The readers have spoken, but they had a little help.
We media types like to put together year-end lists of the top news stories. Judging by Google Analytics, readers have their own ideas on what makes a story have legs.
The story with the most views, clicks or hits on VTDigger.org in 2013 was … Vermont Yankee? No. Health care reform? Nope.
With 9,554 views (as of Thursday) the winner is: “Burke resort cuts ties with mountain biking trails network.” That story managed to outpace any on the website all year and it did so in one week, having been posted Dec. 18!
VTDigger reporter Hilary Niles’ revelation that Q Burke Mountain resort was no longer sharing offseason lift fees with the mountain biking organization Kingdom Trails sparked an uproar in the trail-riding community.
Stories that generate the most traffic on our website are almost always boosted by an external referral. In the Burke example, the biking community shared the story through a well-developed network of online forums and blogs, which resulted in big bump in readership. Thank you, blogs and forums.
The second-most popular story was headlined “Vaccinated kids account for 90 percent of child whooping cough cases in Vermont.” That story by Andrew Stein on a rise in cases of pertussis in Vermont drew 9,254 views in 2013, even though it was originally posted Oct. 8, 2012.
Huh? you ask. Vaccination is a third-rail issue for many parents and there are probably hundreds of websites devoted to pro- and anti-immunization causes. That kind of passion drives readership on any story dealing with the issue. Any time the debate surfaces, Web searches are launched and, voila, Stein’s story pops up.
No. 3 on the hit parade was Stein’s Aug. 26 article “Nurse sues Springfield Hospital for alleged whistleblower law violations,” with 7,689 views.
That case of a whistleblower losing his job for reporting alleged incidents of malpractice struck a chord with national organizations that seek to protect employees who reveal company wrongdoing.
The fourth virtual page-turner with 7,529 hits, “Shumlin to sign marijuana decriminalization bill into law Thursday,” was not exactly Pulitzer material. It was a news release from the Marijuana Policy Project, which shared the link with its followers and, perhaps, the pro-pot group NORML.
No. 5 was a brief story we picked up from our media partners at The Caledonian Record on July 23. “Drunken fan of dead punk rocker GG Allin injures herself by banging head on police car,” was essentially a cop brief but to fans of the artist, and the Internet curation site Reddit, it was much more.
The story about an incident in the parking lot of a Littleton, N.H., Walmart on the 20th anniversary of the artist’s heroin overdose death fetched 7,222 views. Allin, whose performances were, literally, marked by self-mutilation, was born in Lancaster, N.H., and lived in Vermont as a youth.
Rounding out the Top 10 reader favorites are:
6. “Biologist Paul Ehrlich gives dire prediction for global civilization.” The May 1 story by Audrey Clark about a speech in Vermont by the scholar of Zero Population Growth fame received 6,331 views.
7. “Digging deep into the Shumlin-Dodge deal.” No sooner had the Legislature adjourned than Gov. Peter Shumlin became embroiled in a controversy about a deal to buy a house and land from his East Montpelier neighbor, Jeremy Dodge. This May 24 story by Stein garnered the most traffic among several on that political hot potato with 6,065 hits.
8. “Builder of state’s health care exchange misses key deadlines.” Stein also wrote this Sept. 27 story about Vermont Health Connect contractor CGI missing some targets in the construction of the state’s health care exchange website. Political drama ensued over Republican Randy Brock’s role in the “leaking” of the story. It drew 6,060 views.
9. “State pulls plug on EB-5 project.” The story about the loss of support for DreamLife, a proposed development of retirement living facilities written by Nat Rudarakanchana in April, earned 5,878 views.
10. “Vermont Law School makes more cuts as class size drops.” Shrinking enrollment has forced many colleges to reduce costs and the South Royalton campus was not spared. Alicia Freese’s report received 5,676 hits, including many from college alumni, no doubt.
What will you be reading in 2014? More great stories on VTDigger we hope.
