***Originally published on Facebook on 3/6/2015***
So what the heck is Hy-Lo News? Is it news about being high on something and then having a crash that makes you feel low? Or is it a blog site named in honor of the Hy-Lo corner store on 175th street and 27th Avenue in Miami Gardens where many people have seen highs and lows? (Yes, that was actually asked of me.lol)
Sorry guys, it’s neither.
Hy-Lo News is short for hyperlocal, a term I learned the Fall semester of my second junior year of college (lol yep I meant to say second). I had a great professor who predicted what she thought the future of news would be like. She said the changing landscape of media would have to adapt to providing information around a well-defined community with its primary focus directed toward the concerns of the population in that community. Short version: news focused on a specific community or city. Professor Veraldi called it hyperlocal news. Even back then I thought the idea was pretty cool and needed– especially in under exposed communities.
So in 2010, I came up with the concept for this blog site, but wasn’t sure how to go about bringing it to life. In 2013, I had a more defined idea of this concept, but I let what I want my ultimate goals for the news site to be, intimidate me on starting. I’ll admit it, I was afraid to begin.
So now it’s March 2015, and I’m taking this leap of faith to provide black communities in South Florida news I’ve been asked to do while being a reporter for the bigger media outlets, but I couldn’t do. I was told they weren’t newsworthy, they weren’t timely or that some other story warranted the space in the newspaper or time on television. Those things I totally understand, but what happens to those stories that I felt should have been told, but were believed to not have an appeal to a mass audience? I don’t want to tell that new business, that nonprofit, that community leader or that student essentially their story doesn’t matter. Also, having a different running narrative of the communities I chose to cover, tells a different story that you don’t see all the time on mainstream news.
Now I’m choosing to tell those stories. The ones you’ve asked me for, the ones I wanted to do, but couldn’t. I will bring them to you because people should know about people from their community who are doing cool things and what’s happening in the communities they live, work and play.
I’m still hammering out details, but nonetheless I introduce you to Hy-Lo News.
SN: At this point, the page is operated solely by myself and I work a full-time gig, so in the words of my favorite artist…. “Keep in mind that I’m an artist and I’m sensitive about my shit. So yall be nice about it, alright.”-Erykah Badu
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