The Province launched crowd-funding campaign for alleged Rob Ford crack-cocaine video
Several crowd-funding campaigns have cropped up to see the now infamous video that allegedly shows Toronto mayor Rob Ford, including one by Vancouver tabloid The Province.
John Gordon Miller, a former senior editor for the Toronto Star, wrote a scathing column on his blog taking to task newspaper’s editors in choosing to run the story. He was, however, far more critical of The Province’s “bonehead” decision to crowd fund for the video.
“By this morning, 654 readers had pledged a dollar each to the Province– surely a low point in the recent history of yahoo ethics at Canadian newspapers,” Miller wrote.
Help us purchase the infamous #RobFord video. We're crowdfunding here: indiegogo.com/projects/alleg… #topoli
— The Province (@theprovince) May 17, 2013
The Province later tweeted that Indiegogo had deleted their campaign.
[node:ad].@indiegogo has deleted our fundraising campaign without explanation, but @gawker is now seeking pledges here: indiegogo.com/projects/rob-f…
— The Province (@theprovince) May 17, 2013
Thanks to all who pledged, but the price has gone up and @gawker probably has a better shot anyway: indiegogo.com/projects/rob-f…
— The Province (@theprovince) May 17, 2013
Here is what Miller says the crowd-funding campain said before it was taken down:
Help us buy the Rob Ford video
Gawker has published a post claiming a video exists of Toronto mayor Rob Ford smoking crack. We do not know if this is true, but we would like to see it. Gawker claims to have seen it, but they did not want to pay the $100,000 being requested by the owner. Together, perhaps we can pay that. Surely there are 107,500 people who would be willing to pay $1 to see this video. (The extra $7,500 is to pay fees.)Our promise
If we reach our goal, we will reach out to Gawker for their contact who has the video. If we are successful in obtaining it, and our legal counsel clears it for publication, we will publish it. If any of these things do not happen, your money will be refunded. You cannot lose.But there's more than one campaign… which should I fund?
While our campaign will return your funds if we come up short, another worthy campaign will donate them to an addiction centre. We won't object if you choose that one!
Tamara Baluja is an award-winning journalist with CBC Vancouver and the 2018 Michener-Deacon fellow for journalism education. She was the associate editor for J-Source from 2013-2014.