Reporter decides to go it alone
Shane Richmond, the editor of the Telegraph’s website, described recently on his blog how a fellow journalist — a longtime sports reporter — decided to quit his job and become a freelance writer/editor/photographer and run his own local media site. Rick Waghorn read about Craig Newmark of Craigslist and decided to take a buyout from his paper and become a Web journalist.
The site now picks up around 260,000 page impressions a week and Rick is optimistic about further growth. The business model is impressively diverse too; a subscription service, a mobile service, a betting portal, and advertising income.
As Shane points out, not every reporter would be able to do what Rick Waghorn did. In order to do so, a journalist would have to have a well-developed following already, or face a long struggle to build an online audience. “It’s not all that different from being a professional blogger,” says Richmond. “It’s just that Rick has the accreditation, the experience and the contacts to give himself an advantage.” Jeff Jarvis has some thoughts here.
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