Small team does local journalism, motivated locals donate to keep it running. It's that simple. Some people are happy to donate $20 a month to their favorite Twitch streamer or open source project, and other people are happy to do the same for their local newspaper.

The failed model is trying to run it like a journalism factory: producing articles at some marginal cost and selling them at a fixed price that exceeds marginal cost.

Just look at NPR and member stations. The federal government ended their funding, but they kept right on going because of donations.