Local News Cooperatives: The Future of Community Journalism?
A few weeks ago, I got together with Chris Horne, the founder and publisher of The Devil Strip, a local culture and arts magazine serving the city of Akron, Ohio, for a conversation about the potential of news cooperatives like his to revive and strengthen local civic life. As we have become a “disinformation society” where tens of millions of Americans are highly susceptible to false news, conspiracies, junk information and spectacle, I’ve grown more convinced that quality news has to be supported and valued as a form of public infrastructure. The same way we invest public funds in things like schools and libraries, as well as roads, water systems, sewers, and emergency services, we have to recognize that quality information isn’t something that the private market is going to deliver on its own. There are lots of promising experiments underway that are trying to address this problem, and what fascinates me about The Devil Strip is how, as Horne describes, it is trying to use cooperative ownership not just as a potential business model but also as a way to ensure that the journalism and engagement work it does truly serves the Akron community.
What follows is a lightly edited transcript of our conversation.
Micah Sifry: I’m really interested in this problem of civic renewal. Today we live in places that are not just…
