Are citizen contributors liable to pay gift tax?

Might citizen journalists have to pay a gift tax when their work is used by mainstream media organizations?

Rhonda Roland Shearer and Danielle Elliot investigate at StinkyJournalism.org.

Is the "donation" of a citizen's content (video, articles, commentaries, images) to for-profit media outlets that exceeds a fair market value of $12,000 in any single year subject to gift tax? Judging from the IRS guidelines, the answer is "yes."

Find the whole deal here.

Rhonda directs New York's Art Science Research Laboratory, a non-profit she co-founded with her husband, the late Stephen Jay Gould.