By Prajna Brooks

On June 11th, 2025, we held a panel discussion with journalists from worker-owned cooperatives. Hosted by the Writers Guild of America East, Matt Pearce from Rebuild Local News acted as a moderator. The speakers included Anh-Thu Nguyen from Democracy at Work Institute, Max Rivlin-Nadler from Hell Gate, Bikram Chatterji from Maximum Fun, Pablo Correa from La Coperacha, Jasper Wang from Defector, and Angas Challa from Time of Day Media. This Worker-Led Media virtual panel on building a better media economy was hosted by the Writers Guild of America East, in conjunction with Democracy at Work Institute, CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies, and the Consortium for Worker Education/Astoria Worker Project. There were interpreters, allowing the panel to be viewed both in English and Spanish. This was in part due to the involvement of speaker Pablo Correa, a journalist and worker-owner with La Cucaracha, a Mexico-based media co-op.

Topics included strategies for revenue from subscriptions to the pros and cons of advertising, how to turn a business idea into a business plan, and financial advice about pacing growth for when a co-op is just starting up. The panel concluded with a Q&A. Questions were asked from the WGAE Co-ops 101 class, as the students were tasked with studying some of these co-op media outlets.

Some discussion-provoking questions from the students:

Padmini asked, “Is everyone paid equally, and how do you navigate that?”

Since the origin of our cooperative (La Cucaracha), we’ve had the same pay. We’ve had long convos about this; it changes depending on the week, and we make sure there is a balance with work. This is something that has marked our project. – Pablo Correa, La Coperacha

Money is always going to be the hardest conversation, especially if you come from a place where your paycheck just shows up. At Time of Day Media, we were previously paid equally, and now we are not. There’s no easy way to come to that decision, but we are always transparent. Transparency is the fundamental difference of a co-op. – Angad Bhalla

Bryan asked, “Has worker ownership’s autonomy and independence enabled you to pursue a scoop or a project that a previous place of employment may have spiked?” 

It puts journalists in the driver’s seat. Journalists have good sensibility; we know what connects with readers. We do have a hierarchy in the newsroom via editors, but our editors are out in the field—just like us. Everyone is young just by virtue of our cohort. Hellgate has gotten to do big, homerun projects that we feel really good about because we were willing to put money behind them because we believe in them. There is very little mediation between what we see on the ground as reporters and what journalistic endeavors we should pursue. I believe a lot of what we’ve produced would not have flown at other news outlets. Our model makes journalism more dynamic, quicker, and more interesting to read. – Max Rivlin-Nadler, Hell Gate

It was so great to hear experts from successful worker-owned media cooperatives speak about their experience, especially to hear them answering questions from the students, many of whom are prospective [whose goal is to open a media worker-run co-op/wish to become involved with a co-op] co-op owners!

You can view the entire event here.