Welcome to “Greensboro - The Blogging Greenhouse,” a look at the history of the News & Record blogs. Yes, history. Because in this medium, everything moves pretty fast. As Ferris Bueller said, “If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it!” The Greensboro News & Record began blogging in August of 2004. There were actually two staff members blogging already, but editor John Robinson joined their ranks with his first post, and declared that blogging at the newspaper would now be a priority.

The whole thing started - according to an interview with Poynter’s Bill Mitchell - when Robinson and managing editor Ann Morris asked city editor Mark Sutter to investigate readership initiatives - ways to keep old readers and attract new ones. He came back with a report that called for the creation of a “Town Square,” a “trusted place where people gather to read, write, report the news, debate issues of the day, get shopping information and, generally, engage in civic discourse.”

The newspaper staff decided the best way to do that was through the internet, and so Lex Alexander was commissioned to research possible methods of creating an online community of readers. He began by asking the readers of his blog what they thought the newspaper should do. And he received several responses. A full account can be found on the Lex Files in January 2005. His full report can also be found online and can be downloaded in word document form.