On the job learning

Reporters gain expertise about the subjects they cover on the job, through reading, working beats, talking to news sources. Few reporters have ties to not-for-profits. The vast majority of reporters are surprisingly young (21-33), low paid (median of $20,000 annually in 1997), and on a dead-end career track (few make it into media management or to the well-paid anchor's desk). Lacking monetary incentives, they are motivated by the psychological rewards that come from shaping stories.

Understandably, reporters jealously guard their prerogative to call the news as they see it. They resist any notion that community members should have a say over which ideas ought to get a public hearing in the press — a concept that is implicit in the typical not-for-profit pitch.