WeSearchr¶
This is huge. It’s what media following the grain of the Internet looks like (if only as a preliminary glimpse).
Here‘s how it works:
WeSearchr has a select group of editors that we call “Askers”
who watch the news cycle and figure out what people want to
know. […] If an Asker believes that there is enough interest in
a question, they will create a “Bounty” as a reward for the
answer to the question. The minimum amount of funding to trigger
a Bounty is called a “reserve”. […] Members of the WeSearchr
community can browse the bounties and donate money to fund a
bounty, like other crowdfunding sites. […] Once a Bounty hits
its reserve, it is funded and WeSearchr will accept answers from
people that have the answers to that question. […] WeSearchr
will review the submissions and check them for veracity. […] If
the submission fulfills the terms of the Bounty, WeSearchr will
assign the reward and release the information to the Asker and
assigned news outlets for distribution. […] 30 days after the
story’s release, WeSearchr pays the Bounty.
75% of the Bounty goes to the person(s) that deliver a
solution.
10% goes to the Asker
15% goes to WeSearchr
So: A decentralized market place for journalistic research.
The conception alone crosses an honesty threshold. There is no longer any need for meta-lies about the essential character of contemporary journalism (as a political apparatus screened by an increasingly-ludicrous pretense to disinterested ‘news’ curation). All research is interested, and its incentives are now openly formalized. The result is a germinal assassination market for hidden things. It targets enemy secrets. The information warfare that media have always been ceases to be promoted as anything else.
For the first time in over a century, it is now possible to envisage journalists making an honest living (by fulfilling private research contracts). This type of transition only goes in one direction. A piece of the future just came into view.