• by June 30, 2006

Perhaps you missed it. This week, Rafat Ali's company ContentNextMedia Inc., which runs PaidContent.org, the popular blog covering the digital media business, received a small cash infusion. Alan Patricof's Greycroft Partners pumped less than a million dollars into the news blog. Ali retains controlling interest in the company he founded four years ago.

Ali showed up in New York this week at a networking party--he regularly puts on such gatherings in cities around the world with the help of sponsors. The timing could not have been better. Hundreds of people showed up to chew the fat, hear a Q&A between Ali and New York Times Co. Publisher Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., and to congratulate the 31-year-old editor and publisher on the funding.

Ali has spent months sifting through at least a dozen VC proposals--there was no shortage of interest. But he's known for being picky about potential investors who wanted too much control; this guy wants to go his own way. Regarding funding, Ali says, "For me, the biggest thing was editorial independence in terms of running the strategic vision of the company. That was the main goal. A buy-out deal was just too early for us."

Ali's been boot-strapping his business via advertising revenue and sponsor dollars for a while now. Not bad for a guy who started the site from a cold-water flat in London after being exiled from New York due to visa issues. All the more impressive since the flat didn't have Internet access; Ali produced his blog at cybercafes and coffee shops; he uploaded the content from computer disks.

In Patricof, Ali has a seasoned backer who helped finance Apple Computer Inc., AOL, and New York magazine. The guy has been around the block, so to speak. "Alan's team called me in January, they said he kept hearing about us from all kinds of people," Ali says. "I knew instinctively that he got it. The other VCs and media companies I had spoken to were looking at us as a content investment; it's fine, but we're a journalism investment," he adds.

"The media companies that we were talking to would have meant us compromising our editorial independence. We were covering all the media companies. It became difficult for me internally, to justify," Ali explains. "It's such an early stage company, had we been more developed, I would have [considered an investment]. Alan came in and it just made sense."