Staffers from the news startup NJ Spotlight spend a lot of time at the New Jersey statehouse covering the intricacies of state policymaking. (Credit: mtstradling/Flickr/Creative Commons License)

This is the first of a two-part series looking at the growing variety of journalism startups and the business models that are powering them. The second part, which you can read here, examines for-profit news outlets, with a particular focus on the mobile video service NowThis News.

Cameras flash in the New Jersey statehouse. It’s early January, and in a back corner of the Assembly chamber, the Trenton press corps sit in three close rows of chairs as they await Gov. Chris Christie’s State of the State address. The aftermath of Hurricane Sandy is all anyone expects the governor to talk about. [Read more…]