Civil, a blockchain-based journalism startup, promises a comprehensive solution to create a “decentralized marketplace for sustainable journalism” by directly supporting content creators, fighting “fake news,” and removing advertising from the news experience. While Civil’s goal –– to flip the current journalism model on its head –– is ambitious, the team has already recruited a network of newsrooms and has secured $5 million from ConsenSys to build their product.The State of Online News in 2018It’s hard to verify the trustworthiness of online news in 2018. From fake news spread through social media networks such as Twitter to “deepfake” videos of President Obama circulating on YouTube, consumers must be ever vigilant when they’re looking to catch up on recent events.And the migration of news online is accelerating, especially among younger generations. According to the Pew Research Center for Journalism and Media, as of early 2016, only 20 percent of U.S. adults and only 5 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds reported that they accessed news via a print medium.As businesses, online publications generally rely on advertisement-first models, so that they can serve consumers free news in exchange for the consumers’ eyeballs on targeted ads or sponsored messages. To maximize profit, it is in the online publications’ best interest to serve as many ads as possible. This profit maximization may interfere with a use...
