chicago Woman, The Chicago Reporter and Crains Chicago Business. Both Columbia College and DePaul University's journalism students also contribute to the site.

And our site's success has not gone unnoticed. In May, Mashable.com and The Poynter Institute named ChicagoNow one of "Five Innovative Sites That Could Reshape The News." ChicagoNow has also inspired several other sites, including the recently launched TBD.com in Washington, D.C.

Here's a few photos from the past year:

We can't say it enough. Thank you.

Thank you to our users, our media partners, our colleagues at Chicago Tribune Media Group, and--most importantly--to our bloggers.

Our site would not be the success that it is without all of your support and hard work.

Here's to another tremendous year!

ChicagoNow tweetup — Pictured, Todd Allen of Division and Rush. Photo courtesy of John Morrison.

ChicagoNow's smartest bloggers — Named as such after a trivia contest held by Chicago Hearts Trivia. Photo courtesy of Chicago Hearts Trivia.

Candace visits DePaul University's journalism students — Pictured, Candace Jordan of Candid Candace with students of ChicagoNow Editorial Director, Tracy Schmidt.

ChicagoNow Radio — Pictured, WGN Program Director Kevin Methany and Garrard McClendon.

ChicagoNow Radio's first show — Pictured, Mare Swallow of Etiquette Bitch and ChicagoNow Radio Host Bill Leff.

ChicagoNow does kareoke — Pictured, ChicagoNow Community Manager Fernando Diaz, ChicagoNow Social Media Director Mu Saleem, and RedEye Web Editor Steph Yiu.

CTA Tattler Pub Crawl — Pictured, ChicagoNow Radio host Amy Guth, Kevin O'Neil of CTA Tattler, and ChicagoNow Blog Scout Bill Adee.

Blogaplooza — Pictured, Jen Weigel of I'm Spiritual, Damnit.

Blogapalooza — Pictured, Stephen Markley of Off The Markley.

Blogapalooza, held at 900 North Michigan Ave., showcased our bloggers. — PIctured, Candace Jordan of Candid Candace.

Filed under: ChicagoNow News

Tags: @globalfooter

Comments

ClarkBender said August 12, 2010 at 12:00 am

Thanks to all our great bloggers and readers for helping ChicagoNow reach our "official" first anniversary! It sure has gone by quickly!

silkysoul said August 12, 2010 at 12:00 am

Congrats to Chicagonow! Just the fact that readers can affect the experience of people in Chicago by direct interaction with your staff (from the "twitter movie reviews", to "blah, blah bloggers", to a story of the couple traveling the USA through website suggestions who had a ball in Chicago due to the kindness of your staff), this experiment is definitely a hit!

FernandoDiaz said August 12, 2010 at 12:00 am

I miss the crap out of everyone at ChicagoNow and love the fact that all I have to do is dial back into RSS or cruise the site for the latest and greatest. Happy Birthday to you!!! Happy Birthday to you!!! And many more!!!!!!!

alexquigley said August 12, 2010 at 12:00 am

Who's the jerk on the right in Picture #35?

nixhexison said August 13, 2010 at 12:00 am

Rock and/or roll.

JohnSchmidt said August 13, 2010 at 12:00 am

One year old! New finger!
--JRS