Survey: Help us draft standards for independent creator journalism

Today, you have the opportunity to contribute to an important part of the future of news by taking part in a survey about developing standards for ethical independent creator journalism. Read on for some context, then take the survey. And share it with your networks. The more answers, the more confidence we’ll have in the data.

In August, when I (and lots of us) jumped into the debate about influencers at the summer’s party conventions, many pieces were written and many takes were fired off, to either defend the evolution of news or condemn the future as somehow dumber and more vapid, shallow and dangerous. Some said influencers are not journalists and risk muddying our information ecosystem. Others pointed out the evolution of attention and media and warned against gatekeeping news just because a new crop of voices don’t do things the same old way. There’s value in both arguments. Additionally, many things can be true at once:

• Media consumption continues to evolve, and some of the most exciting work happening today is coming from independent creators who are reaching audiences traditional news brands are not. At least not at the same scale.

• What feels outside institutional norms today will be the institutional norms of tomorrow.

• Influencers and content creators raise awareness and represent traditionally marginalized voices.

• Content creators can mislead or put content out into the world for the wrong reasons and with little concern around ethics, whether for financial gain or ideological reasons.

• Journalists and media companies can do that, too.

• Journalists can be an insular, snobby bunch who don’t like to make room for the new.

• It is only getting more confusing for consumers of information to tell what is accurate and trustworthy. It’s all too easy to make misleading or inaccurate messages feel like credible news.

Still, things are changing and the sweep of media history tells us that change is generally good. The more mediums, the more voices, the more access there is to information in general – especially for groups who have traditionally felt (and legitimately been) marginalized by mainstream news organizations.

So, what would it look like to try to define responsible independent creator journalism? Should creators transparently signal how they gather their news or what level of fact-checking they engage in? What about how they support themselves? Often, creators are solopreneurs, so the traditional lines that exist between editorial and business just don’t exist. What does an advertising policy look like for a creator journalist?

Might a pledge or set of standards around things like sourcing, fact-checking, bias and advertising be a starting point for a clearer sense of where journalism ends and pure content creation begins? What else do we need to take into account?

I’m not entirely sure, which is why I’m partnering with Trusting News, an organization laser focused on how the public can identify trustworthy information. We’re asking you and many others to take a survey designed as a jumping off point for what will be the start of a BIG conversation. It may be easier than we think (mirroring existing news norms). It may be complicated (developing new standards because the mediums and messengers are new). I don’t know.

Your collective answers will be a beginning, a jumping off point for identifying the things that feel important to carry over from traditional, legacy news norms or existing industry-wide efforts like Trusting News, and those things that we’ve just never really had to think about before because the times, they are a changin’.

To what end? The intention isn’t to stifle evolution or hold independent creators to norms that just don’t fit a new approach to journalism. Instead, like INN’s work with non-profit newsrooms, the hope is to support this work by opening conversations around transparency, ethics and standards – especially as we sit on the cusp of a flood of AI-generated content and are already facing situations like the recent revelation that prominent conservative independent creators were in fact paid to amplify messages from the Kremlin. 

So take the survey. Share it with your networks. The more data the better. And if you have questions or thoughts, comment here or write me at [email protected].