ATLANTA — It’s safe to say this doesn’t seem like the best time to start a news outlet, given the recession and the struggles of the media industry.
But the creators of the Mother Nature Network are betting that another trend will eclipse even the worst economic forecast: the green boom.
They’ve launched an advertising-supported Web site, mnn.com, that aims to be a dependable source of environmental news written for the average reader — a sort of WebMD for green topics.
The Atlanta-based site, which launched this month, is off to a quick start. Joel Babbit, a veteran marketing executive who is the company’s president, raised much of the $10 million for the venture in a 24-hour spree last year. He and his partners helped pitch in the rest.
So far the company has hired 17 full-time staffers — many of them castoffs of CNN and belt-tightening media companies — and is assembling a vast network of college bloggers. The goal is to create the most visited green-themed destination on the Internet, beating out not only established commercial sites like TreeHugger.com but also online resources maintained by the Environmental Protection Agency.
Before starting the site, Babbit and his partners studied Web pages from government agencies and advocacy groups and concluded that most are either too biased, too shallow or too wonky.
The other sites “don’t seem to be doing what we thought they could do,” said one Mother Nature Network investor and contributor, Chuck Leavell, a Georgia tree farmer better known as a keyboardist for the Rolling Stones and, before that, The Allman Brothers Band. “I think there’s a gap as big as the Grand Canyon there that needs to be filled.”
Six months of development have yielded a crisp, colorful Web site. Mother Nature Network features eight broad channels — like “transportation” and “food” — each with its own blogger and a cadre of news stories. Among the articles are reports on the environmental ideas of Cabinet appointees, and features that delve into how to “green” your morning coffee with shade-grown blends that better preserve rain forests.
The Mother Nature Network, like other media sites, is breaking down complex stories using graphics and other multimedia. Much of the focus is on video.
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