Real-time local newswire service Fwix has announced that they are opening their API to all interested developers. Although the startup, which launched just over a year ago, has worked on applications with partners in the past, an open API will allow more bloggers and site owners the ability to deliver local news content to users.
The company has also announced a $2.75 million Series A round of funding from BlueRun Ventures.
Fwix combines local news with local blog content and user-generated “man on the street”-type coverage for a comprehensive view of a given area’s news. The API allows people to both retrieve items from and submit specific content to the newswire.
Best of all for the less technical site owner, the data is also available immediately through a customizable, embeddable widget. Though the widget-builder is still buggy, news items can be filtered by search term and source. We would have liked to see the option to select multiple sources or combine search and source filters – for example, tech-related items from LA Business Weekly and Lalawag.
When Fwix announced their iPhone application last month, we wrote, “This is precisely the sort of iPhone application your hometown local paper should have thought of first. Unfortunately, they didn’t – which is probably one of the many reasons they’re struggling today.”
Similarly, an API offering access to local news as it is published is something that should have been developed and publicized by hometown news organizations, including the increasingly web-focused newspapers and television news programs in local markets. We’re glad to see the Fwix has attempted to close this gap and can’t wait to see what apps come from this API.
In a jointly issued statement, BlueRun rep Jonathan Ebinger said, “We see Fwix as a key company in helping everyone from big online media outlets to smaller local news bloggers reach larger audiences with the most relevant quality content. This enables sites to better monetize a larger audience, while readers simply receive the best local content available. It’s not often that we find bankable companies whose clear path to success really offers the potential to lift up an entire industry, but we’ve found that in Fwix.”
