Sorry for the slow response. Came down with a cold and haven't felt very lucid. I'm just talking about positive externalities: anywhere the social value create

Sorry for the slow response. Came down with a cold and haven't felt very lucid. I'm just talking about positive externalities: anywhere the social value created by producing + consuming local news exceeds the social cost of producing + consuming it. It seems like you're focused more on the consumption side (i.e., pearl-clutching over whether people spend their time/money consuming local news, or whatever they spend time/money on instead). I wouldn't say that the consumption side is irrelevant, but I'm more concerned about the production side. For example: The social value of reporting out a local corruption scandal isn't necessarily linked to the market value of the associated column-inches. The lion's share of the social value comes from rooting out the corruption. Try flipping it around. If a news outlet had enough metrics on past scandal coverage to know that breaking it won't increase profits, should they make a shrewd decision to accept payment from one or more participants in the scandal to bury the story, save the time on reporting it out, and run a wire piece in its place?