Outgoing NUJ Journalist editor urges journalists to seek funding however they can

Outgoing NUJ Journalist editor Tim Gopsill has called on journalists to look for any source of funding to secure the future of regional news. 

"We should be working with any possible source of funding. I do not mind if it's public or if it's some kind of crook," said Gopsill, who edited union publication The Journalist for 21 years.

Speakers at the Campaign for Press and Broadcasting Freedom's 'Media for All' conference this weekend discussed the future of local papers in an inclement economic climate and a corporate culture obsessed with high profit.

 Gopsill blamed the rise of the media conglomerates for the decline of local news. 



"Once every little town had its own paper; every larger town had two evening papers. Now there are no evening papers at all," said Gopsill. 

"This is the curse of the PLCs."

He criticised the local press for not being adventurous enough in moving online, claiming that they had thrown away an opportunity to profit from the internet: "They don't even have the gumption to use the name of the paper for their websites. They threw away the brand."



Gopsill argued the best sources of funding would come from local sources. 

"The parallel I like to think of is the local football club, it's an institution that everyone cares for," he said.



But Gopsill decried suggestions that journalists should take charge of their own media businesses, as suggested by new media commentators like Jeff Jarvis.  "I've worked in co-ops before, journalists should never be allowed to manage anything," he said.

Damien Gayle is a postgraduate journalism student at City University, London.

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