4 ms·

We as an industry have kicked around "how to save journalism" for years now. Here's what I've got: If you want journalism, sponsor endowments for journalists t

We as an industry have kicked around "how to save journalism" for years now. Here's what I've got: If you want journalism, sponsor endowments for journalists to report in certain areas, like foreign policy or local government. At the same time, and critically, sponsor endowments for editors to put a tight reign on these journalists. Completely decouple good journalism for hunting-for-eyeballs. Then let the content curators and aggregators make some kind of business out of it, if they can. In the past, whenever we consumed quality content, it was always there because some commercial interest paid for it to be there. Somehow we've forgotten about that. There has always been a difference between what the commercial interests wanted and what quality content demanded, but in the past the feedback loop was so slow and diffuse that good content happened anyway. This is no longer the case. So if you want good content, you're going to have to completely decouple it from commercial interests -- and apply rigorous quality standards as well. Good editors are sorely missing in modern content creation, and everybody seems to want to take the old models, including ad-sponsored material, and make them work. They will not work.

captainlego 10y ago
Would it be feasible to address the problem by passing laws that would penalize news organizations who publish/promote blatantly false information?
snarf21 10y ago
I agree with you but the unsolved problem is the "... and make some kind of business out of it, if they can". Netflix is $10 a month and look at all the value you get there. News will have to be half or (maybe much) less than that. Can you build a good news product on $1/month? I'm not sure you can. Additionally, how do you make people actually want the news? A sound bite or tweet or headline is super easy to digest and doesn't take a lot of time and makes people feel like they are in the know. Just regurgitate any article title and you're an expert. On top of that is the click baiting for eyeballs (driven by ad money) removing at least the journalistic integrity of putting out information with some basis of fact. True news will always have some bias but we have to find a way for it to not be ad supported. The only way I see that happening is some kind of subscription or independently wealthy patron.
- erikpukinskis 10y ago
  > Can you build a good news product on $1/month? Sure, find something 5000 people with a dollar go crazy for and then pay one person full time to investigate that stuff.
JumpCrisscross 10y ago
> If you want journalism... Buy newspapers. Ads, paywalls and the death of journalism are instrinsically linked. If you reject the first two then you promote the last. Endowment, patronage, and advertising share the problem of the person paying the bills not being the user.
- DanielBMarkham 10y ago
  The person paying the bills with newspapers never was the users in the first place. Newspapers were traditionally funded by advertising, not subscriptions.
LeifCarrotson 10y ago
> Completely decouple good journalism for hunting-for-eyeballs. Then let the content curators and aggregators make some kind of business out of it, if they can. You're just moving the eyeball-hunting to the aggregators. Clickbait works. The human brain is just plain vulnerable to certain stimuli, and a business which exploits this has an advantage over one which does not. In the short term, at least. If people will recognize this and choose to willfully select businesses which make a point to not do it, perhaps we can change things. There's just not enough public intent in this direction yet.
- ABCLAW 10y ago
  Clickbait works, but tabloids weren't shaping elections. Newspapers would use attention-grabbing headlines and cover photographs, but ultimately subscription would require people to make a decision about whether or not they gained recurring value from receiving the publication. Technological fatalism in this area undervalues history. This exact battle between sensationalism and quality is not a historical novelty. Tabloids were not out-competing the NYT. A more nuanced view shows that current trends aren't predestined, or even distribution medium specific.
hxta98596 10y ago
For the most part I agree. Some version of this has been discussed for years: basically a non-profit, non-commercial, bipartisan, transparent, independent, professional journalism organization(s) using an endowment or donation-based funding model seems to be one of the best options at the moment. The cynics and trolls will attack the idea that it's impossible. Ignore them of course, it is possible but it will not be perfect, and it must be open about it not being perfect. The pragmatists have the more valid pushback: implementing such a solution is still too difficult, too expensive, it will take too long and it may crowd-out remaining journalists who are still in business while discouraging other solutions coming forward. I think it can start small. It has to. But the seeds how this could work can be seen in organizations like C-SPAN, National Public Radio and Wikipedia (Yes, Wikipedia is also not perfect but it's pretty damn good and arguably better than for-profit journalism right now in terms accuracy and staying close to the center on stories). Expanding on those models has potential if support for doing so can be rallied and the idea can be paid for. Who knows, this could turn into a US version of Pravda, if it even gets off the ground. Maybe. But when current journalism is already a biased disaster still going out of business, what's the harm in trying a little experiment and giving other options like this a try?
- DanielBMarkham 10y ago
  You know, baseball is quite the pastime in the US. Professional players make a lot of money and have their salaries paid for by wealthy folks. (Where they get their money is important, but let's ignore it for now) But there are a ton of folks playing baseball for a small salary -- the minor leagues. There's also scads of folks playing baseball recreationally. I don't see any reason professional news journalism couldn't be done in a similar way: more secure, rewarding jobs for those at the top of their fields paid for by a permanent endowment. A "middle league" that may only get internet like points or small payments for worth contributions. And tons of folks yukking it up on the sidelines doing the best they can and hoping one day to make it to the major leagues.
  - hxta98596 10y ago
    I get what you're saying. Though I'm not sure baseball is the best example here as baseball is kind of broken right now. Look at the strikes, bargaining issues and communist cartel of baseball team owners needing to cooperate to keep it together, just barely. Other industries have similar development programs like pro baseball's farm and minor leagues. But all these are getting difficult to maintain. Pro baseball teams supporting minor leagues isn't what it used to be and they have become harder to afford. Still I agree there are many lessons to take from what baseball does well and not so well. I do agree a lesson from baseball is that the best in journalism should be highly paid for their work. Journalism needs to continue to attract and retain talented professionals who are compensated competitively. This is harder than it might sound though. Professional baseball players don't really have their salaries paid for by wealthy folks; rather players make a lot of money because of MLB television and media rights in the billions of dollars. Players play 162 games on television every season so TV commercials and expensive TV cable packages is what pays for baseball. One big advantage if the endowment model can be pulled off and funded as a source for journalists income is it could in theory help minimize the corruption and pandering to advertisers at the higher levels of journalism too.

captainlego 10y ago

Would it be feasible to address the problem by passing laws that would penalize news organizations who publish/promote blatantly false information?

snarf21 10y ago

I agree with you but the unsolved problem is the "... and make some kind of business out of it, if they can". Netflix is $10 a month and look at all the value you get there. News will have to be half or (maybe much) less than that. Can you build a good news product on $1/month? I'm not sure you can. Additionally, how do you make people actually want the news? A sound bite or tweet or headline is super easy to digest and doesn't take a lot of time and makes people feel like they are in the know. Just regurgitate any article title and you're an expert. On top of that is the click baiting for eyeballs (driven by ad money) removing at least the journalistic integrity of putting out information with some basis of fact. True news will always have some bias but we have to find a way for it to not be ad supported. The only way I see that happening is some kind of subscription or independently wealthy patron.

erikpukinskis 10y ago
> Can you build a good news product on $1/month? Sure, find something 5000 people with a dollar go crazy for and then pay one person full time to investigate that stuff.

JumpCrisscross 10y ago

> If you want journalism... Buy newspapers. Ads, paywalls and the death of journalism are instrinsically linked. If you reject the first two then you promote the last. Endowment, patronage, and advertising share the problem of the person paying the bills not being the user.

DanielBMarkham 10y ago
The person paying the bills with newspapers never was the users in the first place. Newspapers were traditionally funded by advertising, not subscriptions.

LeifCarrotson 10y ago

> Completely decouple good journalism for hunting-for-eyeballs. Then let the content curators and aggregators make some kind of business out of it, if they can. You're just moving the eyeball-hunting to the aggregators. Clickbait works. The human brain is just plain vulnerable to certain stimuli, and a business which exploits this has an advantage over one which does not. In the short term, at least. If people will recognize this and choose to willfully select businesses which make a point to not do it, perhaps we can change things. There's just not enough public intent in this direction yet.

ABCLAW 10y ago
Clickbait works, but tabloids weren't shaping elections. Newspapers would use attention-grabbing headlines and cover photographs, but ultimately subscription would require people to make a decision about whether or not they gained recurring value from receiving the publication. Technological fatalism in this area undervalues history. This exact battle between sensationalism and quality is not a historical novelty. Tabloids were not out-competing the NYT. A more nuanced view shows that current trends aren't predestined, or even distribution medium specific.

hxta98596 10y ago

For the most part I agree. Some version of this has been discussed for years: basically a non-profit, non-commercial, bipartisan, transparent, independent, professional journalism organization(s) using an endowment or donation-based funding model seems to be one of the best options at the moment. The cynics and trolls will attack the idea that it's impossible. Ignore them of course, it is possible but it will not be perfect, and it must be open about it not being perfect. The pragmatists have the more valid pushback: implementing such a solution is still too difficult, too expensive, it will take too long and it may crowd-out remaining journalists who are still in business while discouraging other solutions coming forward. I think it can start small. It has to. But the seeds how this could work can be seen in organizations like C-SPAN, National Public Radio and Wikipedia (Yes, Wikipedia is also not perfect but it's pretty damn good and arguably better than for-profit journalism right now in terms accuracy and staying close to the center on stories). Expanding on those models has potential if support for doing so can be rallied and the idea can be paid for. Who knows, this could turn into a US version of Pravda, if it even gets off the ground. Maybe. But when current journalism is already a biased disaster still going out of business, what's the harm in trying a little experiment and giving other options like this a try?

DanielBMarkham 10y ago
You know, baseball is quite the pastime in the US. Professional players make a lot of money and have their salaries paid for by wealthy folks. (Where they get their money is important, but let's ignore it for now) But there are a ton of folks playing baseball for a small salary -- the minor leagues. There's also scads of folks playing baseball recreationally. I don't see any reason professional news journalism couldn't be done in a similar way: more secure, rewarding jobs for those at the top of their fields paid for by a permanent endowment. A "middle league" that may only get internet like points or small payments for worth contributions. And tons of folks yukking it up on the sidelines doing the best they can and hoping one day to make it to the major leagues.
- hxta98596 10y ago
  I get what you're saying. Though I'm not sure baseball is the best example here as baseball is kind of broken right now. Look at the strikes, bargaining issues and communist cartel of baseball team owners needing to cooperate to keep it together, just barely. Other industries have similar development programs like pro baseball's farm and minor leagues. But all these are getting difficult to maintain. Pro baseball teams supporting minor leagues isn't what it used to be and they have become harder to afford. Still I agree there are many lessons to take from what baseball does well and not so well. I do agree a lesson from baseball is that the best in journalism should be highly paid for their work. Journalism needs to continue to attract and retain talented professionals who are compensated competitively. This is harder than it might sound though. Professional baseball players don't really have their salaries paid for by wealthy folks; rather players make a lot of money because of MLB television and media rights in the billions of dollars. Players play 162 games on television every season so TV commercials and expensive TV cable packages is what pays for baseball. One big advantage if the endowment model can be pulled off and funded as a source for journalists income is it could in theory help minimize the corruption and pandering to advertisers at the higher levels of journalism too.