If you don’t need to be persuaded to donate, but haven’t done so yet, please go directly to our fundraising page and donate.
Thanks to your support, we have achieved our first six goals. That’s providing critical IT, support for the comments section, funding the new Coffee Break/Sundae Links feature, bonuses for writers we respect, continued link expansion, and preventing burnout.
But we are not where we should be! We need to have enough cash for next year, but we’re still behind. So go to the Tip Jar and do your part.
Our seventh goal is to fund more original reporting. It may seem strange to have this as an end goal. Shouldn’t I have asked sooner?
In fact, all of the previous targets are essential to the continuity of the site. For example, rewarding regular writers does more than just recognize their dedication. It also helps bring in seasoned writers on board, as seen with Haig, Nat, and Curro.
Readers have told us that one of the things they especially appreciate about Naked Capitalism is its incisive coverage of financial, economic, and increasingly geopolitical news and the power relationships that drive them.
All the great reader responses warn us of the worst possible outcomes, but we’re still in catch-up mode when it comes to donations. If you haven’t yet, please help us! The tip jar beckons. From Amfortas:
I don’t remember how I found this place…I think it was around the 2008 Global Financial Crisis (GFC) (I’m not actually doing time, so to speak, haha) and just stared blankly.
As usual, I was lurking for a long time.
My first comment may have been about organic/regenerative farming and all the weird gratitude I have here on the farm.
I don’t understand.
But when Tam got cancer, you all were there for me and Tam… until the very end… and I’ll never forget that. (These threads are kept on file along with all my diary entries from that time and are still ongoing)
I wish I had money to send.
For those with extra jacks…put your money where the mouth is and hit the tip jar.
From Wetwear Antenna:
Please keep up the great work. And thank you for providing this important space as a refuge from all the madness and stupidity of this world.
God speed!
And Roxanne:
The check is in the mail but has no actual value in NC. Thank you for your hard work!
And Iowan X:
Congratulations on continuing to run the best website on the planet! $100 is at most this year.
One of the reasons we’ve been able to punch above our weight is the large amount and very high quality input we receive from this community.
But while this site makes important contributions by analyzing news articles and adding expert insights, our biggest impact comes from our original reporting. You’d be hard-pressed to find a site where we’ve forced so many officials out of office, including Andrew Borden of the SEC, for looking for his son’s job among the people he regulates.
We also forced industry-wide change in private equity by blackmailing CalPERS into disclosing how much it pays through one of its largest fees, the so-called carry fee. In the wake of Hubert Horan’s Uber series, reporters are finally starting to question the fundamentals of ride-sharing companies. More recently, Mr. Lambert’s relentless Covid reporting focused early on on *Covid being airborne* and encouraged community members to practice layered protection, which some say he feels has saved lives.
Connor delved into new angles, such as South Africa’s importance on global trade routes. Nick has been relentless in his work on the war on cash (and now perhaps backing extraordinary powers) and digital identity schemes. KLG has documented important medical advances (including steam challenge wear) and the impact Trump’s wrecking ball has had on the practice of science. Mr. Curro presented the report from BRICS 2025. Mr. Haig has had a peek into military weapons, corruption and wrongdoing. Nat (along with Connor and Nick) has been investigating the power structures of high-tech billionaires, as well as new political alliances created by the rift caused by the genocide.
We would like to report more, but I can see why journalists are angry with bloggers. An initial news story takes approximately 4 to 10 times more effort than an explanatory and analytical blog post. Consider the following example, which I previously published as an example in Columbia Journalism Review.
In this economic environment, it’s becoming increasingly rare that a time-consuming, in-depth report might get the green light, but might get less traffic than a cheaper article. A recent report by Mother Jones, in which a senior reporter spent four months working as a corrections officer, exemplifies this tension. The 35,000-word report, which exposed corruption in private prisons, conservatively cost $350,000 to produce and only $5,000 in banner ads.
We now have a clear advantage when it comes to Naked Capitalism readers experiencing richer content. But even so, producing your own reporting is not only a much more difficult task than analyzing the news. It also involves pursuing leads, which often don’t work out. You may also need to spend significant hard dollars, such as paying a lawyer to pursue a FOIA.
This is a tired way of saying that independent reporting is costly, but increasingly important as mainstream media face budget constraints and become less bold overall.
Again, the original reported goal is $45,000. We’re already $1,730 toward that goal.
To those who have already donated, we would like to once again thank you for your generous support. We also look forward to working with North Carolina fans who are just learning about our fundraising efforts and helping make the site even more successful.
There are multiple ways to give. The first is the Tip Jar on this blog, which gives you access to PayPa and the new payment service Clover. There, you can use your debit card, credit card, or PayPal funds (with PayPal, charges will be made in the name of Aurora Advisors).
You can also send a check in the name of Aurora Advisors Incorporated (I love checks! No fees!).
Aurora Advisors Co., Ltd.
P.O. Box 110105
Brooklyn, NY 11211-0105
To have your donation included in the donation total, please send an email to yves@nakedcapitalism.com with the heading “Your check is in the mail” (please include only the $ in transit in your message).
Whether you donate $5, $50, or $5,000, please donate to Naked Capitalism today. If you don’t have much, give what you can. If you can afford more, give more. If you can give a lot, please give a lot. It will definitely pay for itself, I guarantee it. This isn’t just giving, it’s an expression that you want a different discussion, a different society, a different culture. “Together, make a small investment in our future,” one reader wrote.
