<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div><blockquote type="cite"><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div><a href="http://www.fundbreak.com.au/beta/index.php/archive/index/105/description/0/0">http://www.fundbreak.com.au/beta/index.php/archive/index/105/description/0/0</a></div><div><br></div><div><blockquote type="cite"><div style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Georgia" size="6" color="#333333" style="font: 24.0px Georgia; color: #333333"><b>New New Matilda attempts old old media strategy</b></font></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333"><a href="http://redirect.cmailer.com.au/LinkRedirector.aspx?clid=010c7ba1-0989-4b25-b0ef-2a63ff87bfaa&rid=0c9e231f-44d0-4763-a136-a74fb25deebb"><u><i>Crikey journalist Amber Jamieson writes:</i></u><u><i></i></u></a></font></div><div style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><font face="Arial" size="3" color="#639a39" style="font: 12.0px Arial; color: #639a39"><a href="http://redirect.cmailer.com.au/LinkRedirector.aspx?clid=035f4c3b-7868-4c01-9bf8-cc0b1da7854e&rid=0c9e231f-44d0-4763-a136-a74fb25deebb">DEATH OF NEW MEDIA</a></font><font face="Arial" size="3" color="#333333" style="font: 12.0px Arial; color: #333333">, <a href="http://redirect.cmailer.com.au/LinkRedirector.aspx?clid=2d2f0f45-a91c-4048-89ca-ff3e77805fd2&rid=0c9e231f-44d0-4763-a136-a74fb25deebb"><font color="#639a39" style="color: #639a39">MARNI CORDELL</font></a>, <a href="http://redirect.cmailer.com.au/LinkRedirector.aspx?clid=9398483a-3039-4fee-a3a7-431353974da5&rid=0c9e231f-44d0-4763-a136-a74fb25deebb"><font color="#639a39" style="color: #639a39">NEW MATILDA</font></a>, <a href="http://redirect.cmailer.com.au/LinkRedirector.aspx?clid=f64a7264-cc2c-4aa5-a328-9bcc7c6440c4&rid=0c9e231f-44d0-4763-a136-a74fb25deebb"><font color="#639a39" style="color: #639a39">NEW MEDIA</font></a></font></div><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333">Online commentary website <i>New Matilda</i> has one week to raise nearly $60,000 in its <a href="http://redirect.cmailer.com.au/LinkRedirector.aspx?clid=8bfc742b-00b5-4535-9ca6-37dfd6fa52b2&rid=0c9e231f-44d0-4763-a136-a74fb25deebb"><font color="#639a39" style="color: #639a39"><u>last-ditch subscriberthon</u></font></a>, or its virtual doors will be shut permanently.</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333">Nearly $10,000 was raised from individual donations in the last two days, so the $175,000 target figure -- "the minimum budget for one year, the very minimum to relaunch the site with," according to editor Marni Cordell -- is not impossible.</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333">The fund-raising strategy used by <i>New Matilda</i> is an Australian first for a news and commentary site. It's <a href="http://redirect.cmailer.com.au/LinkRedirector.aspx?clid=7d1725d6-dbc2-4454-bd03-872449abef00&rid=0c9e231f-44d0-4763-a136-a74fb25deebb"><font color="#639a39" style="color: #639a39"><u>attempting</u></font></a> to adopt the strategies of a community radio station, to "operate more like a public radio station than a subscriber service" and convince readers to support <i>New Matilda</i> and sign up as "supporters", although all content will remain free.</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333">In May <i>Crikey</i> <a href="http://redirect.cmailer.com.au/LinkRedirector.aspx?clid=0ac0956e-a6ba-4493-b712-8e7bbd0a76c8&rid=0c9e231f-44d0-4763-a136-a74fb25deebb"><font color="#639a39" style="color: #639a39"><u>revealed</u></font></a> that <i>New Matilda</i> was to close in June after advertising and funding revenue dried up. Cordell then bought the publication from Duncan Turpie for the grand sum of $10 -- the same price Turpie paid three years earlier. In October Cordell announced that <i>New Matilda</i> was <a href="http://redirect.cmailer.com.au/LinkRedirector.aspx?clid=1af6897a-d81a-43c8-bbe8-aa281e8688fc&rid=0c9e231f-44d0-4763-a136-a74fb25deebb"><font color="#639a39" style="color: #639a39"><u>relaunching</u></font></a>, with a critical "save <i>New Matilda</i>" style subscriberthon to raise $175,000 by December 15.</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333"><i>New Matilda</i> is a labour of love for Cordell, who is currently doing all work for it, for no money, in her spare time. Associate editor Catriona Menzies-Pike is being paid to work on the site full-time. Since the October relaunch an average of two stories per days have been published on the site, although all authors are now working voluntarily.</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333">If the $175,000 is reached, the money should fund about four days of work per week for Cordell and Menzies-Pike, as well as paying authors -- previous standard was $100 per piece -- for publishing two articles daily.</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333">But what sets <i>New Matilda</i> apart from the masses of online commentary and opinion? "We're a place that people go to to get context to what's in the news," said Cordell. "We take our role as editors quite seriously and everything that is published is thoroughly fact-checked and goes through a process of consideration and editing that I think other outlets don't necessarily do."</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333">Many of their writers used <i>New Matilda</i> as a stepping stone to hone their skills before then also being published elsewhere."Ben Eltham, Ben Pobjie, they weren't writing before I became editor and I think we built up a good stable of regular voices and we became known for that. I want to foster new talent, more often than not people are picking established talents from other outlets rather than fostering new talents and I think that's a shame," declared Cordell.</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333"><i>New Matilda</i>, founded in 2004, started as a subscription-based paid service, before the pay model was lifted in 2007. Is there much lamenting that the original subscriber model was abandoned? "I don't think we should have dropped the pay model, I just think we should have dropped the paywall. We dropped a really good revenue scheme and we never made up the shortfall."</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333">But why go down the community radio station-style road? "Main reason is we don't want to limit our audience to people who already know they like us," said Cordell. "The readership has really grown since we dropped the paywall and if we close the content we could lose it."</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333">Kath Letch, general manager the community broadcasting association of Australia and station manager for 14 years at the successful Melbourne community station 3RRR, understands difficult subscription drives and building supportive independent media communities.</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#333333" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #333333">How to convince people to pledge money for something they can have for free? "It's about wanting to be part of that community by supporting it," Letch told <i>Crikey</i>. "It's about the content itself and it's also about identifying strongly with something and want to feel some way a part of that."</font></p><p style="margin: 0.0px 0.0px 14.0px 0.0px"><font face="Arial" size="4" color="#639a39" style="font: 14.0px Arial; color: #639a39"><a href="http://redirect.cmailer.com.au/LinkRedirector.aspx?clid=4ab86122-1067-4acd-8ef2-25dd64250fe3&rid=0c9e231f-44d0-4763-a136-a74fb25deebb"><u>Read the full story on our website</u></a></font></p></div></div></blockquote></div></div></blockquote></div><br></body></html>