From the Editors

It’s 2012, and we at the Columbia Daily Spectator are determined to act like it.

With the new year come new challenges, and with them, new approaches to coverage. We’ll be finding new and faster ways to contribute to a dynamic journalism world, recognizing that news is now usually broken on Twitter and that our commenters and fellow students often have as much claim to the “journalist” label as we do. Our website is getting more traffic than ever, but too often we’ve pretended that those changes don’t matter.

In the months ahead, we’re planning to tell fun and compelling stories that provide information that you won’t get elsewhere. And we’ll be trying to do that in all of the ways that matter—on our website, on your phones, on our blog, on Twitter and Facebook, and in the physical paper. At the same time, we’ll be listening to your feedback in comments, letters, and in person. The days of us publishing the news once a day, as a transaction from us to you, are long over.

What will never change is our commitment to providing what you need to know, from the latest updates about our expansion in Manhattanville to changes to Columbia’s administration, to our basketball team’s latest win streak or Barnard’s increasing global reach. We will be reaching out too—to our readers, to our neighbors, and to our sharpest critics. We’re determined to better use those connections to highlight the most important issues facing students today.

That also means we’re ready to do a lot of listening in order to make sure that we’re focusing on what really affects the daily lives of Columbians and our neighborhood residents. What questions do you want us to ask President Bollinger, and what issues deserve more attention? There are more ways than ever to tell us, and we’ll be asking.