Web startup to offer foreign news as papers cut (AP)

[EV_Ares]

NEW YORK - As budget cuts force many U.S. newspapers to retrench on their foreign coverage, veteran journalist Charles Sennott saw virtually no chance of getting another assignment abroad.

So Sennott left The Boston Globe to start his own news organization, GlobalPost.com. It launches Monday with 65 journalists, including veterans of major news organizations such as CNN, The Washington Post, Time magazine and The Associated Press.

The free Web site, supported by ads, will offer regular dispatches for an American audience to supplement coverage from the AP, Reuters and other news organizations still covering the world. GlobalPost also will sell stories to papers to run in print or online.

"We cannot cover every plane crash or be there for every press conference," Sennott said. "What we can do is have a network of talented writers who live in the places they write and who deliver stories that are comparable to a metro newspaper's columnist, stories that connect the dots, that give you a sense of a place in a relatively short space."

At launch, Boston-based GlobalPost will span nearly 50 countries, including Brazil, Indonesia and other regions that Sennott believes are undercovered in American media. Reporters also will be concentrated in key emerging markets like China and India.

Link to article: http://tech.yahoo.com/news/ap/20090109/ap_on_hi_te/foreign_news_startup

[globalvillage]

1. That's great news.

I hope it's objective.

[FarCenter]

2. Not sure why you need a new site -- just read the foreign sites

Start with BBC, Guardian, Deutsche Welle, Der Spiegel, Al Jazeera, Daily Star, Haaretz, RIA Novosti, IRNA, Dawn, The Hindu, Asia Times, Peoples Daily, Daily Yomiuri.

The MSM of most countries has an English site. And you can easily get a variety of perspectives that are lacking in the US MSM (and especially lacking in the cable channels).