Wikipedia co-founder Jimmy Wales to create news service

Wikipedia's co-founder Jimmy Wales is planning a news service that combines the work of professional journalists and volunteers.

His goal is for Wikitribune to offer "factual and neutral" articles that help combat the problem of "fake news".

The service is intended to be both ad-free and free-to-read, so will rely on supporters making regular donations.

One expert said it had the potential to become a trusted site, but suggested its influence might be limited.

Wikitribune shares many of the features already found in Mr. Wales's online encyclopaedia, including the need for writers to detail the source of each fact and a reliance on the public to edit articles to keep them accurate.

However, while anybody can make changes to a page, they will only go live if a staff member or trusted community volunteer approves them.

The other big difference is that the core team of writers will be paid, although there may also be instances in which a volunteer writes the initial draft and then a staff member edits it.

A demo version of the site, seen by the BBC, declared "the news is broken and we can fix it".

Mr. Wales explained that he believed the advertising-based model used by most of the media had led it to "chase clicks", which affected standards.

Although staff members will decide the topics that get written about on a day-to-day basis, funders will get to influence the contents.


BBC NEWS