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Interview with Joe Shea, editor-in-chief of the American Reporter, the internet's first digital daily.
 Why was the American Reporter created?
Reporters, even back in 1995, were losing their jobs, and alarm about the future of journalism was growing even then. I had the insight that the mailing lists we were on could just as easily be email newspapers, with correspondents sending in stories from all over the globe. All we needed was a financial and business model, and so I created one. Then the Web gave it a harder, more evocative dimension. We not only started a new media, but we adapted the rules to a new medium.
What changes have you seen in online journalism since 1995?
It seems to have drifted very far away from the mission of delivering vital, hard-hitting news, sort of into a form of dull entertainment. I rarely read stories that are all that different from the stories I read the day before, and I think that reflects these deep furrows mainstream journalists often find themselves in, covering the same stuff readers have already been told about again and again and again, but leavening it with entertainment news. That to me is deathly. We believe at AR that a lot of the time telling you once about a thing is sufficient, because it's going to be covered by a zillion other publications and may not have any real significance, anyway. If it's a story that demands a daily update, and a reporter is willing to do it, fine. But we would prefer he or she move on to another story, and perhaps dip back into the old one every once in a while. Tell us what is new in this world, or what we have not heard before, or what will help us become more free as people. There's plenty of that stuff untold.
What do you think is the biggest issue facing the journalism industry? And what can be done?
The biggest issue is the failed model. Journalists need to own their own news publications, not simply toil for the people who own them. I'm no socialist, so don't get me wrong, but there's really no point in supporting other people with our work when we can support ourselves with it. The American Reporter was founded to make that possible when journalists are ready for it. We don't care how long it takes; we always knew they would be slow to get off the corporate teat and start walking on their own. When that happens, and great news organizations owned and operated solely by journalists who are their own bosses exist all around the world - that's when a newspaper war will erupt, and the world will find journalism anew. It won't be so boring then.
What are your views on Citizen Journalism? Can it play a role in helping newspapers survive?
The idea should not be to dub people "citizen journalists" because they've contributed to a newspaper, but to take ordinary citizens who can write and are observant and care about the world around them and to work with them, train them, and help them become journalists who advocate for (all) citizens. We've done that with great success; some of the writing we've had from people who were new to journalism and to publication has simply been astonishing. If you get a chance to read the American Reporter, go back to the archives from the drop-down menu and look for Cindy Hasz. She is an RN, not a journalist, but she
became by far one of our most eloquent writers on a key and very neglected area - the human aspects of health care. Writing like hers could keep a rock alive.
What advice can you provide current journalists and/or journalism grads?
Think about joining other journalists and striking out for yourselves. There's no point in trying to get on with newspapers that are not hiring and may soon fold, despite their handsome profits. So often those have to be kicked upstream to the owners, who often have lots of debt from leveraged buyouts and find it's not enough, so they close the profitable publications down. As Bob Dylan sang, "Let the dead bury the dead." Join The American Reporter or any other publication you think you'd like to write honest truths for and be willing to slog a few years before it starts to monetize. Just make sure that you own
the publication you work for. If you really want to be a journalist,
put off kids, marry a fellow journalist, start a small business that
doesn't take a lot of time to run and work hard for a group of fellow journalists that are trying their best to do a good thing. Make it work. And God bless you all.
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