About Madison Minutes

Our two-person team works every day to find and share the news and information you need to thrive in our community.

Our daily newsletter includes useful local news stories, broken down into easy-to-digest bullet points. We want you to feel  informed without feeling overwhelmed. We believe it shouldn’t feel like a chore to know what’s going on in your own backyard.

In addition to our news updates, we also publish a comprehensive community calendar There’s always something going on around town — if you know where to look.

Sign up for Madison Minutes today (and yes, it’s free!).

Our story

Madison Minutes was founded in April 2021 by Sam Hoisington and Hayley Sperling.

We started Madison Minutes because we know the value of high-quality news stories but understand how hard it can be to find high-quality local news and information.

We have years of experience working across all aspects of the journalism industry in both local and national newsrooms.

So we decided to do it ourselves and pass the knowledge on to you.

Have questions? Our inbox is always open.

About Sam

Sam Hoisington is a co-founder of Madison Minutes. He handles the operations, advertising, and revenue stuff.  You might see him walking around the east side with his dog Phillip.

About Hayley

Hayley Sperling hails from the land of 10,000 lakes, but has spent the last 10 years living on (and writing about) the isthmus. She graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with a degree in journalism. As co-founder of Madison Minutes, she manages the editorial side of the business. When not writing emails, you can find her in the SASY neighborhood, probably drinking a beer or hanging out with her cats.

Editorial standards and ethics

Madison Minutes abides by the Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics. Our values can be summarized by these three promises:

• We will always tell the truth. We will tell you the facts, in context, as best we can. If we make a mistake, we will promptly correct it.
• We will listen to you. We want to hear your thoughts on how to make Madison Minutes better. Share your ideas, questions, and feedback with us via email at contact@madisonminutes.com.
• We will reflect the diversity of Madison. Both in our content and business decisions, we will strive to amplify diverse and underrepresented voices from our community. The journalism industry at large has an extremely racist history. We acknowledge this history and are committed to being anti-racist in our work.

Our role in the local news ecosystem

In addition to our original journalism, we often reference work done by other news organizations. In doing so, we hope to create a comprehensive feed of what’s important in Madison. We will always give credit where credit is due. Any information that comes from another news source will be clearly labeled.

Collaboration

News organizations can better serve their audiences by focusing on collaboration instead of competition. We don’t endeavor to replace any existing news source. Instead, we hope to supplement them with additional reporting, context, and distribution.

Political affiliation

Madison Minutes has no partisan affiliation. Employees will not volunteer, work for, or donate to any political campaigns. Employees are, however, permitted to participate in activities promoting racial justice, human rights, and equality.

Correction policy

Any mistakes will be promptly corrected. When errors of fact are made, the correction will be displayed prominently. We draw a distinction between corrections (for mistakes) and clarifications (for vague or misleading content).

Our funding

We’re proud to be funded by local advertisers and reader contributions.

We will always clearly label advertising arrangements. Advertisers do not hold any authority over editorial content. Learn more about our advertising options here.

City Cast partnership

We’ve partnered with City Cast to bring a daily podcast to the isthmus.

As part of our partnership with City Cast Madison, we share new podcast episodes in our newsletters. Madison Minutes retains complete editorial control over our newsletters, while City Cast Madison staff produce the show.

You can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever else you listen to podcasts.