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Wikileaks Targets the Local News Frontier
eldavojohn writes "Wikileaks has been pretty successful on a global scale — from ACTA documents to East Anglian e-mails, it is the definitive place to find suppressed documents. But some are saying that now Wikileaks should begin focusing on a local level. From the article: 'The organization has applied for a $532,000 two-year grant from the Knight Foundation to expand the use of its secure, anonymous submission system by local newspapers. The foundation's News Challenge will give as much as $5 million this year to projects that use digital technology to transform community news. WikiLeaks proposes using the grant to encourage local newspapers to include a link to WikiLeaks' secure, anonymous servers so that readers can submit documents on local issues or scandals. The newspapers would have first crack at the material, and after a period of time — perhaps two weeks, [German Wikileaks spokesman Daniel] Schmitt said — the documents would be made public on the main WikiLeaks page.' Anyone reading this who works for a community news source and would like to host sensitive documents with no risk: here is your solution."
This may well be the key to resuscitating the integrity of journalistic reporting. With falling revenues comes an inability to pay reporters enough to research stories and verify the claims of sources. By helping reporters to more quickly arrive at the heart of the story, WikiLeaks Local just might turn around the industry!
If it becomes big, it may also become an anonymous source of misinformation. Sad.
I'd assume that this is a strategic compromise on Wikileaks' part. They are trying to encourage local papers to bring them into the process of storing and disseminating juicy information, so that they can make it available to the public.
The supply of journalists willing to play along if they get a two-week head start over their competitors is almost certainly a good deal larger than the supply of journalists willing to do so out of the goodness of their hearts.
If the alternative were getting it now, obviously waiting two weeks would be stupid. If, however, the alternative is never seeing it, two weeks would be a tiny price to pay.