3 ms·

"But the press of today is a for profit endeavour." It is worth paying attention to the significant rise in prominence of non-profit newsrooms, particularly in

by simonw 1y ago

"But the press of today is a for profit endeavour." It is worth paying attention to the significant rise in prominence of non-profit newsrooms, particularly in the USA. Some notable examples: The Baltimore Banner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Baltimore_Banner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Baltimore_Banner Founded: 2022 ProPublica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ProPublica https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ProPublica Founded: 2007 The Texas Tribune https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Texas_Tribune https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Texas_Tribune Founded: 2009 The Marshall Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Marshall_Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Marshall_Project Founded: 2014 I'm particularly excited about the Baltimore Banner, who are only a few years old but are earning sizable subscription revenue now (it's healthy for them not to be too dependent on donors).

BeetleB 1y ago
I didn't realize Pro Publica is that "new". I've been following them for almost as long. They are fantastic.
- Forgeties79 1y ago
  Definitely a template. I can’t think of a single major issue I’ve had with anything they’ve put out. I’m sure something exists, I haven’t read literally everything they’ve put out stall, but I have been very impressed with everything I have seen.
rootusrootus 1y ago
I would like to see more information like this, thanks for sharing. Though at least one of those examples has a red flag for me - The Baltimore Banner gets a non-trivial amount revenue from advertising. For me personally, I feel like advertising is directly at odds with quality journalism. I would also be interested to hear about how older small and alternate news sources compare to these newer ones. To use an example I'm familiar with, Willamette Week in Portland has a reputation of being halfway decent. Though to be fair, it also has advertising, and does not even have subscriptions since 1984.
- simonw 1y ago
  "For me personally, I feel like advertising is directly at odds with quality journalism." Advertising is how journalism has worked since journalism first started. Running a newspaper used to be a fantastic business, because you effectively had a local monopoly on advertising to a geographic area. If someone wanted to promote things in your city, you would be top of their list. Facebook, Google, Craigslist etc completely decimated that business model over the past 20 years and the news industry is still trying to figure out how to fund itself via alternative means. Historically news organizations have had very strong mechanisms for avoiding advertisers influencing their coverage - the "editorial–advertising firewall". Reputable new orgs like the Baltimore Banner should have policies like that in place today.
  - chaps 1y ago
    Getting grants is an alternative way and it's how freelancers are able to do reporting for cash-strapped newsrooms. Grants definitely have their own can of worms, though. Things like restrictive reporting requirements, do-not-do requirements, and the dynamics that just come from people giving other people relatively large sums of money.
    - simonw 1y ago
      Yeah, the problem with grants is that even with no strings attached there's still a subtle influence where a publication may not want to harm the interests of the source if that grant since they might not provide more funds in the future.
      - Karrot_Kream 1y ago
        I don't know if it's possible to ever be completely free of outside influence. If anything, I think standards for publishing have become so low that any incentive model that helps keep a majority of facts straight should be the goal. The loss of traditional publishing gatekeepers has just generated a lot of noise and in that noise non-mainstream viewpoints have thrived.
  - 1y ago

by simonw 1y ago

BeetleB 1y ago

I didn't realize Pro Publica is that "new". I've been following them for almost as long. They are fantastic.

Forgeties79 1y ago
Definitely a template. I can’t think of a single major issue I’ve had with anything they’ve put out. I’m sure something exists, I haven’t read literally everything they’ve put out stall, but I have been very impressed with everything I have seen.

rootusrootus 1y ago

I would like to see more information like this, thanks for sharing. Though at least one of those examples has a red flag for me - The Baltimore Banner gets a non-trivial amount revenue from advertising. For me personally, I feel like advertising is directly at odds with quality journalism. I would also be interested to hear about how older small and alternate news sources compare to these newer ones. To use an example I'm familiar with, Willamette Week in Portland has a reputation of being halfway decent. Though to be fair, it also has advertising, and does not even have subscriptions since 1984.

simonw 1y ago
"For me personally, I feel like advertising is directly at odds with quality journalism." Advertising is how journalism has worked since journalism first started. Running a newspaper used to be a fantastic business, because you effectively had a local monopoly on advertising to a geographic area. If someone wanted to promote things in your city, you would be top of their list. Facebook, Google, Craigslist etc completely decimated that business model over the past 20 years and the news industry is still trying to figure out how to fund itself via alternative means. Historically news organizations have had very strong mechanisms for avoiding advertisers influencing their coverage - the "editorial–advertising firewall". Reputable new orgs like the Baltimore Banner should have policies like that in place today.
- chaps 1y ago
  Getting grants is an alternative way and it's how freelancers are able to do reporting for cash-strapped newsrooms. Grants definitely have their own can of worms, though. Things like restrictive reporting requirements, do-not-do requirements, and the dynamics that just come from people giving other people relatively large sums of money.
  - simonw 1y ago
    Yeah, the problem with grants is that even with no strings attached there's still a subtle influence where a publication may not want to harm the interests of the source if that grant since they might not provide more funds in the future.
    - Karrot_Kream 1y ago
      I don't know if it's possible to ever be completely free of outside influence. If anything, I think standards for publishing have become so low that any incentive model that helps keep a majority of facts straight should be the goal. The loss of traditional publishing gatekeepers has just generated a lot of noise and in that noise non-mainstream viewpoints have thrived.
- 1y ago