June | 2015 | Anthony De Rosa

I’ve been flooded with messages of support since we shut down. I asked permission to share these messages from the folks who sent them. I have been so amazed and humbled by how much people really had emotionally invested in Circa. It makes me feel really proud of what we were able to build and the impact we have now created in the industry.

Here’s a sample of some of the letters I’ve received…

To Anthony and my distant friends at Circa News—

It is with great sadness that I started my morning off with the Farewell, from Circa headliner. I won’t torture you by yearning for the what-ifs and the if-onlys; still, I had to write you because I feel oddly close to the team that for so long now has brought me my daily news brief. Your idea was brilliant and you changed the market—there is no denying that. In today’s America we find ourselves at odds with the current event paradox. That is, technology, social movements, crowd-sourced collaboration and the freedom of press make accessing real, unbiased, ugly-truthed frontline news more possible than ever; yet, we amass a naive population that becomes disgruntled and misguided by ‘news’ organizations that are controlled by their advertisers so much so that what becomes the top story on every major news source is more often than not a ‘fluff’ to redirect attention from the real stories and make an aggregate audience fell all warm and fuzzy inside. But you already know this. Continue reading Dear Circa →

(click here to skip to the list of Circa employees looking for new opportunities)

Here’s the short Circa version: We tried to do something very different, we took huge risks, we built a product that spawned a whole new category, and we enjoyed every moment of it, at least until the money ran out and that sucked.

Care to know more? By all means, read on:

We got some stuff wrong, but there’s a hell of a lot we got right. There will be a time and place for me to expand on that, today is not that day. I’m delighted to see we’ve inspired many other apps to do part of what we did or attempted to do. It’s great that we’ll see various elements of Circa live on through them.

I want to thank this team:

Arsenio, I am so lucky to have worked with you and have someone so willing to work hand and glove with editorial. That’s a rare thing in our business. You’re a rockstar, I hope we cross paths again. I also loved the chance to work with your amazing team: Tim, Travis, Chris, Michelle, Ashley, AJ, Brian, Darren, Adam, and Frank.

John Maloney, you know how much you did for this team. You are selfless. Without question, you have been a rock and fought the good fight to try to get us over the finish line. I’ll never forget that. I am your brother for life.

Matt, you gave me an amazing opportunity and you’re an incredible product designer. The industry is still trying to catch up with you. I know you’ll continue to do amazing things.

David, our founding editor, who mentored me and taught me the very unique way we do things here at Circa. Without you, I would be nothing. You’re killing it at Al-Jazeera. I am indebted to you for teaching me and giving me the skills to have continued what you created here.

Adrian, Daniel, Greg, Evan, Andrew, Ted, Chad, Lenika, Nicholas, Peter, Abraham, Amelie, Alli, Nallur, Kevin, and Lisa. Who fought their asses off and have unique skills that few others in our industry can boast of. They’re now free to take those skills out to the world and give your newsroom superpowers. Startups are hard, they’re not the safe passage for anyone. News is tough enough to then have the unpredictability of startup life tossed in for good measure. I respect and admire these folks for putting their heart and soul into this.

Christine, our incredible designer. Your work speaks for itself. Someone will be very lucky to have you bringing your magic to them soon.

Jessie, our operations rock. Without you, the ship doesn’t sail. Thanks for keeping us on track and making sure the trains run on time.

Finally, I want to thank the majority of our investors, who believed in us enough to write a check. There are some investors making it difficult to get our team paid for services rendered. Be assured I won’t stand by idle if they’re not made whole.

I can vouch for all the people above, but I worked as Editor In Chief and can uniquely speak for the skills of the team I led below. I’m providing short bios but can get into more detail about what I think their strongest skills are. Please do get in touch soon if you want them, there’s actually a lot of demand and I’m happy to see that. I also linked their emails to their names here if you want to reach them directly.

Continue reading Farewell Circa →