Pasadena publisher launches a system for outsourcing local news

A publisher in Pasadena (CA) who said he received death threats when he started hiring workers in India to write local stories five years ago nevertheless has launched a business to help other local publishers start outsourcing.

James Macpherson, who founded local news site Pasadena Now nine years ago, launched a business called Journtent last week, just a month after the outsourcing company Journatic sparked panic in US newsrooms when it emerged that local stories outsourced to Journatic by the Chicago Tribune, the Houston Chronicle and others had been written abroad and then published with fake, American-sounding bylines. More recently, there have been reports of Journatic laying off staff and cancelling independent contracts as it tries to recover from the scandal.