About the Website

History of Yale Daily News Online

The nation’s oldest college daily first began publishing on the Web in February 1995. While the constant change going on at yaledailynews.com can be a source of frustration for editors, managers and programmers alike, that’s part of what makes it fun.

The Yale Daily News Online was launched by Sascha Segan ’96, managing editor of the Board of 1996, in February, 1995. Chris Grosso ’97 and Duncan Levin ’97, managing editor and executive editor of the Board of 1997, maintained the site during the 1995-’96 school year. During the tenure of the Managing Board of 1998, the site was maintained and expanded by the first online editors of the Yale Daily News, Shawn Bayern ’99 and Akiko Fujikawa ’99. Guy Penini ’00 and Jackie Eisler ’01, online editors on the Board of 2000, and Eric Kennedy ’02, the online editor of the Board of 2001, redesigned the site and adapted it from static files to database-driven content.

Technical

The previous version of yaledailynews.com was launched on Courant News, an open source publishing platform originally pioneered by Online Directors Robert Baskin and Max Cutler, in the fall of 2009. The site and Courant News are written in Python on the Django web framework. It ran on an Apache and nginx web servers, and connects to a PostgreSQL database.

Currently, Ellington CMS hosts yaledailynews.com. We strive to support all A-Grade browsers (as determined by Yahoo), including Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Safari. Our site is CSS-based, and whenever possible, we use semantic HTML and unobtrusive Javascript to allow for the best user experience.

To the current and former managers of yaledailynews.com: We thank you for your vision and leadership. We just wish you had documented your code better.

* 1995-1996: Sascha Segan, managing editor
* 1996-1997: Chris Grosso, managing editor; Duncan Levin, executive editor
* 1997-1998: Shawn Bayern and Akiko Fujikawa, online editors
* 1998-1999: Guy Penini and Jackie Eisler, online editors
* 1999-2000: Eric Kennedy, online editor
* 2000-2001: Rebecca Carlin, online editor; David Thompson, director of online business
* 2001-2002: Francis Browne, director of online business
* 2002-2003: Reshma Champaneria, director of online business
* 2003-2004: Shelly Lin, director of online business; Michael Wong, technical director
* 2004-2005: Ajay Kishore
* 2005-2006: Ajay Kishore; Scott Peachman
* 2006-2007: Robert Baskin, online development manager; Henry Corrigan-Gibbs, online staff
* 2007-2008: Robert Baskin, online director; Steven Siegel, online editor; Henry Corrigan-Gibbs, director of online initiatives
* 2008-2009: Catherine Cheney, online editor; Michael Boyce, online staff; Max Cutler, online development manager
* 2009-2010: Martine Powers, associate managing editor for online; Max Cutler, director of online operations; Andrew Williams, director of online business
* 2010-2011: Esther Zuckerman, online editor; Shadbha Chigurupati, director of online business
* 2011-2012: Michael DiScala, lead web developer; Daniel Serna, online editor; Max Cho, director of online business
* 2012-2013: Caroline Tan, online editor; Earl Lee and Akshay Nathan, lead web developers; Yume Hoshijima, online business manager; Vincent Hu, online development manager