Project Largo is a responsive WordPress framework created by the Investigative News Network (INN) to help its member news organizations and other publishers build optimized news websites easily and at low cost. It allows publishers to focus on content while providing readers with a clean, fast experience across devices. The framework is open source and has been used by around 20 INN member sites and 20 other publishers. INN is working on new features and documentation to improve the framework and help more publishers launch robust, customized news sites.

1. Project LargoA Responsive WordPress Framework
for News Websites
Adam Schweigert
aschweigert@gmail.com
Twitter: @aschweig

2. Me
• Currently:
– Director of Technology for the Investigative News
Network
– Founder of my own consultancy, Media Toybox
– Learning to play banjo
• Previously:
– Director of Strategy at Mindset Digital
– Director of Digital at WOSU Public Media (NPR/PBS)
– Director of Digital at Indiana Public Media (NPR/PBS)
– Grad school at Indiana University
– Undergrad at Ohio State
Email: aschweigert@gmail.com
Twitter: @aschweig

3. “We, representatives of nonprofit
news organizations, gather at a time
when investigative reporting, so
crucial to a functioning democracy, is
under threat. There is an urgent need
to nourish and sustain the emerging
investigative journalism ecosystem to
better serve the public.”
— The Pocantico Declaration, 2009

4. Today: 86 Members

5. Today: 86 Members
http://InvestigativeNewsNetwork.org

6. The Problem
• Many members have little or no dedicated
technology resources
• INN wants to help but we’re a small
organization
• Not feasible to provide one-on-one help to
every member
• Most members have websites, but…

13. http://LargoProject.org
http://github.com/inn/largo
Our Solution: Project Largo

14. Project Largo
• WordPress-based
– Used by more and more major news sites
– Large, active community
– Many third party plugins
– Easy to learn
– Fast and (relatively) inexpensive to develop

15. Project Largo
• WordPress-based
• Optimized for News Publishers

26. Project Largo
• WordPress-based
• Optimized for News Publishers
• Responsive Design – Looks great on any
device

29. Project Largo
• WordPress-based
• Optimized for News Publishers
• Responsive design – Looks good on any
device
• Easy to setup, customize and extend

35. Benefits
• For Publishers
– Dramatically reduce cost of developing and launching a website
– Remove technical barriers to allow you to focus on content
• For Readers
– Clean, fast-loading, beautiful reading experience on any device
• For Developers
– A robust toolkit for building news websites
• For INN
– Framework allows us to build and launch sites quickly and
provide better support to our members
– Common backend enables new distribution and content
syndication possibilities
– When INN (or a member) builds a new feature we’re better able
to share with the entire network

36. Where We Are
(~1 Year into the project)
• About 20 sites in our network using Largo
• Around 20 non-INN sites (that we know of) using the open source
version
• Upcoming first “public” release of the Largo framework
– Design improvements
– Custom landing page for projects
– More flexibility for article page layouts
– Better tools for customizing the look of a Largo site (without
having to touch the code)
• Working on better documentation
• Soon: new “magazine” theme optimized for Longform

37. Contribute!
Download or fork Largo on Github:
http://github.com/inn/largo
(Plugins other themes, etc. at: http://github/inn)
Use Largo in your own project
Contribute Code (or documentation)
Get in Touch
aschweigert@gmail.com
(or: largo@investigativenewsnetwork.org)

38. Questions?
Adam Schweigert
aschweigert@gmail.com
Twitter: @aschweig
Project Largo
http://LargoProject.org
Github: http://github.com/inn/largo
Twitter: @LargoProject
Investigative News Network
http://InvestigativeNewsNetwork.org
Twitter: @INN