Rex Wockner, a longtime journalist in the LGBT media, on his blog recently interviewed Andy Towle, the former editor in chief of Genre and current editor of the popular LGBT blog Towleroad.
Here’s an excerpt:
Rex: You post about 18 to 20 items a day. How many articles do you read before you choose those?
Andy: I don’t know that I read all of the articles but I definitely scan and look over a few hundred articles every morning before I even begin writing anything. I scan headlines to see what’s happening, and then the things that interest me I will usually linger on, and if I linger on certain topics or headlines or articles, then I’ll know in my head that it’s something that would interest me and might interest my readers, so I will continue on and sort of pursue that line of news.
Rex: How many hours a day do you work?
Andy: Generally from like 6:15 in the morning till 7, 8, 9 at night.
Rex: Is your boyfriend OK with that?
Andy: Not really. He’d like me to work probably about six hours less than that but, you know, it pays the rent and it’s what I need to do to sort of keep the site going, so, you know, he understands.
Rex: How do we keep up with the flow of information? You and I have similar kinds of jobs. I feel overwhelmed regularly. Do you?
Andy: I feel overwhelmed right now because I’m not reading and I’m doing this interview instead, but, you know, it’s how I regularly feel if I’m out or whatever. It’s like there is always a constant barrage of news and things happening, so the struggle to keep on top of it is a constant challenge and I think anybody who’s in news these days understands the same thing — that it’s just, you know, like a 24-hour thing and to stay on top of it, you just have to constantly keep reading.
I believe both Wockner and Towle do an amazing job keeping us informed, so keep up the good work!