A push-start for three innovative media ideas


In case you missed this from earlier in the week, the McCormick Foundation funded three proposals from new media women entrepreneurs at $10,000 each so they can launch within a year.

Here are the three plans::

ChickRx – Harvard MBA student Stacey Borden and partner Meghan Muntean will lead a team of women in launching an “edgy, approachable, engaging” online health resource uniquely targeted to women, ages 18 to 27. It will have content and Q&As, updated daily, from medical, family and nutrition experts, addressing such questions as: “Can drinking too much Diet Coke increase my risk of getting cancer?” “Can I lose five pounds in week without starving myself?” “Why am I unhappy, even though I know I shouldn’t be?” Borden is the former campus relations director of 85 Broads, a national professional women’s group.
      
Women’s Community News Franchise – Former MytopiaCafe.com editor Michelle Ferrier will develop a complete infrastructure, to be franchised, for those who want to launch hyperlocal news sites. A demo site will launch later this year in West Volusia County, Florida, piloting services that will include a Web platform, software development, market analysis, some content, and legal and marketing assistance. Such an infrastructure, says Ferrier, will permit citizen journalists and community members to “focus on what they are most passionate about – building their community conversation through good local information and networking.”
      
The Good Food Fight – Three media-savvy Seattle women will connect consumers interested in food with larger public policy issues that affect food choices, security, safety, health and sustainability. Partners Kristin Hyde, Jen Lamson and Amy Pennington will use their deep experience in policy, marketing, journalism and digital campaigns “to leverage the growing concern and interest in food with a call to arms.” They plan to use a business-to-business model as well as their own outreach to leverage support from subscribers, sponsors, donors and foundations.