Episode 99: John Mooney

Episode notes

Dan and Ellen talk with John Mooney , the founder of NJ Spotlight News, a digital nonprofit that's part of NJ PBS , the state's public broadcasting network. Mooney, who covered education for The Star-Ledger in Newark, took a buyout in 2008, put together a business plan, and launched their site in 2010 under the auspices of the nonprofit Community Foundation of New Jersey. While Spotlight was making a mark journalistically, it wasn't breaking even, and its sponsor, the Community Foundation, was getting impatient. After extensive talks, Mooney affiliated with NJ PBS. The name changed to NJ Spotlight News, and the merger means true collaboration between the newsrooms. Both the broadcast and digital sides take part in news meetings. (In a previous podcast , Northeastern University professor and TV journalist Mike Beaudet discussed his initiative aimed at reinventing TV news for a vertical video age.) As Dan wrote in "What Works in Community News," the story of NJ PBS and NJ Spotlight News suggests that public broadcasting can play a role in bolstering coverage of regional and statewide news. It's a question of bringing together two different newsroom cultures.