Thread by @dwallbank

The greatest threat to a free press in the U.S. is the business model itself. And press freedom organizations, which are generally geared up for other fights, need to refocus.

a short thread...

This is the thing spurring this thread. It's staggering in scope to hear about it all at once:

"The Plain Dealer had a unionized staff of 340 journalists two decades ago. That soon will be reduced to 33."
s.cleveland.com/OvcsjpU

For everything that's not Washington, trade publications or major national news, the business model is basically broken.

There are some green shoots - nonprofit/membership model among them - but local news is hemorrhaging generations of talent and what's replacing it is nothing

Adding to the problems: In many cases, local news assets have been strip-mined to fund other stuff. Papers bought for their buildings and the news assets still hollowed out to goose profit figures.

Tho short term gain devoid of long term strategy is unsustainable.

Others are trying to goose storied outlets into being partisan vehicles, which is another form of media strip-mining in a way because it spends down the credibility the outlet previously had. Once you lose a reputation, it's hard to get it back.

I've been a part of a lot of free press fights, including on domestic access, combating the "fake news" nonsense from professional partisans, and trying to get people released from jail overseas.

This though, the business model fight, is existential.

This is tough for many journalists. Reporters are taught to not get involved with the business side at all. Which is a good lesson... up to a point.

Wherever the line is, and J-school ethicists can debate that, underlying business model to me is 100% fair game.

There are many many many suggestions I have on this, but step one is to engage existing resources.

Press freedom groups largely haven't joined this fight. Most are focused on other things. That needs to change, urgently.

Praise where it's due though:

I was really proud of the @NPCInstitute for recognizing this and honoring a former Denver Post editor for speaking out when his paper was being gutted. He was awarded the NPC's highest press freedom award, b/c business model is press freedom.