Dec. 19, one of the Marquette LIMOs finally made their way to Raynor Library where they picked up Ben Jansen. Jansen, relieved to see the LIMO team, had been waiting there since approximately Aug. 29.
Before you panic and alert the head of the Marquette LIMO service, consider the source. This story came from Marquette’s satirical news website, the Golden Seagull.
The website launched last summer, and members of its original six-person team hope they can provide some fresh humor and inside jokes for Marquette students, mirroring content from satire publications such as The Onion.
“We have a growing number of writers right now,” Jimmy Starke, a senior in the College of Arts Sciences and writer for the site, said. “Anyone that’s interested in writing articles for us can get involved.”
While the site has gained attention recently, Starke explained that many of the writers just do it for pure enjoyment. Outrageous headlines, coupled with no lack of photoshopped images are entertaining for readers and contributors alike.
“It’s just something that we all enjoy doing. I don’t know if anyone plans on doing it for a living,” Starke said. “We all just have group meetings and come up with funny ideas for headlines, and (our editor) always does an amazing job with the Photoshops, so it’s a lot of fun for us.”
The team runs stories that are relevant to life on campus and to students as a whole. For example, following the heated November presidential election, one popular article reported that Thanksgiving family dinners were shaping up to be especially civil that year.
Some of the staff members only write for the Golden Seagull, while others write for the Marquette Wire or other websites as well. Regardless, the writers are excited that their story views have been climbing in recent months.
“The website itself can actually be tricky to get to, so social media is our biggest outlet to get content out,” Starke said. “The Golden Seagull has its own Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook page where they’ll post all the headlines for new articles with links to the real site.”
While the site gains attention, many students have opinions on the Seagull’s outrageous headlines.
“I think they’re pretty funny,” Jessica Kathe, a sophomore in the College of Health Sciences said. “Most of the time it’s just cool to see specific inside jokes and references to Marquette, and you know exactly what they’re talking about because you’ve probably already seen it before on campus.”
Jake Champe, a sophomore in the College of Business Administration, touched on the same point.
“I just like that they do Marquette-centric content,” Champe said. “Rather than try and do content from all around the news, they just do stuff Marquette students will relate to.”
