Talking Points Memo

Marketers have a habit of stretching the meaning of words so far they cease to mean anything at all. We run up against this a lot at TPM. We're proud to be independent but the term loses some of its panache when everyone says it. Authenticity is important, but people have gotten very, very good at faking authenticity. Size is another seeming liability that many have transformed into an asset — not just for us, but for many media outfits: Everyone is "small" these days.

Here are the facts. TPM has three editors, five reporters and a Josh Marshall. We have two developers, a head of product, a designer, an assistant publisher, and a publisher. That is our staff. There are no consultants on retainer or anything like that. When you are small, every dollar counts, every decision counts. 

The situation at the courthouse for the duration of the Trump trial has demonstrated how you can do more with less. On a given day, the New York Times has something like 5 reporters on the scene. NBC has maybe 10. They aren't alone. They are sending teams the size of our entire editorial staff to cover one thing. And without denigrating the work those fine people do, I would take Josh Kovensky's live blog and write-ups, along with David Kurtz and Josh Marshall's legal and political analysis, over all of that.

Some of this is addition by subtraction. When you have limited reporting resources, you have to think critically about what the public really needs. You don't have the luxury of throwing the kitchen sink at problems. And that is good. Because in our experience, readers don't want to sift through the kitchen sink. They (you) have lives outside of the news that they'd like to get back to. So, what is important, what is interesting, what should we know? In this era of digital news, there are many places to find "everything" but very few to find "the thing." We specialize in identifying "the thing" — as in, the thing you need to know.

Our promise to our members and readers is not just that we'll deliver high quality journalism, but that every time you trust us with a membership or a contribution, we'll be efficient with how we use those resources. It's the right thing to do, but it also just yields the best product.