Last week, Johnny Harris — former Vox video journalist whose YouTube channel alone has over 7.5 million subscribers, many of them exactly the young, news-curious audience legacy media is trying to reach — announced Newpress, a platform for “creator-led, community-driven journalism.”

What makes it interesting isn’t just the ambition. It’s the structure. 

Newpress pays its journalists a salary with revenue share. It provides editors, producers, and animators editorial feedback. Harris called it “our answer to a world where a handful of platforms run by the richest man now decide what billions of us see, read, and believe.”

Think about the symmetry for a moment: In part one of this newsletter, we looked at a legacy institution learning to work like creators. Here, we’re seeing a creator building something that looks a lot like an institution.

Both sides are moving toward each other. I don’t think this a coincidence. It’s much more of a signal.

Harris isn’t building this out of nowhere. He’s building it because there’s a gap, and that gap is getting wider every month.

The sweeping layoffs at The Washington Post are the latest and most devastating example. Close to half of the newsroom has been eliminated. The sports section, the books section, foreign bureaus — gone or gutted. Hundreds of experienced journalists are suddenly looking for what comes next.

I felt this acutely last week when I had lunch with a colleague who is retiring from journalism after more than 40 years. At one point, he paused and said: “I honestly don’t know if I could, in good conscience, recommend this career to a young journalist today.”

That hit me.

I never experienced the golden years of this industry. I started my career when the disruption was already well underway. But I still believe journalism is a fantastic profession. For me, being able to ask people questions for a living — questions that genuinely interest me — remains one of the greatest privileges I know.

And yet, I could see it in his eyes: The journalistic fire hadn’t gone out. But years of cost-cutting rounds, restructurings, and watching talented colleagues leave had worn him down. I get it.

Maybe this is exactly why so many talented journalists are finding their way into creator journalism. Not because they love the hustle of going solo, but because legacy media no longer has room for them.

I’m curious: What are your most pressing questions about creator journalism? Drop them in Slack or reply to this e-mail. I’d love to shape upcoming content around what’s actually on your mind.

If you’d like to subscribe to my bi-weekly newsletter, INMA members can do so here.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .