As Shrinking Newsrooms Use Upstarts' Content, Vetting Questions Arise

News comes from more and more outlets, about which readers know less and less.

Publishers and broadcasters have always called on freelance journalists. But a generation ago, if they used material from another organization, it was usually limited to a handful of large, well-known and respected ones like The Associated Press or Reuters. With established newsrooms shrinking, a raft of smaller news outlets have cropped up in the last few years, selling or simply giving news reports to the traditional media — groups like ProPublica, Global Post, Politico and Kaiser Health News.

"There are more pressures than ever to acquire content from outside sources, and there are going to be even more going forward," said Alan D. Mutter, a media consultant and former newspaper editor who blogs about the news business. That means that despite declining resources, newsrooms, he said, "have to get better at due diligence in terms of who this provider is," and at explaining it to their audiences.