[MGP-Forum Announce] Sustaining, organizing news organizations of the future

[Barry Parr]

I don't see many advantages to going non-profit right now.  The big
advantage is that I *might* be able to get some grants to give
Coastsider the capital to get to break-even. But even the prospect of
writing grants instead of journalism makes me weary. The whole process
seems design to extract maximum mediocrity from applicants.

Also, I've seen non-profit boards in action and I want nothing to do
with the process.  Our local public-access station is mired in
timidity and pleasing its funders to a degree that they've forgotten
they're chartered to serve the citizens and not their funders.

My other problem is that Coastside politics is highly polarized. That
makes it a challenge to build a board. I'm a moderate, but not neutral
by any means. I don't want Coastsider to be a creature of one side or
the other, or mindlessly "objective", but it's hard to find enough
moderates who care enough to nurture the project.

I am considering is convening an advisory board of local journalists
(who don't practice locally) who have taken an interest in Coastsider.
It might help me get some clarity on this and some other things.

But Lisa put her finger on the contradictions: It's the individual
voice that makes these sites sing, but individual ownership is a very
fragile structure for an institution and non-profits and co-ops are
not ideal structures for bringing out individual voices.

bp

-- 
Barry Parr

http://coastsider.com

650.523.4929 phone
815.572.0794 fax
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