Jessica with Samvad CVU, 75% sustainable from outside projects.

There's an ongoing conversation, in the west at least, about the death of old media. Traditional journalism, magazines, book publishing houses, broadcasting stations, the corporate music industry - all are scrambling to find revenue as advertisement dries up and more and more and more cultural products become available online for free.

While we should celebrate the rise of new voices who take full advantage of the digital age's cheap creative tools - including VV's community producers - there's still a lingering question: how are we going to pay for it all? As traditional economic models grow obsolete, how will we monetize our art, news, and entertainment? Importantly, how can VV find opportunities in this economic shake-up?

One answer is a hybrid business model that offers some free services, but with subsidiary content for sale.

A few examples: Lastfm, a free internet radio site that makes money by a combination of ads, user subscriptions and donations. Another example is open access publishing, free online scholarly journals that either require the author's payment in exchange for exposure or are subsidized by academic institutions. And the Prelinger Archive allows non-commercial access to 48,000 downloadable video files but profits from fees paid for a licensing clause.

VV is now working towards a similarly creative strategy. Currently one of its CVUs, Samvad in Ahmedabad, is about 75% sustainable. That is, it only relies on financial support from VV for a quarter of its costs. The rest of its income combines revenue from community workshops, wedding videos, and work-for-hire for other NGOs. Likewise a quarter of the other original CVUs now make 20-30% of their operating costs from earned income. And this year VV launched its VCU.br program of ten graduates from Brazilian favela media programs who train for a year in making and selling videos for mainstream TV.

It's a challenge to be sure. To make a CVU sustainable, for instance, it would need to earn around $30,000 a year. Plus the CVU must sustain its function as a vital social service, even as it earns additional income. Striking the balance between empowering the poor with a voice and creating a sustainable financial future is key.

VV is working with the Indian Institute of Management to research hybrid models and roll out a future business plan, the goal being 30% sustainability for all CVUs after two years. Here are a few ways IIC suggests CVUs could earn revenue in the future:

• Wedding videos
• Children video workshops
• DVD sales
• Films for other NGOs
• Government programs buying advertising
• Operations as a production company for hire by local businesses
• Stringers for local news, such as CNN IBN's Citizens Journalist program
• Producing for television, such as Current or MTV Iggy
• Providing vocational training in movie making to other local NGOs
• Showing advertisement for local shops in the screenings
• Screening Government films or films by other NGOs
• Providing computer education to the villagers
• Paying to organize screenings in other villages
• Operating as an internet kiosk
• Equipment rental
• Operating “media clubs"

For more on this issue, read Jessica's article on PBS's Mediashift blog and also this article from the Christian Science Monitor.

Posted by Morgan Currie, VV volunteer.