The Future of Journalism: a joint Media Alliance & Walkley Foundation initiative

5.5 The journalist-free news operation: Examiner.com

Examiner.com is owned and run by the Clarity Media Group in Denver, Colorado, and also runs free sheets in cities including San Francisco, Washington and Baltimore. The owner, billionaire Philip Anschutz, is a Christian conservative ranked by Forbes as the 31st richest person in the US, with interests in oil, entertainment, film, sports,broadcasting and railways. Anschutz was behind the LA Galaxy soccer team’s import of David Beckham. Former AOL executive, Michael Sherrod, runs the internet operations. The group has domain names for hyperlocal sites in 70 US cities, although sites had officially launched in beta for only San Francisco, Chicago, Baltimore, Denver, and Seattle.

A New York site is under construction. The principle is pure citizen journalism with contributions from “examiners” paid by numbers of page views and advertising clicks. The pay starts at US$2.50 for every thousand page views and, according to TechCrunch, the median income is $25 a month (although Sherrod told TechCrunch he had written a cheque for $1,700). “We are building a community of Examiners to focus on specific topics ranging from sports to tourism to local politics,” a post on the website said recently. “Examiners are local experts who have a voice, knowledge and an opinion.

Think of an Examiner like a blogger on steroids. Examiners will have the tools, platform and exposure to not only report, but build a community of others who share their passion.” Sherrod calls it a “community knowledge site.” “The examiners are knowledgeable people, writing with passion and expertise on what’s happening in the local community,” Sherrod told the Journal. “All of us are amazed at the quality of these people.” It was not journalism: “It’s about people sharing what they know in a fun, informative, different way. It’s their voice.”27