rssA Mission of Independence
Tuesday, December 18, 2007 at 3:41 pm
- 3 Comments
<p>I thought I’d respond to Danny Glover’s post on <a href="http://beltwayblogroll.nationaljournal.com/">Beltway Blogroll</a>, where he argues the use of the word “independent” in the name of the Center for Independent Media and <em>The Washington Independent</em> is “misleading” Glover would prefer us to be called The Center for Progressive Media, and the Washington Progressive because “it would be far more truthful.” Yet, the Center’s mission, which can be read <a href="http://http://beltwayblogroll.nationaljournal.com/">here</a> is dedicated foremost to the advancement of independent news media, by training bloggers and citizen journalists to conduct investigative reporting that adheres to the highest standards of the profession.</p>
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<p>When I founded the Center in May 2006, the thinking was that people were increasingly turning to the blogs to get “news I can’t find elsewhere” (See BlogAds reader surveys for this interesting and critical reader motivation) as a response to the lack of news diversity in the established news media. The consolidation of news sources has rapidly reduced the breadth of news sources available to the public. The Internet, and the self publishing model of the blogs, offers the best and most obvious solution to what I think we can all agree is a terrible trend in a democracy: the shrinking of the press, especially an independent press. So what I mean by “independent” is news media that isn’t part of one of the few major conglomerates that produce most of our news. When the bulk of our news comes from these conglomerates, what we are left with is a monotone of information: a very narrow spectrum of news to inform the public on the great issues of our time. And when it comes to holding government accountable for its actions, a homogeneous press owned by a few conglomerates with business before Congress and federal agencies is an effective guarantor of a toothless media. Media consolidation is bad for journalism and bad for democracy. At its core, <span class="caps">CIM</span> is looking to enhance the stability and capability of citizen journalists to produce news that can inform the public, (re)diversify the media, and to do so according to the best practices of journalism, with remuneration. Thus the name “Center for Independent Media”—our foremost mission is to advance, through our programs, an independent media that can fulfill its historic role in a republic.</p>
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<p>As to <em>The Washington Independent</em>—the name reflects the core brand value we are trying to propagate in all our sites: independent thinking and independent media. <em>The Washington Independent</em> is part of a network that now has four state-based sites. That network we’re calling the Independent News Network, or IN Network. We’ve designed the gothic typeface letter “I” in Independent to reference the storied tradition of serious news informing the public. We aim to live up to that journalistic standard, while embracing the speed, vitality, and intimacy of the blog platform.</p>
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<p>At the same time, there are values and beliefs beyond the importance of an independent media that we hold. Being transparent about those is easy—we do it on the <a href="http://newjournalist.org/about/">Center’s web site</a> and our existing state sites have vibrant opinion driven commentary, alongside the news, which is clearly labeled as such. We will do the same at <em>The Washington Independent.</em> Many of these opinion items will resonate as “progressive” in their worldview. Some will be “conservative”. But foremost, we will be breaking news. And that news will be be factually accurate. Just as the news in <em>The Economist</em> or <em>The Nation</em> is factual and accurate. Accuracy and fairness in journalism is neither progressive nor conservative, it’s merely good practice. We aim to do that foremost, while remaining independent of corporate interests and firmly non-partisan. I am looking forward to it.</p>
3 Comments
Comment posted January 17, 2008 @ 11:55 am
Tom Swift knows all this, of course, as he brings up our Soros funding regularly. Rather than focus on the CIM’s broad funder support, he fixates on Soros (although, curiously, <a href="http://minnesotamonitor.com/showComment.do?commentId=10436">he accused me of lying about such funding</a>, later revealing he didn’t know the Open Society Institute was a Soros organization). He chooses to ignore all the places we’ve publicly listed or linked to our funders, and his comment here is proof: <a href="http://minnesotamonitor.com/showComment.do?commentId=10435">it comes a few days after I gave him the same list that appears above</a>, as well as links to the CIM’s donor page, Wikipedia page and articles, both here and at Minnesota Monitor, where one can learn about our funders.
Comment posted January 9, 2008 @ 10:50 am
The idea that we conceal our supporters is a lie. They are publicly listed, here: http://www.newjournalist.org/donate/
In this list, you will see we include George Soros’ foundation, the Open Society Institute. We are honored to be among a wide range of wonderful press and journalism organizations that have received OSI support over the years, including the Columbia School of Journalism, the Annenberg School of Communication’s Center for the Study of Journalism and Democracy at the University of Southern California, and the Center for Investigative Reporting.
Furthermore, OSI publicly lists its grants to the Center for Independent Media in its online grants database. For instance, this link shows a $20,000 grant to Minnesota Monitor in 2006, which we were honored to receive:
http://www.soros.org/grants/research/results.php?s=issue&q=&issue=Media%2C+Arts+%26+Culture&p=15
In 2007, the Center for Independent Media received a $100,000 grant from OSI, towards general operating support. We are enormously grateful for OSI’s ongoing support.
In addition to OSI, we are equally honored to receive support from the foundations listed on our corporate web site (link above), including:
Arca Foundation
Arkay Foundation
Bauman Family Foundation
Better World Fund
Bohemian Foundation
Brett Family Foundation
Gill Foundation
Open Society Institute
Park Foundation
Quixote Foundation
Rockefeller Family Foundation
SEIU
Sunlight Foundation
Surdna Foundation
Wallace Global Fund
Our diversity of funding ensures our independence, as do our internal editorial policies. Our funders do not tell us what to write, and fund us with an expectation that our programs will pursue an independent journalism. Our growth is a reflection of our success in fulfilling our mission of independence.
We look forward to enormous success with the Washington Independent.
Comment posted January 2, 2008 @ 2:31 pm
I am having a really tough time with this editorial.
We in Minnesota have been waging a war for honesty with another of the center’s enterprises, a political blog known as "Minnesota Monitor".
From the start, this blog, as well as the "Center for Independent Media" itself had been pegged as yet another spin off of George Soros’s covert propaganda enterprises, while the former editor and staff made virulent denials of any such connection.
In fact, in time they deleted any suggestions of the sort from their comments. Did someone say somthing about "transparency"?
Now however, a former writer has gone on record as admitting the Soros connection and so has the editor of Minnesota Monitor.
After a solid year of denials…dozens of denials.
Before you folks get anywhere near "accuracy and fairness", you need to start with "truthfulness".
The fact that you are funded by George Soros and other leftist philanthropic sources may or may not make what you report biased, but denying such connections shreds any shot at credibility right from the start.
You may be "independent" from corporate influence, but you certainly have no claim to independence from influences of any sort.
That being said, I do look forward to getting the left’s perspective of what is going on in Washington from the Washington "Independent".
Best of luck,
Thomas Swift
(I’m contributor to Looktruenorth.com, which is wholly self supporting and receives no funding from anyone)
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