Think Again | Meet the Gawker alum who permanently archived a story to the blockchain
Hmm Daily is the brainchild of Tom Scocca. It aims to carry on the political and cultural legacies of beloved, late publications like Gawker and The Awl (both of which he used to write for). Hmm Daily is among the 18 Newsrooms currently publishing on Civil, and has been doing so since last summer. Among other things, Tom is the author of the publication’s aptly named “Worst Thing We Read ™” feature, a daily — and often hilarious and/or critical — analysis of popular culture, politics and the world we live in. Soon, the site will host Hmm Weekly, a weekly email newsletter to paid subscribers launching the week of January 15. Enter your email at hmmdaily.com to be among the first notified of the forthcoming newsletter.
In December, Tom became one of the first journalists to use the Civil Publisher to archive the full text of an article on the Ethereum blockchain. Now, “The Subway Makes a Stop at Ground Zero” will be forever archived on the blockchain, and can never be altered by anyone who may want to take the publication’s work down.
“The Subway Makes a Stop at Ground Zero” was an interesting choice for the publication’s first permanently archived article. The piece outlines a conversation with the author’s 11-year-old son about his discovering of the September 11 terrorist attacks in New York City. Initially fascinated by the reopening of a new subway station at Cortlandt Street after 17 years, his son travels to the station for the first time in his life, and speaks with his dad about what happened that day — an event that happened well before he was born.
We asked Tom a few questions about his experience archiving this article with the Civil Publisher, and what readers can expect in the forthcoming Hmm Weekly. Here are his answers about his experience.
Q: Hmm Daily’s first post to be permanently archived to the Ethereum blockchain was based on a conversation with your 11-year-old son about his discovery of the September 11 attacks. Why did you choose this story? Is there any personal significance knowing that this conversation will be around forever (or until the end of the internet)?
Tom Scocca: The initial plan was just to go back and pick out one of the stories the site published on its first day, because that seemed like the logical place to start archiving. But when I remembered that this was among those stories, it felt like it had to be the one. There’s an obvious gesture toward futurity in using something that an 11-year-old co-wrote, but there was also something about the way the piece had been conceived and produced — from the reporting trip to Ground Zero through the writing of the piece itself, as we passed it back and forth, it was an improvisation that took on its form and meaning as it went. That is, to my mind, what journalism is: the process of witnessing things and thinking them through and figuring something out as you go. So it made sense to take the result we’d landed on and inscribe that into the permanent ledger.
Q: Tell us a little about the forthcoming Hmm Weekly. What is it? How do readers sign up, and what can we expect there vs. what we can find on hmmdaily.com?
TS: Hmm Weekly is going to be an email newsletter, delivered each week to the people who choose to be paid members of Hmm Daily. We expect it may be a bit more conversational, or at least more epistolary, than the posts on the site are, and that it may incorporate some new formats and ideas. We’ll figure it out by doing it. To get a copy, please sign up through the email signup box on the site.
Q: Why does the paid newsletter route make sense in this case, versus making the website subscription-based?
TS: There’s always a tension between trying to publish so that pieces can reach as many readers as possible and trying to make sure people who value the publication put up money to sustain it. Part of our plan for the site has always been to try to create opportunities to showcase writers, and if freelancers are willing to write for us, we’d prefer not to put up a barrier between them and the audience. So we think of a newsletter as a way to have something in more limited circulation, in which some form of the institutional voice can speak more directly to the community of people who specifically read and support the site.
If you’re interested in starting an independent newsroom on Civil, learn how to join the community.
