A Truly Independent, Committed Focus on Money in Politics — with Sludge, on Civil
Ahead of the launch of the Civil publishing platform, a Q&A on our Sludge newsroom.
First, get Sludge’s weekly newsletter, full of curated money-in-politics links.
Why did you partner with / choose to advise Civil?
I have a natural interest in explaining the way that political systems really work. I like making the arcane processes of campaign contributions and lobbying more widely-accessible and publicly accountable.
My Sludge Co-founder Donny Shaw and I covered Congress every day for seven years on our previous project, OpenCongress (from 2007–2013). Over that time, even with increased government transparency, we were continually dismayed by how the entrenched special interests set the boundaries of what was possible in policy making. U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) famously said of the Big Banks, “Frankly, they own the place.”
Investigative journalism offers the ability to bring in effective public transparency to the lawmaking process, creating public benefit through increased scrutiny and deliberation. One example is the huge social benefits of net neutrality — currently, the telecom industry and its lobbyists take the initiative to set the boundaries of the legislative debate over input from expert technologists and community groups seeking universal broadband.
An example of a positive outcome from a Sludge article on net neutrality would be that, by exposing corporate influence over elected officials and regulatory agencies, lawmakers move to incorporate more public-interest testimony into the hearings process. We’re seeing newsworthy stories every day under the current Administration and Congressional leadership, of lobbyist control over public policy — finding a way to tell more of these public-interest stories using open data analysis, and with greater impact, is our goal with Sludge.
* In your opinion, what makes this model so different from journalism’s status quo?
Civil is a perfect fit for Sludge’s journalistic mission because Civil enables a strong degree of editorial independence. The stories we’re reporting on special interest lobbying center around conflicts of interest with major industries. Money-in-politics deserves a dedicated, continual focus, as a field — we’re aiming to provide a deeper level of analysis, while still being timely in responsive to the day’s news and meeting wide public interest in juicier stories of scandals. Some of our key concepts are power networks (see, e.g.: LittleSis); info laundering (see Represent.Us); and systemic corruption (cit., Prof. Lessig).
To investigate these stories and surface original news and insights, we should be primarily accountable to our readers and the money-in-politics journalism community.
To be accountable to our readers, in turn, Sludge seeks to be an independent, ad-free publication, without major financial contributors on a controlling Board of Directors — which, in turn, requires financial support from a base of paying members. Members will support our investigative journalism and original reporting to expose how the campaign finance system really works, and we’ll offer members sneak peeks into the editorial process and unique question-and-answer channels with issue experts. Digital media projects have sought to crowd-fund their news operations before, but none have fully leveraged blockchain to build a process of community self-governance, such as Civil’s token-curated registry of publishers. Until Civil, there hasn’t been a publishing platform with out-of-the-box integrations to the Ethereum blockchain and access to forthcoming decentralized apps — these will unlock new revenue streams for independent publishers, to connect directly with their supporters.
For someone arriving on a Sludge article about campaign contributions in a midterms election contest, they’ll know that being part of the Civil network means a commitment to the network’s journalistic standards. News readers who are so inclined can acquire Civil tokens and use them to put out “smart contracts” for stories they seek to have published. In turn, Civil newsrooms can crowd-fund reporting projects they seek to undertake, and thereby set a high standard for being directly responsive to their supporters.
One of the things I’m most excited about, for the Civil network, is reporting collaborations between newsrooms — and Sludge is already planning several such projects. With the First Fleet newsroom Cannabis Wire, we’ll investigate lobbying of state governments around cannabis regulations and legalization, harnessing their policy expertise with our campaign contribution analysis. With Block Club Chicago, we’ll investigate the money behind Illinois state legislators, whose policies affect life and communities in Chicago — and examine the state of good-government practices in Illinois, compared to New York, California, and other major states. Building these cross-newsroom collaborations will help build the overall value of the Civil network, and incentivize more local & policy journalists to make their valuable work available on the platform.
Our Sludge reporters, in their introductory blog post on Civil, made the case directly:
Jay Cassano: “Everyone knows that the ad model has lead to chasing clicks. That’s bad for investigative journalism, and it’s bad for quality shoe-leather reporting, which we see most especially in the massive downsizing of foreign bureaus and local outlets.”
* What are the biggest challenges Civil will have to confront in the current marketplace?
I know the Civil founders realize that even people who follow digital media don’t necessarily understand the details of blockchain technology or anticipate all the implications of a token-curated registry for independent journalism. As blockchain technology becomes more user-friendly and the Civil platform launches publicly, I think outreach and education will be easier — to show people how Civil’s concept of “the waterline” will incentivize journalism worth supporting, the kind that the previous ad-centric model isn’t doing enough to sustain.
Decentralizing journalism for sustainability is a widely sought-after goal — such as with micropayments for a-la-carte news articles, mentioned in the blockchain + media event at Postlight as a key piece of media infrastructure. The Ethereum blockchain offers a new foundation for governance and an efficient marketplace for all sorts of media services & freelance reporters.
* Where do you see Civil in 1 year? 5 years?
Typing for Sludge, I think there will be a lot of news interest in follow-the-money stories over this 2018 midterms election year. So our goal is to build a base of members who help us produce the kind of researched, deeper-dive work we seek to do on the status quo political system. The best path for us to build a supporter base, in turn, is to be part of the Civil network, on a platform that’s producing quality journalism and attracting audience across its newsrooms, from the international cultural creativity of Popula to the policy expertise of an expanding industry with Cannabis Wire to the community well-being of immigrant families in NYC with Documented.
In five years, I expect Civil will be the publishing platform of choice for local newsrooms covering community issues in many more U.S. cities, as well as more nationally-focused verticals on topics from technology (especially blockchain) to “net art” to independent culture. Sludge will be ramping-up to coverage of the 2024 Presidential election, drawing on a supporter base to bring on even more design expertise and data analysis, to surface more of the real story behind how decisions are made in U.S. government.
