Student Web Zine Hooks Readers Worldwide

Want to listen to the sound of lightning on Saturn, find out whichrock stars hold Ph.D.s, or learn how religion affects the brain? Apparently, science enthusiasts around the world do, and they’re returning to a new student-produced science Web site for answers.

Hypercube is the current edition of a scientific Web zine published each year by graduate students at the College of Communication’s Center for Science and Medical Journalism (CSMJ). With no advertising or publicity (except for some drink coasters distributed at a past science writing conference), the site has been drawing several thousand online visitors a month, from as far away as Sri Lanka and Australia.

“Hypercube is a science news Web site for the general public,” says student writer Lauren Cahoon (COM’08). “The goal is to bring a more light hearted approach to science — to keep in touch with the mainstream, with pop culture.”

Afew years ago, Douglas Starr and Ellen Ruppel Shell, COM professors of journalism and CSMJ codirectors, noticed that many newspapers were dropping their science sections. At the same time, science Web zines were emerging online. While the United States is still the epicenter of science, Starr says, the science audience is extremely international.

“We’reconstantly scouring for what to do to stay ahead of the curve,” Starr says. “We don’t want our students playing catch-up when they get out of here.”

So for the past four years, Starr and Ruppel Shell havehad their third-semester grad students create a science zine from scratch: establishing a tone or theme, picking out graphics, colors, and layout, and developing multimedia elements. The content, student-written and student-edited, is usually a mix of serious and fun— opinion, reviews, features, news quirks.

“The Web zine really made me fine-tune my writing, knowing it was going to be onlineand people were going to reading it,” Cahoon says. “I found myself writing in a way that grabbed people’s attention. I did not want to bore people.”

The inaugural publication, Resonance, won several awards in 2004 from the Society of Professional Journalists, including Best All-Around National Student Web zine. That edition featured pieces on the neurological origins of empathy, a company that produced fetal keepsake videos, and the scientific purpose of the female orgasm.

But the class venture is about more than honing Web skills and engaging readers — it’s about working as a group.

“Getting 12 people to decide on anything is nearly impossible,” Cahoon says.“We’re all creative. We all have our own ideas. The most difficult part was figuring out the name. At one point, we decided on The Mullet — you know, business in the front, party in the back. Then, after we all went home, we thought, ‘We can’t use that.’”

Ruppel Shell says the Web zine has led to paying gigs for some of the students. “The students use it as a résumé tool,” she says. “Some have been contacted by people who’ve seen the Web zine and want them to freelance.”

Other graduates have landed online writing work at outfits like Discover and Science News. Elizabeth Savage (COM’06) is assistant news editor at the Journal of the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Md.

“I don’t know if my experience helped me get a job, but it did make me feel more qualified for the positions I applied for, particularly since so much of journalism is moving online,” Savage says. “It was something concrete that I could show prospective employers.”

So far, Hypercube is averaging around 4,000 visitors a month, with more than 8,000 page views, according to student writer Kristina Grifantini (COM’08).

“It’s sort of surprising when you see the number of places no one here has a connection to,” she says. “That’s pretty good, considering we haven’t advertised. People might stumble upon us and then just stay and explore.”

The most visited piece so far is a first-person account on the success of pick-up lines at science night spots. Author Laura Morgenthau (COM’08) is still stunned at the traffic.

“I figured my friends and family would like it, but I didn’t expect the piece to have the appeal it’s been having,” she says. “On the other hand, when I read newspaper and magazines, I really enjoy personal columns. So it may not be so much a Web phenomenon as a person phenomenon. The Web just makes it more accessible to more people.”

Caleb Daniloff can be reached at cdanilof@bu.edu.