Frequently, "ordinary" (non-celebrity/political) people get caught up in a major news story. They may be trapped on a blazing oil tanker, injured in a train crash, or heroically rescue a little puppy from a runaway steamroller.
When this happens, they become the object of intense media interest. The
representatives of said media dash around trying to gather as much information as possible to fill "human interest" segments.
But what if they could just bid for this information ?
The proposal is for a website, rather like Facebook, in which members of the general public can file (securely and confidentially) their biography, including face-to-camera pieces, family photos, CVs, pictures of house and pets, names addresses and contact details for friends and family.
If the user becomes involved in an incident, media orgaisations - who pay an annual subscription to maintain the site - are informed that infomation on "Joe Public" is available. Just like eBay, there is an auction option, or a Buy-It-Now. Low-Res samples of the material are available for review, suitably overprinted to make them unusable for publication.
The user receives the money from the winning bid, less a small administration fee. The winning bidder gets immediate, relevant, juicy goodies to publish, quickly and for a moderate cost, and with all the legals prearranged by a standard form contract with future options built in, for negotiation.
Offer prices for various parts of the biography are set by the user according to a scale depending on the class of incident. Some basic public domain information is provided free.
This may reduce doorstepping, ambulance chasing, etc. and make reports more accurate and factual, as clear authenticated information is available quickly.