MSNBC bought a social news gathering site , MSM uncharitably refer to it as "amateur journalism" which distinguishes it from CNN and the AZ Republic  only on terms of remuneration.  Er  let's take another look. People can submit stories for others to comment on  and where are the vast majority of stories seeded from? 

Go on guess. 

Which is why I am not sure that the following paragraph from the Loose Wire blog is  maybe not  going to cause MSNBC the potential headache it could.

Of course, the community itself, by not being party to the discussions with MSNBC nor beholden to the deal, can just up sticks and leave if it doesn't like the outcome. And that's where the other illusion kicks in: MSNBC can't buy the community, although it may feel it has. It can buy the site where that community has built its camp.

 They appear to  already HAVE bought the community  hook, line and sinker.  Most of the content originates from  wires, rewrites of wires  and the "news" parts I've seen are mainly  "me too"  from like minded brethren of the original site from which it was posted.   Maybe digging deeper ( pun oh so very much intended)  there's a hotbed of investigative journalism but searching through their archives for the more interesting bits of corruption that escape the MSM locals yielded surprisingly few results leaving only the comments to  chip away at the stories. Once Newsvines is  subsumed into MSNBC I can only hope they take more pains to differentiate  the local from the speculative punditry from those that haven't left their own country yet seem to know more about "furriners"   than their local legiscritters.

loose wire blog: When Old Media Buys a Community