Another parliamentary inquiry into how to rescue public interest journalism has come and gone, having raised barely a ripple. Is it because nobody cares? Is it because there’s no money in it? Is it because there really isn’t a problem to begin with? Or is it because we’re stuck inside an old mindset?

Certainly, if you read the dissenting comments by the Coalition senators from the report of the Senate Select Committee on the Future of Public Interest Journalism, you would be forgiven for thinking this was another exercise in leftist navel-gazing by the chronically nostalgic pining for a world that no longer exists, if it ever did. 

“Hold on,” I hear you say. “There’s been a parliamentary inquiry into public interest journalism? Why didn’t I hear about this?” Well, you were told, but the news was probably overwhelmed by the focus on the Barnaby saga and Australia’s apparently pressing need to cut corporate taxes.

The Senate inquiry was announced last May, a response to further waves of redundancies in the Australian mainstream media, concerns about ‘fake news’ in the wake of Trump’s election and the Brexit vote, and a general need to canvass ideas about new funding models for journalism, including government support.

The inquiry soon lost traction, however, as its four main parliamentary proponents – Labor Senator Sam Dastyari, Greens Senator Scott Ludlam and crossbenchers Nick Xenophon and Jackie Lambie – all departed federal politics in the past year, (Ludlam and Lambie over the dual citizenship saga, Xenophon to SA politics and Dastyari because of his clumsy lobbying on behalf of Chinese interests). As journalism academic Margaret Simons noted, the committee became a zombie, dead before it began.

“This, combined with the reflex hostility of the government to the committee’s existence, let alone its findings, guarantees its recommendations will be ignored, just like those of its predecessors,” Simons wrote. “Given this woeful history, it’s reasonable to ask why the issue of the future of journalism keeps being investigated, and why so little action results.”

Sure enough, the final report, released early this month, tells us what we already knew – that the significant disruption of traditional media by digital technology has only accelerated since the last government report, the Finklestein Inquiry into Media and Media Regulation of 2012 (PDF).   Another 2,000 jobs have gone in the industry since then, standards have declined, resources for investigative work have been cut and even the ABC, as we have seen recently, is increasingly buckling to political pressure.

If you’re a long-time follower of this blog, you’ll know I’ve been writing and presenting on this story virtually non-stop for nearly a decade. (Such is my influence).

But it is an intractable problem. An effective democracy depends in part on a strong, independent fourth estate that holds power to account. But with the subsidy of classified advertising gone, how do we pay for it? We’re talking here, by the way, about hard graft accountability journalism – coverage of courts and council meetings and the relentless questioning of the powerful. This is public interest journalism, as defined by Monash academic and former reporter Dr Bill Birnbauer as “journalism that provides new information on issues of public importance that governments, companies and powerful interests may want to keep secret”. Think about Buzzfeed reporter Alice Workman’s dogged coverage of the AFP raids on the Australian Workers Union.

The skint nature of the media is ironic because the most profitable business in the world right now is the one that is about monetising your attention. The problem is it’s not traditional media companies that are winning. Digital platforms like Google and Facebook are hoovering up 80-90% of the advertising revenue that might formerly have funded journalism. Indeed, Google and Facebook have market capitalisations that dwarf the values of even established media companies like News Corp, the New York Times and CBS. For once, I agree with Rupert Murdoch. The digital platforms fail to recognise the social value of professional journalism and need to put their hands into their overflowing pockets to pay for it. (But don’t hold your breath).

 In the meantime, the Australian Senate Committee’s final report actually makes a couple of positive recommendations that even the Coalition members left the door open to – one is extending deductible gift recipient (DGR) status to not-for-profit news media organisations that adhere to “appropriate standards of practice” for public interest journalism. The second is allowing Australians to claim as a tax deduction the cost of subscriptions to outlets that produce public interest journalism.

“The acceptance of these ideas – their move from being roundly mocked to broadly accepted – suggests a serious attempt to get them implemented might soon be successful,” Simons said. 

In his own submission to the inquiry, former Fairfax business columnist and now self-employed investigative journalist Michael West said he had found significant demand for quality independent journalism, particularly in relation to multinational tax avoidance. But the fact is he is financially stretched, funding himself solely from his Fairfax redundancy money and non-tax-deductible donations from his supporters.

“Delving into tax rorts and bank scandals, and exposing corporate and political chicanery, requires resources and commitment. What is desperately needed is an alternative source of revenue,” West wrote, noting that even the climate denialist body, the IPA, has charitable and DGR status. “The issue here is not free speech. The IPA, like any other organisation, is entitled to express its opinions. Rather, the issue is a level playing field where public interest journalism is, at the very least, afforded a level playing field with advocacy bodies when it comes to public funding.”

West is a great journalist, but he’s only one lawsuit away from going out of business. That is the challenge for individual operators like him. Which is why another submission, from the Business Council of Cooperatives and Mutuals, caught this blogger’s eye. Independent journalists could be so much stronger as part of a collective, ones with multiple stakeholders that include crowdfunding members and supporters. The New Internationalist magazine is such an enterprise, a truly independent media co-operative dedicated to socially conscious journalism and publishing.

Will people pay for public interest journalism? Certainly, one of the trailblazers of the digital economy, Amazon founder and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos, has stated what many of us have been saying for the years – the media needs to drop its reliance on advertising and charge readers directly. The traditional comeback is that people won’t pay for journalism or music or movies. (“Everything is free now”) But recent experiences around ‘fake news’, cynical click-bait, tiresome culture wars and trolling tabloids suggest many citizens now see the innate value of quality journalism.

The trick is creating a price-point that is low enough to attract a decent audience, but high enough to provide a living income for writers and editors. That should be easier if media companies stop trying to be all things to all people, scale back traditional, pricey distribution (print) and invest more in actual journalism (finding out stuff we don’t know) than in paying demagogues to spout their (usually ill-informed) opinions.

This means smaller, leaner (and virtual) newsrooms of highly specialist writers and editors, articulate and skilled across all media and able to turn around high-quality copy that holds the powerful to account.

Big media attracts big owners, who want to push their agenda. Better for journalists to own this as a cooperative, subscription-service – think a Netflix or Spotify of journalism, in which subscribers pay $10 a month. Business functions (like public liability insurance and legal counsel) can be outsourced. This seems an idea worth investigating and there are certainly plenty of journalists out there with time on their hands who could make it work.

What do you think?

See also: Ben Eltham, ‘We Should Levy Google and Facebook to Fund Journalism’

 


4 Comments

Melina Morrison · February 25, 2018 at 10:32 PM

Thanks for calling out this potential solution Mr Denmore. One needs look no further than the most famous media cooperative of all, Associated Press, to realize the power of cooperation when scaled. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Associated_Press More media cooperatives are forming around the shared interests of readers and journalists for independent, public interest journalism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Media_cooperative

Lt. Fred · February 25, 2018 at 10:59 PM

The really insane thing is that many newspapers are not even going broke. Look at the books – they’re making a solid 1-2% profit every year. That’s enough to live on, if not enough for a commercial return. One idea I’ve been bouncing around is to buy out the big corporates and have the news run and owned directly by the journos and other employees. Give the corporates the option to sell to their employees, subsidised by the public if need be. They’ll probably figure it out better them stupid old Rupert anyway.

    mackak · February 26, 2018 at 6:58 AM

    Lt.Fred I don’t think anyone will have to buy any of the current newspaper names. They will not be worth anything and the current companies that own them will likely have debts when the newspapers are finally closed unless they change how they operate. Current attempts to charge readers haven’t been working very well, at least not at Fairfax as far as it appears (we haven’t had any news on that).

Noely (@YaThinkN) · February 26, 2018 at 8:04 AM

I can’t remember the name of it and was a decade ago, but a Scandanavian online publication did a ‘netflix’ style news service. Though was focussed more on how they paid their contributors. BUT in the case above – very good case I might add – it had many different rates for different types of access. Again, this is only from memory but had a large sport section, so you could actually pay to subscribe to sport only, you also had option to subscribe (for a pittance) to particular journalists only, or particular number of articles per month, or full subscription to whole site.

When I was looking at it, was more looking at the software side of it, as obviously the type of subscriptions & views affected how much each journalist earned, so the permissions and membership access to be built into software to run this sort of thing for fascinating for me.

BUT ten years later as a subscriber, or way too many patreon accounts and Indy journalists. Something like this would really be useful for me. Currently I am having an issue with many as our Credit card changed. So some not being paid, trying to track down on different systems how to edit my payment details etc etc. I realise there would still be some that you paid directly, but if a heap of the smaller Indy ones were to join this Netflix style suggestion of Mr Denmores, well, that would also be good for us readers/subscribers as well?

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