Newsvine is a community-powered, collaborative journalism news website which draws content from its users and syndicated content from mainstream sources such as The Associated Press. Users can write articles, seed links to external content, and discuss news items submitted by both users and professional journalists.

Newsvine, the company, is not a news bureau and exercises no editorial voice, but acts as a social news platform for the community which has grown around it. Members decide with their actions what news makes it onto the site and what news is removed, and the Newsvine staff works to keep the platform operating and evolving.

Newsvine was named the Top News Site of 2006 and one of the 50 Best Websites of 2007 by Time magazine.

History

Seattle-based Newsvine, Inc. was founded in the spring of 2005 by Mike Davidson, Calvin Tang, Lance Anderson and Mark Budos. Josh Yockey joined the company a few months later, with Tom Laramee following in spring 2006. The development team consists of several veterans from the Walt Disney Internet Group and ESPN.

The company moved into its offices near Downtown Seattle on August 1, 2005 and launched newsvine.com into private alpha on December 1, 2005. On January 5, 2005, the site went into private beta, and then launched to the public on March 1, 2006.

On October 7, 2007, Newsvine announced its acquisition by the news website msnbc.com, effective October 5, 2007. Since the acquisition, Newsvine has continued to run as a separate website and brand from msnbc.com, operating out of its original headquarters in Seattle.

Seeding

Newsvine allows users to "seed," or post links for others to view. Seeds usually contain a short description or direct quotation from the linked article. With the "Newsvine Button," users can select "Seed Newsvine" from their bookmarks and a seeding dialog will appear. Seeds allow for all of the same options as articles except the ability to insert photographs and/or polls.

Articles

One of the most defining features of Newsvine is the ability for users to write their own articles. Commonly known as citizen journalism, this allows users to express their opinions for public discussion or even report in a journalistic manner. The most popular articles for top tags appear in the "Featured Writers" section, where article writers can receive extra publicity.

While writing articles, users can upload their own photographs or choose from a list of Flickr photos registered under a Creative Commons license for addition to the post. Captions can be written to clarify the meaning of the photograph.

Voting

Another common feature among social bookmarking websites is the ability to vote for content. Users who enjoy reading an article/seed or agree with its content are encouraged to vote for the content. Articles and seeds with the most votes appear in the "Top Wire," "Top Seeds," or "Top of the Vine" sections of the site.