The End of the Story?

My former employer The Story ended its print edition with last Thursday's issue. It plans to continue in some form online.

Begun five years ago by Creative Loafing's founding publisher and a former managing editor for the Atlanta Constitution, The Story from the Westside was a free weekly covering Atlanta's long-ignored but then revitalizing Northwest side. Later an Eastside edition was added and The Story Group acquired the larger circulation Community Review in Decatur for a chain of Inside the Perimeter neighborhood newspapers. The idea was hard news coverage of Atlanta Neighborhood Planning Unit meetings and the Dekalb County Commission along with local color features and a listings section. It was all too ambitious at a time when everyone started going online for their news and concert start times. And who wants to read about sewers all the time? Still, the papers did provide extensive coverage of Atlanta's watershed problems, the development of Atlantic Station, Avondale Estates' stop Wal-Mart campaign and the Piedmont Parking Deck.

I was a catch-all office boy (had to teach myself Excel) and helped with the listings. Moreover, I started using neighborhood issues as a source for comedy. It made my humor more organic. Or hopelessly provincial.