As a matter of fact who would trust a journalist that was obviously paid for.
Discussion
You also would never trust a supermarket where you need to pay for the products? Or a phone which you needed to pay?
If the information comes for free, it can hardly be journalistic work. Some businessmodel is needed in order to deliver work.
The problem is not *that* they get paid but by whom. Ignoring the motivation of the ones paying for the information is more dangerous than compete ignorance of what they profess.
Is the one paying the benefactor or beneficiary of the information they provide?
And yes, I do trust a supermarket less than a market created by individual producers. Unfortunately most demand convenience over everything else so supermarkets exist.
Real Journalists exist and do their job regardless of compensation because they have integrity to *the* truth not *their* truth, or the truth of their benefactors.
Again
Media ≠Journalism
Media is closer to entertainment than Journalism conflating the two is the flaw.