1st Edition
Reviving Rural News Transforming the Business Model of Community Journalism in the US and Beyond
Based on extensive research into weekly rural publishers and rural readers, Reviving Rural News demonstrates that a new financial approach to community journalism is urgently needed and viable.
This book provides historical context for the state of local news, examines the influence of journalistic identity and boundaries that have prevented change, and offers practical guidance on how to adapt the financial strategies of weekly newspapers to the habits of modern readers. Findings are grounded in robust data collection, including surveys, focus groups, and a year-long oral history study of a small weekly newspaper group in the United States. A new model known as Press Club is presented as a template via which memberships, events, and newsletters can better engage community journalism with its audiences and create a more sustainable path for the future.
Reviving Rural News will be of interest to advanced students and researchers of local, community, and rural journalism as well as practitioners looking to bring about real-world change in journalism organizations.
Acknowledgements
1. Introduction. Rural Journalism in Crisis
Patrick Ferrucci and Teri Finneman
The History of How We Got Here
The Norms of Journalism
An International Problem
Project Overview
References
2. The Uniqueness of Rural News
Patrick Ferrucci
Defining Rural News
Disruption of Local News
Understanding the Rural News Weekly
Disruptive Innovation
The Urgency of a New Model
References
3. Publishers: Stuck in the Status Quo
Nick Mathews
The Survey
Tradition vs. Innovation
Resources vs. Growth
Potential vs. Perception
Summary
Acknowledgement
4. Readers: Seeking Change
Teri Finneman
Finding Rural Readers
Readers and Revenue Streams
Reader Motivation for Financial Support
Who Supports Local News?
Summary
References
5. Press Club: Implementing Change
Teri Finneman and Nick Mathews
Who is Harvey County Now?
Getting Started: Forming the Experiment
The Model: Press Club
After the Launch
The Model: E-newsletters
The Model: Events
Reflecting on the Experiment
6. Rural Journalism and Disruption
Nick Mathews and Patrick Ferrucci
Rural Journalism and Disruption
The Final Words
References
Index
Biography
Teri Finneman is an associate professor of journalism at the University of Kansas, USA. She is a journalism historian who also studies local news. She coedited Social Justice, Activism and Diversity in U.S. Media History. She is the founder of the Journalism History podcast.
Nick Mathews is an assistant professor at the School of Journalism, University of Missouri, USA. He studies local and rural news and information ecosystems. He often seeks to represent the audience, translating their lived experiences for news organizations to help those news organization’s stability and viability in their communities.
Patrick Ferrucci is an associate professor and chair of the Department of Journalism at the University of Colorado, USA. His research is in media sociology and primarily concerns itself with how shifting notions of “organization” in journalism lead to influence on journalism practice. He is the author of Making Nonprofit News: Market Models, Influence and Journalism Practice, and coeditor of The Institutions Changing Journalism: Barbarians Inside the Gates.
Reviving Rural News helps readers see the value and role of community and rural news, and helps the people running those newsrooms see the dire need for thoughtful experimentation, which, by the way, works. This book shows that we – readers, communities, and journalists – all have a stake in the survival of local news and a role to play in that transformation.
– Kristen Hare, Poynter
Local news is one of the most valuable forms of journalism, yet it is ironically also the least economically secure. Drawing on a rich data set, Reviving Rural News offers a sharply written explanation of why this problem persists, and, more importantly, puts forward a compelling argument for how to solve it. The result is an invaluable contribution to both journalism studies and practice that not only provides a novel solution to one of journalism’s most distressing problems, but also a template for how journalists and journalism scholars can – and should – work together.
– Jake Nelson, University of Utah
