A new project by PJnet called Representative Journalism is looking for a new recruit to test out the best way to make local reporting financially sustainable. The project’s a testimony to the latest of the latest in online journalism; the local stuff.
The new hire’s stories will appear on LocallyGrownNorthfield.org, a two year old blog that recently received funding of the Harnisch Family Foundation to test out locally-grown journalism and podcasting options.
Locally Grown is quite an impressive set of weblogs which have been welded together into a tool for strengthening the civic fabric of the area, both for individual citizens, local leaders, and local non-profit organizations. This is grassroots reporting where it should be at perhaps.
Taking into account the site’s own definition of ‘blogosphere’ lands us straight at the heart of civic and democracy issues, local style. The blogosphere, is defined by Local Grown as ‘the intellectual cyberspace occupied by a subset bloggers’. Nothing could be closer to the truth.