The Price of Truth
Sure, information wants to be free. Alas, it's not.
IN OUR BUSINESS, you can't swing a dead cat without hitting some expert waxing on about what ails journalism and how to fix it. Gratingly, many of those who tout prescriptions are the same people who let the patient get critical. And the new-media pundits whose analysis was fresh five years ago now feel like a Greek chorus that won't shut up after the curtain's down and the seats are empty. (Or, to retweet @theatavist, a.k.a. writer Evan Ratliff: "Maybe the future of journalism is just an endless vacillating din of banal bluster and whinging about the future of journalism.") We'll save you the agony; here's the Masterplots version:
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- In the first half of 2009, 123 TV news shows were canceled, 106 newspapers folded, 110 bureaus closed, 556 magazines died, and 12,000 journalists lost their jobs. These numbers are likely to get much worse.
- The old model, where journalism was heavily subsidized by advertising, is over. The recession has made the divorce faster and more acrimonious, but the knives were already out. And online advertising is turning out to be a harsh mistress. Consider: Even as the NYTimes.com readership grew 7 percent last year, online ad sales began dropping. As for the big online-only shops, they either lose money, are subsidized by parent companies, or feed off venture capital.
- Overpaid anchors; if it bleeds, it leads; papers that acted omniscient but practiced omission—the MSM's bad apples and bad practices, combined with industry upheaval and the stench of WMDgate, created a mood so toxic that even four years after Judy Miller's downfall, cheers seem to go up every time a reporter loses a job. That most journalists toil on for the public good—despite long hours, generally low pay, and a terribly bleak future—gets lost.
- Love The Daily Show, HuffPost, All Things Considered, Kevin Drum? We do, too, but much of what you're consuming is built from reporting (read: going to places, talking to people, and digging through documents) done elsewhere. Or as Rachel Maddow said at her MoJo fundraiser in April, "Without the David Corns of the world, there is no show. [MoJo DC bureau chief] David Corn can do his job without me, but I can't do my job without him."
- Reporting takes money. Duh. Yet we keep hearing that "journalism will survive the death of its institutions," so allow us to point out: not if that means the end of its resources. Indie bloggers, citizen journalists, pro-am reporting have dramatically expanded the public debate. But in the end, if there is 50 or 30 or 20 percent as much money being spent paying people to do consistent, reliable reporting, we'll have a corresponding reduction in consistent, reliable reporting. Not to mention fact-checking, editing, and presentation. (Want to see the first drafts of our investigative pieces? Trust us, no.)
- Anyone who claims to know where to get the money should be locked in a room and forced to read blogger Jim Romenesko's entire death-of-media archives. Advertising? Less and less. Online subscriptions? Sure—but how many of the New York Times' remaining 550,000 daily print subscribers will pay the same $770 for a digital product? Bringing back paywalls? Expect it to happen, but whether it'll work...
- So what about these big, nonprofit save-journalism projects we've heard so much about? We did a back-of-the-envelope tally of the marquee ones—ProPublica, HuffPost's I-team, Knight Foundation grants, etc. Including multiyear grants, and even padding the reported amounts substantially, we're talking $100 million. That's not even half what it takes to run the New York Times' news-gathering operation for a year. Part of the problem is that—take it from a nonprofit journalism shop with 34 years' experience—institutional funders for media are few, generally cautious, and (with some laudable exceptions) lacking in transparency. And as bad as it is for national operations, the problems become more pronounced for local muckrakers: Just try to raise money for investigative reporting from the Chamber of Commerce crowd.
So where does that leave us? All the honest pundits will give you the same answer: No &$#@ing idea. We may well end up with a society that simply doesn't have the quantity and quality of journalism we've enjoyed. Other countries don't; though those that run well also have functioning regulatory systems and raucous, diverse, parliamentary oppositions—not our two-party compromise machine.
But before we resign ourselves to whinging and vacillating, let's try to rewrite this tragedy. Many Mother Jones readers already help by writing checks beyond the price of a subscription; it's those checks that pay for our reporters and earn the attention of the Times and others who have spotlighted our reader-supported model as one promising avenue for journalism.
What it's going to take is for many more Americans to decide that quality reporting—be it on local school boards or Iraq or climate negotiations—is as vital to their lives as box scores and celebrity spats. As media theorist Clay Shirky recently wrote, "Journalism is about more than dissemination of news; it's about the creation of shared awareness," and ultimately the ability to act on that awareness. Because make no mistake: This is a zero-sum equation. Less journalism = less accountability. Corruption, nepotism, cronyism, and propaganda thrive when reporting dies. That's not a price we're prepared to pay.
Update: Clara breaks down the cost of a blockbuster investigation published by the New York Times Magazine and ProPublica here.
Comments
"Nichepapers"
Submitted by Budding Misanthrope (not verified) on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 5:47 AM PDT.
Well constructed piece! I do appreciate for a change a media outlet admitting that it has no idea what's in store for media outlets.
I would, however, turn your attention to Umair Haque's interesting approach to the creation of a 21st century news-market at Harvard Business Publishing.
http://blogs.harvardbusiness.org/haque/2009/07/the_nichepaper_manifesto....
I think he's on to something, in that the post-modern attention span and hunger for varied subject matter is somewhat lessened from the archetypal Rennaisance Man. "Nichepapers," as he terms them, are topic- and dialogue-oriented, encouraging readers to do perhaps even the lion's share of the analytical work, and develop the piece further than a single day's article. They are also reader supported, and I feel MoJo gives a great, long running example of how effective that can be.
More and more readers are turned off by having their opinions dictated to them through a series of talking points rammed down their throats by reporters with a clear agenda, or news conglomerates beholden to corporate interests. In the "new" system, whatever it ends up being (and will we really know when we get there?), readers will be able to hold their media accountable for quality, agenda-less reporting that informs and promotes critical thinking on a given issue.
Haque gives a few tasty bits that may draw the outline for this shift, "Journalists didn't make 20th century newspapers profitable--readers did," and states that these nichepapers are "finding new paths to growth, and rediscovering the lost art of profitability by awesomeness." Just think, the NYTimes became such a huge name in the first place because people felt they could trust it.
Nichpapers not enough
Submitted by Clara Jeffery on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 4:48 PM PDT.
Dear Buddying Misanthrope:
Niche papers theory interesting (and there has always been some of same), but when you assert that "in the 'new' system...readers will be able to hold their media accountable for quality, agenda-less reporting that informs and promotes critical thinking on a given issue," well, that's a mighty big assumption.
No reason to assume new will mean equal or better to what we have, as perhaps Clay Shirky has put best: http://www.cato-unbound.org/2009/07/13/clay-shirky/not-an-upgrade-an-uph...
Clara Jeffery
Co-Editor
Mother Jones
didn't expect that!
Submitted by B. Misanthrope (not verified) on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 7:08 PM PDT.
Well, I certainly didn't expect a direct reply from the author--not sure that's ever happened to me before!
I realize I made a pretty big cognitive leap with the thinking that whatever news-media "survives the end-times" will be an impossibly well-constructed organization with perfect oversight of the organization by it's readership. That was more a product of brevity's sake and having to get back to work myself.
Shirky's article is great, and I admit that foresight of what is to come is murky at best, but I don't think that he would necessarily disagree with me about how the public readership will relate to their news sources. People tend to vote with their feet, or in this case number of hits on a site, and I think more and more people are wary of even the idea of patronage. Whether it's by a single well-meaning and wealthy magnate or a corporate interest, a great many (especially younger) readers are wary of anything that would seem to impart an agenda.
My basic thought was that in the coming age of information, the public will simply not visit those outlets they perceive as being influenced by a particular agenda--thus giving them a form of oversight over those outlets, and providing an incentive toward truly responsible, fact-based journalism from most major sources.
This isn't true across the board, and sites that espouse a particular political view, economic school of though, etc. will remain popular for adherents to those views and people wishing to research the other side. However, there is a real need and thirst for un-biased A part, I believe, of the shock of the ease of acess to information that was the internet and the rise of the blogosphere, was and is the tendency towards heavy-handed opinion-based commentary on everything. It was, and is, difficult at times to separate the wheat from the chaff because the general readership didn't learn how to responsibly use the medium from the start. The social import of the internet was vastly underestimated--that's why only now are we really seeing a hard concern for internet privacy practices and personal safety from the casual user.
I don't really profess to know better than anyone else what will happen. I just know that I have a real concern for the fate of responsible journalism, and that I'm not alone in that--which gives me hope that the public can have a positive influence on what does eventually come of all this.
Fate of responsible journalism
Submitted by Clara Jeffery on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 9:21 PM PDT.
Dear B. Misanthrope (and thanks for glossing over my misspelling of your handle earlier):
You raise some interesting points. Let me try and address a few of them.
In theory, and often in practice, readers voting with their feet could be a good thing. But consider two things.
First, there's the boring but important story. Say a local paper reports on some corruption within the purchasing mechanism of the school board. Now, best as a writer might try and sex it up, such as story might not be a gripping read. Maybe for people in the community with school age children, or CPA, but for an extended audience? Probably not. Yet I think we'd all agree that it's best that Topeka not have corrupt school board accounting practices, and that even if I don't live in Topeka, I'd be glad that their schools would be better, and that news of this scandal might put a shot across the bow of school board officials everywhere.
On the flip side, what kind of story is likely to be widely read? It's no secret. Just scan Digg or HuffPost or aggregator of your choosing. It will likely contain 1) sex 2) agitprop 3) comedy 4) in a perfect traffic world, all three (see also: Mark Sanford). Such stories might be intriguing, and maybe even passably important, but do we want that to rule our media MORE than it does now?
You raise another crucial point: Ownership and bias. Like many people you seem to be wary of corporate ownership and its biases, and ditto for private and/or nonprofit ownership. You are correct, each comes with pitfalls. Part of the problem the MSM is facing was that it put forth the largely false paradigm of "objective" reporting. Reporting is human endeavor, and as such is flawed. Objective became, all too often, he said/she said, even if 99% of climate scientists said A, and ExxonMobil bag man said B. Reporting that is vigorously edited and fact-checked can, however, be fair. Not omniscient, but fair.
Consider that we've seen an unbelievable rise of opinion journalism, via blogs and also cable news. We're unfortunately also seeing a corresponding fall of reporting, which also serves as a check on run-away opinion. Opinion that all too often is ax grinding. Blogs have/can/do serve as fact-checkers to other media, but it is disheartening to the degree that they can be pushing an agenda and blind to their own bias.
Not convinced it's so bad
Submitted by B. Misanthrope (not verified) on Tue Sep. 1, 2009 5:57 AM PDT.
I agree with your assessment of the major content of MSM outlets, and I've always tried to take my journalism with the grain of salt sprinkled on by recognizing the possibility of human fallibility. "Tripe" is a word that think is applied all too often, and at times with painful accuracy, to many news programs, blogs, and sites.
That said, perhaps I am taking a more idealist view of the general readership and the material they will find important enough to read. The internet has allowed more and more people to become at least marginally well informed about a wider variety of issues, and begins to check up on those areas more frequently as issues they can take a stand about begin to arise.
This is where nichepapers will become important. While perhaps not drawing the massive readership of institutions like the NYTimes, they find readership across the country--something that probably took the NYT years to develop--very quickly in those groups who are consistently interested in, say, school board problems nationwide. The sex/agitprop/comedy writers will always have a public, because people feed on those things.
Personal blogs and those connected with a particular institution (Think Progress, American Prospect, The Atlantic) are great for developing ideas along a particular school of thought and helping the layperson articulate arguments they may otherwise not have had the tools to do themselves. Following that line, however, can lead to a Limbaugh-style, dare I say cult-like, population who can't critically analyze things for themselves. And obviously I have my own opinion about that...
For all of that, I don't think we're in a real danger of losing the responsible and fair reporter, because too many people have a strong desire to hear the facts and decide for themselves. Within what structure those honest reporters will operate is the salient question of the debate. I think it's fairly obvious that they will be largely electronic sources, with a modest but dedicated readership who will, with any luck, disseminate those ideas and facts further within their own circles, and create an ever more aware and informed public. The big wheel keeps on spinnin'.
Hoisted on their own petard.
Submitted by Walter Sear (not verified) on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 9:03 AM PDT.
The media killed the media.
"quality reporting"? Give me a break. It's partisan bickering from all sides. Mainstream reporters aren't reporting on things that matter, aren't reporting objectively, and don't even constructively express their -own- opinions about things: they just parrot the corporate screed. I am beginning to suspect it's because they don't know enough about the world to properly report on it.
Here's a morsel of the bleeding obvious to back up that up. Courtesy of, guess what? One of those fake online reports: someone's blog:
http://larrycheng.com/2009/08/12/its-hard-to-get-the-news-from-the-news/
At least when I see an eye witness account on someone's blog or forum post, I know that one person is trying to convince me, subjectively, that what they report is what happened. And since this is the tacit foundation for the conversation, the competent ones go above and beyond to provide me with as much objective evidence as they can to back up their point of view. And if they don't, great - I won't believe them.
In professional journalism, this underlying need to establish and maintain veracity with every word is replaced with a "Your reading, it's in my article, and I'm a reporter (one on 'your side' of the red/blue divide) so it must be true". Are you surprised that no one trusts you to even get the basic facts right? That they are leaving in droves?
That readers (sorry, eyeballs) you are left squabbling for are too addled tell truth from fiction, and prefer fiction anyway?
The mainstream editorial process has destroyed any trust that I have in modern professional reporting: you aren't trying to give me fact or insight - you are trying to please everyone: your advertisers, your managers and the subjects of your article (hey, you want to get invited back to the whitehouse/goldman sachs pretty penthouse offices again, don't you?). You even pander to me, delivering only the stories and points of view that you think I want to here. Micheal Jackson? Lacie Peterson? OCTOMOM? FFS.
Good riddance reporters: you, collectively, sullied the pool. Don't point fingers: it makes you look even more stupid. Just accept a world where the leading cable operator (Comcast) now only offers the lowest, most insidious news channel (Fox) as part of its basic service. Have some news-lite: I'm afraid you have to pay extra for real news!
(There is, also, your management's complete and utter lack of ability to figure out how computers work until it was too late. But that's small potatoes compared to what's happened on your watch: both to your industry and the rest of the world, by letting all that truthiness in)
This is a lot like a company
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 9:06 AM PDT.
This is a lot like a company that's not quite profitable. All the good employees, who can actually DO something, move on, while the dead-weight hangs around. The problem is, our filthy financial system can spend YEARS bailing out companies that should have been allowed to die peacefully, that's what we're seeing now. Rupert Murdoch and the Newsweek - Washington Post mob will keep their lie / propaganda machines afloat, even at a loss, because G_d only knows, Israel and the corporate Mob needs all the help they can get, at least in their deranged minds. Meanwhile, us poor worker-bees who don't have mob protection will have to fend for ourselves.
BTW, I spent ten years in the TV biz. So I'm not going to drone on about the glorious altruism of the Judith Millers of the world and corporate con artists with an agenda. Let it bleed. The truth will survive and might even prosper. And please don't bother inviting me to the funeral.
Colapsing media & democracy
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 9:55 AM PDT.
Jack Shafer has constantly written saying the demise & worry about monopoly is overblown.
Susan Mernit replying to idea that newspapers gave their all to get on the web:
"For every honest attempt to change that Shafer and Boczkowski talk about, I saw many more efforts to avoid and even torpedo change: newspaper editors and executives who told me that it was not their job to help this internet thing, to share content with the internet, to link to anyone else on the internet, to interact with readers on the internet, to rethink their procedures because of the internet, to teach new skills because of the internet, to promote the internet, and on and on. I saw too many direct attempts to subvert the future. That's where the fault lies."
Problem is that the papers & news never cared much about democracy. When's the last time a paper ever asked their readers to rate their regular Op Ed contributors? Always thought that MJ did have that interest.
How does rating = democracy?
Submitted by Clara Jeffery on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 4:55 PM PDT.
Dear Anon 10:55 am:
As we laid out in our editorial, the media, mainstream (whatever that means) and otherwise, have certainly committed many sins, failed to innovate, etc. Some bathwater must go, no doubt. But there's a baby in there too.
As for your idea that papers ask readers to rate columnists, I'm afraid that the politics of what rules on Digg etc have pretty well proven that what would then thrive is sex and agitprop.
FWIW, it seems unfair to
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 12:15 PM PDT.
FWIW, it seems unfair to label All Things Considered among the list of "derivative" media outlets. NPR has a big, relatively well-resourced, and dedicated staff of real reporters who do the shoe leather reporting and break big stories. They've also got a lot of deadwood and self-important bloviators, and it's a crime that the top anchors and executives make 200 to 400k a year while the organization was laying people off this year -- but I would still suggest you mischaracterized NPR by including ATC in that list.
NPR is the bomb
Submitted by Clara Jeffery on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 5:00 PM PDT.
And of course they do do a ton of original reporting, but the point we were trying to make is that shows such as ATC are a mix of original reporting, commenting on reporting done elsewhere, follow-on reporting that began with a story elsewhere—this is true of magazines and papers and of course blogs too. Upshot, though is that if you eliminate huge swathes of reporting firepower, all the parasitic superstructure of news will come tumbling down. I just people forget that when they think, I don't need to read my paper, b/c I get my news from NPR that the logical conclusion of everybody doing that is that NPR would be critically weakened—as I'm sure the reporters there would say is true.
Clara Jeffery
Co-Editor
Mother Jones
Make it easy for readers to support
Submitted by Carbon Sink (not verified) on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 4:18 PM PDT.
> What it's going to take is for many more Americans to...
I'm not in the U.S. and I'd like to contribute. How come Paypal isn't an option? I've sent in the suggestion but it was rejected.
We Take PayPal
Submitted by Clara Jeffery on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 5:10 PM PDT.
Dear Carbon Sink:
MoJo takes PayPal. You can access our page through the "tip jar" in the tool bar at the top and bottom of every article and blog post. I'll try and paste in the link:
https://www.paypal.com/us/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_flow&SESSION=CaZjkC1DBKwG6...
you became willing conduits for power
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 7:36 PM PDT.
it won't really matter if all newspapers and tv news shows go under.
You see, 98 percent of all news media output is simply edited copy that was obtained from govt and corporations. Actual investigative reporting is a tiny fraction of all news.
When you media go under, the govts and corporations will just issue the news they want to issue. The PR flacks of the govts and corps will write the news they want to public to get and then put it on a website.
At least then it will not have the veneer of objectivity that the media give it now.
Evidence?
Submitted by Clara Jeffery on Mon Aug. 31, 2009 7:58 PM PDT.
You show me evidence of your point and I'll happily fact-check it. And if you feel that way, why are you reading this site or any other?
Am I an oxymoron?
Submitted by smcohn on Tue Sep. 1, 2009 8:26 AM PDT.
Re: The Price of Truth.
Until recently, I subscribed to the S.F. Chronicle and stuck by it's side for more years than I care to recall. I jumped ship two years ago to wallow in the world of "intelligent optimists". Feeling underwhelmed, I finally landed where I belong in "smart, fearless journalismville" only to be insulted by the editors. Based on my print subscription, I am willing to pay for the truth. I eat carefully, exercise regularly, recycle, re-use, conserve, served my country, question authority (and journalism) and teach all this to my children. But alas, I am on the Board of Directors of my local Chamber of Commerce. Before casting aspersions, consider that some of us muckrakers enjoy being involved in more than just muckraking. Does that make me an oxymoron, or you prejudiced?
Native San Franciscan
You don't seem oxymoronic to me
Submitted by Monika Bauerlein on Fri Sep. 4, 2009 11:10 PM PDT.
Thanks, smcohn, for subscribing. And for commenting. These are all terrific points, and--I know this sounds corny--we are honored for having readers like those in this thread.--Monika Bauerlein, MoJo co-editor.
What about informants?
Submitted by Jeni (not verified) on Tue Sep. 1, 2009 10:33 AM PDT.
Reading all these comments reminded me of Woodward & Bernstein and Deep Throat. NO reporting is enough without willing sources, albeit anonymous sometimes. I'm worried that whistleblowers are becoming a dying breed.
Truth or...
Submitted by borewell (not verified) on Tue Sep. 1, 2009 1:40 PM PDT.
I, for one, think this collective angst over the imminent demise of printed matter elides a primary fact: those purveyors are now making news because they were not very good at reporting it in the first place. Most of today's outlets process news: after spinning and redacting it, they serve it up hoping the reader/viewership will find it flavorful. People have had their fill of this unpalatable stuffing and look elsewhere to satisfy their cravings. Although it's fashionable to blame failure on other exigencies, the bottom line is that the mainstream 4th estate has not done its job very well. If newspapers were to offer points and counterpoints to enlarge the public debate in an effort to educate its readership with FACTS instead of trying to package news as drama, then maybe people would learn more, buy more often. I think that being information rich is better than being information poor. But then perhaps people just prefer to view/listen to manufactured soundbites rather than reading it.
Somewhere in the middle
Submitted by Lysergia Disflux (not verified) on Wed Sep. 2, 2009 1:15 PM PDT.
I've found it's best for me to read a variety of sources - from the big MSM like CNN/MSNBC etc all the way to out there like
Red Ice Creations - http://redicecreations.com/
Throw it all in, mix it up and the truth is somewhere in the middle.
Some Suggestions
Submitted by Kathy (not verified) on Fri Sep. 4, 2009 11:05 PM PDT.
Monika and Clara:
This reads as though y'all have not seen EPIC2015.
Newspapers, television and radio owners have held local, regional and national monopolies and oligopolies on audience eyeballs for most of the 20th century. In so doing, they could charge advertisers lots of money to connect their messages with those eyeballs. Today's digital technologies allow advertisers to skip the middleman (news media) and go straight to an increasingly large audience. This is the reality of the digital economy. I'm sure artisans of the 19th century sounded laments similar to yours with the rise of industrialization and, later, mass production, laments that were as fruitless as this hand-wringing. [Of course they did. They were called Luddites.]
Read Gibson and Stephenson and Card. They envisioned the world ours is turning into ... as far back as 30 years ago.
Contrary to the implication in your headline, newspapers do not have a monopoly on truth or public interest journalism. Let me point you to two examples: The Corporation, an award-winning indy film that is public interest journalism at its heart (and viewable in its entirety on YouTube) and Independent America: Rising from Ruins, an award-winning indy film chronicling the rebuilding of New Orleans. Both, ironically, have Canadian roots. Neither was funded by an institution like the NYT.
In response to Anonymous' comment about regurgitating official sources and press releases ... we need look no further than the NYT itself and its reliance on government sources in the run-up to Iraq to validate at least part of that comment. And in my market, I have counted the number of original (Seattle Times) articles versus the number of wire stories. The content is overwhelmingly non-local in origin. The majority of original-by-employees stories live on the sports pages -- and they are often equivalent to the number scattered through the other sections of the paper.
I feel little sympathy for the corporate owners of America's news media, even my non-national-chain Seattle Times.
"I don't mind so much that newspapers are dying -- it's watching them commit suicide that pisses me off." - Molly Ivins, 2006
I do feel for journalists who are having to deal with a job market destabilized by the digital economy. However, the only real difference between journalists and the coal, steel and autoworkers who experienced similar upheavals before them is that today's journalists have soapboxes from which to wail about the injustice of the change. Before you say, "but we need professional journalists or democracy will wither and die," let me close with quotes from two more esteemed journalists:
"Publishing is a business, but journalism never was and is not essentially a business." -- Henry Luce (founder of Time magazine)
"Journalism is our daybook, our collective diary, which records our common life." James W. Carey, 1998 (Columbia University)
In short, ladies, journalism is not owned by corporate media. Journalism will survive the death of its institutions.
--
Kathy E. Gill
Master of Communication, Digital Media
Department of Communication, University of Washington
http://uwdigitalmedia.org/
@kegill
Did we say it's about newspapers?
Submitted by Monika Bauerlein on Mon Sep. 7, 2009 9:49 PM PDT.
Kathy--thanks for the thoughts. Completely agree that the institutions of traditional journalism are riddled with problems--that's why we don't work in them. But there's nothing in our piece, let alone the headline, that suggests newspapers have a monopoly on information--or that any of this is about newspapers at all. What worries us is not that papers are dying, but that money for journalism is drying up. And all the save-journalism grants and crowdfunding experiments out there, no matter how groundbreaking and impressive, don't change that... If the institutional money flow were being replaced with something else, that'd be great, and anyone saying otherwise would be properly accused of living in in buggy-whip land. But as it is, we're replacing a vast universe of deeply flawed, but well funded institutions with... a vast universe of exciting, very poorly funded experiments. And what we're saying is, good riddance to the institutions, now who's going to pay for the journalism? I don't see anyone who has an answer, EPIC2015 included.
Transparency of Money
Submitted by Digidave (not verified) on Sat Sep. 5, 2009 7:52 PM PDT.
Monika and Clara
An excellent breakdown of where we are.
I agree: There is no silver bullet. I don't think subscriptions, advertising or nonprofit charity will replace entire news organizations by themselves.
As you bout know, however, I do believe that small donations can increase (that's part of what your post is aiming to increase as well). And it's not about big charities who, as you mention, are few and far between and lack transparency.
I wonder how many people donated to Mother Jones after reading this post?
I wonder how many MORE would have donated if you had the mechanisms to account for where the money was going to go? That is, of course, the whole theory behind Spot.Us. As you know - I'd love the opportunity to fundraise for Mother Jones and that way instead of asking people to donate just to donate, you could ask people to donate to make a specific project possible.
Hope all is well and as always - I am a fan of MoJo - so keep up the great work!
Amen to that
Submitted by Monika Bauerlein on Mon Sep. 7, 2009 9:52 PM PDT.
Digidave--Yes, transparency is terrific, and we think there's a ton of potential for small donations on a model like Spot.Us. Of course project-based funding alone won't give us the journalism we need--it won't pay for sending reporters down ratholes over and over again--but it can do a lot, and we're excited to find out just how much.
This piece does a great job
Submitted by Kay in TX (not verified) on Sat Sep. 12, 2009 5:50 AM PDT.
This piece does a great job explaining how expensive it is to report news. Most everything we see is the same news spit out over and over again with the reporters personal bias inserted into the story. In my opinion, if we still all got our news from Walter Cronkite this country wouldn't be as divided as it is today. Far too many people sit around all day listening to the venom spewed out of "journalists" mouths. Not only do they not get all the facts, they don't want the facts. They just want to read/hear the side of the story they agree with.
Wonderful post, good discussion
Submitted by susan mernit on Sat Sep. 12, 2009 6:48 PM PDT.
I was enjoying this discussion before I had the pleasure of seeing myself quoted in the comments. Newspapers are in trouble, especially the big ones, but this offers a great chance for reinvention and we are going to find our way. I am heartened by Spot.us, Dave Cohn's project, and by the eagerness of reporters like Kamika Dunlap and Elise Ackerman to work with smaill new sites like my Oakland Local (oaklandlocal.com), a news & community site for Oakland that Amy Gahran, Andrew Hoerner, Kwan Booth & myself are launching in about a week, with funding from J-Lab's new voices program(tiny funding.) What's the future? Flux.
