Frequently Asked Questions
Ad Fontes Media funding comes primarily from sales of products and services.
Ad Fontes Media is a Public Benefit Corporation in Colorado, which means it is a for-profit corporation with a stated public benefit mission. That mission is “to make news consumers smarter and news media better.”
The startup company, which was founded in February of 2018, was initially self-funded by its Founder and CEO, Vanessa Otero, who is a patent attorney in Westminster, CO. The company’s initial products included digital licenses and poster prints of the Media Bias Chart®. Ad Fontes Media can and does accept individual donations through its, but they are not tax deductible.
From September to November 2018, the company ran a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo and raised approximately $32,000 from 508 individual backers. This funding was used to hire a team of part-time analysts to conduct our first Multi-Analyst Ratings Project, build our database, and build out our Interactive Media Bias Chart.
Since August 2019, Ad Fontes Media has expanded its products and services to include the following:
- Individual memberships that provide updated licensed versions of the Media Bias Chart and other benefits
- An educational news literacy software platform called CART, available via subscription
- News rating data via API
- Media Bias Chart merchandise such as mugs, t-shirts, stickers, and posters.
Ad Fontes Media does not sell ads on its website. Ad Fontes Media currently has no organizational donors or outside investors; however, Ad Fontes Media may seek such funding to grow in the future and will disclose any such funding sources on this site.
Our full methodology explanation can be found at our Methodology Page and in this White Paper.
If you think about political dimensions beyond the left-right divide, you are a more astute political observer than most. We use the left-right dimensions because most Americans, whether sophisticated or unsophisticated, recognize that at least these dimensions exist. They exist, in part, by virtue of our two-party system. We recognize that there are additional dimensions, and that many people who are very politically engaged have room for nuance outside of the left-right dimensions. For further reading, we recommend this article on the dimensionality of Trumpism by Prof. Maxwell Stearns of The University of Maryland Law School.
RE: Reason Magazine:
Reason is a pretty unapologetically libertarian publication. Many libertarians like to think of themselves as centrists because of the whole “socially liberal/fiscally conservative” policy positions, but there’s pretty broad consensus among Democrats and Republicans that Libertarians’ governing policies align with Republicans more than Democrats. This consensus, we believe, has arisen because any Libertarian-friendly politicians in elected positions (there aren’t many, but, for example, Ron and Rand Paul) typically identify as or caucus with Republicans. Also, Libertarians in government tend to not be super interested in implementing new laws (less government!) that would actually protect or advance progressive policies. We believe this is why liberals/progressives/Democrats tend to not vote for Libertarians, while some Republicans do. But notice that Reason is not rated as the most conservative (left-to-right) publication. If you look at individual articles on the Interactive Chart and on Reason’s Individual Source Page , there are some rated farther to the left because of the particular political issue being discussed.
We currently do not rate comedy and satire sources because the sarcasm adds such different linguistic factors, and the shows are in such a different format that each of those considerations require some different dimensions, or at least different categories in the vertical taxonomy. Many current satire and comedy shows do skew liberal or are hyper-partisan liberal, as most observers would likely agree. We may add them in the future, though.
I think it’s a useful site for getting a general sense of partisan bias. The moderators evaluate at least five articles from each site as part of the rating. Additionally, they crowd-source votes on bias, which can skew the results depending on who the site happens to attract. At the moment, their ratings show CNN to be just as far left as MSNBC, and I don’t think that’s quite right. Another useful site is allsides.com. They also allow people to vote, but they ask the voter to rate their own bias as well. A nice thing about Media Bias Fact Check is that they have tried to rate hundreds of sites–I think they are over 1000 now, so that obviously includes very obscure ones. It’s quite a bit of work, and overall I think that it’s a great resource.
I am trying to provide an extra dimension of rating with the quality axis. Most media evaluation right now is limited to left-right bias ratings and “fact-checking.” However, as you know, there is much more to quality than just fact checking. Stay tuned–I’m trying to fill that void.
See here.
It is a scheduling platform and used for reporting time worked. It is NOT related to Zoom, Video Conferencing (they are separate services).
All shifts start in this meeting room: https://zoom.us/j/4775856282
Record a new timesheet for each shift, please see the above video for additional details.
Zoomshift will not submit a timesheet for you based on the schedule; so, each shift worked needs its own timesheet. Please see the video above for additional details.
If you’re working at a time that is not on the schedule – reading the assigned training materials, for example – is work not related to a shift.
Please include a note in relation to the type of work done for Ad Fontes so hours worked can be validated.
We have many analysts working for the team, and open shifts tend to be picked up very quickly.
Please be aware that our payroll program, Gusto, pays the 15th and 30th of the month, NOT EVERY TWO WEEKS. The pay period cutoffs will be 12th and 27th of each month (except for February, which will be the 12th and 26th).
It takes 2 business days for payroll to hit your bank accounts, so 2 days after payroll is run, you will see a deposit in your bank account.
Please reach out via email to Julie Bachman at julie@adfontesmedia.com if you have any questions or concerns regarding payroll.
We anticipate growth and are always looking for new analysts, if you want to refer someone please send their resume to Ria and Jeff so we have those on file for when we do the next round of hiring.
