Always collaborate -- A Look at OpenFile

OpenFile, a Toronto-based local news site.

Structurally and editorially, the site is centered, as its name suggests, around files: topic pages-meet-news articles, focused on a particular problem or issue, that combine text, photos, video, and links -- 'sort of a multimedia package.' Some of the files featured on the site at the moment: a look at energy-efficient street lights, a call for questions and opinions about Toronto's bike lanes, a report on sharia-compliant financial products. 'We're calling it a 'file,'' said Craig Silverman, OpenFile's digital journalism director, 'because a story isn't just a single, static text document anymore. It has to be something that lives. One of the more interesting aspects of the OpenFile infrastructure - one connected to the 'directed by its users' mandate - is that the site's files are community-initiated."