Letter from the editor,
Welcome back to Seven Mile Satellite!
Whether you’ve been with us for a few years or are new here, we’re excited to have you along for the ride as we complete a 2024 relaunch. Over the next few weeks, we will be updating our website and rebranding.
We launched in 2019 with a goal of filling the news desert on the island. By our second summer, this became all the more important as COVID-19 was in full swing and social distancing signs lined every beach entrance. 2020 and 2021 focused on pandemic reporting and giving our readers access to county infection rates. It’s now 2024, and while covid isn’t completely gone, we’re in a very different place than we were a few short years ago.
As editor, my life has also changed a lot since 2019. I graduated in 2020 at the start of the pandemic from James Madison University’s Honors College with degrees in journalism, Spanish, translation/interpretation and honors interdisciplinary studies. I then went on to Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism and graduated with my master’s in 2021. I’ve now been working for The Boston Globe for nearly two years.
The past two summers I haven’t been as focused on Seven Mile Satellite between moving to Boston and launching my professional career. I’m someone who always likes to give 110%, so I felt that if I couldn’t be fully dedicated to the site and if I didn’t have time to run a staff like in previous summers, I shouldn’t be posting. But every time I had a great sunset photo, heard island news or had a movie I really wanted to review, I felt the urge to continue Seven Mile Satellite.
When I reflect on the brand, I think about how hard I worked hard to launch this site and socials back in 2019. I had a staff for three summers and redesigned the website twice. And I don’t feel like its work is done. At the end of the day, the island is still home and there will always be prevalent and interesting news between the two beach towns.
But it’s time for a rebranding. With the pandemic not being the focus of the content, there’s room for the fun stuff too. In addition to hard news, I want to make room for upcoming events, new business profiles, food and movie reviews, fun videos, beach-inspired cocktail recipes, beach reads, small business shopping finds, weather coverage and so much more. Overall, I want Seven Mile Satellite to more accurately convey the joy and love my readers and I have for the island.
With just under four months until Memorial Day Weekend, let the work begin.
Sincerely,
Shanna Kelly
Founder & Editor