What if the Fediverse had its own full-scale News Network?

[teknevra@lemmy.world]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/43657336

So I’ve been thinking about the whole PSKY winning the bid for WBD situation, plus a ton of other US News sites being owned and controlled by MAGA — and now that PSKY owns massive legacy brands like CNN and platforms like TikTok, it got me wondering:

What would it look like if the Fediverse built its own large-scale news station?

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And I don’t mean news apps (I know things like Flipboard already exist and are experimenting with federation). I mean:

A full-on journalism operation that is:

Fediverse-first

Hosted via PeerTube, Loops, its own website, etc.

Producing regular news broadcasts, investigative journalism, live streams, analysis panels, documentaries, etc.

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Two Possible Models

1. Professional Model (CNN-style equivalent)

A structured newsroom:

Editors, reporters, correspondents

Daily live broadcasts via PeerTube

Clip distribution via Loops

Federation across Mastodon/Lemmy/Pixelfed

Transparent funding (co-op model? public donations? instance-backed?)

Essentially: a decentralized alternative to cable news, but not algorithm-driven or corporate-owned.

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2. Amateur / Grassroots Model

Think:

Independent PeerTubers collaborating

Loop creators reporting locally

Lemmy communities functioning as distributed editorial desks

Citizen journalism amplified through federation

This could look more like a decentralized wire service, where stories propagate organically across instances.

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Alternative Idea: Federated News Aggregator

Instead of building from scratch, what if the Fediverse collaborated with existing independent outlets like:

World Socialist Web Site

Communist.red

Mother Jones

The Nation

Common Dreams

The Intercept

Jacobin

Cpusa.org

(And many others.)

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Podcasts:

The Deprogram:

https://youtube.fandom.com/wiki/The_Deprogram

Revolutionary Left Radio:

https://revleftradio.com/

Guerrilla History:

https://guerrillahistory.libsyn.com/

etc

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YouTubers:

https://youtube.fandom.com/wiki/Hakim

Second Thought:

https://youtube.fandom.com/wiki/Second_Thought

YUGOPNIK:

https://youtube.fandom.com/wiki/YUGOPNIK

r/TankieTheDeprogram

https://www.reddit.com/r/TankieTheDeprogram/s/mJqfxpGOYK

r/TheDeprogarm

https://www.reddit.com/r/TheDeprogarm/s/Re7CYFSaSW

Lee Camp-Unredacted Tonight

https://youtube.com/@unredactedtonight

Chris Hedges

https://youtube.com/@chrishedgeschannel

Jimmy Dore

https://youtube.com/@thejimmydoreshow

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Maybe:

A federated aggregator

A shared ActivityPub-based publishing layer

A “news hub” instance that boosts and categorizes content

Or something similar to the federated streaming marketplace idea I suggested before — but for journalism instead of an Amazon Prime alternative

https://lemmy.world/post/40697282

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Big Questions

Would a Fediverse news network increase credibility — or fragment it?

How would editorial standards work in a decentralized ecosystem?

Could co-op funding sustain professional reporting?

Would mainstream journalists ever migrate?

Should this aim to compete with centralized media — or complement it?

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Also: would this risk becoming ideologically siloed? Or would federation naturally diversify perspectives?

Curious what everyone thinks.

Is this unrealistic? Inevitable? Already quietly happening?

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Link to same post, but on Reddit:

https://www.reddit.com/r/fediverse/s/wt59TIXVv3

[solrize@lemmy.ml]

Might be interesting but with the same sources of funding we could also have our own space program. It would be really cool to have interplanetary missions and maybe even interstellar ones. People don’t always realize that the United Federation of Planets began as a fediverse project! Why stop with a newsroom once enough imaginary resources can be deployed?

[frongt@lemmy.zip]

It’s your idea, you tell us what it would look like to you. Because we have plenty of people doing journalism and using federated platforms as their primary platforms.

[lost_my_mind@lemmy.world]

You posted this 2 hours ago. However I read this same post yesterday.

…you a bot?

[teknevra@lemmy.world]

No I am not

[lost_my_mind@lemmy.world]

Oh yeah? What’s your favorite curse word, and what’s your favorite display of violent imagery.

Me personally I’m partial to the french killing the wealthy with a guillitine.

[jayjader@jlai.lu]

They aren’t fediverse-first, and they’re French-based/French-focused/French-language-only, but Blast is an online, video-first news station that hosts their own peertube instance (https://video.blast-info.fr/) where they upload everything as well as putting their videos on YouTube. They also have a mastodon account where they share everything they publish: https://mamot.fr/@blast_info.

So, it’s definitely possible to have news on the fediverse, but I don’t think we’re at a point where it can be exclusively on the fedi - even if the stations’ website is ActivityPub-enabled, the majority of the people that a news station would want to reach just aren’t browsing the fediverse, let alone have accounts here.