About

The Citizen Journalist Cooperative (“CJC”) is a News Project of TheMountainsVoice.com. The target market is currently limited to the general North Georgia Mountains area.

This primary goal of the Project is to restore confidence in what is a broken News Media System, and restore accountability of our Social and Governmental Systems through truthful, analytical and investigative reporting. We will attempt a completely new model, with citizen engagement, utilization of modern technology, and lots and lots of ideas. We plan to take 8 – 12 Counties in North Georgia and use the area as a Beta Project to test out various ideas. Read on for some initial thoughts and goals that we are basing the Project around.  These are general thoughts, subject to change over time.  You have to start somewhere.

The corruption of traditional News Media is a growing concern. Average citizens have increasingly filled the “Honest Reporting Gap” through social media activism. While often better than current Mainstream Media, this new approach lacks the professionalism, depth of reporting coverage, and centrality of access that previous generations took for granted. There is also a trust issue, as unsubstantiated information (on ALL sides of the issues) is often found to be false, politicized or manipulated.

The CJC has the following short term goals:

  1. Create a Shared Resource space for Citizen Journalists (“CJs”) .
  2. Create a Central (Free) Platform for CJs to host and distribute articles.
  3. Our current network of CJ Social Media sites includes the following:
  4. To provide Financial Assistance to CJs through distribution funding (i.e. boosting Facebook or Twitter posts that link to articles; and Eblast distribution at the community, county, and regional level.)
  5. To collaborate with CJs to establish some basic professional guidelines and standards.
Initial focus will be generally limited to issues of public concern, such as:
  1. Governmental and Judicial Accountability (i.e. corruption, systemic breakdown, oversight of policy).
  2. Planning, Zoning and Infrastructure issues that affect Quality of Life in our Communities, Counties, Region.
  3. Health, Public Safety, Educational issues.
  4. General Sustainability and Preparedness issues in an increasingly dysfunctional and dystopian world.
  5. Strong Focus on “Buy Local”, Local Business Growth, Inter-Regional Supply Chain Development, etc.
The CJC has the following flexible long term goals:
  1. Explore becoming a non-profit, establishing a Board, etc
  2. Use CJC.News as a platform to evolve the news industry from a financial standpoint, taking advantage of smart contract blockchain technology to allow readers to make instant “tips” to Citizen Journalists.
  3. Explore the introduction of a traditional PRINT distribution method (i.e. Newspaper).
  4. Develop an outreach program for aspiring CJs: Educational Classes, Internships, Mentor Programs.
  5. There are some interesting ideas for how to evolve the political campaign world.  It is a mess right now, and some productive standards for how Candidates share information through the Media would be welcome.

Hope you will consider supporting this Project.  The world has a lot of problems, and much of it is being caused by our broken Media System.  This Project is being done for you, and future generations.

Thank you in advance!

 

Peace,
– david / publisher
Citizen Journalist Cooperative (CJC)
publisher@cjc.news

* a publication of The Mountains Voice