The New York Times published “Small Cheese Makers Invest in a Stinky Science” by Larissa Zimberoff on February 6th about Jasper Hill Farm, a cheese producer, and their recent investment in science. Cheese making usually begins with a starter culture to help the proper bacteria grow, and most farms buy starter cultures from the few providers that sell them in the U.S. Jasper Hill Farm is part of the new trend of dairy farmers partnering with scientists and creating their own starter cultures.
This is an entertaining article with multiple elements that make it more compatible with multimedia journalism. First, it’s an entertaining subject: cheese. It’s also quite different from many of the articles published by major publications recently relating to politics.
The article also includes a number of visual elements. The first image is dynamic and
entertaining. It is of Jasper Hill cheese makers standing in front of their barn painted with cows flying in space. It is also a fairly long article, which is usually a negative for online posts because readers rarely make it to the end of long articles online before venturing to another page, but the article includes six images that break up the text and make it easier to read.
They include a link to the NYT Food Pinterest and the number of comments so far toward the bottom of the article. These are both smart choices by the New York Times because they are able to gain more social traction from those who are reading the article.
The one problem with this article is that they link to multiple different sites throughout (cheese companies, scientific mentions, etc.), but when you click on the link, it doesn’t open in a new page. It draws the reader away from the main site and makes them less likely to read more New York Times articles.
Rachel E McLean 