Let's Form a Media-Consumer's Co-op

Kate B. Maxwell, Neal Gorenflo, Jay Cumberland, Josh Wilson

Let’s consider mass media as a "monster." How can we turn this powerful beast into a force for positive change? At present, media and journalism financing is the domain of unaccountable commercial and philanthropic entities. While good journalism happens, this economic regime has produced an ongoing crisis of public trust, the spread of news deserts, rampant commercialism, the closure of newspapers nationwide, the enclosure of journalism practice in exclusive institutions, and the wider degradation of the mechanisms of a democratic society. Consumer and multi-stakeholder co-ops are an exciting alternative organizing model for financing independent media beyond the existing commercial/philanthropic paradigm, and can serve as empowering partners to the new wave of media-worker co-ops now emerging in the Bay Area and beyond. This workshop opens what we intend to be ongoing conversation and action toward a multi-stakeholder co-op ecosystem for independent journalism and mass media in a world that can’t wait for change.