Update, March 11, 3:04pm: Here’s a link to the show.

Original post: I’ll be on Betsy Richter’s @redoingmedia show tomorrow at 1pm on pdx.fm talking about efforts—which I first reported on last November—to get a nonprofit media model going here in Portland.

Over recent weeks I’ve been asking those involved in a “nonprofit media incubator” whether they might actually get something off the ground in the next, you know, decade. I even bet a couple of them $10 that they couldn’t have a story up by August, and Tweeted this, when they told me the “incubator” isn’t about stories, but herding cats, or some such:

davisquote1.gif

Since then, I heard that quote eerily echoed by Rupert Murdoch in a series of Australian lectures he delivered in the 1990s. “Whingeing about technology will get you nowhere,” he said. “The more serious challenge is the complacency and condescension that festers in the heart of most newsrooms.”

Or in this case, of course, in most efforts to get a non-profit media model off the ground in Portland. For the time being it seems to me that the prospect of a paycheck—of generating and capturing some kind of value from one’s journalistic efforts—is the greatest motivator in this business. Anyway, all of this will be up for discussion on the air tomorrow at 1. So I hope you tune in and Tw-engage with your questions to #wmtm (“we make the media”) or @redoingmedia.

Matt Davis was news editor of the Mercury from 2009 to May 2010.

14 replies on “Discussing Non-Profit Media on pdx.fm”

  1. Perhaps it is reporters wasting time on twitter instead of an actual expansive and dynamic medium.

  3. Well, Twitter has more than a couple faults, but if I listed it’s good points I’d START with “expansive” and “dynamic.” Weird that you should pick those words – that’s exactly what it DOES do well! Millions of users in real-time. Expansive and dynamic.

  6. Matt –

    I think you’ve oversimplified things. It’s not that a paycheck is a journalist’s top motivator. It’s that we have mortgages and rents and car payments to make.

    It takes time, effort and experience to inform readers with a depth of information and a variety of perspectives. It’s hard to do that properly, and in a timely manner, when you’re spending your days (or nights) at another job.

  7. Nick: Of course we’re living beings in the real world. And I’m not unconvinced that a nonprofit model might work.

    The question for Oregon appears to be whether divorcing commerce from the writing means divorcing value and relevance, also motivation, too.

    Currently the motivation certainly seems to be lacking. That’s not to say that models like Blue Oregon and Bike Portland aren’t relevant. Although they’re not necessarily sustainable in the long term, or reflective of what I think the broader community wants to be thinking about most of the time. That’s the value question.

    Then, of course, there’s the question of what Oregonians do value. And I think that many of us new arrivals are still trying to figure that out.

    @Chunty: Don’t forget I went on Victoria Taft this morning 😉

  8. A nonprofit model does work: Look at OPB. They do great work as non-profits, and I’m fairly sure their journalists are compensated for their efforts.

    BikePortland, Blue Oregon, etc. have their place, and at times offer important, original reporting. But they are, at the end of the day, advocates — and I think they will admit as much. Professionals — at for-profit or non-profit outlets — are trained to overcome their biases to present both sides.

    Unfortunately, I think that means a startup, nonprofit Web site is not going to be particularly sexy to read. That’s the rub. Who wants to follow a site that plays it down the middle? Even you guys have figured out that coming with an edge, and sometimes a flat out angle, sells online. In some cases, I think it’s come at the expense of trustworthiness.

    So does this mythical outlet play it down the middle and hope people catch on? Or does it border on advocacy, developing a following but at the expense of fair reporting? (Gee, where have we seen that model before?)

  9. Have you been to the Sentinel’s site this afternoon? We’ve got Todd Barnhart winning his $10 bet, and then a MAD post by Richard Ellmyer.

  10. Twitter isn’t expansive by rate limiting it’s signal.

    Twitter isn’t dynamic because it is so restrictive with its format and horrible signal noise ratio.

    Jackattack has no idea what unicode is.

  11. Oh it’s also a complete security nightmare as a platform, which I suppose in my line of work is a plus.

  12. I will say it’s harder than hell to create revenue for SR the newspaper itself, and the staff time it takes to creating a viable product. (Which by the way, is a credible news source.)

    Most of the money earned by SR, from foundations, individuals, etc. is geared towards working with people on the streets. We do have some contributors and large donors that simply believe in grassroots media, but they are few and far between.

    Saying that. I don’t think it’s impossible to vision a foundation that is created in Oregon, or for the Pacific Northwest that is geared towards funding media projects, or specific media outlets.

    There’s two kinds of media that I believe could benefit from a newly found foundation dedicated to such efforts. One being the old school journalists and editors who believe in whatever they imagine fair and balanced news to be. (Which I find very boring and so Robber Baron era) and/or something that supported a more grassroots, Upton Sinclair kind of media that works on specific issues, like oh, say, bikes, poverty, minority communities, politics, etc.

    I think the Pacific Northwest is progressive enough to support such a venture at the grassroots level. The question becomes does the leadership exist to create such a foundation, or movement? If the Arts community can do it at a grassroots level, why can’t media?

    For the old school journalist, the question becomes are their venture capitalists and business minded individuals w/deep pockets that care enough about media to keep things “fair and balanced.” I believe big business is big business is big business. If the industry shifts, they won’t have any problem bringing their advertising dollars or sponsorships or foundation money over to a non-profit ran media. In fact, it may be easier. They can write it off. Does that kind of muscle exist to create such an engine?

    Lastly, if this has all been discussed or thrown out before, I apologize. I haven’t attended any of the conversations on the subject.

    – Israel Bayer

  13. The other aspect, that nobody wants to discuss, is that there’s no problem with a non-profit news site. The problem is the usual situation of the contributors continuing to work for free while the editors fight (in some cases, literally) over who gets to become the first full-time paid staffer. It’s a problem all over, but it seems to be a particularly bad one in Portland: announce a new publication, and suddenly the masthead is full of old buddies of the founder whose sole experience is driving their own publications into the ground.

    The other factor is whether or not anyone’s talking about legitimate financing, instead of the usual “we’ll hype it up and wait until someone comes along and gives us lots of money with no strings” dance. We’re talking more than the also sadly usual game of getting enough money for one issue and assuming that it’ll sell well enough to finance issues two and three. Making this work will probably require at least one year, and preferably two years, of funding before it comes close to being self-sustaining, and IOUs from attention-seeking flakes won’t cut it. Will someone actually step up and hand over this kind of cash, or will we see a news site with an actual business plan? Or will we see yet another potential news venue implode because “we don’t want to ask for money because that’s soooooo commercial”?

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