The fourth estate is critical infrastructure to a functioning democracy. I know that in the US, we've kind of accepted a certain level of decay in the system, but I can't see how this does anything but accelerate the transition of the US into a more openly anti-democratic oligarchy.

We desperately need alternative models to ad-funded journalism. The two main alternatives seem to be state funding and patronage, both of which have difficulty shoring up a wide perception of legitimacy and independence. I'd love to see more organizations pursuing a model like The Correspondent, where readers are given more involvement in the production of news in exchange for higher subscription charges (or perhaps we could begin to think of them as member dues).

What models have others come across that seem promising?