NewsTrust Baltimore, the "local news experiment to find and share good journalism about Baltimore," got a healthy nod from Harvard University's Nieman Journalism Lab.
"NewsTrust sees its mission as helping readers find "good journalism" by giving people the tools to separate good from bad. But when it comes to journalism, good and bad aren't exactly universal truths anymore. Is a story good if it adheres to facts but lacks strong writing? Is a story bad if it's on a blog, regardless of how it's reported? And what if its told through an ideological or political lens different from your own?
While NewsTrust has previously employed its tools for vetting journalism on a national level, their newest test, NewsTrust Baltimore, takes things to a smaller scale � namely one where readers' connection to news is based on geography (will a new school be built? is the police department cutting staff? did the legislature cut taxes?) and necessity.
That familiarity, with both the news and outlets reporting it, could make for a better experiment in media criticism as well as media literacy. Who better to judge the Baltimore Sun or WYPR than the people who live in the area?"
Read the full writeup
here.