What a year! New Matilda famously runs on a shoestring but thanks to those of you who answered the call during our September funding drive we are finishing the year in our strongest position yet as a reader-funded news outlet.
Our team has grown — in April we welcomed Melbourne-based Adam Brereton as associate editor, and in September investigative journalist Wendy Bacon came on board as a contributing editor.
With your help 2013 will be the year that we consolidate our position as one of Australia’s strongest — and oldest — independent online outfits.
It’s been another hard year for the media — rolling job cuts at Fairfax and News Ltd, and now, pre-Christmas redundancies at one of the country’s newest online outlets, The Global Mail. Each year we watch the sector around us change and remain grateful that we can keep this patch of independent news and ideas online.
Everyone is struggling to make ends meet in this business and we don’t pretend it’s been easy. But the exciting thing about NM is that it’s funded by thousands of individuals, each of whom cares about the quality of media in this country, and wants to contribute to its diversity.
Likewise, all of us who work here at NM are committed to independent journalism — not only for the role that it plays in keeping the bastards honest, but also because it helps disrupt the pack mentality of so much of the mainstream media.
With the help of you lot and social media, our journalism has influenced the mainstream news agenda this year. Stories like West Papua, the treatment of asylum seekers on Nauru, the commercialisation of higher education and James Packer’s casino plans have been given greater exposure in the other media because of the work that we do here at NM — the work that our 2000 individual funders make possible.
Together we’ve had an impact on the quality of debate and breadth of information available, and we look forward to expanding that footprint in 2013.
Become a New Matilda funder here.
We’ll be taking a break over the Christmas period and will be back publishing daily in mid-January, all geared up for an election year. In 2013 we won’t be hitting the campaign trail to report on Tony Abbott’s biceps or Julia Gillard’s baby kissing, but we will be bringing you real news, ideas and context to guide you through the election circus. Never fear, we won’t give up our usual quality journalism and analysis to go chasing speedos.
We also have plans for some exciting new features on the site, as well as tech upgrades made possible by this year’s fundraising campaign.
We hope you have a safe and happy festive season and look forward to seeing you online in the New Year.
Marni Cordell
On behalf of the NM team
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