Nonprofit and philanthropic models offer new hope for journalism
As the commercial model faltered, nonprofit newsrooms and philanthropy emerged as a growing force in the press.
As the commercial model that had long sustained journalism continued to falter, nonprofit newsrooms and philanthropic funding emerged this year as a growing and increasingly important force in the press, offering new hope for sustaining the public-service journalism that the collapse of traditional revenues had imperilled.
The nonprofit model, in which journalism is funded by donations, grants, foundations and philanthropy rather than primarily by advertising or subscriptions, had expanded significantly, with a growing number of nonprofit news organisations established at the national, state and local levels.
These organisations focused often on investigative and public-service journalism, accountability reporting, and coverage of underserved communities and topics, areas that the shrinking commercial press struggled to support, filling gaps left by the decline of traditional newspapers.
Philanthropic funding played a growing role, as foundations and individual donors, recognising the civic importance of journalism and the crisis facing the industry, directed substantial resources toward supporting news organisations, initiatives and the broader effort to sustain the press.
The nonprofit and philanthropic model offered advantages, insulating journalism to some degree from commercial pressures and aligning it with public-service missions, but it also raised questions about sustainability, scale, and the influence of funders, as well as whether philanthropy could fill the vast gap left by the collapse of commercial journalism.
The growth of nonprofit and philanthropically funded journalism represented one of the most significant developments in the effort to reinvent the economics of the press for the digital age. While not a complete solution to the crisis facing journalism, it had become an increasingly vital part of the ecosystem, offering a measure of hope that essential public-service journalism could be sustained, and marking an important evolution in the long history of how the press is funded and organised.