Our Funding
The Credibility Coalition is an initiative co-founded and led by Meedan and Hacks/Hackers in 2017. It grew out of conversations held at MisinfoCon in February 2017.
Meedan is a US registered, San Francisco-based, 501(c) 3 non-profit organization established in 2006 that works on projects to support global journalism and cross-cultural education. Hacks/Hackers is a US registered, Washington DC-registered 501(c)3 non-profit organization established in 2014 to create a network of journalists (“hacks”) and technologists (“hackers”) who rethink the future of news and information.
Meedan and Hacks/Hackers accept monies from a diverse set of corporate and foundation funders. We see our funders as key partners in the effort to create a better environment for quality information. Their financial contributions also facilitate our larger conversation with them and their stakeholders about the complexities of the current media environment.
Because we do not accept capital directly, our funding model is somewhat unique. Though donations are clearly delineated to be directed towards CredCo, they are funnelled through Meedan (for corporations) and Hacks/Hackers (for foundations/nonprofits/individuals). Meedan is the primary organization managing, delivering, and reporting on the project, Hacks/Hackers supports with fundraising and outreach.
Accepting financial support does not mean we endorse donors or their products, services or opinions. We neither seek approval from funders for the studies we pursue, nor give them control over the content and data we collect. We do not accept donations from sources who present a conflict of interest with our work, compromise our independence, or are anonymous.
If you have any questions regarding our funding methods or processes, please don’t hesitate to reach out hello@credibilitycoalition.org
You can find out more about the funding behind Credibility Coalition general operations, research microgrants, as well as specific projects below:
2018
Google News Initiative, Facebook Journalism Project and Twitter - Monies from platforms are funding research projects along the lines of our first effort, which includes coordination and operation costs, annotator stipends, and software support. The data related to these studies will be collected and made available in accordance with our data policies.
Craig Newmark Philanthropies - General support towards the creation of credibility indicators, including coordination with the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) to formalize and broaden them.
2017
Shuttleworth Foundation - Microgrant for Jennifer 8. Lee for her work on the Credibility Coalition, nominated by Mark Surman of the Mozilla Foundation. Shuttleworth flash grants are $5,000, directed at social change agents with no strings attached.
Knight Prototype Fund - The initial concept from Misinfocon Boston in February grew under a Knight Prototype Fund Grant to building a network and processes towards improving the flow of accurate information. Monies were used to pay for events to facilitate network building, operations and processes in addition to funding annotators to work on the results connected to our first paper.
In addition, in 2017, we received small private donations to support work on our credibility indicators.
