By Marina Savchenko
Cross-border collaborative journalism is a powerful journalistic method. It has been practiced for a while, and with prominent examples such as the PanamaPaper or the FootballLEaks researches, the potential is widely recognised. Brigitte Alfter shared her experience with young media makers.
Here are interesting tips and tricks for young media startup founders by Brigitte Alfter:
- Networking is the basis. Start networking and keep going as good as you can.
- The budget of your project should be modest, realistic and well researched.
- It is not only a journalist who benefits from getting financial support or grants from foundations. Foundations themselves also need good projects in a given field.
- Donors like if your project becomes commercial, but for the beginning you need funding.
- Potential sources/steps to a cross border story: Actuality, Organization stories, Chain stories, Comparative stories.
Photo: Elena OStanina
About: Brigitte Alfter is a German-Danish journalist and covered European affairs for two decades on local, national and European level. She started out as a local journalist and was a Brussels correspondent for Danish daily newspaper Information from 2004-2008. She has worked in several cross-border teams including ICIJ-teams. Since 2007 she has developed the European activities of Journalismfund.eu, a Belgian organisation working for in-depth, independent journalism in Europe. Her ‘Handbook in cross-border journalism’ was published in Danish in 2015 and in German in 2017. She has a track record of teaching journalism at all levels – from school children to university and mid-career.
www.alfter.dk, www.journalismfund.eu
