ABSTRACT
This chapter introduces the reader to the concept of crowdfunding and crowdsourcing on Internet platforms, and provides an overview of the different types of models that exist. It situates crowdfunding within the larger media landscape, where news organizations are struggling to find successful business plans in an Internet era in which many expect that information should be free. It looks at some of the reasons journalists and would-be journalists have turned to crowdfunding (freelance budgets drying up in legacy media, creating jobs after being laid off, trying to break into the industry). In terms of crowdsourcing, it gives an overview of how journalists are using the Internet to involve the “crowd” in story ideas, angles, sources, fact-checking, and data-sifting.
Going to the “crowd” for money and ideas or sources has a long history in journalism. Telethons, for instance, are a pre-Internet form of crowdfunding and journalists have always been encouraged to meet as many people as possible in order to expand the network of people they can draw on for sources and story ideas. While this chapter addresses these continuities, it focuses on how Internet platforms change and disrupt the breadth, scope, and quality of these practices.
