For Columbia University grads Nick Summers (‘05), a former Current staffer, and Chris Beam (‘06), the answer was easy: start your own blog.
The two friends created the popular www.ivygateblog.com, a news and gossip blog chronicling the eight Ivy League schools. Ten months old, IvyGate has already received national attention, more than 10,000 visitors a day and a nomination for Best Educational Blog in the 2006 Weblog Awards.
“Few institutions are the object of more obsession and derision, mockery and respect, than this little group of schools,” Beam, 21, and Summers, 24, explained in their inaugural post. Finding news, however, is an eclectic affair. Along with its team of stringers, the duo consolidates information collected from the respective schools’ newspapers, and the site’s inbox is constantly filled with tips.
From Hanson’s pit stop at Yale to a Princeton eating club’s request for a property tax exemption, readers can always find a hodgepodge of Ivy League gossip.
“IvyGate takes real news and makes it entertainment,” says one devotee, Vivian Tien, a University of Chicago sophomore.
There is a fine line between what to cover and what not to, Beam says. Luckily, there will always be more than enough news for them to choose from. “There is no shortage of foolish kids in the Ivy League to make fun of,” he says.
