I’ve been doing some research into alternative media models, like non-profit ones, for a research paper. I fired off This Magazine, a Canadian current-affairs mag dating back to 1966, an e-mail to find out how their model works. Graham Scott replied, and this is what he said:

This Magazine’s revenue model is comprised of:

• Circulation revenue (subscriptions, newsstand sales)
• Grants (Department of Canadian Heritage, Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Ontario Media Development Corporation, etc.)
• Charitable Donations (mostly individual donors who support the foundation)
• Advertising (mostly small-press publishers and labour unions who support the magazine’s mission)

The important point is that we’re organized as a non-profit charity, so profitability is not our ultimate object—meeting our mandate is:

1. To publish long-form investigative and public-interest journalism on Canadian current affairs;
2. To showcase emergent Canadian arts and culture, including publishing short fiction and poetry;
3. To incubate Canadian journalism talent by supporting young or emerging creators.

The non-profit model is not without its own set of difficulties, but for the kind of journalism we do — which has never been especially commercially viable — it has worked fairly well for quite a long time.

Interesting. And informative, since I didn’t really know what This was about before–it has one of those kind of inscrutable titles. (It’s also now citable, which I swear has nothing to do with this post.)