Sharesleuth.com, the investigative news site funded by Mark Cuban, blogger, entrepreneur and Dallas Mavericks owner, announced a new feature called “short takes” last week. “Sharesleuth.com is independent Web-based reporting aimed at exposing securities fraud and corporate chicanery,” according to the Web site, but it is paid for by Cuban.
The “short takes” item alleges that Marvin K. Rowe II, principal in Going Public LLC, a concern that helps companies get listed on stock exchanges, is actually Kyle Browning Rowe, who was barred from the financial industry by the SEC and the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD.) The story includes the petition for a name change from Kyle Browning Rowe to Marvin Kyle Rowe II, and an outline of Rowe’s history of regulatory run-ins with the SEC, including an episode with Salomon Grey and Freedom Surf, and problems with the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (formerly the NASD.)
“Short takes” promises more on the story, after describing several current deals that Going Public LLC has worked on this year. This is a serious business story. Knowing about the SEC complaints is important for potential investors.
But Sharesleuth’s full disclosure notes that, “In certain instances, the majority partner [Mark Cuban] of Sharesleuth.com is going to make personal investments based on information we uncover. Those investments will be fully disclosed, so that readers can evaluate any potential conflicts of interest. The reporters and editors, however, will maintain policies of not holding individual securities, and we will report Sharesleuth.com stories no differently than we have others throughout our careers.”
Patron-sponsored investigative journalism is controversial. Yet, transparent business reporting that goes beyond quoting analysts and printing the company line is essential to us all, as the recent failure of much of the mainstream press to recognize the coming economic meltdown makes clear.
What are the standards in the current media environment for this kind of investigative work? Jarvis points out that whether the reporting is by a “big, old, professional institution or by a renegade upstart company or by individuals or networks of all of the above,” there’s a need to explore and debate the ethical and practical conditions of patron-sponsored journalism.
It would be easy to scoff and dismiss this model because Cuban, who pays for it, stands to make money off the reporting, though he says he will be transparent about this, and will share the story with the public. But in a time when investigative reporting is a luxury for many news organizations, and there are tools for “triangulating” the veracity of a story, patron-funded journalism may have come into its own.
Patronage, with a set of standards and ethics, including full disclosure, might become respectable again, but it is important that journalists have a say in the debate.
