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5,000 new media startups — can one save local news?

RISE OF THE NEWS MACHINES: The future has arrived and it’s called the Age of Data
This article appeared as part of the Public Press’ Spring print edition media package of stories.
San Francisco sits at the epicenter of a brand new tech boom revolving around several thousand variously funded startup companies. The organizer of the premier mixer for entrepreneurs in the city, Christian Perry of SF Beta, estimates that there are between 4,000 and 6,000 such outfits in the city. (His current mailing approaches 5,000.) Many other ventures can be found in the Valley or in tech-focused business strips all over the East Bay and Marin.At the same time that all this feverish activity is taking place — and some would say because of it — there have been massive dislocations among the people who traditionally dug up the news. So how might these new ventures impact the future of journalism?