Hi Steemians! I was recently introduced to Steemit through a contact in the Bitcoin community here in Montreal (I'm British but recently moved here). I'm a freelance journalist with a strong interest in technology, and spend a lot of time thinking about crowdfunding and micro-payments as a way to fund independent journalism.
The problem
Though there's no need for me to write a primer on how the media works, the basic situation is that with most mainstream publications editors are the gatekeepers of content - deciding which pitches to commission and which to reject - whilst above them sit the owners of the magazines, TV channels, etc., who have ultimate say in what kind of agenda the outlet should promote.
Besides that, with the switch towards free content on the internet and decline in revenue for almost all media outlets, there's a looming crisis in the funding of journalism, and pressure to deliver value for money in terms of the time to produce vs traffic generated for a given piece of content means that in-depth, investigative reporting is more and more difficult to fund, whereas clickbait listicles and endless re-posting of essentially the same story across different media is becoming the norm.
The solution?
In light of the above I'm really excited to have discovered Steemit, and would love to be part of the conversation amongst the community about 'commissioning' and funding high quality journalism. (For example: as a freelancer it's viable for me to produce original, heavily-reported stories for Steemit, but only if I can be reasonably sure of the ultimate payoff; without that kind of certainty it's difficult to justify the time invested).
So my first question is, what would a commissioning process look like (and is there interest in it)? Could the community vote in advance on which stories to produce on the understanding that writers delivering on those assignments would be appropriately upvoted and rewarded?
Really looking forward to hearing everybody's thoughts. Go Steemit!