Our Story
Every day, at Orato World Media, we have the rare privilege of working with qualified journalists who interview subjects who experience newsworthy events first-hand, from every corner of the globe. Equally important, our journalists verify the veracity of each story so you can be confident each published piece is a true reported event experienced by a real person. When a news event breaks, wherever that might be, Orato is there searching for someone who not only witnessed the event but, more importantly, survived it. An Orato journalist interviews that individual in their own domestic language, so we can publish – in English and the subject’s native language – the account of their story. We call this first-person news reporting. Orato’s content gives people a reliable and trusted source for news, while generating understanding, empathy, and compassion for the people impacted by world events.
Every week we learn about world events and the way they affect individual lives. Day in and day out, our readers’ hearts are moved, and their souls are stirred. Orato’s stories help us open our minds to the truth of our global society, and the impact world issues have on each of us, wherever we reside. We see the intense disparities from nation to nation and this compels us to pursue change.
As a global, digital news outlet, Orato has qualified contributors on every continent. Orato is an approved content provider for Google News, Samsung News, NewsNow, and Upday; and has offered internships in this emerging form of journalism at colleges and universities around the globe.
Orato World Media Inc. is a for-profit corporate entity incorporated in the state of Florida, USA in 2020 and owned by Inconel Investments Inc. which was incorporated in British Columbia, Canada in 2019. This corporation’s mandate is to create a repository of verifiable first-person news stories and to market and promote the brand globally wherever and whenever possible with the overarching goal of creating goodwill and becoming commercially appealing. Whether it be advertising, sponsorship, subscription, syndication, or the post-publication creation of cinematic, literary, or multimedia purposes, the goal is to monetize the content in whatever ethical way possible for the purposes of making Orato World Media a globally recognized and self-sustainable media brand.
Orato World Media Foundation Inc. is a non-profit corporation incorporated in the state of Delaware, USA in 2021 and certified by the IRS on March 25, 2022 as a tax-exempt entity from federal income tax under Internal Revenue Code (IRC) Section 501(c)(3) that is qualified to receive tax deductible bequests, devises, transfers, or gifts under Section 2055, 2106 or 2522.
This corporation’s mandate is to invest in the teaching, training and engagement of professional journalists to learn how to write first-person stories to thereby create a network of correspondents to interview, verify and produce first-person news stories from real people (eyewitnesses, survivors, whistleblowers, first responders, photographers, videographers to name a few) and who’ve been directly impacted by a current and or newsworthy event.
Wherever they may be located and in whatever language they speak, Orato’s journalists and correspondents will represent a community of professional writers dedicated to the task of reporting the news in the words of the interview subject after verifying the facts and collecting the evidence which establishes the veracity of the interview subject’s truthful account.
In addition to the above, this non-profit corporation will be dedicated to the establishment, publication, and production of Orato’s first-person content in as many commonly spoken languages as humanly possible. It will also focus on incorporating complimenting features into their online content which will increase the appeal like audio functionality and entertaining elements such as polls, petitions and puzzles to name a few.
- Vision
- Mission
- Values
- History
Vision
Orato World Media will be the go-to news source where individuals experiencing world events can share their verified, truthful experiences with a global audience.
Our readers gain a greater understanding of the world events and issues that challenge us. Orato will renew the public’s trust in digital media by delivering true stories from real people.
Mission
Orato World Media gives people anywhere in the world, without prejudice or discrimination, a trusted platform in which their true experiences can be shared with a qualified journalist through a rigorous interview and verification process.
Orato provides state-of-the-art journalistic and technical support to its contributors so they can capture, and share verified, factual, eyewitness accounts of world events. By reading first-hand human experiences, Orato readers grow closer to their fellow humans through knowledge, understanding, and truth – thus reducing the cultural and philosophical separations that divide us. They garner greater compassion, understanding, and empathy.
Orato combats fake news and takes ownership of that which is real, verifiable, sound, honest, and legitimate. Readers will always leave trusting that every Orato story includes a real person and a verified news event.
Values
At Orato World Media, we assert the following values, which the majority of humanity shares:
- Independent of age, gender, race, color, creed, religious conviction or sexual orientation; no one shall be oppressed or exploited.
- Every human will have the sovereign right to choose what they can do with their bodies.
- Every human being will have the right to speak their truth without undue influence.
- We will accept indisputable facts so we can make decisions based on those facts.
- No one shall be entitled to intentionally disseminate misinformation or disinformation.
History
In the late ’90s, with the advent of the internet, Sam Yehia, working with a team of globally situated editors, artists, and journalists, launched a digital media platform based on first-person storytelling.
In the ensuing five years, Orato garnered a lot of attention but was unable to find a sustainable revenue model at a time when digital advertising and subscription models had not yet been established.
After selling all his businesses in 2019 and when the world was shuttered by the global pandemic in 2020, based on the deteriorating state of news media worldwide, Yehia decided to relaunch Orato World Media as a non-profit endeavor. As he explained; “Lifting the human voice so we, as fellow humans, can better understand the challenges that others are experiencing is too important to be exploited for profit.” The epiphany of that realization reset the stage for the relevancy and timeliness of Orato’s concept today.
With the growing prominence of AI, misinformation, skewed and obfuscated facts, and so-called “fake news,” many of us have lost trust in media thereby motivating us to search for alternate sources.
With all the competing “truths” circulating, no matter how well respected a media brand has become, conventional journalism struggles to compete and attract the attention of viewers as it once enjoyed in print, radio, and television industries before the advent of the internet.
As the manipulation of facts and information is revealed, it does not change the fact that readers are still hungry for the truth, but where do they find it?
At Orato our readers subscribe to the belief that ensuring verifiable truth in the dissemination of news and information is critical to a thriving, open, and free democracy. That’s why those who seek a true understanding of the human plight embrace the content we feature on Orato.
Giving readers the confidence that they can trust what they are reading, hearing, or watching will not be simple but, I believe Orato World Media has developed an editorial model that will win adopters in great numbers, early and often.”
— Sam Yehia, Orato World Media
With the benefit of technology, we are a global community. We saw this with COVID-19, recent wars and conflict zones, and our shared grappling around the world with issues like ethnic cleansing, demographical manipulation, corruption, police brutality and racism, to name a few. Everyone has been touched in some way by the impacts of these events.
There is no better time than now to share trustworthy stories that help us understand what our fellow human beings experience around the world.
Orato will be the de facto site to find captivating, honest, first-person accounts from real people.
