Forbes has joined blockchain journalism network Civil in order to ensure that no third party can remove or alter its published content. The business magazine will also experiment with new methods of reader engagement in partnership with Civil.

Forbes Joins Civil Network to Increase Trust With Audiences

The arrangement will make Forbes the first major media brand to publish content on the blockchain-based platform designed to facilitate a peer-to-peer exchange of value between journalists and the audience in order to promote ethical journalism. The ecosystem is enabled by the CVL token which keeps “tech giants and billionaire owners” from controlling the model, “including where and how revenue is allocated”.

Forbes will experiment with the Civil platform as a means to increase trust with audiences and assess emerging opportunities, including additional revenue streams, according to Salah Zalatimo, Senior Vice President of Product & Technology at Forbes.

“We are relentlessly focused on rapid experimentation and implementation so that we can determine what’s in the best interest of our audience and what is next for our industry. Forbes and Civil believe passionately in the mission of journalism, and together we can provide audiences with a level of unprecedented transparency around our content. We’ll also be able to expand the reach of our writers and identify new revenue channels over time.”

At the Civil platform, participants can vote for/against newsrooms that are being challenged, earn CVL for participating, pay their favorite journalists with CVL, and convert CVL into cash. Contributors are required to deposit tokens as a ‘stake’ in order to start or back newsrooms, challenge bad actor newsrooms, and appeal to the Civil council.

The team behind Civil built their careers at NYT, The Wall Street Journal, BBC, The Guardian, El Pais, NPR, The Atlantic, among others. The agreement with Forbes is a milestone for the project, said Chief Executive Matthew Iles.

“Civil’s mission is to power sustainable journalism throughout the world, and Forbes’ commitment to regularly publish content on our platform is a major milestone for our approach. We look forward to working with Forbes as we connect with a broader audience interested in new, more direct ways to discover, share and support ethical journalism.”

Forbes is due to start publishing metadata of a number of articles to the blockchain via Civil in Q1 2019. The company intends to begin committing metadata from all of its articles to Civil’s decentralized network at some point later next year. The published metadata establishes the author’s identity and credibility, as well as the expert nature of participating sources.

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