TechCrunch | Center for Investigative Reporting
The Center for Investigative Reporting will curate “The I-Files,” a new YouTube channel featuring investigative videos from partners such as Al Jazeera, The New York Times, and the 60 nonprofit news organizations that make up the Investigative News Network.
“The launch of the new investigative YouTube channel, The I Files, in association with INN, reflects CIR’s belief that collaboration and partnership are crucial to the sustainability of investigative, public service journalism,” said Robert J. Rosenthal, executive director of CIR. “There is enormous potential in finding new audiences to magnify the impact of all of the partners participating in The I Files.”
PEJ recently did a study of YouTube’s role in news consumption, writing:
The data reveal that a complex, symbiotic relationship has developed between citizens and news organizations on YouTube, a relationship that comes close to the continuous journalistic “dialogue” many observers predicted would become the new journalism online. Citizens are creating their own videos about news and posting them. They are also actively sharing news videos produced by journalism professionals. And news organizations are taking advantage of citizen content and incorporating it into their journalism. Consumers, in turn, seem to be embracing the interplay in what they watch and share, creating a new kind of television news.
The Knight Foundation is providing $800,000 for the project.
To foster video-based student investigative reporting, CIR is holding a contest in which the public will vote on the top 10 videos. The winner will receive $2,500.
Related: News events occasionally outpace entertainment on YouTube
