Scoop 3.0 - How You Can Help Scoop’s Evolution

Friday, 17 November 2017, 10:41 am
Article: Scoop Publishing

Entering into its third decade of operation, the Scoop news ecosystem is set to undergo another phase of transformation and evolution. We have big plans for 2018 as we look to expand our public interest journalism coverage, upgrade our publishing infrastructure and offer even more valuable business tools to commercial users of Scoop.

We will reveal more about these exciting plans soon, however, before we move to this next level we need to ensure the sustainability of Scoop’s core services. These services include the Scoop.co.nz website, our uninterrupted, curated daily news feed of relevant press releases and news items,and our publicly accessible, searchable archive of nearly 800,000 published news items. Part of this transition involves the launch of ScoopPro - a service for professional users of Scoop which will support the continued access by both workplace users of Scoop and the public to this important publishing service.

Many people use Scoop in the workplace and find it useful. Scoop has been a fixture of New Zealand’s news infrastructure for over 18 years. We publish around 1000 news items per week to our main website and several sub-sites. The majority of this content consists of press releases from Government, political parties, business, academia and civil society. Around 20% of the material we publish is journalistic: news reports, columns, analysis, local news reports, reviews and photo essays.

All of this content is available to the public free of charge, indexed forever and searchable via search.scoop.co.nz and global search engines.We are committed to maintaining public access and have found what we think is a fair way to ensure that this is possible.

Many people take for granted that Scoop’s free stream of breaking news and public news archive will always be around. However, without the financial assistance of our professional users, those whose material we publish and distribute, and those who routinely access Scoop for business intelligence , Scoop will not be able to continue this service.

For our first 15 years of operations the majority of Scoop’s income came from advertising income. However that source of income - as a reliable means for funding our operations - dried up in 2014. Scoop receives no Government grant or institutional support, and the fact that it has survived this long is testament to the tenacity of its founders, core supporters and staff.

Imagine for a second if you will, a New Zealand media environment which lacks Scoop as a clearing house recording in real-time and making available to all, the activities and views and work of all aspects of New Zealand society. Scoop provides a reliably curated indelible record of what was said and who said it which is accessible to everybody on their phone. There may be commercial alternatives, however none of these contains the historical depth, value for money and open public access aspects of Scoop.

Each day 210,000 Google search queries return Scoop indexed pages for searchers seeking information about a myriad of New Zealand subject matter and each month 500,000 users access the Scoop site. Scoop’s usage patterns are proof that Scoop is indeed the home of NZ’s National Debate.

Over the past three years the team at Scoop have looked into the abyss on multiple occasions. But we have also worked hard to secure our future. In 2015 we developed and launched a new business model to fund public interest Journalism in New Zealand. Scoop.co.nz is now a social enterprise owned by a charitable trust board, the Scoop Foundation For Public Interest Journalism.

Scoop is currently in transition to full sustainability on a zero advertising funding model through the professional use “Ethical Paywall” copyright licensing framework underpinning ScoopPro. This progressive copyright law innovation enables Scoop to require professional users of Scoop - those who receive the most value from our services - to pay an annual licensing fee towards covering the costs of this important publishing service. And to make the deal sweeter ScoopPro provides additional professional news intelligence and PR services to those organisations who comply with our terms and conditions of use.

At its heart this is simply a user pays system, those organisations who receive tangible value from Scoop.co.nz as a source of actionable business intelligence and a means to carry their communications to the wider community are asked to support the ecosystem they rely on professionally.

>> Click Here To Find Out More About ScoopPro Licensing <<

Scoop considers its ScoopPro business model to be a fair and reasonable way to serve the interests of both the organisations relying on Scoop professionally and the wider public. This model also enables us to keep Scoop.co.nz as a free and open access news-source for it’s public and educational readers.

All Profits generated in the future by Scoop will in turn be reinvested in improving the Scoop Public and returned to the Scoop Foundation which it will in turn invest in fulfilling its purposes, supporting independent public interest focused journalism and educating the public about the importance of quality journalism.

Today we are asking all New Zealanders, and especially those who work in institutions that rely on reliable and timely information, to support Scoop in its quest to complete it’s transition to sustainability.

>> Click Here To Find Out More About ScoopPro Licensing <<

This depends on whether you are an individual using Scoop or you regularly use Scoop as part of your duties for a Company, Government Department or Academic institution or community organisation.

1 - Professional Users of Scoop

This includes anyone within an organisation, Government Department or Academic institution using Scoop regularly as part of your work and finding it useful for research, keeping informed, publishing press releases, copying, linking etc.

You can check here whether your organisation is one of the 180 organisations already licensed under ScoopPro.

The best way for you to help Scoop continue is to pass on a simple message to the appropriate decision makers (CEO, Board members etc ) in your own words suggesting the organisation considers becoming a ScoopPro licensed organisation. You might set out the reasons you find Scoop useful and the legal and ethical reasons you think it is important to comply with Scoop’s advertised terms and conditions of use, and you might also outline the added benefits your organisation will receive if it becomes ScoopPro licensed.

Alternately please email us with the details of who you think we ought to contact within your organisation to inform them about ScoopPro licensing.

>> Click Here To Arrange A Call From The ScoopPro Team <<

We will be contacting organisations directly, however the more support we receive from those working within the organisations, the more likely decision-makers will be able to understand both the legal requirement to pay for professional use of Scoop, and why access to Scoop is necessary for your organisation.

If a few people in your office agree with you on this, you could possibly send a joint letter or raise it as an agenda item at a staff a meeting.

Suggested Example text for sending to decision makers in your organisation:


“I routinely use Scoop.co.nz as part of my work, and wanted to let you know that I personally find it a useful service for accessing timely and accurate information about what is happening in New Zealand to help me do my job. Over the past two years Scoop has transitioned to a ScoopPro model in which professional users like us are required by its advertised copyright terms of use to have a ScoopPro license if staff like me continue to use Scoop professionally.


This month Scoop has adjusted its product offering to provide additional benefits to ScoopPro licensed organisations, these include - access to daily and weekly Newsletters on our region and key industry sectors, and the ability to continue including hyperlinks in press releases or news items we submit.



More information on the legal requirements and benefits is available here at the ScoopPro page

>> Click Here To Find Out More About ScoopPro Licensing <<

2 - Non-professional Readers of Scoop

If you simply value Scoop as a news source and would like to help then you can support Scoop.co.nz by donating to the Scoop Foundation through a partnership we have formed with innovative local journalism crowdfunding platform - PressPatron.

Every little bit of support helps us as we work towards completing the ScoopPro business model transition to a stage where Scoop Publishing is generating surpluses and able to return dividends to the Scoop Foundation.

If you would like to support us now you can chip in on a one-off basis or as a regular monthly supporter by clicking here.

Over the first year of its existence the Scoop Foundation has funded a number of public interest journalism projects through crowdfunding from supporters. These include a series on Post Natal Depression by Alison McCulloch, and a series on the Kaikoura Earthquakes which we expect to publish shortly. When it is able to do so the Scoop Foundation will invest in further in-depth investigative journalism grants.

Click Here To Support Via PressPatron

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