News website gives journos the chance to turn entrepreneur

Amid a shifting United States media landscape, a new website has gone online offering an innovative platform for journalists and advertisers and pledging to break down "walls" with its audience. "True/Slant is an original content news network," said Lewis Dvorkin, the Founder and Chief Executive of trueslant.com, which was recently launched in beta, or test, version. "We are tailored to what we call the entrepreneurial journalist," said Dvorkin, whose 35 years of media experience includes stints at internet portal AOL, Forbes magazine, Newsweek, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. "An entrepreneurial journalist could be a traditional journalist, an author, a blogger, an academic or an expert," he said. "Any one of those and a couple of other types who have knowledge and credibility about very specific news topics." "We have built a platform with publishing tools for contributors that enable them to create their own digital brands within a network," said Dvorkin. He said that in addition to providing a platform for contributors, the New York-based True/Slant was also "tailoring our site to marketers who are looking for a more effective way to engage with news audiences." True/Slant currently has a stable of more than 100 contributors, said Dvorkin, one of the most prominent being Miles O'Brien, an aviation and space expert who was laid off by CNN six months ago after 17 years with the network. O'Brien has brought his aviation expertise to bear in three incisive articles about the crash of Air France Flight 447 and has attracted some 140 "followers" so far on True/Slant. Dvorkin said True/Slant, which is privately held and funded by Forbes Media and Velocity Interactive Group, was a platform to help writers such as O'Brien "build, anchor and consolidate their digital brands." "Our contributors have the tools to publish their own content in real-time," he said. "They are creating their own homepage and they have tools to curate their own community." True/Slant's six full-time staffers "do not line edit copy in the traditional fashion," said Dvorkin, leaving contributors to effectively "self-publish." Contributors are also under contract to engage with their followers. "They want to anyway but they're contractually obligated to interact and engage and to approve comments and elevate comments from the users of their community," said Dvorkin. "We are breaking the walls down between contributors and audience." True/Slant is also open to marketers, he said, with marketer-generated copy clearly labelled to prevent any misunderstanding or conflict of interest. "We have a model that enables a marketer to have a voice on True/Slant," said Dvorkin. "Effectively, the marketer has a page as a contributor does, fully labelled, fully transparent." Keep up with the latest business news from the region with the daily Emirates Business 24|7 newsletter. To subscribe to the newsletter, please click here .