RIP Rocky Mountain Independent

The Independent, the second attempt by former Rocky Mountain News staffers to start an online news operation, will stop posting new/updated content on Monday. Not enough revenue.

http://denver.bizjournals.com/denver/stories/2009/09/28/daily78.html

The INDenver Times continues, for now.

 

These operations are hard in major metros with a large daily and several weeklies. What was the big draw besides former Rocky staffers working for this? I'm not trying to be a smart-ass about it, since a Web operation has to fill a vacuum to have success, in my opinion.

Looking at the front page of the site, there commenting on national and international stories, instead of aiming for Denver news. Not many people, except for the NPR and PBS contributor set, would give money for that.

 

And the Post lives on, although in its defense it has thickened up a bit in the absence of the RMN. But Stitch is right. It's quite hard to make a go of things in a market where there are plenty of options.

On an unrelated note, Insidetherockies.com (a site run by former RMN writers like Tracy Ringolsby and Jack Etkin) still is around and active. At least we still have a piece of the Rocky in this way.

 

ESPN Denver sounds like the next logical step

 

Only 200 people signed up for subscriptions. Ouch.

http://blogs.westword.com/latestword/2009/10/steve_foster_on_the_death_of_t.php