The New York Times is jumping into the market for news tips in a very visible way. A visit to its homepage reveals a notice inviting readers to share “confidential news tips.” It even has a webpage with advice on how to submit sensitive materials securely.
Tips – anonymous and otherwise – have always been the grease in the wheels of news-making.
What’s unusual is that the Times is now openly encouraging tippers. The old gal is clutching her pearls and admitting that, yes, she is willing to hear all kinds of proposals from strangers.
That’s a big change, and it shows how competitive the news business has become. But it is also an acknowledgement that the Times must broaden its method of news-gathering and reach beyond the sources it has relied on in the past.
There was a time not so long ago when the editors at the Times felt they had all the sources they needed to report on the news of the day. They and a few other newspapers stood at the top of media-land, unchallenged and content. So if a corporate whistleblower or a government official had a story to tell, the Times could be confident that it would get the call (usually from a desolate parking garage). And if they lost a few to the Washington Post occasionally (e.g., Watergate), well it all evened out eventually.
This happy state of affairs collapsed with the arrival of digital news platforms and social media. Now the Times has to compete with dozens of other news organizations, some of which have become quite good at mining their readers for news tips (see: Politico).
By creating a gateway to encourage tippers, the Times is bringing into the open a practice as old as newspapers themselves. But the stakes today are higher.
Getting scoops – the big stories no one else has – is vital to news organizations today, and the Times is hungry to get its share. Exclusive news drives web traffic, creates ripples across other media and ultimately racks up advertising dollars. (It’s the same economic force behind the plague of fake news, but that’s a topic for another time.)
Although technology makes it easier to share information, there still might be a place for old-fashioned methods like postal mail. Email leaves a trail that could deter a cautious source. An envelope and stamps work just as well. That, after all, was how the Times got one of the year’s biggest stories: it received a copy of Donald Trump’s tax returns through the mail.