In 2023, I hope newsrooms understand why audiences are tuning us out and try to do something about it besides stoking another Trump bump.
Journalism today is still executed largely like the journalism of yesterday, from tone to format to process. News is defined by conflict, stories boiled down to two warring sides, presented by a distant, omniscient narrator in order of most important to least important information. The approach basically ends up telling readers: Everything sucks. Good luck to you.
It’s no wonder that news consumption is plummeting and users are left feeling confused or overwhelmed. There are better ways. I share two below from my experiences running Epicenter-NYC and URL Media — with a warning on why the problem stands to get even worse.
You learned the five Ws in journalism school — the questions that every story must answer. At Epicenter-NYC, a newsletter launched to help New Yorkers get through the pandemic that has evolved into a multi-platform community media outlet, we ask one more of sources, whether they are in line at a food pantry or a multimillionaire entrepreneur on a panel: What do you need?
In turn, the stories we produce, whether in article or bullet form, a video or podcast or flyer, anticipate and preemptively address the concern of users and try to answer it: What can I do?
We don’t want you to feel helpless or depressed reading the news. These two fundamental tweaks to our reporting and editing process, searching for needs and offering actions, have made our work much more relevant, distinctive, personal and positive.
Journalists often compete with each other. But the last few years have seen a rise in cohorts, collaborations, and cooperation. Ever less-resourced newsrooms see the value of creating economies of scale. Already, there are many examples of this, including URL Media, the network we run of 16 high-performing Black and Brown media organizations. By sharing content, our newsrooms feel less small, sure, but we also embrace the overlaps of our audience. We know if you are a worker trying to navigate receiving unemployment benefits, you’re more likely to seek out multiple stories on the subject. In that particular scenario, after writing about the issue for each of their respective outlets, Epicenter-NYC’s reporter Andrea Pineda Salgado teamed up with Documented’s Rommel H. Ojeda to write a story based on workers’ WhatsApp messages to the latter. The collaboration was not rooted in anyone telling them to join forces but rather in the belief that their audiences could benefit from the others’ expertise, platform and distribution.
Our outlets are focused on service to our communities. And so collaboration feels less contrived than necessary. In the process of uplifting our audiences, we are uplifting each other. We feel so strongly about this that we built that mission into our name: URL stands for Uplift, Respect and Love. These actions inform every aspect of our company, and we believe they also send a signal to users on the role we hope to play in each other’s lives.
Going digital is not enough
The pace of change is faster than we can keep up with. I could have had a bot write this prediction (my lazy friend Bill Grueskin beat me to it). In the midst of AI, metaverses and 1,427 platforms claiming to be the next Twitter, legacy newsrooms are still trying to get staff to embrace being “digital first.” Mainstream media are ill prepared for what’s to come. I’ve staked my future on this: The sincere commitment to serve direct, defined audiences and the convening power of multi-platform networks acknowledging overlapping communities in order to achieve scale might give us at least a fighting chance.
S. Mitra Kalita is the co-founder and publisher of Epicenter-NYC and the co-founder and CEO of URL Media.
In 2023, I hope newsrooms understand why audiences are tuning us out and try to do something about it besides stoking another Trump bump.
Journalism today is still executed largely like the journalism of yesterday, from tone to format to process. News is defined by conflict, stories boiled down to two warring sides, presented by a distant, omniscient narrator in order of most important to least important information. The approach basically ends up telling readers: Everything sucks. Good luck to you.
It’s no wonder that news consumption is plummeting and users are left feeling confused or overwhelmed. There are better ways. I share two below from my experiences running Epicenter-NYC and URL Media — with a warning on why the problem stands to get even worse.
You learned the five Ws in journalism school — the questions that every story must answer. At Epicenter-NYC, a newsletter launched to help New Yorkers get through the pandemic that has evolved into a multi-platform community media outlet, we ask one more of sources, whether they are in line at a food pantry or a multimillionaire entrepreneur on a panel: What do you need?
In turn, the stories we produce, whether in article or bullet form, a video or podcast or flyer, anticipate and preemptively address the concern of users and try to answer it: What can I do?
We don’t want you to feel helpless or depressed reading the news. These two fundamental tweaks to our reporting and editing process, searching for needs and offering actions, have made our work much more relevant, distinctive, personal and positive.
Journalists often compete with each other. But the last few years have seen a rise in cohorts, collaborations, and cooperation. Ever less-resourced newsrooms see the value of creating economies of scale. Already, there are many examples of this, including URL Media, the network we run of 16 high-performing Black and Brown media organizations. By sharing content, our newsrooms feel less small, sure, but we also embrace the overlaps of our audience. We know if you are a worker trying to navigate receiving unemployment benefits, you’re more likely to seek out multiple stories on the subject. In that particular scenario, after writing about the issue for each of their respective outlets, Epicenter-NYC’s reporter Andrea Pineda Salgado teamed up with Documented’s Rommel H. Ojeda to write a story based on workers’ WhatsApp messages to the latter. The collaboration was not rooted in anyone telling them to join forces but rather in the belief that their audiences could benefit from the others’ expertise, platform and distribution.
Our outlets are focused on service to our communities. And so collaboration feels less contrived than necessary. In the process of uplifting our audiences, we are uplifting each other. We feel so strongly about this that we built that mission into our name: URL stands for Uplift, Respect and Love. These actions inform every aspect of our company, and we believe they also send a signal to users on the role we hope to play in each other’s lives.
Going digital is not enough
The pace of change is faster than we can keep up with. I could have had a bot write this prediction (my lazy friend Bill Grueskin beat me to it). In the midst of AI, metaverses and 1,427 platforms claiming to be the next Twitter, legacy newsrooms are still trying to get staff to embrace being “digital first.” Mainstream media are ill prepared for what’s to come. I’ve staked my future on this: The sincere commitment to serve direct, defined audiences and the convening power of multi-platform networks acknowledging overlapping communities in order to achieve scale might give us at least a fighting chance.
S. Mitra Kalita is the co-founder and publisher of Epicenter-NYC and the co-founder and CEO of URL Media.
David Cohn AI made this prediction
Sarah Stonbely Growth in public funding for news and information at the state and local levels
Emma Carew Grovum The year to resist forgetting about diversity
Nicholas Diakopoulos Journalists productively harness generative AI tools
Jody Brannon We’ll embrace policy remedies
Janelle Salanga Journalists work from a place of harm reduction
Simon Galperin Philanthropy stops investing in corporate media
Joanne McNeil Facebook and the media kiss and make up
Mariana Moura Santos A woman who speaks is a woman who changes the world
S. Mitra Kalita “Everything sucks. Good luck to you.”
Sumi Aggarwal Smart newsrooms will prioritize board development
Michael W. Wagner The backlash against pro-democracy reporting is coming
Anthony Nadler Confronting media gerrymandering
Gordon Crovitz The year advertisers stop funding misinformation
Amethyst J. Davis The slight of the great contraction
Doris Truong Workers demand to be paid what the job is worth
Valérie Bélair-Gagnon Well-being will become a core tenet of journalism
Peter Bale Rising costs force more digital innovation
Jenna Weiss-Berman The economic downturn benefits the podcasting industry. (No, really!)
Molly de Aguiar and Mandy Van Deven Narrative change trend brings new money to journalism
Walter Frick Journalists wake up to the power of prediction markets
Kaitlyn Wells We’ll prioritize media literacy for children
Christoph Mergerson The rot at the core of the news business
Alex Perry New paths to transparency without Twitter
Esther Kezia Thorpe Subscription pressures force product innovation
Emily Nonko Incarcerated reporters get more bylines
Alex Sujong Laughlin Credit where it’s due
David Skok Renewed interest in human-powered reporting
Dana Lacey Tech will screw publishers over
Nikki Usher This is the year of the RSS reader. (Really!)
A.J. Bauer Covering the right wrong
An Xiao Mina Journalism in a time of permacrisis
Josh Schwartz The AI spammers are coming
Andrew Losowsky Journalism realizes the replacement for Twitter is not a new Twitter
Errin Haines Journalists on the campaign trail mend trust with the public
Karina Montoya More reporters on the antitrust beat
Jaden Amos TikTok personality journalists continue to rise
Cindy Royal Yes, journalists should learn to code, but…
Pia Frey Publishers start polling their users at scale
Sue Schardt Toward a new poetics of journalism
Ariel Zirulnick Journalism doubles down on user needs
Shanté Cosme The answer to “quiet quitting” is radical empathy
Mauricio Cabrera It’s no longer about audiences, it’s about communities
Sarah Marshall A web channel strategy won’t be enough
Sarah Alvarez Dream bigger or lose out
Rodney Gibbs Recalibrating how we work apart
Megan Lucero and Shirish Kulkarni The future of journalism is not you
Cari Nazeer and Emily Goligoski News organizations step up their support for caregivers
Julia Beizer News fatigue shows us a clear path forward
Janet Haven ChatGPT and the future of trust
Kerri Hoffman Podcasting goes local
Ryan Kellett Airline-like loyalty programs try to tie down news readers
Bill Grueskin Local news will come to rely on AI
Sue Cross Thinking and acting collectively to save the news
Gabe Schneider Well-funded journalism leaders stop making disparate pay
Basile Simon Towards supporting criminal accountability
Kirstin McCudden We’ll codify protection of journalism and newsgathering
Laxmi Parthasarathy Unlocking the silent demand for international journalism
Bill Adair The year of the fact-check (no, really!)
Anika Anand Independent news businesses lead the way on healthy work cultures
Elite Truong In platform collapse, an opportunity for community
Nicholas Jackson There will be launches — and we’ll keep doing the work
Eric Holthaus As social media fragments, marginalized voices gain more power
Eric Nuzum A focus on people instead of power
Danielle K. Brown and Kathleen Searles DEI efforts must consider mental health and online abuse
Jessica Maddox Journalists keep getting manipulated by internet culture
Tre'vell Anderson Continued culpability in anti-trans campaigns
Stefanie Murray The year U.S. media stops screwing around and becomes pro-democracy
Ben Werdmuller The internet is up for grabs again
J. Siguru Wahutu American journalism reckons with its colonialist tendencies
Alexandra Svokos Working harder to reach audiences where they are
Al Lucca Digital news design gets interesting again
Paul Cheung More news organizations will realize they are in the business of impact, not eyeballs
Wilson Liévano Diaspora journalism takes the next step
Jesse Holcomb Buffeted, whipped, bullied, pulled
John Davidow A year of intergenerational learning
Martina Efeyini Talk to Gen Z. They’re the experts of Gen Z.
Larry Ryckman We’ll work together with our competitors
Amy Schmitz Weiss Journalism education faces a crossroads
Juleyka Lantigua Newsrooms recognize women of color as the canaries in the coal mine
Nicholas Thompson The year AI actually changes the media business
Jarrad Henderson Video editing will help people understand the media they consume
Peter Sterne AI enters the newsroom
Alexandra Borchardt The year of the climate journalism strategy
Don Day The news about the news is bad. I’m optimistic.
Sarabeth Berman Nonprofit local news shows that it can scale
Mael Vallejo More threats to press freedom across the Americas
Anna Nirmala News organizations get new structures
Surya Mattu Data journalists learn from photojournalists
Priyanjana Bengani Partisan local news networks will collaborate
Victor Pickard The year journalism and capitalism finally divorce
Michael Schudson Journalism gets more and more difficult
Delano Massey The industry shakes its imposter syndrome
Eric Ulken Generative AI brings wrongness at scale
Christina Shih Shared values move from nice-to-haves to essentials
Anita Varma Journalism prioritizes the basic need for survival
Jim Friedlich Local journalism steps up to the challenge of civic coverage
Laura E. Davis The year we embrace the robots — and ourselves
Jonas Kaiser Rejecting the “free speech” frame
Burt Herman The year AI truly arrives — and with it the reckoning
Kathy Lu We need emotionally agile newsroom leaders
Lisa Heyamoto The independent news industry gets a roadmap to sustainability
Leezel Tanglao Community partnerships drive better reporting
Andrew Donohue We’ll find out whether journalism can, indeed, save democracy
Kaitlin C. Miller Harassment in journalism won’t get better, but we’ll talk about it more openly
Jessica Clark Open discourse retrenches
Jennifer Brandel AI couldn’t care less. Journalists will care more.
Sam Guzik AI will start fact-checking. We may not like the results.
Ryan Gantz “I’m sorry, but I’m a large language model”
Mar Cabra The inevitable mental health revolution
Rachel Glickhouse Humanizing newsrooms will be a badge of honor
Barbara Raab More journalism funders will take more risks
Masuma Ahuja Journalism starts working for and with its communities
Jennifer Choi and Jonathan Jackson Funders finally bet on next-generation news entrepreneurs
Mario García More newsrooms go mobile-first
Eric Thurm Journalists think of themselves as workers
Joshua P. Darr Local to live, wire to wither
Snigdha Sur Newsrooms get nimble in a recession
Brian Moritz Rebuilding the news bundle
Cory Bergman The AI content flood
Dominic-Madori Davis Everyone finally realizes the need for diverse voices in tech reporting
Brian Stelter Finding new ways to reach news avoiders
Kavya Sukumar Belling the cat: The rise of independent fact-checking at scale
Sam Gregory Synthetic media forces us to understand how media gets made
Johannes Klingebiel The innovation team, R.I.P.
Elizabeth Bramson-Boudreau More of the same
Cassandra Etienne Local news fellowships will help fight newsroom inequities
Julia Angwin Democracies will get serious about saving journalism
Gina Chua The traditional story structure gets deconstructed
Francesco Zaffarano There is no end of “social media”
Zizi Papacharissi Platforms are over
Ryan Nave Citizen journalism, but make it equitable
Ståle Grut Your newsroom experiences a Midjourney-gate, too
Tim Carmody Newsletter writers need a new ethics
Joe Amditis AI throws a lifeline to local publishers
Moreno Cruz Osório Brazilian journalism turns wounds into action
Mary Walter-Brown and Tristan Loper Mission-driven metrics become our North Star
Upasna Gautam Technology that performs at the speed of news
Felicitas Carrique and Becca Aaronson News product goes from trend to standard
Daniel Trielli Trust in news will continue to fall. Just look at Brazil.
Jakob Moll Journalism startups will think beyond English
Sue Robinson Engagement journalism will have to confront a tougher reality
Susan Chira Equipping local journalism
Alan Henry A reckoning with why trust in news is so low
Raney Aronson-Rath Journalists will band together to fight intimidation
Dannagal G. Young Stop rewarding elite performances of identity threat
Jacob L. Nelson Despite it all, people will still want to be journalists
Joni Deutsch Podcast collaboration — not competition — breeds excellence
Matt Rasnic More newsroom workers turn to organized labor
Hillary Frey Death to the labor-intensive memo for prospective hires
Ayala Panievsky It’s time for PR for journalism
Jim VandeHei There is no “peak newsletter”
Parker Molloy We’ll reach new heights of moral panic
Tamar Charney Flux is the new stability
Richard Tofel The press might get better at vetting presidential candidates