Friends With Benefits
Funded early work
Volume VII — Money
Where the money comes from. What it’s allowed to do.
A contributor-owned newsroom owes its community visibility into who’s paying. No investors, no ads, paid first. Here’s the math, in detail.
Raised so far
$0
of $40,000 Season 01 floor
Donors so far
0
on Giveth + POIDH combined
Counter is updated weekly from the public Giveth + POIDH pages.
Section 01
The principle
Most newsrooms keep funding quiet. We’re going the other way.
Most journalism outlets keep funding details quiet. We’re going the other way.
Two reasons. One: the readers funding this work deserve to see the books. Two: in 2026, most newsrooms that fail are failing for funding reasons readers couldn’t see coming. Showing the math is how we earn the trust to keep going.
The live numbers (what’s been raised, what’s been spent) live on The Ask. This page explains the categories of funding and the rules we apply to each.
Section 02
Where the money currently comes from
The patronage auction. The newsletter. The bootstrap.
1. Direct donations — Giveth (live now)
The simplest way to back the work is on Giveth: giveth.io/project/we-them-media. Zero platform fees, peer-to-peer, every dollar pays a working journalist, editor, or fixer. Donations of $1,000+ enter as Executive Producers and get credit on every release this season. Donations under $1,000 join as Supporting Patrons. Once Giveth verifies the project, donors will earn GIVbacks — a portion of every donation streams back in GIV tokens.
2. Token of patronage
Our second funding mechanism is a token-of-patronage auction running through Nouns Builder on Ethereum. One token mints per period. The proceeds fund the work. Token holders are publicly listed (opt-in) on The Ask and have no editorial influence. See Section 4.
Combined with Giveth donations, this is how the launch year is being funded. The target is $40,000 raised between launch and end-of-summer 2026.
3. The newsletter (Beehiiv)
The newsletter is free. Beehiiv enables a paid tier and we may turn it on later in 2026 for readers who want to support us beyond the auction. If we do, paid subscribers receive nothing the free newsletter doesn’t. No exclusive editorial. The paid tier is patronage, not a paywall.
4. Founder bootstrap
The founder (Maceo) has personally funded equipment, travel, and operations through 2024–2026 from outside income. This funding is explicitly disclosed and treated like any other funding source: it doesn’t direct editorial.
5. Past partners
Earlier WTM work received support from individual partners and small organizations. That partnership history is disclosed on The Ask and was never structured to give partners editorial input.
The funder wall
Named, with permission · updated weekly
Who’s actually paying for this. In public.
Every donor of $5+ on Giveth or POIDH is named here unless they ask not to be. Every patron-token holder is named here unless they ask not to be. We’ll add new names within 7 days of the donation hitting our wallet.
Past patrons (publicly disclosed)
C.Y. Lee
Funded early work
Season 01 donors · Giveth + POIDH
Be the first
Donate on Giveth →
Want to give without being named? Add “anonymous” to your Giveth donation note. We’ll honor it.
Section 03
Where money is being applied for
What we’re pursuing, and the rules we’ll keep.
We are applying to and pursuing:
- Tiny News Collective (TNC) — fiscal sponsorship and grant infrastructure for independent news startups. Application in progress as of April 2026.
- Editorial / journalism grants — case-by-case, only from funders whose source-of-funds we can verify and who don’t restrict editorial direction.
- Production sponsorships — for specific projects, clearly labeled, never blended into editorial.
If any of these come through, we update this page with the source, amount, restriction terms, and what the funds were used for.
Section 04
What no funder gets
Funding pays for the work. It doesn’t direct it.
Regardless of contribution size or relationship, no funder of any kind has:
- Any veto, advance review, or pre-publication input on editorial coverage
- Any vote in editorial direction
- The ability to remove published pieces
- Pre-disclosed access to upcoming stories
- Any role in hiring or assignment decisions
This applies to token holders, individual donors, partners, sponsors, grantors, and any future investor.
The only people who pick what gets published are the editors. The only people who pick what gets reported are the contributors who report it. Funding pays for the work; it doesn’t direct it.
Section 05
What we won’t take
The default is to decline.
We won’t take funding from:
- Any source that requires confidentiality of the funding itself
- Any source that requires editorial pre-approval, post-approval, or directional influence
- Any source that is the subject of, or directly affected by, current or upcoming WTM coverage
- Any source whose ultimate funding origin we can’t verify
- Any source that conditions funding on protection from future coverage
- Equity in companies we cover or might reasonably cover
- Direct funding from political campaigns, candidates, or campaign-affiliated PACs
If a borderline case arises, the default is to decline.
Section 06
Disclosure thresholds
Named, aggregated, verified.
-
Disclosed by name
Token holders of patronage tokens (opt-in; defaults to public on The Ask unless the holder requests otherwise). Any single source providing >5% of annual revenue. Any source providing >$5,000 in any 12-month period. Any in-kind contribution valued at >$5,000 (equipment, services, travel). Grant funders, regardless of amount.
-
Aggregated
Smaller individual contributions are aggregated by category in the The Ask.
-
Source-of-funds verification
For any funder providing >$5,000, we ask the funder to confirm the source of those funds. If we can’t verify it, we don’t accept.
Section 07
How money is spent
Contributor pay is the largest line item.
The The Ask is the live document. Categories include:
- Contributor pay (weekly tips, bounties, project commissions)
- Production costs (equipment, software, travel for reporting)
- Distribution costs (Beehiiv subscription, Paragraph hosting, domain, hosting)
- Operations and contingency overhead. Currently a $5,000 buffer covering legal, accounting, admin, and short-term cash-flow continuity. As the network matures and funding stabilizes, this evolves into a dedicated operating reserve.
Contributor pay is the largest line item. It is the largest line item by design.
Section 08
Reporting cadence
Live money, monthly report.
- Live The live numbers update as funds are raised and spent.
- Monthly A monthly financial report is published in the newsletter and on the The Ask, starting with the first month money flows in. Each report covers the prior month: what came in, what went out, contributor pay line, reserve balance, progress against the season target.
- As required Filings for We Them Worldwide LLC (U.S.) are made on schedule and summarized in the appropriate monthly report.
Section 09
How to fund this work
If you want to support WTM.
The readers funding this work deserve to see the books.