HuffPost's Investigative Fund: New Slice of a New News Pie

The AP reports that Huffington Post is announcing the creation of a $1.75 million fund with various donors to pay for investigative reporting. First target: the economy.

This, I've long held, is where foundation and public support will enter into the new ecosystem of journalism: not by taking over newspapers but by funding investigations and other slices of a new journalistic pie.

I've been hoping to get the resources to preform an audit of the current resource allocation in journalism: Take a town, add up all the journalistic spending there (paper, TV, radio, magazine) and then see how much is spent on investigative reporting (I'll wager it will be tiny; a fraction of a percent of the total) as well as the beat reporting that feeds it - and judge the value of the results.

When we see that number, I predict, it will be feasible to imagine support from foundations and the public (that is, in the NPR and Spot.US models) to pay for investigative journalism. Indeed, I'll bet that we could multiply the amount spent on and the output of investigative reporting today. This is how to subsidize news. It's happening now, as ProPublica stories run in The New York Times. That is a form of subsidy.

Now to touch the third rail in the debate over the future of news: This is how paid content will work, how news will get money from its public -- not by putting content behind walls and charging all readers (the few who'll remain) to see it but instead by setting up systems to take advantage of the 1 percent rule online that decrees you need only a limited number of contributors (of money or effort) to support great things in a gift economy. See: Wikipedia and NPR. But the public's contributions won't go to lifting the sinking Titanics of the old-media failures; I don't want to contribute to failed newspapers anymore than I want my tax money to go to failed banks and their dividends and salaries. Instead, contributions will need to go directly to supporting work people care about.

The future of journalism is not about some single new-fangled product and company taking over from the old-fangled and monopolistic predecessor. News come from a broad ecosystem with many players adding in under many models for many reasons. News organizations will organize news in this diverse new framework, aggregating, curating, organizing. Laid-off journalists are starting blogs, alongside other bloggers. Some people will volunteer, podcasting their school-board meetings, just because they care. When we demand transparency from government as a default, data will become part of the news ecosystem we can all examine. Some of this will be supported by advertising, some by contributions from foundations, some by contributions from individuals, some by volunteer effort. And it will all add up to a new pie, one slice of which will be efforts such as the one HuffPost is announcing.

Comments

[jerrydenim]

Sounds great, very commendable, except who are those "various donors"?

Just how far is an serious investigative effort of the financial industry going if donations are coming from Jamie Dimon or Vikram Pandit? Careful who's money you're taking if you really want to investigate.

Go get 'em Arianna!

[american-dolt]

I like this idea muchly

[PlanetKansas]

Why don't you use your fund to directly finance journalism students in college to apply their education towards investigative journalism?

The project would be limited to only state universities to eliminate any bias from religion or wealth, and the journalism faculty could provide oversight and monitoring of ethics (theoretically). This could create a whole new generation of journalists as opposed to the current tactics practiced by

BYU has a journalism program dedicated to cloning attractive, non-controversial "news anchors" Though perfect for the current MSM environment, it makes me shudder.

Funding investigative journalism at the college level would create a whole new generation of reporters based on fact finding instead of feeding the current MSM model of advertising disguised as an info-factory.

[janiepants]

I don't know. I like Huffingtonpost-but it's not exactly non-bias. I'd like C-span or something like that to follow this model plan/ I just want the facts and let me arrive at my own conclusion.

[PeaceMongerToo]

Viva La revolucion!! Finally good questioning.

[CarmanK]

A free press is vital to our democracy. Thank you Arianna for taking the lead on this issue. Good investigative reporting is what really keeps us safe.

[oxygen]

a revolucion

[joanVA]

As major newspapers go under, this initiative will help keep investigative reporting alive and well. Thanks!

[politicky]

Looks good. Can they please hire Greg Palast?

[candyc]

This is a GREAT idea! You go Arianna!