A new journalism nonprofit aimed at investigating tech giants is set to launch next year, backed by a $20 million donation from Craigslist founder Craig Newmark.

The Markup, which will begin publication early next year, was founded by a pair investigative journalists who previously worked at ProPublica — Julia Angwin and Jeff Larson — and Sue Gardner, former executive director of the Wikimedia Foundation.

ADVERTISEMENT

The project, announced on Sunday, is aimed at exploring how tech platforms like Google and Facebook impact society.

“In a healthy society, there's an ongoing conversation about what's in the public interest—a debate that includes legislators, regulators, the institutions of civil society, the private sector, and the general public,” Gardner said in a statement. “We aren't having that debate right now about new technologies because the level of understanding of their effects is too low.”

In addition to Newmark’s contribution, the organization’s funding sources include the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, which gave $2 million, and the Ford Foundation and John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

"I’m proud to back The Markup and support people whose work I’ve followed and admired for a long time,” Newmark said in a statement. “As a news consumer, I look for journalism that I can trust, and by producing data-driven, rigorously fact-checked reporting on the effects of technology on society, The Markup is helping to fill a largely unmet need."