[Foundation-l] Murdoch newspaper websites to go paywall -opportunity for citizen journalism!

[Nathan]

The biggest problem for Wikinews in my mind is that delivering news is a
competitive and innovative business. In the on-line and comprehensive
encyclopedia vacuum, Wikipedia was able to be "get there first, with the
most" and draw eyeballs and participants by being the leader. Wikinews, by
contrast, is at a substantial disadvantage when it comes to online news
reporting. There are hundreds of major news sites that offer content at no
charge (although not "free" in the sense we usually mean), with the huge
benefit of full time, paid reporting staff.

If the best news sources online go behind a paywall (which is inevitable, I
think, as a WSJ subscriber...), Wikinews might draw enough participants to
reach the wiki "critical mass." I'm not sure what else will do it - some
series of high profile scoops or major interviews, perhaps?

Nathan