''De Correspondent'' is a Dutch

news website An online newspaper (or electronic news or electronic news publication) is the electronic publishing, online version of a newspaper, either as a stand-alone publication or as the online version of a printed periodical literature, periodical. Goin ...

based in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...

Netherlands , Terminology of the Low Countries, informally Holland, is a country in Northwestern Europe, with Caribbean Netherlands, overseas territories in the Caribbean. It is the largest of the four constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Nether ...

. It was launched on 30 September 2013 after raising more than in a

crowdfunding Crowdfunding is the practice of funding a project or venture by raising money from a large number of people, typically via the internet. Crowdfunding is a form of crowdsourcing and Alternative Finance, alternative finance, to fund projects "withou ...

campaign in eight days. The website distinguishes itself by rejecting the daily news cycle and focusing on in-depth and chronological coverage on a topical basis, led by individual correspondents who each focus on specific topics. Sometimes it publishes English versions of its articles. The concept and initial success of ''De Correspondent'' has inspired other projects elsewhere. A German website '' Krautreporter'' was founded in 2014 and adopted the same concept. An English-language news site, titled ''The Correspondent'', launched on September 30, 2019. English language version. The site raised through a crowdfunding campaign in late 2018, boosted by prominent backers including Jay Rosen and

Trevor Noah Trevor Noah (born 20 February 1984) is a South African comedian, writer, producer, political commentator, actor, and television host. He was the host of ''The Daily Show'', an American late-night talk show and satirical news program on Comedy ...

. However, it endured substantial criticism after it was announced that it would not open an office in the United States, as many backers had anticipated. On 10 December 2020, ''NiemanLab'' broke the news that ''The Correspondent'' would be closing down on 31 December 2020.

History

The project was co-founded by Dutch journalist Rob Wijnberg, creative director Harald Dunnink, CTO Sebastian Kersten, and publisher Ernst-Jan Pfauth. Wijnberg, former

editor-in-chief An editor-in-chief (EIC), also known as lead editor or chief editor, is a publication's editorial leader who has final responsibility for its operations and policies. The editor-in-chief heads all departments of the organization and is held accoun ...

of the Dutch newspaper ''

NRC Next ''NRC Next'' (; stylized as ''nrc•next'') was a Dutch daily newspaper published in the Netherlands by Mediahuis. The first edition was released on 14 March 2006. It was stopped in March 2021. ''NRC Next'' was a morning edition tabloid, and it ...

'', proposed the crowdfunding idea for an ad-free news media platform on national television in March 2013. Eight days later, he and his team reached their goal of 15,000 subscribers all paying €60 for a one-year membership. Wijnberg worked with digital creative agency Momkai and its owners, Harald Dunnink and Sebastian Kersten, served as creative director and CTO respectively. Ernst-Jan Pfauth, who had been the founding editor of The Next Web and head of digital at Dutch newspaper ''

NRC Handelsblad ''NRC'', previously called ' (), is a daily morning newspaper published in the Netherlands by Mediahuis NRC. It is widely regarded as a newspaper of record in the country. History was first published on 1 October 1970 after a merger of the Amst ...

'', joined as a publisher. The website went live in September 2013. By January 2015 the website had more than 45,000 paying subscribers. In January 2016 the number of paying subscribers on the website was reported to be 50,000. In 2014, ''De Correspondent'' concluded a deal with

Medium Medium may refer to: Aircraft *Medium bomber, a class of warplane * Tecma Medium, a French hang glider design Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''The Medium'' (1921 film), a German silent film * ''The Medium'' (1951 film), a film vers ...

’s magazine ''Matter'', for the magazine to translate stories from ''De Correspondent'' that they believe are relevant for an international audience. The first article in the partnership concerned the hazards of using

public Wi-Fi A municipal wireless network is a citywide wireless network. This usually works by providing municipal broadband via Wi-Fi to large parts or all of a municipal area by deploying a wireless mesh network. The typical deployment design uses hundreds ...

. In 2015, ''De Correspondent'' started translating stories from Dutch to English. In December 2018, an English-language

newsroom A newsroom is the central place where journalists—reporters, editing, editors, and Television producer, producers, associate producers, news anchors, news designers, photojournalists, videojournalists, associate editor, residence editor, visu ...

, ''The Correspondent'', reached its

goal of . The crowdfunding was enabled by a US$1.8 million "runway funding" by grants and loans from the

Omidyar Network Omidyar Network is a self-styled "philanthropic investment firm," composed of a foundation and an impact investment firm. Established in 2004 by eBay founder Pierre Omidyar and his wife Pam, Omidyar Network has committed over US$1.5billion to no ...

, the Dutch Democracy and Media Foundation, and

Craig Newmark Craig Alexander Newmark (born December 6, 1952) is an American internet entrepreneur and philanthropist best known as the founder of the classifieds website Craigslist. Before founding Craigslist, he worked as a computer programmer for IBM, Bank ...

Philanthropies. Its first news stories were published in September 2019. On 31 December 2020, ''The Correspondent'' was shut down. Pfauth and Wijnberg noted that the platform was no longer financially viable due to two primary reasons: poor conversion and retention of members, especially with only 27% of founding members renewed for the 2021 fiscal year, as well as readers' demand for more immediate news in light of the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

that ran contrary to the outlet's concept of "unbreaking news".

Content

The website aims to move away from the daily news cycle by focusing on context, rather than what happened in the past 24 hours. Individual correspondents lead as "guides" — deciding the news agenda and making their choices explicit. ''De Correspondent'' intends its authors to report on under-reported themes including energy, privacy, technology, and future economic trends.

Technology

''De Correspondent'' runs on a

content management system A content management system (CMS) is computer software used to manage the creation and modification of digital content ( content management).''Managing Enterprise Content: A Unified Content Strategy''. Ann Rockley, Pamela Kostur, Steve Manning. New ...

(CMS) called Respondens. In several blog posts, the founders said that they might make Respondens available for other publishers in the future.

Criticism

At least one incident involving editorial integrity was pointed out by Sarah Kendzior, a political journalist and one-time correspondent for ''De Correspondent''. In 2018, Kendzior expressed concern on Twitter that an editor at ''De Correspondent'' was refusing to review her draft articles due to

climate change denial Climate change denial (also global warming denial) is a form of science denial characterized by rejecting, refusing to acknowledge, disputing, or fighting the scientific consensus on climate change. Those promoting denial commonly use rhetor ...

. The outlet denied these allegations in a public letter on Twitter, as well as an accusation that they deleted Kendzior's articles as retaliation. However, Kendzior replied that their responses "grossly misrepresent" the "deep disagreement" behind this conflict. The fundraising campaign for ''The Correspondent'' featured endorsements from political celebrities primarily based in the United States, including

Jimmy Wales Jimmy Donal Wales (born August 7, 1966), also known as Jimbo Wales, is an American List of Internet entrepreneurs, Internet entrepreneur and former Trader (finance), financial trader. He is a Founders of Wikipedia, co-founder of the non-profi ...

DeRay McKesson DeRay Mckesson (born July 9, 1985) is an American civil rights activist, podcaster, and former school administrator. An early supporter of the Black Lives Matter movement, he has been active in the protests in Ferguson, Missouri, and Baltimore, ...

, and

Rosanne Cash Rosanne Cash (born May 24, 1955) is an American singer-songwriter and author. She is the eldest daughter of country musician Johnny Cash and his first wife, Vivian Cash. Although Cash is often classified as a country artist, her music draws f ...

. As such, crowdfunding supporters as well as "ambassadors" including

Baratunde Thurston Baratunde Rafiq Thurston (; born September 11, 1977) is an American writer, comedian, and commentator. Thurston co-founded the black political blog ''Jack and Jill Politics'', whose coverage of the 2008 Democratic National Convention was archived ...

and

Nate Silver Nathaniel Read Silver (born January 13, 1978) is an American statistician, political analyst, author, sports gambler, and poker player who Sabermetrics, analyzes baseball, basketball and Psephology, elections. He is the founder of ''FiveThirty ...

noted an expectation that ''The Correspondent'' will launch as an outlet specifically focused on the United States. However, a progress update from the platform in April 2019 revealed that the platform did not intend to build a physical presence in the United States. Zainab Shah, a former strategy leader of

BuzzFeed BuzzFeed, Inc. is an American Internet mass media, media, news and entertainment company with a focus on digital media. Based in New York City, BuzzFeed was founded in 2006 by Jonah Peretti and John Seward Johnson III, John S. Johnson III to ...

who resigned from ''The Correspondent'' a month prior, claimed that the platform's decisions "was a betrayal" and criticized the fundraising drive for operating under a "false pretense". The outlet tweeted on April 30, 2019 an unsigned letter that apologized for having "screwed up" its public launch. In it, ''The Correspondent'' noted that they "initially envisioned setting up a newsroom in the US" but "poorly communicated" changes in that vision to supporters and staff, and falsely represented the platform's vision as an American version of ''De Correspondent''.

References

External links