Sumer Sharma, a freshman at India’s Ashoka University started INFORMission Weekly as an iniitiatve when he was just turning 16 .
Readily available news sources focussed so much on crime, corruption and negative news that Sumer felt it was making his generation cynical as well as indifferent. This bothered Sumer. He believed that there was a lot more happening in the world than the “he said, she said” and “he did, she did” sensationalism the media seemed to be obsessed with.
Sumer decided to put his thoughts into action and create a 5-6 page weekly newsletter customised to give his peers a short simplified update of important events and happenings from around the world.
INFORMission Weekly was thus started by Sumer in May 2013, on Mother’s Day with a simple motto “Our Mission is to INFORM”.
IW’s PDF format evolved into a website to capture informative, interesting and relevant happenings from around the world in a simple & summarised manner for youngsters without a focus on crime or sensationalism.
Sumer stays true to his original goal: to produce a resource that embodies his own positivity and optimism, while “telling it like it is”: without bias or exaggeration. The stories are meticulously researched and are comprehensive write-ups, with not an image or word unattributed.
The motto remains the same as it has always been; but our mission is not just to inform. It is to sensitize us to the world out there, about which it is our business to know. In the timeless words of John Donne:
“No man is an island, entire of itself.”
informissionweekly.com was recently selected as an Official Honoree in The 20th Annual Webby Awards in the Web: Personal Blog/Website category.