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The German newspaper saved by its readers: "To paywall or not to paywall: it's a question that plagues the media. At its heart is a debate about whether your readers are your customers – or your product, to be sold to advertisers. At Die Tageszeitung, a newspaper based in Berlin, they look at it differently. Its readers are its owners. Taz – as the paper is nicknamed – is owned by a co-operative of 12,000 readers. Taz was founded in 1979 by west Germans disenfranchised by the conservative mainstream media and it is a leftwing paper. Half of its readers vote Green. For years, Taz – circulation 60,000 – was funded by state handouts. But with the fall of the Wall in 1989 came a drop in subsidy – and by 1992, the paper faced bankruptcy. Enter the Genossenschaft, or co-operative: a group of concerned readers who valued the paper's independence, or its ability, as one has it, "to put its finger into the wounds of our economic system". The group invested its savings in the paper, and the paper was itself saved. Two decades on, the co-operative's coffers contain EUR 11m. Murdoch, this isn't: anyone can invest as little as EUR 500, and everyone gets an equal say, regardless of their stake. They can't influence the paper's day-to-day operations, but they can propose policy at the AGM. Recent meetings discussed whether to raise freelance fees (yes) and to ban advertising for nuclear energy (no). The egalitarian approach extends to the 140-strong newsroom" (The Guardian).German news agency DAPD declares bankruptcy: "Germany's second biggest news agency DAPD said on Tuesday it was declaring bankruptcy, in a surprise move that was set to affect 299 of the group's 515 employees. Six other subsidiaries of the holding company DAPD Media Holding would start insolvency proceedings on Thursday, the group said in a statement. Sources close to the agency said that salaries for September had not been paid and the Federal Labour Agency would pay employees for this month and in October and November. An administrator has been appointed who will decide the agency's future by the end of November, the statement added. "During the ongoing insolvency procedure, the DAPD companies will continue its news production operations. Clients will receive their accustomed service in the same volume and to the quality they are used to," the firm stressed. DAPD was formed in 2010 after a merger of the DDP agency and the German service of US news agency Associated Press (AP). Its main competitor on the German market was national news agency Deutsche Presse Agentur (DPA). The announcement came as a surprise in Germany as the group has said it was expanding. Last year, it took over the photo agency Sipa, which had itself recently bought AP's French service, in a bid to compete with Agence France Presse (AFP) on its home market in France" (AFP).[from European Journalism Center Media News]