On the other hand, another Examiner, Brian Lilley, is the Ottawa bureau chief for Newstalk 1010 in Toronto and CJAD 800 in Montreal. A full-time journalist, he's the "Canada Politics Examiner."
"I'm not out there doing this just for the money," he says. "It's a nice little side benefit, but mostly it's about engaging people in conversation about national politics."
Nurturing future rivals?
Dan Gillmor, director of the Knight Center for Digital Media Entrepreneurship at Arizona State University's Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, says Examiner's commitment to nurturing its writers may eventually cause it to confront some tough questions.
"What happens when some of [the Examiners] develop a good-sized audience? Will they split off and try to take it with them? Will Examiner try to pay them more?" Mr. Gillmor asks. "I'm unclear about what the purpose of the Examiner brand really is, and I don't think that they've entirely figured out what to do."
Still, he says he's happy that someone with "deep pockets" is investing in "these kinds of experiments."
Mr. Brody, a Canadian entrepreneur, became president of Clarity Digital Group after it acquired the Vancouver website he co-founded, NowPublic.com. But Clarity is wholly owned by Denver billionaire Philip Anschutz, who, unlike many spotlight-seeking media moguls (paging prisoner Black), is known for being reclusive. Portfolio magazine noted this summer that he "hasn't spoken to a journalist on the record since 1974." He does, however, speak with his money: Mr. Anschutz is a major contributor to conservative and Christian causes.
Mr. Brody says, "I don't want to, and I can't, talk about Phil in any way." He and Mr. Blair would rather talk about their site's explosive growth.
It launched 19 months ago with 60 Examiners in the U.S. Today, it attracts more than 12 million visitors a month, and has close to 22,000 Examiners serving 177 cities in two countries. The site publishes more than 3,000 articles a day. The goal for Canada was to start with 60 Examiners. It already has 277.
Prof. Currie says the focus on community is crucial to its success. "There needs to be a face, a real person, that people see as part of their community. Still, from what I see on the site, most of the topics are fairly generic - home-schooling, romance and relationships. I haven't seen anyone sign up for city council yet."
Indeed, he says, "I'm not sure if it's possible to get regular people to do what we would have called journalism in days past."
Then again, Mr. Blair says it's not about journalism. One thing it is about? Scale. "We believe we have the largest information-gathering organization in the world today," Mr. Blair said. "We're not going to stop at 50,000 or 60,000 [Examiners]. I can see a general goal for the U.S. of maybe having 100,000."
That's a whole lot of not-journalism.
Craig Silverman is a Montreal-based journalist and author.
