Noosphere, a new premium news platform designed to bundle content from independent journalists, has launched with a mobile-first approach that resembles TikTok’s full-screen scroll while incorporating text articles, audio, and photography.

Jane Ferguson, Noosphere’s CEO, and a former PBS war correspondent, developed the platform in response to collapsing broadcast and digital media ecosystems that have displaced thousands of journalists. 

During a teaching fellowship at Princeton, Ferguson recognized the shrinking audience and business model for broadcast journalism.

“I had essentially built an incredibly successful career in an industry that was collapsing, which is a very weird place to be, where you just collect trophies while the audiences are getting smaller and the finances are not working,” Ferguson told Semafor. “What we really wanted to do is build the architecture for the best journalists to enter the content creator economy.”

Revenue Model Prioritizes Journalists

The platform launches with approximately $1 million in funding from executives, family offices, and private investors interested in sustainable journalism models. Initially featuring over a dozen journalists, Noosphere plans to quickly add another dozen within its first months of operation.

Subscription fees start at $15 monthly, eventually increasing to $19.99. Revenue will be shared among participating journalists and partially distributed based on viewership and subscriber attribution. The platform remains invite-only for journalists to maintain reporting quality standards.

Potential Industry Partnerships

Ferguson highlighted discussions with existing news organizations about potential partnerships that would allow established outlets to monetize their work through Noosphere or license videos from the platform’s journalists.

“This is an opportunity for a broadcaster to access a sort of an A-team of award-winning broadcasters on camera, many of whom are already in the field,” Ferguson told Semafor.

Co-founder Sebastian Walker, a former Middle East Bureau Chief for Vice, contributed to the platform’s development alongside a small technology team. 

The platform’s design incorporates input from working journalists to create an experience that appeals to news consumers while enabling content monetization.

Recent Pew Research Center research on American news consumption patterns revealed that 21% of Americans regularly receive news from social media creators. The trend is particularly pronounced among younger adults, as 37% of those between 18 and 29 regularly turn to these creators for news content. About half of TikTok users (52%) – equivalent to 17% of all U.S. adults – say they regularly get news on the platform.