Dear Readers,
The beginning of the new year is a time for change, reflections, and an almost mythological moment for potential change.
Ten years ago today the people who started The Reporter were scrambling like madmen to figure out what an online edition of a newspaper would look like. They were not 100 percent sure they should actually do it, but they had resolved to try it and on Jan. 2, 2014, they put out their first electronic edition.
Want to see how far we’ve come? Ok, here’s a link to that first one: tinyurl.com/Reporter-2014-01-02.
You will note that it was heavy on sports. In fact, it was all sports with the exception on one obituary and two short pieces on this new digital newspaper and how to get you some of that sweet pixel-news goodness.
Make no mistake about it. A digital newspaper laid out with the same design standards of a print one was a rather revolutionary idea for this area.
There were like 200,000 variations of The Reporter in the first few print years.
The Hamilton North Reporter. The Sheridan something-something. The Noblesville Reporter.
Sometimes it was free. Sometimes it cost 50 cents. Sometimes it apparently cost one-half a cent.
But lo, on the second day of the first month of the 2014th year of our Lord … Don Jellison, along with a son named Jeff and a sports editor like unto another son named Richie Hall, brought forth unto our county a new paperless newspaper, filled with stories of the people, submitted by the people, and edited for the people.
It was a paper conceived in liberty from the oppression of corporate agendas. Free from disconnected owners longing for the bygone era of overstuffed newsrooms filled with indentured servants toiling away for the greater glory of ink on tree bark.
No! This was a new era! A new news media! A light in a world of darkened devices, giving them reasons to power up and brighten readers’ lives before the rise of the morning sun.
In the beginning there were pixels. And the pixels were random and without form. And the Publisher said unto the pixels: Let there be news! And there was news – again, mostly about sports – and it was good.
“Hmmm,” mused the Publisher, “this is pretty good.”
Thus was born The Hamilton County Reporter.
The day that first edition hit emails across the county, the skies opened up bringing snow and 30 mph winds to drift shut roads and cancel plans. The little sportspaper everyone planned on evolved into a real NEWSpaper.
Evolution is often change as a way to adapt to outside forces.
Canceling all the sports events in a winter storm helped start The Reporter on the path to grow into what it is today: the largest legally defined newspaper in Hamilton County both in terms of content and number of subscribers.
Some of the leaps forward tended to happen at the beginning of new years.
January 1, 2017, former publisher Jeff Jellison brought on the media consultants from 4th Hawk Consulting to help with public notices and page design.
January 1, 2022, those consultants gathered a few friends and bought The Reporter from Jellison as he prepared to run for the office of coroner.
Those of you who have read this paper over the years know that one of the changes you saw in the last two years was in the sheer amount of news being covered. One reader told us he was a little frustrated that he used to be able to sit down with a cup of coffee and read the morning edition, but now he has to make two cups. Sorry about that. Or not. Either way, thanks for noticing.
People now compare us to the good old Ledger. Sometimes they tell us how much more they enjoy us than the Star.
Thanks for both of those compliments, but all we do is give you accurate, balanced, local news. And while we can’t predict evolution, we’re at least as curious as you are to see what this year brings.
Happy reading.
Sincerely,
The Reporter
P.S. Don’t forget to make extra coffee.