This June, trailblazing Greek investigative journalist and IPI member Costas Efimeros passed away, leaving behind the respected independent news site that he founded in the wake of the Greek financial crisis: ThePressProject.

Despite this loss, ThePressProject’s journalists are keeping the site’s investigative mission alive. As it has from the beginning, ThePressProject relies on crowdfunding and donations to finance its operations and ensure that it remains independent of government or corporate influence.

We’ve invited ThePressProject, as a valued member of the IPI community, to update fellow IPI members in their own words on the progress of their work and the challenges they face in bringing critical, independent news to the Greek public and beyond.

To learn how to support ThePressProject, see the instructions at the end of the article.


A message from ThePressProject:

ThePressProject needs your help

The fundamental ethical principle of ThePressProject was extraordinarily simple, almost self-evident: if you don’t pay for the news, someone else will – someone who doesn’t have your best interests in mind. The difference in our case is that there was a person who, for seven years, dedicated his entire life and all of his resources to that idea. His name was Costas Efimeros, and he is no longer with us. What has remained is his life’s work, ThePressProject, and along with it a group of people who embodied his vision

Costas may not be with us anymore, but his dream – our dream – is still alive. ThePressProject was born in 2010, during the Greek crisis, as an answer to the corruption and infringement of journalistic ethics by the traditional mass media. Seven years on, one person’s idea has found thousands of supporters. The idea, in other words, is that one large, fully-operational media outlet can be funded (even in a Greece facing its greatest peacetime economic recession in history) exclusively by its readers, and thus categorically refuse, once and for all, the three basic and near-sole funding sources of all other Greek media: bank “advertisements,” the state, and the oligarchs.

We are fortunate, in a way: we don’t seem crazy anymore; we’re no longer viewed as odd; the idea that you can convince someone to pay for open-access content on the Internet is no longer outright laughable. The TPP managed to produce a daily newsfeed, original content, investigative stories and news analyses, television, and radio; it succeeded at becoming a truly expansive medium, open to the international conversation about the crisis. It found a way to collaborate with notable international media outlets and, what is most important, to win readers – readers willing to pay. To have, that is, subscribers. The arguments might not have always been right, but they always reflected the consciences of their authors, who wrote in service of the public good as they understood it. No other purpose ever determined the content.

Right now, the problem of the mass media isn’t limited to the traditionally corrupt systemic media. Even the Greek media that, since the beginning of the crisis, have played an important role in informing the progressive-leaning public eventually cede to the interests of the government or the oligarchs who sustain them. Our country is currently at the bottom of the list in terms of faith in the media. As this situation becomes even more dire, the urgency of our need to keep the TPP’s journalistic endeavour alive will only increase.

On June 21, we promised our readers and supporters that we would pick up right where we had left off. One month later, we believe that we have realized this first goal. We said that we would continue, and we are continuing, with even greater passion. We have produced original content that surpasses or at least contends with most newspapers, with more than 60 original pieces (of reportage, interviews, and analyses). We asked you to help us so that we could help you, and we already have proof that our “social contract” has been received with success.

We uncovered the Greek government’s efforts to gain a re-examination of the European Court of Human Rights’ decision in the Manolada human trafficking case, which shocked Greece in 2014 and led to the country’s condemnation by the ECHR. We were glad to see the attention, criticism, and communal reaction that our work provoked have immediate effects, when just a few hours later the request for a review was cancelled. We also uncovered, as we continued our investigative work, that the “staff registry” of the opposition party New Democracy had infringed laws on private data protection by using private data of registered voters illegally and without necessary safeguards. We produced an entire special edition dedicated to the anniversary of the 2015 referendum, a watershed moment in Greek political history, and to the country’s return to the bond markets, for which we gathered an array of expert opinions from politicians and economists. We chronicled in detail the case of Andreas Giorgiou, the former President of the Hellenic Statistical Authority, who was convicted of misrepresenting statistics related to the Greek deficit, which in turn led to the provisions of the First Memorandum of Understanding. This is a matter in which the Greek government is being coerced by its creditors, who are demanding that Georgiou be acquitted and his legal fees be paid by the Greek public. In short, we accomplished a great deal. With your support, we can accomplish even more.

Costas had dreams that weren’t confined to Greek borders. He had a vision for an international ThePressProject capable of presenting the Anglophone public with an accurate picture of the historical and global significance of what has been happening in Greece these last seven years. He also envisioned that this international edition would be able to finance its own reporting from different corners of the world – with internationally respected journalists able to make the most of ThePressProject’s financial model of complete independence and contribute original primary content. It was with that vision in mind that he became a member of the International Press Institute, and began an official collaboration with Julian Assange which enabled the TPP to be a part of Wikileaks revelations and to collaborate with some of the highest-quality international media (Project Syndicate, Political Critique, The Intercept).

If you don’t pay for the news, someone else will, and they won’t have your best interests in mind. We exist only because you support us, and only to the extent that you support us.

You can make a donation with PayPal here

ThePressProject bank accounts:

PIRAEUS BANK
6598-105207-071 (PAPADOPOULOU ZOI)
IBAN: GR03 0171 5980 0065 9810 5207 071
BIC: PIRBGRAA

ALPHA BANK
29200-2101-098-278 (PAPADOPOULOU ZOI)
IBAN: GR31 0140 2920 2920 0210 1098 278
SWIFT: CRBAGRAA

NATIONAL BANK OF GREECE
138/620264-01 (KARATZA GRANETA)
IBAN: GR50 0110 1380 0000 1386 2026 401

This article was written by ThePressProject. Any opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and may not necessarily reflect the view of IPI.