20 Years Ago Today, I Helped Launch Foxnews.com

How the Lewinsky scandal turned a liberal online playground into a neo-conservative nerve-center.

Illustrations by David Alvarado

Our ’90s-era business-casual clothes were a bit baggy, which may have contributed to the sense that we were children playing grown-up, wearing our fathers’ suits. About a dozen reporters and producers had gathered around the conference table in the fishbowl, and we were pitching stories for Foxnews.com. Leading the meeting were a producer and editor who, like us, were in their mid-twenties. You knew it was your turn to speak when the producer tossed a foam football your way.

“What about the Bermuda Triangle?” our editor asked. We looked at each other and shrugged. “I haven’t heard about anyone disappearing in a long time,” he clarified. “Do people still disappear?”

Even with our limited journalism experience, most of us felt there wasn’t much of a story there. “Sounds more like an episode of ‘Scooby Doo,’” said one of the reporters.

Beyond the glass wall stood the thrumming hub of Foxnews.com, a circular newsroom ringed by a low wooden wall, with a dozen te…