Markets

Startup Breaking Tweets is "Hyperlocal Gone Global"

By David Weir

Updated on: June 25, 2009 / 1:16 PM EDT / MoneyWatch

One good thing about Twitter's spare U.I., limited functionality, and chaotic stream of content is that it creates a great opportunity for entrepreneurs to step into the vacuum. One example is Breaking Tweets, which was launched earlier this year by Craig Kanalley, a graduate student at DePaul University in Chicago, online editor of DePaulia, the student newspaper, and a freelance writer/blogger.
The site's main goals are "to help people enhance their worldview or perspective of global events;" and "to increase dialogue about international news and make the world smaller through conversation and interaction, both on this site and on Twitter."

Breaking Tweets has been drawing deserved attention with its coverage of the rebellion in Iran. By identifying those inside Iran who historically had been posting to Twitter, the service was able to separate reliable sources out from the noisy crowd of people Tweeting, RTing, and just shouting.

After ingesting the real-time information flow, Kanalley provides context for events breaking over Twitter, adding in links to traditional news media sources and some thoughtful analysis. The site's philosophy is "hyperlocal gone global."

But on the business side of the equation, I wondered how Kanalley and his band of volunteer student editors were going to be able to monetize their company. He and I discussed this via email yesterday and here is what he told me:

I'm just beginning to experiment with revenue streams. So far, I've yet to find any solid ways to make money, and the primary goal for the time being is to keep posting fresh and interesting content and increase traffic over time.
Our primary revenue source is Google Ads at this time. We just launched a sponsorship program within the last month, but so far it has been slow to get off the ground. It's been a challenge to promote this without being in the readers' face too much or spamming on the Twitter account, as our primary goal is to serve the public and provide information.
We are accepting donations via PayPal.
We do sell ads but so far no one has bought any.
The Google Ads actually aren't doing very well. We're working to improve SEO and our tagging so they match better with the content. It's a work in progress.
No other sources of revenue right now. Definitely interested in any revenue streams out there and I continue to look into options and ask business professionals for advice.
I haven't approached anyone in the VC community or angels. I actually don't have any familiarity with this process -- my background is in journalism not in business so I'm trying to learn on the fly.

What Kanalley is doing with Breaking Tweets is what journalistic entrepreneurs have always done -- starting with the journalism. This is how, for example, Rolling Stone magazine started out. Developing an effective business plan followed the journalism by a few years.

There is no reason this can't work in today's media world for an idea as fresh and promising as Kanalley's, as long as he can keep his effort going until the cavalry show up. That would be the guys bearing a business model.