"E & P Reports" from Editor & Publisher Magazine hosted by Mike Blinder: Recent Episodes
Mike Blinder
Each week, Editor & Publisher Magazine (E&P) produces a Vodcast of timely interviews with newspaper, broadcast, online and all forms of news publishing and media industry leaders.
E&P has been publishing since 1884 and is considered the "bible" and "authoritative voice" of the North American newspaper industry. Each episode is hosted by Publisher Mike Blinder.
A video version of "E&P Reports" is also available on YouTube or on the E&P Website at: http://www.EditorandPublisher.com/vodcasts
She expected to find an industry weighed down by layoffs, closures and uncertainty. Instead, a summer spent visiting independent newsrooms across America introduced Jasmine Shiffer to publishers, editors and reporters who remain deeply committed to serving their communities—and surprisingly optimistic about the future. Along the way, she discovered that local journalism's greatest strength isn't its technology or business model. It's the people who still believe the work matters.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/at-24-she-drove-across-america-looking-for-the-future-of-local-news-what-she-found-surprised-her,262971
For job seekers, landing a newsroom job can feel increasingly dependent on luck, connections and an opaque hiring process. Cristina Silva, managing editor for Operations & Standards at The Boston Globe and the new author of Poynter's Ask the Recruiter column, says candidates have more control than they may realize. The key is to understand how editors make decisions, communicate clearly and make it easier for a hiring manager to see your value.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/how-to-stand-out-when-journalism-jobs-are-harder-to-find,262881
Local journalism does not need another obituary. It needs a new operating model. In New Jersey, Stefanie Murray is helping build one that treats local information as civic infrastructure, supported by collaboration, philanthropy, local business revenue and carefully protected public funding. Her message to the industry: The future may not look like the past, but communities still need journalism that serves them.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/can-new-jerseys-civic-information-model-help-rebuild-local-news,262753
As broadcasters debated whether to air President Donald Trump's recent prime-time address live and local newspapers continued rethinking political opinion pages, one question has become increasingly difficult to ignore: Has journalism's greatest challenge shifted from protecting free speech to preserving productive public discourse? Constitutional scholar Stuart Brotman believes the First Amendment remains remarkably strong. It is America's ability to engage respectfully with one another that is showing signs of strain.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/opinion-pages-need-a-reboot-not-a-retreat-says-stuart-brotman,262652
For decades, the leaders of America's newspaper industry have gathered separately to tackle many of the same challenges—from protecting journalism and strengthening business models to navigating public policy and emerging technology. This September, that changes as the News Media Alliance and America's Newspapers bring their flagship meetings together in Washington, D.C., creating an unprecedented week of collaboration, advocacy and education. In an exclusive conversation with E&P, Danielle Coffey and Dean Ridings explain why they believe a more unified industry is essential to protecting local journalism's future. They also discuss the growing fight over AI, the need for stronger publisher advocacy on Capitol Hill and why they remain optimistic that local news can not only survive, but thrive
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/industry-unites-nma-and-americas-newspapers-come-together-in-washington,262551
While much of the news industry continues to focus on shrinking newsrooms, disappearing newspapers and expanding news deserts, Village Media is proving another path is possible. In this exclusive E&P Reports conversation, founder and CEO Jeff Elgie and Board Chair Richard Gingras explain how their digital-first company has grown into one of North America's most successful local news organizations by putting community, audience reach and disciplined execution at the center of its strategy. Rather than chasing legacy business models, they argue that local journalism can still thrive when publishers understand how audiences and advertisers have changed. Their insights offer a practical roadmap for news leaders determined not just to survive, but to grow.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/beyond-news-deserts-how-village-media-is-proving-local-journalism-can-still-grow,262431
Local media sales has entered a new era. Advertisers no longer need a salesperson to launch a marketing campaign, buy digital ads or build an online presence, giving them more choices—and less patience for generic sales pitches—than ever before. According to Dream Local Digital founder and E&P "Ad Sales Life" columnist Shannon Kinney, the sales professionals who thrive won't be those with the best rate cards or biggest audiences. They'll be the ones who consistently deliver ideas, insights and strategic value, positioning themselves as trusted advisors rather than order takers.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/shannon-kinney-why-todays-media-sellers-must-become-trusted-advisors,262305
News organizations have spent years debating whether artificial intelligence will replace journalists, whether social media is helping or hurting democracy, and whether younger audiences still value news. But according to Nebraska Public Media Chief Innovation Officer Chad Davis, those may no longer be the most important questions. During a recent episode of E&P Reports, Davis argued that journalism's greatest challenge is understanding how audience behavior is changing in a world increasingly shaped by gaming, creator-driven platforms, conversational media and AI. His message: The future of journalism may depend less on protecting old models and more on adapting to entirely new ways people consume information, build habits and engage with media.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/the-future-of-news-could-depend-on-gaming-creators-and-creative-friction,262233
A new global study suggests journalism's biggest challenge may not be AI, declining trust or shrinking revenues. Instead, it may be the widening gap between what news organizations say their priorities are and how their newsrooms actually operate. In a recent E&P Reports conversation, WAN-IFRA CEO Stig Kirk Ørskov and FT Strategies Insights Manager Lamberto Lambertini discussed findings from the Future Newsrooms Study, which surveyed more than 400 newsroom leaders across 86 countries and revealed an industry still spending far more time producing content than building audience relationships. As engagement replaces reach as the defining metric of success, the report raises difficult questions about newsroom culture, strategy and the skills journalists will need for the future.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/newsrooms-know-what-they-need-to-do-why-arent-they-doing-it,262126
Artificial intelligence is rapidly changing how media sales teams prospect, research, communicate and report results. Yet according to media revenue strategist Ryan Dohrn, the technology itself is not the competitive advantage. The real differentiator remains the same as it has always been: the salesperson using it. In a conversation with E&P, Dohrn argues that AI won't replace strong salespeople or save weak ones. Instead, it will amplify existing strengths, expose existing weaknesses and reward those who learn how to combine technology with relevance, preparation and authentic human relationships.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/ai-wont-save-bad-salespeople-ryan-dohrn-on-the-future-of-media-revenue,262011
The future of local journalism is increasingly being shaped by two fundamental questions: Who should pay for it, and what should it produce?
Those questions were at the center this conversation between E&P Publisher Mike Blinder and media critic, author and journalism educator Jeff Jarvis. The discussion grew out of two recent E&P Reports episodes that sparked debate beyond E&P's audience: an interview with Rebuild Local News founder Steven Waldman about public policy funding for journalism that drew a response from The Wall Street Journal, and a New York Press Association panel on newsroom cadence, AI and audience expectations that prompted a published rebuttal from publisher Christian Hendricks.
Together, the debates raised larger questions about journalism's future, sustainability and purpose—questions Jarvis was eager to tackle.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/jeff-jarvis-challenges-conventional-wisdom-on-public-policy-funding-ai-and-audience-growth,261858
For decades, local journalism's business model rested on advertising, subscriptions and philanthropy. Now, according to Rebuild Local News co-founder Steven Waldman, a fourth leg is rapidly emerging: public policy. New state laws, tax credits and government-backed initiatives have already directed more than $129 million into local newsrooms, with tens of millions more expected this year alone. Waldman says the shift signals a major new chapter in how communities may ultimately sustain local journalism.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/tens-of-millions-flow-into-local-news-as-public-policy-becomes-journalisms-fourth-leg,261799
As America approaches its 250th birthday, USA TODAY is reviving a nearly forgotten newspaper tradition with the debut of the "USA TODAY March," a new Sousa-style composition celebrating journalism, patriotism and community connection. In a recent E&P Reports interview, USA TODAY's Liz Johnson and composer and features writer Jim Beckerman discussed how the unusual project evolved from a piece of newspaper history into a modern effort to reconnect audiences with the civic and cultural role journalism once played in American life.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/why-usa-today-created-a-newspaper-march-for-americas-250th,261672
For years, the local news industry has searched for a sustainable business model while navigating shrinking legacy revenues, rising costs and growing uncertainty. A new report, Meeting the Revenue Challenge: Philanthropy's Role in Local News Growth, examines how nonprofit local news organizations are attempting to build long-term durability through diversified revenue strategies and stronger community relationships.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/inside-the-search-for-a-sustainable-local-news-model-a-new-report-reveals-whats-actually,261560
Journalism is being forced to answer a question it long avoided: why should the public trust it at all? At a moment when credibility is eroding and the definition of a journalist is increasingly blurred, a new industry-wide framework is attempting to reset the standard. The 2026 Oxford Declaration on Journalistic Integrity and Public Trust is not just another set of principles — it is a direct response to a crisis of confidence. And as Steve Herman makes clear, the stakes are no longer theoretical — "the house is on fire and we need to respond to that."
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/journalism-at-a-crossroads-a-new-declaration-aims-to-rebuild-trust-in-the-news,261320
E&P Reports went on the road as Mike Blinder hosted a live panel at the New York Press Association's annual spring conference in Saratoga Springs. Joined by newsroom leaders Casey Seiler, Walter Sanchez and Kirstyn Brendlen, along with voices from the audience, the discussion tackled a question at the heart of modern journalism: are we delivering the news audiences want—or the news they truly need?
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/what-audiences-want-vs-what-they-need-ep-reports-goes-on-the-road-to-confront-journalisms,261318
In this episode of E&P Reports, we examine one of the most consequential local news stories in the country — the near-collapse and sudden reinvention of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette — through separate interviews with two key voices: Andrew Conte, a leading local news advocate and managing director of the Center for Media Innovation at Point Park University, and Bob Cohn, president and CEO of The Baltimore Banner and The Venetoulis Institute for Local Journalism, the organization now stepping in to lead the paper's future.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/inside-the-pittsburgh-post-gazette-turnaround-what-its-new-owners-plan-next,261214
For decades, local media relied on a simple formula: build audience, and advertisers would follow. Now, Gordon Borrell notes, that formula has quietly failed as the local business landscape and marketing decision-makers have shifted. Service businesses, in-house marketers, and AI-driven tools increasingly control ad spending. Borrell warns traditional media must rethink their sales approach to stay relevant with today's advertisers.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/borrell-why-local-media-advertising-got-harder-to-sell,261030
Investigative journalism has never been easy. But according to the latest State of Accountability Journalism report from the University of Florida's Collier Prize, the reporters doing that work today say the obstacles are growing even as their commitment to watchdog reporting remains strong. Shrinking newsroom staffs, rising costs for public records and increasing resistance from government agencies are making investigations harder to pursue. Yet many journalists say the very pressures threatening accountability reporting are also reinforcing why it matters. As Collier Prize director Rick Hirsch put it, "this is a hard business. If you're going to stick in it, you've got to be committed and believe in the impact that it can have."
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/commitment-over-capacity-why-investigative-journalism-persists-despite-shrinking-newsrooms,260965
Rebuilding the statehouse beat: Inside The Center Square's growing newswire model
The decline of traditional newsroom staffing has thinned one of journalism's most important beats: statehouse reporting. As fewer reporters cover legislative chambers and the policy decisions shaping taxpayers' lives, new models have emerged to fill the gap. Among the fastest-growing is The Center Square, a nonprofit newswire focused on government accountability reporting that publisher Chris Krug says was built to address what he sees as a structural hole in the American news ecosystem.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/rebuilding-the-statehouse-beat-inside-the-center-squares-growing-newswire-model,260877
For generations of service members, Stars and Stripes has been known as the soldiers' newspaper, funded by the U.S. government but protected by law to report independently on the military it covers. Now that independence is facing renewed scrutiny. Signals from the Pentagon about refocusing the paper's coverage and internal policy shifts have raised concerns among journalists and press freedom advocates that the Defense Department may be seeking to reshape the mission of one of the world's most unusual news organizations.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/stars-and-stripes-defends-its-independence-amid-new-pentagon-pressures,260760
The Australian Financial Review once called Rod Sims "the most feared man in Australian business." Big Tech soon learned why. As chair of Australia's competition regulator, Sims helped design the groundbreaking News Media Bargaining Code that forced platforms like Google and Facebook to negotiate payments with publishers. In this conversation with E&P, Sims explores how the policy now sends roughly $250 million a year back to news organizations and what publishers around the world can learn from Australia's fight to make Big Tech pay for journalism.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/how-australia-forced-big-tech-to-pay-for-journalism-and-what-publishers-everywhere-can-learn,260630
A new industry survey from the Local Media Consortium (LMC) suggests that while digital revenue across local media remains relatively stable, the path forward is becoming more complicated. One of the most striking findings: the number of publishers identifying audience revenue as a major challenge has surged dramatically year over year. Fran Wills, CEO of the LMC, says the shift doesn't necessarily signal collapse — but it does reflect a new phase of pressure on subscription growth and sustainability. In a conversation with E&P, Wills breaks down what the data reveals about the evolving economics of local journalism and where publishers may need to look next for long-term stability.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/new-lmc-report-finds-digital-revenue-stable-as-audience-revenue-pressures-grow,260529
For decades, media leaders have debated whether journalism can sustain itself as a standalone business. But in a rapidly evolving landscape, Hearst is offering a different perspective — one outlined in its latest annual letter from CEO Steven Swartz, which makes clear the company's center of gravity has shifted far beyond traditional media. In a recent conversation on E&P Reports, David Carey, senior vice president of public affairs and communications at Hearst, expanded on that strategy, explaining how the company's transformation wasn't reactive, but decades in the making. His insights reveal a model that doesn't abandon journalism, but strengthens it through broader business innovation.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/a-blueprint-beyond-media-how-hearst-is-redefining-sustainability,260420
When a newsroom can't hire reporters, the problem isn't always pay — sometimes it's rent. In one coastal community, the cost of living got so high that journalists simply couldn't afford to cover the news. So instead of raising salaries or cutting coverage, the solution took an unexpected turn: they bought a condo. It's a bold move that may point to a new model for keeping local journalism alive.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/when-journalists-cant-afford-rent-one-newsroom-buys-them-a-home,260288
Local journalism isn't disappearing — it's being rebuilt in real time, and a new report from FT Strategies aims to show exactly how. Drawing on global data, newsroom case studies and on-the-ground experience, the Local News Playbook shifts the conversation from crisis to what's actually working. Instead of asking how to save journalism, the report examines what the most resilient organizations already have in common — and how others can follow. In a conversation with E&P, George Adelman, director and head of partnerships at FT Strategies, unpacks the patterns, priorities and practical steps that are redefining sustainability for local news.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/unpacking-the-local-news-playbook-what-sustainable-publishers-are-doing-differently,260183
When national attention suddenly converges on a single city, the decisions made inside one local newsroom can shape how the entire world understands what's happening. That is the position The Minnesota Star Tribune now finds itself in as immigration enforcement activity in Minneapolis draws intense national and international scrutiny. In this moment, journalism, safety, credibility, and brand strategy are no longer separate conversations — they are happening at once, in real time. This behind-the-scenes look reveals how the Star Tribune's newsroom and leadership are navigating pressure, responsibility, and purpose as the world watches Minneapolis.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/when-minneapolis-becomes-the-story-inside-the-star-tribunes-newsroom-and-brand-response,260084
Local journalism has no shortage of big ideas about innovation — but far fewer examples of those ideas being funded, tested, and trusted by the people closest to the work. After a year of scrutiny, retrenchment and hard questions about its future, the National Trust for Local News is experimenting with a different approach: putting real money and real authority directly into the hands of journalists. At the center of that shift is a first-of-its-kind Innovation Sprint designed to surface newsroom-driven solutions, not executive theory. This conversation explores what happens when innovation moves from the boardroom to the newsroom floor — and why that change may matter more than any single tool or grant.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/funding-innovation-from-the-ground-up-how-the-national-trust-for-local-news-is-rethinking-change,259959
Disinformation is no longer a background hazard of modern journalism — it is a coordinated, weaponized assault on truth itself. In a world where lies travel faster than facts and chaos is deliberately engineered to exhaust the public, national security correspondent JJ Green says journalists are now fighting a real war for credibility. Drawing on decades of coverage of intelligence, conflict zones and information warfare, Green frames today's media crisis as an existential battle for democratic survival. His new book, "The Noise War," is not a warning shot — it's a field manual for journalists on the front lines of disinformation.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/inside-the-noise-war-a-field-manual-for-journalists-fighting-disinformation,259836
Local journalism is shrinking in much of the country — but The Baltimore Banner is moving in the opposite direction. In just two years, the nonprofit newsroom has grown into Maryland's largest reporting operation, expanded beyond Baltimore, and built a fast-growing base of paying subscribers. Now, with their new editor-in-chief Audrey Cooper at the helm, The Banner is doubling down on a belief that many in the industry have quietly abandoned: scale still matters. In this wide-ranging conversation, the newsroom's new leader explains why growth, impact, and sustainability are inseparable — and what local journalism risks losing if it stops thinking big.\
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/the-baltimore-banner-enters-a-new-year-and-a-new-chapter-with-a-new-editor-in-chief,259711
What news consumers are really saying about AI: insights from the Trusting News/LMA study
A new national survey of nearly 1,500 local news consumers reveals growing concern about AI's role in journalism—but also a clear path forward. Funded by the Walton Family Foundation and conducted by the Local Media Association and Trusting News, the study shows audiences overwhelmingly want human oversight, transparency, and clarity about how AI is used. John Humenik of LMA and Lynn Walsh of Trusting News joined E&P Reports to break down the results. Their message: trust is still journalism's greatest asset—AI can't replace that.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/988-say-ai-cant-replace-journalists-new-study-reveals-why-that-matters-now,259577
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Jeff Jarvis has never been interested in nostalgia. In a wide‑ranging conversation with E&P Magazine, the longtime media critic, author and journalism educator argues that the survival of local news depends not on preserving legacy structures, but on abandoning them. From print to platforms, from content to community, Jarvis insists that journalism's future lies in collaboration, service and listening — not scale or tradition.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/new-year-new-rules-jeff-jarvis-says-local-journalism-must-reinvent-itself-now,259465
Free expression in America isn't collapsing all at once — it's eroding quietly, often in ways the public barely notices. In a wide‑ranging conversation, First Amendment scholar Stuart N. Brotman warns that political pressure, platform power and public misunderstanding are reshaping the boundaries of press freedom in real time. Drawing on decades of experience across academia, government and media policy, Brotman makes the case that the next few years will be decisive. And he argues that local journalism may be the strongest remaining force capable of rebuilding trust, civic understanding and a shared commitment to free expression.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/scholar-stuart-brotman-sounds-the-alarm-free-expression-is-under-fire,259377
California isn't just a state. It's a story still being written, and USA Today wants a front-row seat. With the launch of Today Californian, the national news giant is investing in a bold new experiment: statewide coverage designed to meet readers wherever they are — from inbox to Instagram. "We're positioning ourselves as highly relevant," says Greg Burton, the project's editorial lead. The goal? To create a digital-first newsroom that feels local, acts regional and delivers impact at scale.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/rewriting-the-california-story-usa-today-bets-big-on-statewide-local-journalism,259321
Mark Puente didn't go to j-school — he drove trucks for 15 years before stepping into a newsroom. But when a judge tried to block him from observing a public court hearing, Puente didn't flinch. Armed with experience, instinct, and a phone call to his editor, he stood his ground — ready to risk contempt rather than walk away. What followed wasn't just a clash over access, but a moment that reveals why blue-collar grit still matters in American journalism.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/from-hauling-freight-to-holding-judges-accountable-mark-puentes-fight-for-courtroom-access,259215
If you think young people aren't paying attention to the news, think again — they are, and they have thoughts. A new study reveals just how skeptical today's teens are about the press, and the results should make every newsroom take notice. From questions of fairness to fears of fabrication, Gen Z is forming strong opinions about who to trust. In this episode, we dive into what teens really believe — and why it matters for the future of journalism.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/half-of-us-teens-think-journalists-make-up-quotes-and-do-favors-for-sources-new-report-finds,259102
Robert Whitehead believes the news industry is entering a make-or-break era defined by AI disruption, collapsing platform traffic and growing public distrust. In a conversation with E&P, he said generative AI is "as transformative as electricity." He warned that publishers are still distracted by "shiny objects" instead of rebuilding the fundamentals that audiences actually value. His new report, authored for the INMA, outlines why newsrooms must urgently rethink distribution, trust, and brand experience to survive. And unless publishers rapidly differentiate their value and restore confidence in their journalism, he argues, they risk losing relevance at the very moment democracy needs them most.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/a-global-perspective-on-what-news-publishers-must-do-next,258967
For more than 160 years, Stars and Stripes has walked a razor-thin line: serving the U.S. military while holding it accountable. Publisher Max Lederer says that balance remains as vital — and as fragile — as ever, noting that "our staff are paid by the Department of Defense" even as the newsroom is mandated to stay "balanced, objective, independent and impartial." Today, new Pentagon access rules, collapsing trust in media, and seismic digital shifts are putting that independence to the test. Lederer argues the mission endures because "we are dedicated to telling the story of the U.S. military community… from within the Department of Defense," a position no other newsroom occupies.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/stars-and-stripes-at-a-crossroads-inside-its-mission-press-freedom-challenges-and-digital-future,258686
For nearly five decades, Jim Slusher has been one of the Midwest's most thoughtful voices on what journalism owes its readers — and how it earns their trust. As managing editor for opinion at the Daily Herald, he's spent his career pulling back the curtain on newsroom decisions and defending the value of open, honest dialogue. Now, with his new book To Nudge the World, Slusher is challenging both journalists and audiences to rethink how truth and trust are built in an era of noise and doubt. His message is clear: transparency isn't a luxury for journalism — it's the lifeline that keeps democracy alive.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/jim-slusher-on-rebuilding-trust-and-why-his-new-book-aims-to-nudge-the-world,258665
In a world overwhelmed by AI-generated imagery and shrinking newsroom budgets, the value of authentic photojournalism has never been more at risk — or more essential. The National Press Photographers Association is sounding the alarm: visuals aren't just decoration, they're the backbone of truth, trust, and emotional connection in journalism. In this exclusive interview, NPPA Vice President Lauren Steinbrecher and Grady College's Mark E. Johnson break down why local publishers, students, and reporters must fight for the future of visual storytelling. Because if we lose the image, we may just lose the story itself.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/why-visuals-still-matter-inside-nppas-fight-for-the-future-of-photojournalism,258582
Local news is collapsing at an alarming pace — more than 3,500 newspapers have vanished since 2005, with 130 disappearing just last year. In this episode, we interview Tim Franklin and Zach Metzger of Northwestern's Medill School of Journalism, the researchers behind the 2025 State of Local News report, which paints a dire picture of vanishing watchdogs, expanding news deserts, and a shrinking connection between journalism and the communities it serves. Yet amid the bleak data are signs of reinvention, from public radio stations stepping up to statewide networks and philanthropic partnerships gaining traction outside major metros. This isn't just a crisis — it's a make-or-break moment for rebuilding local journalism from the ground up.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/the-state-of-local-news-more-urgency-than-optimism,258462
Journalist & best‑selling author Beth Macy returns to the town she once delivered newspapers in to ask: what happens when the civic fabric fractures and no one is left to tell the story? In her new memoir Paper Girl: A Memoir of Home and Family in a Fractured America, Macy digs into her hometown of Urbana, Ohio — exploring how the collapse of local news, growing economic despair and social isolation reshaped a community she loved. Along the way, she argues that if journalism disappears from small‑town America, the consequences are national. Her message is clear: local reporting isn't just "nice to have," it's the glue that holds democracy together.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/bestselling-author-journalist-bethmacy-returns-home-in-papergirl,258348
Local news is changing faster than anyone imagined — and Northwestern University’s Medill School just put numbers to the chaos. Its new State of Local News 2025 report reveals a seismic shift: smartphones have overtaken TV, content creators now rival traditional outlets, and only 15% of Americans say they’re willing to pay for local journalism. For Medill’s Tim Franklin and Stephanie Edgerly, the findings are both a wake-up call and a roadmap for survival. The future of local news, they warn, depends on how fast publishers adapt to audiences who’ve already moved on.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/state-of-local-news-2025-smartphones-surge-content-creators-rise-and-only-15-pay,258226
What happens when a county government tries to silence its watchdog? In Pender County, North Carolina, officials yanked away the Post and Voice’s legal notices — a critical revenue lifeline — not because the paper failed to fulfill its duty, but because it did. Publisher Andy Pettigrew called out backroom deals and ran biting editorial cartoons, prompting the commissioners to strike back. Now, the fight has moved from the courthouse steps to federal court, raising a chilling First Amendment question: If politicians can punish a paper for speaking the truth, what local newsroom is safe?
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/local-publisher-fights-back-after-county-strips-legal-notices-in-retaliation,258103
Polarization isn’t just dividing dinner tables anymore — it’s turning deadly in the wake of the Charlie Kirk tragedy and now the ICE office shooting in Dallas. The role and responsibility of opinion journalism has never been more scrutinized. That’s why we turned to Nicole Russell, one of USA Today’s leading conservative voices, who has spent more than a decade writing on politics, culture, and policy. She has also written for The Washington Examiner and The Federalist, consistently offering a sharp conservative perspective on some of the most hotly debated issues of our time. In our conversation, Russell opens up about how she balances tone and responsibility, the blurred line between news and opinion, the future of editorial pages, and what advice she has for local publishers navigating this polarized moment.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/nicole-russell-usa-todays-conservative-voice-on-why-opinion-journalism-still-matters,257962
When billion-dollar networks like CBS and ABC cave to political pressure and late-night stars like Colbert and Kimmel get muzzled, what chance does a small-town publisher have? If Washington can bend the most prominent players in media, local newspapers — already stretched thin by lawsuits, advertiser boycotts, and the rise of AI — are staring down an even harsher storm. That’s why Bob Corn-Revere, one of America’s top First Amendment lawyers, warns now is the moment to stiffen spines. “A spine is a terrible thing to waste,” he said — and for publishers, wasting it could mean losing the last line of defense for democracy.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/networks-under-fire-and-what-it-means-for-local-publishers,257824
In a world where speaking out can result in being silenced forever, journalism itself is under attack. Hours before this conversation was taped, commentator and podcaster Charlie Kirk was gunned down at an event at Utah Valley University — a stark reminder that public voices, whether political or journalistic, face real and rising danger. Against that backdrop, Dr. Peter Laufer, world-traveling journalist, author and editor of the new book “Don't Shoot the Journalists: Migrating to Stay Alive,” joined E&P Reports to explore what’s at stake when reporters are exiled, threatened or even killed — and what our society loses when truth-tellers are taken off the stage.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/after-the-kirk-shooting-peter-laufer-warns-journalism-is-more-dangerous-than-ever,257691
When E&P reported on Sept. 2 that Broad + Liberty and Access Network were merging to form the Fideri News Network, the press release generated more questions than answers: What exactly is this new company? How is it structured? Is it truly positioned to become a meaningful player in today's media landscape, or simply a rebranding of existing outlets? To delve deeper into the announcement, E&P sat down with Broad + Liberty CEO Terry Tracy and Access Global Advisors CEO Jim McDonald, now chairman of the network, for a closer look at what Fideri actually is — and what it aims to become.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/behind-the-launch-a-closer-look-at-the-philly-areas-new-fideri-news-network,257601
Heather Burns has spent three decades breaking barriers in sports journalism — and now she’s making history as USA Today’s first women’s sports editor. From building ESPN’s NFL Nation team to championing deeper coverage of women’s athletics, Burns brings both experience and passion to the role. “It can’t always be cheerleading,” she says. “It’s also got to be good journalism with integrity.” With a new strategy called Studio 9 and the power of the USA Today Network behind her, she’s determined to give women’s sports the coverage it has always deserved.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/usa-today-doubles-down-on-womens-sports-with-heather-burns-at-the-helm,257504
The Knight Center for the Future of News at ASU’s Cronkite School isn’t tinkering at the edges of journalism — it’s ripping up the blueprint and starting fresh. Dean Battinto Batts calls this moment “an inflection point,” where trust is eroding and technology is racing ahead faster than most newsrooms can follow. Julia Wallace insists transformation must be rooted in community, warning that too many audiences have been “left alone” without information they can rely on. Together, they’re pushing for flatter newsrooms, bold experiments with AI, and business models that do more than keep the lights on — they rebuild confidence in what news is for.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/the-future-of-news-a-deeper-look-at-asus-knight-center-experiment,257394
When Ken Tingley retired after more than two decades leading The Post-Star in Glens Falls, New York, he thought he was closing the book on his newsroom career. Instead, he wrote one. Then he took it a step further—turning his memoir, The Last American Newspaper, into a stage play that sold out four nights in a row at the Adirondack Theatre Festival. The production didn’t just entertain. It pulled audiences to their feet, stirred tears, and forced a community to reckon with what happens when a local newsroom fades away.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/the-last-american-newspaper-takes-the-stage,257267
What if every newsroom in America posted its journalistic values where everyone could see them? That’s the bold vision behind the Center for Integrity in News Reporting (CFINR), founded by Walter Hussman — legendary publisher of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and chairman of WEHCO Media — and led by Executive Director Rufus Friday. Their mission is as ambitious as it is urgent: rebuild public trust in journalism by making transparency impossible to ignore. In this conversation, they reveal how a simple statement of values could transform how audiences see — and support — the news.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/the-cfinr-mission-clear-values-stronger-trust,257142
What happens when more than 250 civic leaders, journalists, academics, and funders gather to face the collapse of local news head-on? In Detroit, it sparked an unfiltered conversation about trust, collaboration, and what it will take to rebuild journalism from the ground up. In this episode of E&P Reports, five media power players unpack the July 22 “Local News Crisis” event — and what must happen next. If you care about the future of local journalism, this is the conversation you can’t afford to miss.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/in-detroit-a-powerful-case-is-made-for-saving-local-journalism,257028
In an era when hedge funds gut local newspapers and trust in media is under siege, Lansing’s fiercely independent City Pulse has found a surprising new lifeline—not in corporate consolidation, but in mission-driven philanthropy. The paper’s founder, Berl Schwartz, turned down multiple offers before striking a deal with the Michigan Independent Media Group, led by civic engagement leader Dr. Jason Franklin. Their partnership isn’t just a transaction—it’s a bold experiment in saving local journalism with values at the center and sustainability in sight.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/new-chapter-for-lansings-city-pulse-philanthropy-backs-fierce-independence,256921
What happens when a local newspaper and a craft brewery join forces? In Spokane, Washington, it results in the First Amendment beer — a bold collaboration between The Spokesman-Review and No-Li Brewhouse that's as much about community as it is about hops. In this episode, we crack open the surprising story behind the beer making headlines and the mission to protect local journalism. It’s a blueprint for sustainability with authentic flavor — and one you’ll want to sip on.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/brewing-trust-how-a-newsroom-and-brewery-built-community-through-beer,256793
When tragedy struck Coeur d’Alene, the local newsroom didn’t flinch — they mobilized. Within hours, the Press team defied routine, printed on an off day, and delivered vital information to a grieving community. Their leadership didn’t just report the news — they helped shape how the town processed its heartbreak. In this episode, Clint Schroeder and Bill Buley reveal how local journalism rose to the moment when it mattered most.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/when-tragedy-strikes-local-journalism-leads-coeur-dalene-press-responds-with-clarity-and,256682
Adams Publishing Group is stepping into a new era with a name that reflects its ambition: Adams MultiMedia. As local news organizations everywhere wrestle with disruption, Adams is betting that combining deep community roots with expanded digital services is the path to growth. The rebrand signals more than a cosmetic change—it’s a strategy to stay relevant to audiences and advertisers in a media landscape that never stops evolving. This move offers a glimpse into how a large, family-owned publisher plans to thrive when so many others are struggling to survive.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/the-evolution-of-adams-from-publishing-to-multimedia,256583
Pason Gaddis thinks local newspapers don’t have to fade quietly into history. As CEO of Hoffman Media Group, he’s betting that lean operations, local control, and a focus on original reporting can rebuild trust—and profitability—where others have given up. “You have to change or you have to die,” Gaddis said, urging publishers to break free from outdated models. His approach is proving that if you invest in community journalism, audiences will still show up—and pay for it.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/rebuilding-local-news-by-thinking-like-an-entrepreneur,256483
Connoisseur Media CEO Jeffrey Warshaw isn’t chasing trends—he’s doubling down on what works: local content, real relationships, and a service-first sales strategy. In a no-nonsense conversation, Warshaw explains why legacy media still has power when it’s community-rooted and advertiser-driven. With digital and radio sales integrated under one roof, he’s building not just reach, but results. “Local, baby,” is still his mantra—and it’s paying off. If you’re in media and missing this mindset, you’re leaving money (and trust) on the table.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/staying-local-staying-strong-jeffrey-warshaw-on-what-still-works-in-media,256362
When a suburban newspaper starts thinking like a startup, big things happen. At Current Publishing in suburban Indianapolis, innovation isn’t just a buzzword—it’s fueling real growth, younger audiences, and serious digital revenue. From influencer-driven reels to a text-based edition with 65% engagement, President Ben Weir is proving hyperlocal doesn’t mean old-school. Here’s how one free weekly is rewriting the playbook for local news success.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/innovating-hyperlocal-how-current-publishing-redefines-suburban-news,256246
Four years ago, Max Kabat left Manhattan to reinvent local journalism in the remote West Texas town of Marfa. He didn’t just take over a newspaper—he built a café, bar, event space, and community hub to fund it. Now, that bold experiment is not only thriving but inspiring others to rethink what local media can be. We caught up with Kabat to find out how it’s working, what’s next, and what lessons other publishers can take from the journey.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/turning-a-small-town-newspaper-into-a-community-hub,256115
What if local media companies stopped acting like publishers and started thinking like SaaS platforms? That’s the provocative challenge laid down by veteran digital strategist Todd Handy in a recent episode of E&P Reports. Drawing from decades in media, tech, and recurring revenue models, Handy believes the path to sustainability lies in ditching short-term campaigns and embracing lifetime customer value. His message to news leaders: the future of publishing won’t look like a newsroom — it’ll look like a software company.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/from-sales-to-saas-todd-handys-playbook-for-sustainable-local-media,256009
Local media isn’t just struggling — it’s at a tipping point, and most companies are leaning the wrong way. In a brutally candid conversation, Gordon Borrell lays out why 85% of local outlets are capturing less than 10% of their digital ad potential and why newspapers, in particular, have seen zero digital revenue growth since 2020. He calls out broken sales cultures, invisible new businesses, and the dangerous illusion that hard paywalls are a sustainable fix. If you’re in news publishing and not reading this, you’re missing your wake-up call — and possibly your last chance to pivot.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/gordon-borrell-warns-local-media-tipping-into-irrelevance-unless-urgent-changes-are-made,255823
With legislative threats mounting at the state level, America’s Newspapers has launched a new coalition to unite press associations and publishers in defense of local journalism. In a recent E&P Reports episode, CEO Dean Ridings was joined by Alan Fisco, president of The Seattle Times and AN board member, and Debbie Anselm, the new executive director of the Iowa Newspaper Association, to unpack the coalition’s goals. Together, they made the case for why statehouse advocacy is longer optional — and how a collective voice can drive meaningful policy change.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/coalition-unites-press-associations-to-defend-journalisms-future,255713
After helping hundreds of publishers navigate digital transformation, Charity Huff decided to walk the walk — by acquiring Denver’s 5280 Magazine. Just four months in, she’s proving that legacy brands can thrive with a modern strategy rooted in audience, authenticity, and innovation. From rethinking revenue to doubling down on events and email, Huff is blending bold ideas with respect for tradition. Her mission: to build a community-first, future-ready media company — and show others it can be done.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/print-proud-data-smart-inside-charity-huffs-reinvention-of-5280,255601
At a time when trust in journalism continues to erode, the future of opinion content is under intense scrutiny. Should newspapers continue publishing unsigned editorials and political endorsements, or is it time to rethink the role of opinion altogether? That was the focus of a live panel at the 2025 America’s Newspapers’ Mega-Conference, where hundreds of news executives gathered for this live panel discussion to share strategies, struggles, and shifting audience expectations. What emerged was a candid, sometimes surprising conversation about how opinion journalism must evolve — or risk becoming irrelevant.
Access more on this episode’s landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/should-opinion-journalism-evolve-or-disappear-a-live-panel-from-the-2025-mega-conference,255476
Press freedom is under attack — not in some distant land, but right here in the United States. From newsroom intimidation to funding cuts targeting public media, the threats are multiplying while public awareness remains dangerously low. In this powerful episode of E&P Reports, three key voices behind the Press Freedom United initiative expose the scope of the crisis — and what every publisher, journalist, and citizen can do about it. Sally Lehrman (The Trust Project), Anh-Thu Vo (PEN America), and Daniel Williams (BlueLena) don’t just ring the alarm — they offer a blueprint for action. If you care about the future of journalism in this country, this conversation is essential listening.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/press-freedom-united,255369
If you’ve ever marveled at a Linotype machine or debated whether Helvetica is overused, you’ve likely felt Frank Romano’s influence—even if you didn’t know it. As the founder of the Museum of Printing and author of nearly 80 books, Romano has spent a lifetime preserving the stories, machines, and ideas that shaped the modern media landscape. From brass matrices to PageMaker, he’s witnessed every disruptive shift in how we communicate. And through it all, he’s championed one unwavering belief: print is immortal.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/saving-the-story-of-print-one-linotype-at-a-time-inside-the-museum-of-printing,255266
From coast to coast, a wave of new laws is quietly rewriting the rules of news publishing. Subscription models are under fire, ad revenues are being threatened by state-level taxation schemes, and postal costs are climbing at unsustainable rates. The chaos isn’t coming—it’s already here. But while most publishers are focused on survival, the News/Media Alliance is walking the halls of Congress and state capitols, fighting back on your behalf. In this exclusive interview, VPs Holly Lubart and Emily Emery reveal what’s really happening behind closed doors—and what every publisher needs to know now.
Access more on this episode's landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/ad-taxes-subscription-laws-postal-chaos-inside-the-news-media-alliances-fight-to-protect,255159
When an explosive leak hit The Atlantic, Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg faced a moment of truth. Journalism professor Jeff Jarvis weighs in on how Goldberg handled the saga, grading his response and breaking down what it means for newsroom ethics. Did Goldberg make the right call—or fall into a trap? Plus, Jarvis shares critical lessons for every journalist navigating today’s chaotic media landscape.
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https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/prof-jeff-jarvis-grades-jeffrey-goldberg-on-signalgate,255022
Voice of America (VOA),, the U.S. government-funded international broadcaster, is facing an unprecedented crisis. Journalists have been cut off from their newsrooms—emails shut down, phones disconnected, and no way to reach editors—leaving many in a state of uncertainty. Steve Herman, Chief National Correspondent for VOA, finds himself among more than 1,300 colleagues placed on excused absence. While Herman was singled out under an executive order deeming him potentially disloyal to the president’s foreign policy, his colleagues’ suspensions were not linked to any alleged wrongdoing. As the shutdown stretches on, audiences once served by VOA’s trusted reporting are turning elsewhere, raising questions about the future of one of America’s most enduring journalistic institutions.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/voice-of-america-turmoil-through-the-eyes-of-veteran-voa-journalist-steve-herman,254884
As tensions rise between the United States and Canada over tariffs, newspapers on both sides of the border are feeling the strain. Paul Deegan, CEO of News Media Canada, joined E&P Reports to discuss how the trade war is affecting the news industry, the broader economic implications, and the efforts being made to restore balance in a historically strong relationship.
Access more on this episodes landing page, at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/paul-deegan-trade-war-threatens-survival-of-local-media-on-both-sides-of-the-border,254777
For decades, journalists have been judged by their reporting and how they look and sound, often conforming to rigid, unspoken industry standards. But as news delivery shifts to digital platforms, podcasting and AI-driven content, those norms are being challenged like never before. In “Performing the News,” Elia Powers reveals how journalists — especially those from marginalized backgrounds — navigate the pressures of self-presentation and fight for authenticity in an evolving media landscape. Are the days of the “perfect broadcast voice” and “polished TV anchor look” finally over?
Access more at this episode’s landing page; https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/examining-self-presentation-in-journalism-elia-powers-on-authenticity-and-industry-norms,254684
The battle over media regulation, political influence and journalistic integrity has reached a new flashpoint as the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) faces scrutiny over its selective enforcement of cases involving major networks. At the center of the debate is Fox’s Philadelphia affiliate, WTXF, and whether its parent company should retain its broadcast license given the network's documented history of knowingly spreading falsehoods.
To unpack this issue, former FCC Chairman Al Sikes and longtime media executive Preston Padden — both leaders of the Media and Democracy Project — discussed the implications of the FCC’s actions and the broader stakes for press freedom and democracy. Their conversation highlights deep concerns about regulatory capture, the erosion of media accountability and the consequences of the FCC acting as a political weapon rather than an impartial guardian of the public interest.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/media-accountability-the-fcc-and-the-fight-over-fox-a-conversation-with-al-sikes-and-preston,254569
When a city government uses the courts to silence a newspaper, it’s not just an attack on one publication—it’s an attack on press freedom itself. That’s exactly what happened in Clarksdale, Mississippi, where a judge ordered the Clarksdale Press Register to remove an editorial questioning the transparency of a proposed tax initiative. The ruling, widely condemned as an egregious violation of the First Amendment, has ignited national concern among journalists and legal experts. In this exclusive conversation, E&P Reports dives into the case with publisher Wyatt Emmerich and press freedom advocate Seth Stern to explore what this means for the future of local journalism—and why every newsroom should be paying attention.
Access more (including actual censored editorial, Complaint and Restraining Order) at this episode’s landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/what-happens-when-a-city-silences-a-newspaper-an-inside-look-at-the-clarksdale-censorship-case,254442
As more newspapers rethink their print schedules, The Post and Courier is making a bold move—scaling back to five-day print delivery while doubling down on digital engagement. In this exclusive interview, PJ Browning, president of the newspaper division at Evening Post Publishing, breaks down the strategy behind the shift, how they’re preparing loyal readers for the transition, and why she believes the future of local journalism is both digital and deeply rooted in community trust. Watch now to hear how The Post and Courier is navigating this pivotal moment in publishing.
Access more at this episode’s landing page:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/post-and-couriers-strategic-print-shift-a-new-era-for-south-carolina-journalism,254302
Journalists have long faced obstacles in their pursuit of truth, but in recent years, a troubling trend has emerged: government-imposed gag rules that restrict public employees from speaking freely with the press. These restrictions, often enforced through public information offices or direct bans on communication, limit transparency and public accountability. In a recent episode of E&P Reports, Mike Blinder sat down with veteran Journalist Kathryn Foxhall and First Amendment Attorney Frank LoMonte to discuss the issue, its legal implications, and what journalists can do to push back.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/time-to-challenge-gag-rules-journalists-fight-back-against-restrictions-on-public-employees,254213
Local advertisers are drowning in a sea of digital choices, overwhelmed by ever-changing marketing trends and unsure where to invest their dollars. Yet, many media companies have abandoned one of the most effective ways to educate and engage them—advertiser workshops. In a recent E&P Reports interview, media sales expert Ryan Dohrn made a powerful case for why now is the time to bring them back. “Most advertisers don’t actually understand how marketing works today,” he explained. “If you’re not the one teaching them, someone else will be.” The takeaway? Local publishers must step up, lead the conversation, and reclaim their role as the trusted marketing experts in their communities.
Access more on this episode’s landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/ryan-dohrn-on-selling-value-overcoming-price-objections-and-reviving-advertiser-workshops,254105
Dave Morgan, a digital media pioneer who helped shape the evolution of online advertising, offers a candid look at the challenges and opportunities facing local news in this episode of E&P Reports. From the rise of AI and social video to the limitations of subscription models, Morgan shares why traditional revenue strategies are faltering and what publishers should focus on instead. He also explores how local news organizations can rethink their business models, embrace new advertising approaches and stay relevant in a rapidly shifting media landscape.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/dave-morgan-on-the-future-of-local-news-embracing-ai-social-video-and-a-startup-mindset,253972
As the local news industry continues to evolve, mergers and acquisitions (M&A) remain a crucial part of its future. While challenges persist, opportunities for strategic growth and sustainability are expanding for both buyers and sellers.
In this discussion, Sara April, president of Dirks, Van Essen & April, and John Thomas Cribb, director of Cribb & Associates, share their insights into current trends in media valuations, the impact of digital transformation, and key strategies for those looking to buy or sell media organizations.
Access more at this episode’s landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/navigating-media-mergers-trends-valuations-and-future-projections,253862
Meta’s recent announcement to end its third-party fact-checking program by January 2025 has sent ripples through the media and fact-checking industries. To unpack the implications of this decision, Editor & Publisher Publisher Mike Blinder spoke with Katie Sanders, editor-in-chief of PolitiFact, a Pulitzer Prize-winning fact-checking organization under the Poynter Institute.
Access more on this episode’s landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/metas-fact-checking-shift-katie-sanders-on-whats-next-for-politifact-and-the-news-industry,253729
The Baltimore Banner, a nonprofit news organization, closed out 2024 with remarkable achievements, positioning itself as a model for sustainable local journalism in 2025. With 55,000 paid subscribers, a rapidly growing newsroom, and diversified revenue streams, the Banner is proving that innovation and community focus can drive success. Editor & Publisher (E&P) spoke with CEO Bob Cohn and Chief Revenue Officer Sharon Nevins to explore their strategies and vision for the year ahead.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/building-momentum-into-2025-how-the-baltimore-banner-is-shaping-the-future-of-local-journalism,253616
By blending investigative rigor with a commitment to public service, USA TODAY has once again showcased the impact of journalism. Editor-in-Chief Caren Bohan joined E&P Reports to discuss a remarkable story that began as a feel-good reunion and evolved into a layered investigation highlighting systemic issues and ethical complexities. Bohan shared insights on how the USA TODAY newsroom navigated the twists and turns of this compelling case while adhering to its mission of accountability journalism.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/public-service-journalism-at-its-best-how-usa-today-shined-a-light-on-a-complex-story,253418
In his seventh appearance on E&P Reports, Gordon Borrell, CEO of Borrell Associates, joined Mike Blinder to preview insights from his firm's latest advertiser survey and its implications for the media industry. Borrell Associates, widely regarded as a leading authority on local advertising trends, has released its fall 2024 survey, gathering data from over 1,100 advertisers and 122 agencies. The findings shed light on evolving advertiser preferences, challenges in media sales and strategies for 2025.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/gordon-borrell-discusses-key-insights-from-the-fall-2024-advertiser-study,253280
In the heart of Galveston County, a unique initiative is revitalizing local businesses and community engagement through an overlooked form of currency — the $2 bill. The Galveston Daily News, under the leadership of Publisher Leonard Woolsey and spearheaded by Michelle Robinson, its chief revenue director, has rolled out the “$2 Shopping Challenge,” a program designed to encourage residents to spend locally while creating a buzz around community investment.
The campaign combines creativity, community spirit and economic strategy, fostering relationships between businesses and consumers while demonstrating the impact of shopping locally. The challenge has gained traction through partnerships with Moody Bank, local chambers of commerce and economic development corporations, offering a model for other regions to emulate.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/woolsey-and-robinson-on-why-local-spending-starts-with-a-2-bill,253179
In a recent episode of E&P Reports, Mickey Osterreicher, general counsel for the National Press Photographers Association (NPPA), shared his insights on the potential impact of a second Trump administration on press freedom. With over five decades of experience in journalism and media law, Osterreicher offered a candid and comprehensive perspective on the challenges facing the news industry and the steps needed to address them.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/defending-press-freedom-in-uncertain-times-mickey-osterreicher-on-the-challenges-ahead,253122
In a landmark case with significant implications for journalism and democracy, Emmerich Newspapers Inc., Helena World Chronicle and Boone Newspapers have joined forces in a class-action lawsuit against Google, challenging what they describe as an unfair “tying” relationship. Filed in December 2023, Helena World Chronicle LLC v. Google LLC alleges that Google’s control over search and content indexing is undermining publishers’ abilities to attract traffic and monetize content independently. In this interview, Wyatt Emmerich, president of Emmerich Newspapers, shared insights into the lawsuit’s motivations, the road ahead, and what’s at stake for the news industry.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/a-legal-stand-against-google-wyatt-emmerich-on-helena-world-v-google-and-the-battle-for,252901
The Lenfest Institute for Journalism, in partnership with OpenAI and Microsoft, has introduced a $10 million AI Collaborative and Fellowship program to support innovation, sustainability, and new business models across five major U.S. metro newsrooms. Lenfest CEO Jim Friedlich, in a discussion on E&P Reports, highlighted how the initiative leverages AI for diverse newsroom applications, from business model optimization to increasing public data accessibility. The program aims to restore the depth of local reporting through AI-assisted research, enabling newsrooms to cover more ground with limited resources. Beyond the initial fellows, the program aspires to scale its impact, offering frameworks and tools for industry-wide adoption that reinforce the sustainability of journalism in an AI-driven future.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/inside-the-lenfest-openai-microsoft-partnership-one-on-one-with-jim-friedlich,252790
In an era defined by an information deluge, rapidly advancing technology, and the decentralization of media, how society perceives news and journalism has become increasingly complex. Addressing this crucial issue, the Center for News, Technology & Innovation (CNTI) has launched the “Defining News Initiative.” Amy S. Mitchell, CNTI’s founding Executive Director, recently joined E&P Reports to delve into the initiative’s insights and discuss the challenges facing journalism’s evolving definition.
Access more on this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/exploring-the-boundaries-of-journalism-amy-s-mitchell-on-cntis-defining-news-initiative,252667
Since its founding in 2017, Report for America (RFA) has supported nearly 400 local newsrooms across the United States, helping them collectively raise $30 million from local communities. Now, the nonprofit journalism initiative has launched an ambitious new pilot project — the Accelerator Program. The Accelerator Program is designed to further boost the sustainability of both for-profit and nonprofit local news organizations by diversifying their revenue streams and tapping into local philanthropic support.
In this interview with Editor & Publisher’s Mike Blinder, Morgan Baum, director of Local News Sustainability at RFA, explained how this pilot project could serve as a game-changer for local news outlets struggling to remain financially viable.
Access more on this episoodes landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/from-survival-to-sustainability-rfas-new-accelerator-program-helping-newsrooms-tap-into-new,252566
As the digital age reshapes the media landscape, local news publishers face a crucial challenge: staying relevant and profitable. At the heart of this challenge is the ability to deeply understand and engage with their audiences. Sammy Papert, President of Wormhole and sales representative for Coda Ventures, and Phillip Beswick, CEO of The Media Audit (TMA), recently shed light on how their audience studies are helping local news organizations thrive in an increasingly competitive environment. Their research offers powerful insights into how consumers interact with local news platforms and why these insights are pivotal for media companies seeking to monetize their content.
Access the studies along with more info on this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/unlocking-the-value-of-local-news-consumers-data-driven-strategies-for-media-growth,252467
The National Newspaper Association (NNA) has long been a key advocate for rural newspapers, championing their importance as trusted sources of information in communities across the United States. In this episode of E&P Reports, Mike Blinder sat down with Martha Diaz Aszkenazy, the newly elected chair of the NNA, and Brett Wesner, the past chairman, to discuss the association’s recent collaboration with the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) on the “Risk Less. Do More” campaign. This initiative, aimed at promoting public health messages about COVID-19, RSV, and the flu, is not only a public health victory but also a significant financial win for rural newspapers. By including these newspapers in their paid advertising strategy, HHS is injecting crucial revenue into these publications, helping to sustain their operations and support the communities they serve. This partnership underscores the vital role that local newspapers play in public health outreach while providing much-needed financial support to ensure their long-term sustainability.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/unpacking-the-nna-hhs-rural-public-health-ad-campaign,252388
In a unique interview, E&P Publisher Mike Blinder sat down with Version 1.2024.240 of ChatGPT, enhanced by Siri Voice 4, to explore the intersection of AI and journalism. The conversation tackled the critical issues facing the news industry today — from copyright and licensing to search traffic, newsroom integration and the future of journalism.
Topics covered, include:
- Copyright and licensing: Navigating the legal and ethical landscape
- AI in newsrooms: Boosting efficiency without sacrificing integrity
- The future of AI’s impact on newsroom jobs: A collaborative or competitive landscape?
More is available on this episode's page on the E&P Website, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/an-interview-with-chatgpt-how-ai-responds-to-tough-questions-about-its-impact-on-journalisms,252198
Josh Sweigart, editor of investigations and solutions journalism at Cox First Media Ohio, shares insights into the local media’s role in addressing misinformation. He focuses on how his newsroom at the Springfield News-Sun handled the recent surge of false claims about Haitian immigrants, amplified by Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and vice presidential nominee and senator from Ohio, JD Vance.
Access more at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/an-inside-look-into-the-newsroom-of-the-springfield-oh-news-sun,252094
In a media environment that is often dominated by narratives of decline, layoffs, and shrinking local news outlets, The Poynter Institute’s newly released report offers a refreshing perspective. Titled “OnPoynt — Values Rising: Trends and Traction in Journalism and the News Industry,” the study showcases optimism and innovation in journalism despite well-known challenges. In this recent interview, Neil Brown, President of Poynter, shared insights on the report and how local journalism is evolving in ways that provide significant value to communities. The conversation highlighted the vitality of smaller, local news startups, alternative forms of content distribution, and the promise of AI.
Learn more at this episodes offical E&P page at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/redefining-value-neil-brown-breaks-down-poynters-vision-for-journalisms-future,251986
Maya Lau, a former investigative reporter for the Los Angeles Times, recently found herself at the center of a shocking revelation. For over three years, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department conducted a secret investigation against her, accusing her of receiving stolen property related to her reporting on a leaked list of problematic deputies. In a conversation on the podcast, Lau shared her experiences, reflections, and the chilling implications of law enforcement’s actions with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder.
Lean more on the episode's landing page at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/a-journalist-secretly-under-fire-the-hidden-investigation-of-maya-lau-by-the-la-sheriffs,251874
The Pulitzer Prize-winning digital news outlet Lookout Local, founded by Ken Doctor, is expanding its innovative approach to local journalism beyond Santa Cruz, California, with plans to launch Lookout Eugene-Springfield in early 2025. This move marks the beginning of a broader national expansion strategy, aimed at revitalizing local news in communities across the United States. Hear insights from founder and CEO Ken Doctor, plus newly appointed COO/CRO Jed Williams and chief of staff, Ashley Harmon,
More information at E&P Magazine episode landing page: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/lookout-local-expands-to-oregon-bringing-back-jed-williams-promoting-ashley-harmon-and-hiring-nyt,251766?
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” Danielle Coffey, president & CEO of the News/Media Alliance (NMA), discussed recent developments in the media landscape, highlighted the implications of California’s public-private partnership with Google and the status of the Journalism Competition & Preservation Act (JCPA), and the recent Department of Justice (DOJ) ruling against Google for antitrust violations. Coffey emphasized the ongoing challenges and opportunities for news publishers in securing fair compensation for their content from Big Tech platforms. She reiterated the importance of unity within the industry to navigate these changes effectively and advocated for continued legislative and legal efforts to protect and support quality journalism.
Access more at this episode's landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/from-california-to-congress-danielle-coffey-of-the-nma-breaks-down-the-california-google-deal-the,251625
In an era where the lines between truth and disinformation are increasingly blurred, the Media and Democracy Project (MAD) has emerged as a non-partisan, all-volunteer organization that claims to be dedicated to ensuring the integrity of public information. Founded by individuals who believe that a healthy democracy relies on accurate and reliable journalism, MAD is actively working to hold media outlets accountable, combat disinformation, and support local journalism. In this episode we chat with Milo Vassallo, the executive director, and Brian Hansbury, one of the original founders as they share insights into their mission and current initiatives.
More at episode landing page on E&P site:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/mads-fight-against-fox-founders-discuss-their-fcc-push-and-this-weeks-open-letter-to-the,251463
The 2022 massacre at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas left an indelible mark on the community, claiming the lives of 19 children and two teachers. The event not only shocked the nation but also profoundly impacted its local newspaper, the Uvalde Leader-News. Craig Garnett, owner and publisher of the Leader-News, shares his experiences during this harrowing time, discusses the challenges and transformations that followed and speaks about the experience of having his team featured in the new ABC News documentary: Print in Black.
Access more at the episode's E&P Landing page at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/navigating-tragedy-and-transformation-the-uvalde-leader-news-craig-garnett,251352
In the ever-evolving media landscape, understanding how news is consumed across different social platforms is crucial for adapting to changing audience behaviors. In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we interview Katerina Eva Matsa, director of news and information research at Pew Research Center, and Jim Brady, vice president of journalism at Knight Foundation, to delve into the Pew study: “How Americans Get News on TikTok, X, Facebook and Instagram.” The insights gleaned from our conversation provide a roadmap for news publishers navigating this dynamic environment.
Read more at this episode's E&P Magazine landing page at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/from-platforms-to-practice-key-findings-from-pews-social-media-study,251134
In this episode, E&P spoke with two prominent figures in the newspaper industry: Matt Paxton, publisher of The News-Gazette in Lexington, Virginia, and past president of the National Newspaper Association (NNA), and Brad Hill, CEO of Interlink and an NNA representative on the USPS Mailer’s Technical Advisory Committee. They explore the ongoing relevance of print media, the intricacies of postal delivery and the NNA’s advocacy efforts.
Visit the episode page at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/navigating-the-challenges-of-usps-print-delivery,251018
In this exclusive interview with E&P Magazine, Mike Beaudet, an investigative reporter for WCVB-TV in Boston and a journalism professor at Northeastern University, shares his vision for adapting local news to resonate with Gen Z through his pioneering Reinventing Local News Project. Funded by the Stanton Foundation, the project aims to repackage traditional broadcast content to meet the digital consumption habits of younger audiences. Beaudet emphasizes leveraging digital platforms like TikTok and OTT to deliver short-form videos, experimenting with longer, context-rich stories, and focusing on authentic, relatable storytelling. By employing innovative strategies and maintaining flexibility in talent acquisition, Beaudet’s project offers a roadmap for news organizations to engage Gen Z and sustain quality journalism in the digital age.
Access more on the ineterview's E&P Magazine landing page, at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/engaging-the-next-generation-mike-beaudets-vision-for-gen-z-news-consumption,250878
In a recent interview with Howard Homonoff, Senior National Advisor for Media & Entertainment Industry at Grant Thornton LLP and a weekly columnist for Forbes Magazine, E&P delved into the current state of local journalism. The conversation was sparked by Homonoff’s recent Forbes article titled “Presidential Debate In Focus But Local Journalism Battles For Its Life,” which highlights the severe challenges faced by local journalism, including a long-term decline in newsroom employment and the emergence of “news desert” communities.
Learn more at: http://www.EditorandPublisher.com/Vodcasts
In this exclusive interview with E&P, prominent American journalist, Guardian columnist and media critic Margaret Sullivan discussed the current leadership turmoil at The Washington Post, highlighting Jeff Bezos’ decision to hire Will Lewis as the new publisher and the controversies surrounding his tenure. Sullivan also emphasized her efforts to reshape her Substack newsletter, “American Crisis,” to address the critical role of the media in informing the public and safeguarding democracy, particularly in the context of the upcoming 2024 election.
Reference more information and complete audio transcipt at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/margaret-sullivan-on-controversies-at-the-post-and-prioritizing-her-focus-on-medias-critical,250533
In this wide-ranging interview with Jeffrey Sleete, a seasoned media sales consultant with a rich radio and TV advertising sales background, we delved into his approach to media sales and the principles that have guided his successful career. Sleete, who now writes a column for E&P Magazine, shared his ideas on various aspects of how to successfully engage small businesses in today’s challenging local media ecosystem.
Access links, audio transcripts and more info on this episode's landing page at:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/unveiling-the-secrets-of-sales-mastery-insights-from-jeffrey-sleete,250412
During this exclusive E&P interview, Gordon Borrell, CEO of Borrell Associates, provided critical insights into the evolving landscape of local media. Highlighting a seismic shift in the industry, Borrell emphasized content as a key differentiator in what he terms the “final phase” for local media. To underscore this, he announced the relocation of Borrell Associates’ 2025 annual conference from Miami to the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at ASU.
Access more at http://www.EditorandPublisher.com/Vodcasts
In an era marked by rampant misinformation and polarized media landscapes, NewsGuard has emerged as both a champion of credible journalism and a lightning rod for controversy. Founded in 2018 by Steven Brill and Gordon Crovitz, the company aims to rate the reliability of news websites based on transparent, objective criteria. However, NewsGuard’s mission has been challenging, facing legal battles, accusations of political bias and public criticism from high-profile figures like Elon Musk. In this exclusive interview with E&P Magazine, Brill and Crovitz discuss these controversies, their steadfast commitment to promoting trustworthy news, and their insights on the future of credible journalism amid the ever-evolving media landscape.
Reference more at this episode's official E&P ;anding page,at: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/newsguard-under-fire-balancing-credibility-and-controversy-in-modern-journalism,250118
Dallas Morning News (DMN) publisher Grant Moise explains the decision to reintroduce the public editor position despite industry trends of cost-cutting, stating, "We looked at data points, we looked at our own internal reasons why subscribers were leaving us, and we just decided we couldn't afford not to make a bold move like this. So, we said, some papers will say, 'They can't afford it.’ We said, ‘We can't afford not to do this.'"
Stephen Buckley, who recently began the role of public editor at DMN, explained: "I'm a bridge between our audience and the newsroom. So, as I get feedback from readers about our work, I will pass that on and investigate and inquire. I'll be asking questions about their coverage of stories and issues." Buckley added, "Independence is a really important part of this job, and, almost by definition, that means that it's going to be lonely sometimes, and that's okay.”
Buckley’s impressive journalistic background includes over 11 years at the Washington Post as a local reporter and as Africa and Brazil bureau chief. He also spent over seven years at the St. Petersburg (FL) Times (now Tampa Bay Times) in senior management positions that included managing editor, moving eventually into the Time's parent company's Poynter Institute as dean of faculty. In 2021, he accepted a position at Duke University as the Eugene C. Patterson professor of practice and public policy studies, which he will maintain as he works for DMN.
During the interview, Moise expresses optimism about the journey ahead, anticipating both successes and challenges. He emphasizes the importance of continuous learning and improvement to enhance the organization's journalistic standards.
Moise further explained that reintroducing the public editor position at the Dallas Morning News reflects a strategic effort to rebuild trust and credibility in journalism. He reflected that: “32% of people in Gallup polls trusting the media these days, which means two thirds don't really have any trust.” Moise and Buckley both expressed a shared hope that this move would enhance the newspaper's reputation and strengthen its relationship with the community.
In September of 2021, CherryRoad Media, a Parsippany, New Jersey-based technology company, surprised the news media industry with its purchase of 20 newspapers from the Gannett. Since then, the company has continued to grow and expand its US holdings, now owning 85 newspapers across 18 states.\
Beyond purchasing existing titles, CherryRoad has also built new operations in some “news desert” communities who lost their local papers. Two of the most recent print/ digital “rebirths” were the mid-May 2024 launches of the Hutchinson (MN) Station and The Litchfield (MN) Rail, replacing the Hutchinson Leader and the Litchfield Independent Review, both stared in the 1880’s and announcing their closure in April of 2024.“It's a good time for anybody who wants to get into this business, because there's a lot of sellers and not a lot of buyers, stated Jeremy Gulban, CEO of CherryRoad.
When asked about how he can maintain business profitability in his smallest market operation in Hamburg, Iowa (population 700), Gulban states he can apply a regional approach to serving the community through economies of scale. “We do reasonably well there because we're able to leverage our staff in Nebraska City, which is across the Missouri River, about 15 minutes away to provide coverage, and the support there to sell into the market,” stated Gulban. “If we didn't have that, it would be impossible. The math just wouldn't work.”
When asked about what’s it like managing so many small market newspapers, Lee Bachlet, CherryRoad COO stated: “I believe deeply that what we do is important, particularly in these small communities. I say all the time, if we are covering their volleyball matches, their city councils, their chicken dinner fundraisers, that means something.” Bachlet went on to add: “This is the best move I've made in many, many years, because what we're doing, I believe, matters and makes a difference.”
In their quest for sustainability, CherryRoad is exploring innovative revenue models. While advertising remains a cornerstone, they're also embracing audience revenue through a carefully crafted subscription strategy. With a newly rolled-out (homegrown) paywall system, CherryRoad aims to strike a balance between free access and premium content, tailored to each market's needs.
Furthermore, CherryRoad isn't just preserving existing newspapers; they're pioneering new products and services to support local communities. By acquiring a glossy press operation in Minnesota, they're expanding their offerings beyond traditional print. From niche publications to digital initiatives, CherryRoad is committed to meeting the evolving needs of readers and advertisers alike.
Despite the challenges, Jeremy Gulban remains optimistic about CherryRoad's future. “We're getting very close to turning the corner. I think in this month of May, we are going to have our first profitable month,” stated Gulban. “This has been a long slog. I think I was naive about how hard this would be to turn all this around. I do feel like we're in the place we want to be finally coming into the summer here.”
In this exclusive interview, E&P checks in with CherryRoad Media’s CEO Jeremy Gulban and COO Lee Bachlet to learn how this less than 3-years-old US media empire is faring with their 85 newspapers across 18 states. Topics covered include their recent acquisitions, revenue strategies and how they find profitability serving some markets with populations less than 1,000. We also explore their recent new title launches in several “news desert” communities.
Detroit Public Television, now rebranded as Detroit PBS, is making a notable return to the heart of the city, signifying a renewed dedication to serving its community with quality, trust, and fairness in media. In this exclusive interview with Rich Homberg, President & CEO of Detroit PBS, he reflects on his journey into public media and the organization's strategic shift towards strengthening local content. Homberg, whose background lies in commercial radio sales and news operations, shares insights into the evolving landscape of public media and the imperative for strong local journalism.
During his 20-minute interview with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder, Homberg emphasized, “We are producing more content than we've ever produced in our history. However, simultaneously, we use, engage, and pivot off of national content as much as any station in the system.” Homberg went on to state, “Our core values are posted on the wall: Diversity, Engagement, Trust, Innovation. This is the mindset inside our building that we install on a regular basis.” Homberg offered to share a recent PowerPoint slide deck with E&P that offers an overview of the operation’s business model.
With Detroit PBS's commitment to producing more content than ever before, Homberg discusses the organization's expansion efforts and its role as a hub for media production and community engagement. The forthcoming Detroit PBS campus, situated in the Milwaukee Junction neighborhood, aims to foster collaboration and innovation while serving as a beacon for local journalism. “We're building a building that has capacity for 147, with an eye towards bringing partners. It'll have 120 parking spots, and it will be an engagement center. It'll be a place to come to. That's not aspirational. It's what we do.”
Reflecting on the challenges and opportunities in public media, Homberg champions the power of partnerships and collaboration. He cites examples of successful public television stations across the country, highlighting their innovative approaches to community engagement and content delivery. As Detroit PBS prepares for its next chapter in the heart of the city, Homberg remains optimistic about the organization's potential to make a significant impact, emphasizing the importance of embracing opportunities and working together towards a shared vision of excellence in media.
Daniel Richardson, a Marine Corp veteran, UT Martin business management graduate and former CEO of Magic Valley Publishing, is making waves in the world of local community media. With a vision to bolster local journalism, Richardson has reopened several recently closed Tennessee newspapers once owned by Holler Media, adding to his growing media empire under the new Richardson Media Group banner.
Richardson’s company now encompasses nine Tennessee titles, including The Fentress Courier, Livingston Enterprise, Citizen Statesman, the Jackson County Sentinel and Shelbyville Times-Gazette, formerly owned by Holler Media.
Richardson's journey into media ownership is deeply rooted in family tradition. His late father, Dennis Richardson, another UT Martin alumnus, initiated the family's involvement in journalism by acquiring the Carroll County News in 1983, marking the genesis of Magic Valley Publishing.
The inception of Richardson Media Group emerged when Apex Bank sought assistance from him to revive several shuttered newspapers in Middle Tennessee, that were owned and shut down by Holler Media.
During this exclusive interview with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder, Richardson revealed, "The bank reached out to me to reopen some publications that they had financed and had subsequently been closed. Apex didn't want to see the communities without newspapers. They didn't want to see the newspapers shut down. However, at the end of the day, they're also responsible to their shareholders. They wanted to recover as much of the capital as they could, which required an ongoing business that was marketable and sellable.”
When asked about how those communities he is now serving initially reacted to the loss and then saving of their local newspapers, Richardson stated: “A newspaper is something that I think most communities take for granted. You don't think much about it until it's gone.” Richardson added: “These towns had a terrible experience with a previous publisher. So, how did they know that I would be any different? It wasn’t real to them until there was a pretty newspaper in their mailbox and on the newsstands. That is a big testament to the power of printed media. The website stayed up. But it's just not the same.”
The Local Media Association (LMA) and the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association (PNA) have united to establish the Pennsylvania Fundraising Lab. This groundbreaking venture is designed to empower Pennsylvania news organizations with the expertise and understanding needed to secure philanthropic funding for their reporting projects
, thereby enhancing their financial sustainability and enabling them to continue delivering high-quality journalism.
In a recent episode of 'E&P Reports,' Frank Mungeam, LMA chief innovation officer, and Bill Cotter, PNA president, shared the success story of the LMA’s Lab for Journalism Funding. With over $23 million raised for journalism funding through the national lab, the decision to expand to a state-level initiative in Pennsylvania was a logical progression. The Pennsylvania Fundraising Lab will operate within a six-month ‘cohort learning format,' offering participating newsrooms the opportunity to learn from philanthropic fundraising experts, share best practices, and receive guidance from experienced mentors.
Bill Cotter emphasized the importance of strong leadership and community-focused projects in driving the success of the Fundraising Lab. "Newsroom leaders play a critical role in championing fundraising efforts and ensuring that selected projects address local community needs," stated Cotter. “This lab encourages proactive, solutions-oriented journalism that makes a tangible impact on communities, fostering support and engagement from local audiences.'"
The Pennsylvania cohort will be led by Liz White, a former newspaper owner/publisher and an LMA Advanced Fundraising Lab graduate. LMA staff and a team of coaches will also provide one-on-one support to the participating newsrooms.
In a recent statement, the PNA explained that preference for participation will be given to media organizations that:
- Have solid local leadership and deep ties to the community.
- Are focused on high-quality local journalism.
- Have leadership-level buy-in to participate in this lab and make the time/resource commitment.
- Value staff and leadership diversity.
The statement went on to say that each publisher in the cohort will set a fundraising goal, in consultation with the coaches, that aligns with that publisher's market size. Participating publishers will also attend the LMA Fest in September and meet with funders and other fundraising lab participants. Case studies and an industry playbook will be published, sharing best practices and lessons learned.
During the E&P interview, Cotter shared the Lenfest Institute’s involvement in the project, stating: “They will play a crucial role by providing programmatic support, guest speakers and case studies to enrich the learning experience for participants,” Cotter went on to highlight the Institute's expertise in assisting news enterprises with fundraising through the Lenfest News Philanthropy Network and its focus on digital transformation for historically print news organizations through the Lenfest Beyond Print program.
Cotter said, “This collaboration underscores the commitment of all stakeholders involved to equip Pennsylvania news organizations with the resources and knowledge necessary to navigate the evolving media landscape effectively.”
To offer additional support, the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association will also award participating Lab newsrooms three $20,000 grants at their 100th Anniversary Gala.
In a groundbreaking move, New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed a 2025 state budget that includes $90 million in tax credits for local news media outlets, marking a significant victory for the press and local journalism.
The Empire State Local News Coalition, which helped champion this legislation, initially formed with 100 news publishers in February 2024 to work together and advocate for what was originally introduced as the New York State Local Journalism Sustainability Act. In just a few months, the coalition expanded to over 200 news outlets.
Rebuild Local News, a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization that advances public policies to help local news and community journalism, posted a press release supporting the legislation, stating that this is “the largest sum that any state has devoted to help struggling community news organizations.”
The new legislation offers $30 million in guaranteed tax credits for three years, with $13 million each year allocated for news organizations with fewer than 100 employees, $13 million for larger ones and $4 million to support new hires.
Caveats within the legislation include:
- No single newsroom can get more than $320,000 each year.
- The subsidy to newsrooms will be based on the number of employees.
- The refundable tax credit offered will be 50% of the salary of any employee up to a $50,000 wage.
- Publicly traded corporations are excluded.
Zack Richner, a New York news publishing executive and the founder of the Empire State Local News Coalition, stated during this episode of E&P Reports, "The success of our coalition demonstrates the power of collaboration and advocacy in shaping policies that support local journalism and empower communities."
Steven Waldman, CEO and founder of Rebuild Local News, who worked with the Empire State Local News Coalition to get this legislation passed, emphasized the importance of designing policies with safeguards to prevent potential infringements on journalistic independence. He stated, "We must ensure that any government involvement in funding journalism is accompanied by robust safeguards to preserve press freedom and integrity."
Both Richner and Waldman stressed their hope that this legislation's impact will extend far beyond the borders of New York State. With initiatives underway in California and Illinois, the momentum generated by the Empire State's success aims to spark a nationwide movement.
In a dramatic turn of events, the Kansas Reflector, a news affiliate of the non-profit States Newsroom, found itself at the center of a contentious battle with Facebook. Sherman Smith, the Editor-in-Chief of the Kansas Reflector, revealed the unfolding saga during an exclusive interview with Mike Blinder, Publisher of E&P Magazine.
The saga began when Facebook rejected an editorial titled "When Facebook Fails, Local Media Matters Even More For Our Planet's Future," authored by Dave Kendall and published on the Kansas Reflector's website. The piece highlighted Facebook's rejection of Kendall's documentary on climate change as too divisive, emphasizing the importance of local media in disseminating crucial information.
Shortly after attempting to share the editorial on Facebook, the Kansas Reflector faced a startling development. Facebook not only rejected the post but proceeded to remove all past posts linking to the Reflector's website. The platform deemed the Kansas Reflector a cybersecurity threat and contacted every individual who had interacted with the Kansas Reflector's page over the past four years, sending notifications labeling the site as “questionable,” prompting widespread confusion and concern among followers.
Smith recounted a conversation with Facebook spokesperson Andy Stone, who acknowledged the platform's error in blocking the Kansas Reflector's posts. However, Stone's apology, delivered via Twitter instead of Facebook's own channels, raised eyebrows and underscored the lack of direct communication from the social media giant. Smith pressed Stone for further clarification on Facebook's actions and the potential implications for media outlets. Stone's response left Smith with lingering concerns about Facebook's accountability and transparency, particularly regarding its content moderation policies and the impact on journalistic integrity. The exchange highlighted the need for greater scrutiny of Facebook's role in shaping public discourse and its responsibility to uphold press freedom.
Smith emphasized to Stone the widespread impact of Facebook's actions, reminding him that individuals who had interacted with the Kansas Reflector's page were told that Facebook deems their site as questionable. Smith highlighted the detrimental effect this had on the publication's reputation and audience trust. Despite raising these concerns, Stone expressed his inability to rectify the situation beyond his initial apology on X, leaving Smith and the Kansas Reflector team frustrated with the lack of concrete action or recourse. This exchange underscored the broader implications of Facebook's content moderation decisions and the challenges faced by media organizations in navigating such platforms while maintaining journalistic integrity.
As the situation continues to unfold, Smith remains committed to keeping the public informed and holding Facebook accountable. He underscores the importance of transparency and urges Facebook to provide a credible explanation for its actions. The Kansas Reflector's battle with Facebook underscores the challenges facing media organizations in the digital age and raises critical questions about the power wielded by tech giants over the dissemination of news and information. As the story continues to evolve, it serves as a sobering reminder of the ongoing struggle to preserve press freedom and protect the public's right to access information.
For more than three decades, The Chronicle of Philanthropy has stood as the foremost beacon of insight and information for professionals and organizations within the philanthropic and nonprofit sectors. Through its printed and online platforms, The Chronicle offers comprehensive coverage of trends, challenges, and best practices in the philanthropic world, serving as an invaluable resource for those dedicated to charitable giving and social impact.
On April 2, 2024, The Chronicle embarks on a new chapter, launching an innovative line of coverage aimed at dissecting America's widening divides and the burgeoning movements seeking to mend the fractures threatening national progress and stability. As the 2024 election landscape unfolds, The Chronicle will take a deep dive into the country's polarization along political, socio-economic, racial, geographical, and cultural lines.
This groundbreaking content will find its home on 'The Commons,' a dedicated online platform set to launch on April 2, 2024. Aptly named to embody The Chronicle's mission of fostering collaboration and insight-sharing, 'The Commons' will serve as a digital hub where thought leaders convene to exchange ideas, perspectives, and solutions. Readers can expect a rich tapestry of opinion pieces, essays, interviews, roundtable discussions, video journalism, and virtual events, all aimed at illuminating and addressing the complex fabric of America's societal divides."
Join us for this episode of 'E&P Reports' as we delve into The Chronicle of Philanthropy's groundbreaking initiative led by senior editor Drew Lindsay. Discover how their innovative online platform, 'The Commons,' is poised to tackle America's deep divides head-on. From political polarization to socio-economic disparities, explore how The Chronicle is fostering dialogue and understanding in an era of increasing division and uncertainty.
While attending the Executive Program in News Innovation and Leadership at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York, Laura Krantz McNeill decided to interview 26 separate media leaders she considered to be “change-makers and innovators” and asked them what they think the essential skills that the next generation of news leadership will need to move us closer to a healthier and more sustainable future for the news media industry.1
The result of that work is a self-published paper entitled "New Skills for a New Era: Five Crucial Skills for the Next Generation of Media Leaders in the Era of Community-centric Journalism," which was later posted by Nieman Labs.
McNeill, who began her journalism career at the Vermont Digger, also spent seven years as a reporter at The Boston Globe and is now the senior editor of subscriber products at The Chronicle of Higher Education. She lists within the study the essential skills as:
We need leaders who think like product managers.And understand that a publication’s value is defined by the communities it serves
We need leaders who can strategize.And who are in conversation with the community.
We need leaders who are excited about being entrepreneurs.And see opportunity in chaos.
We need business leaders who also evangelize our mission.And whose devotion to our cause brings others along.
We need leaders who consider themselves stewards.And who position our organizations, but more importantly, our people, for success.
In this episode of “E&P Reports” we chat with Laura Krantz McNeill who interviewed several news media executives, resulting in a published a study for the Executive Program in News Innovation and Leadership at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY.
The Association of Community Publishers (ACP) is a dynamic organization dedicated to supporting and empowering free, community-based media outlets across the United States.
Founded to promote excellence in local journalism and foster collaboration among community publishers, the ACP represents a diverse array of publications, including newspapers, shoppers, magazines, directories and digital news platforms — all with no paid access to the print or online content they provide.
This year's annual conference will be held May 1-3 in Norfolk, Virginia and will offer programs mainly centered on building revenue. It also will feature a new “THRIVE” certificate program hosted by Author and "Sales Futurist" Meridith Elliott Powell. Her scheduled keynote presentation is designed to help attendees "do the impossible and take action to lead through uncertainty."
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we speak with Manuel Karem, the general manager of Featured Media in Avon, New York and current president of The Association of Community Publishers (ACP). We explore the ACP's mission, why this media organization differs from others and how local news publishers can benefit from membership. We also get a sneak peek at their upcoming May conference in Norfolk, VA.
Ellen Clegg and Dan Kennedy have become recognized and respected news media analysts with their highly listened to podcast series: “What Works. The future of local news.” However recently, Clegg a three-decade Boston Globe veteran who helped get a few Pulitzer Prizes for the paper and Kennedy a Northeastern University journalism professor who writes the Media Nation blog, have released a critically acclaimed book entitled: “What Works in Community News: Media Startups, News Deserts, and the Future of the Fourth Estate,” that explores how a number of news media operations seem to be on their way to finding sustainable local journalism business models.
Some of the local media companies they examine, include the Sahan Journal, a digital publication reporting on Minnesota’s immigrant communities, the Storm Lake Times Pilot, a legacy print newspaper in Iowa, published by Pulitzer Prize winner Art Cullen, who developed a hybrid for-profit/nonprofit model, the New Haven Independent , a multilingual, digital news project that expanded its audience through radio and others.
In this episode of “E&P Reports” we spend 20-minutes with Ellen Clegg and Dan Kennedy the authors of the new book: “What Works in Community News,” to learn how they selected the featured nine media operations and why they believed these are worth exploring to find models for sustainable local journalism. Clegg a seasoned editor and local news media entrepreneur along with Kennedy a respected professor of Journalism also offer advice gleaned from the book to news publishing executives on how to navigate the challenging and ever-changing local news media ecosystem.
In September 2023, E&P reported on the Arizona Newspapers Association and the Arizona Broadcasters Association merger.
In the past year, there have been several legacy newspaper and public media mergers, such as Chicago Public Media's acquisition of the Chicago Sun-Times, The Steinman's "gifting" of their 150+-year-old Lancaster, PA newspaper to the local public broadcasting outlet and the Denton (TX) Record-Chronicle becoming part of Dallas-Fort Worth's KERA Public Broadcasting operations.
Many news media pundits predict that, in the very near future, we will see more broadcasting and newspaper newsrooms working as one to compete for larger audiences and achieve new economies of scale to achieve sustainable business models.
For this reason, E&P sought insights from the Radio Television Digital News Association's CEO & President Dan Shelley on how the RTDNA is helping journalism survive in today's complex local news media ecosystem. Topics discussed in this episode of "E&P Reports" include the fight for cameras (and microphones) in courtrooms. Should the news media industry police itself in defining who is a journalist? We also explore the growth of citizen journalism, its impact on local news media outlets and more.
Dan Shelley is president and CEO of the Radio Television Digital News Association (RTDNA) and president of the RTDNA Foundation. Previously, Dan was senior vice president of digital content strategy for iHeartMedia, senior vice president at Interactive One (part of Radio One), director of digital media at WCBS-TV, New York and an executive producer for WCBS-TV News.
Recently, Public Media Consultant Tom Davidson wrote an op-ed published in “Current,” the industry’s quarterly trade magazine, “decrying the lack of awareness in public media about Press Forward, the $500 million foundation effort to reinvigorate local news.”
Since then, National Public Radio (NPR) published its own white paper to support public media, and the Public Media Content Collective (formally the Public Radio Program Directors Association) added a panel to their fall conference that addresses the same issues.
However, Davidson still sees a major disconnect within public media on how the industry itself sees its place within the local news media ecosystem, which can impact accessing the ever-increasing national philanthropic support of local journalism.
Davidson believes: “It starts with understanding that serving a tiny portion of your market (and the wealthiest, whitest portion of your market) isn’t going to work” when it comes to proving the value you provide within a society being impacted by “news deserts” and “ghost papers.”
However, Davidson sees hope for a change within the public media world, as some broadcast outlets are acquiring local newspapers and others are expanding their news operations to serve a broader, more cumulative audience within their local markets.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with well-known digital media consultant, Knight fellow, professor of journalism, Gannett’s past director of new product development and past senior director of public broadcasting, Tom Davidson, who “pulls no punches” during this frank discussion on the challenges that public media faces today and how it can continue to be a viable, self-sustaining part of local journalism.
On February 4th, 2024, the president of Rebuild Local News and co-founder of Report for America, Steven Waldman, penned an op-ed for E&P Magazine entitled “In defense of (some) old media. Writing off legacy media will lead to bad public policy.” In the very first sentence of the piece, Waldman took aim at the January 24th, 2024 article, “Is it time to give up on old news?” which was penned and published by Jeff Jarvis, author and former professor and director of the Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY. In the article, Jeff Jarvis stated, “Giving more money to old media is throwing good after bad.”
Jarvis stated, “The old news industry has failed at adapting to the internet and every one of their would-be saviors — from tablets to paywalls to programmatic ads to consolidation to billionnaires — has failed them. Hedge funds have bought up chains and papers, selling everything not bolted down, cutting every possible cost and taking every penny of cash flow home with them. The one thing the old companies are still investing in is lobbying.”
Within Waldman’s editorial, he countered by stating that he disagrees that it’s time to dispense with “legacy” or “old” media by writing, “First, even generalizing about 'old media' is absurd. That category includes about 7,000 local news entities of different shapes, sizes and ownership structures, including most Black and Hispanic newspapers.” Waldman also said, “So the real problem must be the big city dailies. Except in his piece, Jarvis (who is an old friend) noted that The Boston Globe, Minneapolis Star Tribuneand Advance publications (Newhouse family) in Alabama ‘seem to be surviving or better.’ So ‘old media’ is pathetic ... except for the ones that aren’t. And we should only invest in nonprofit media ... except for the for-profits we like.”
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we bring together two well-known media experts, Steven Waldman and Jeff Jarvis, in one interview. These two gentlemen have publicly disagreed on major issues and have been getting the lion's share of exposure in representing the news media industry to the national press. They are becoming high-profile advocacy spokespeople on opposite sides of several current, significant legislative matters debated at state and federal levels.
Topics discussed include:
· The reasons behind recent major media company layoffs (such as the LA Times, Newsweek and Sports Illustrated) and shutdowns (like the 10-month start-up to shuttering of the Messenger).
· The impact of corporate and hedge fund newspaper ownership on local communities and what can or should be done to give others a chance to own these local titles.
· Public media’s entrance into local newspaper ownership and how this may become the norm in the coming months.
· Addressing the “hard questions” about current legislation and whether the government should or should not become involved in helping save legacy media.
· And more.
As reported by E&P in May of 2023 (“Ghost papers: Journalists find themselves alone or with just a few left in the newsroom”), UNC’s Hussman School of Journalism and Media’s Knight Chair in Journalism and Digital Media Economics, Penelope Muse Abernathy stated, “Although the exact number is hard to pin down, we estimate, based on news accounts and industry data, at least 1,000 of the 7,200 newspapers still published in this country — and perhaps as many as 1,500 — have lost significantly more than half of their newsroom staff since 2004. As a result, they have become ‘ghost newspapers’ with drastically curtailed reach and journalistic missions.”
The article mentioned Abdulla Gaafarelkhalifa, who became the last remaining journalist at the St. Cloud (MN) Times, a Gannett-owned news brand that has served this city of nearly 70,000 since 1924. Gaafarelkhalifa told E&P that he found the responsibility and demands of his job as the last employee to be so overwhelming that it took a toll on his physical and mental health. So he publicly announced that he’d be taking some time off from the job — not to shame his employer, but to be transparent with the public about his leave.
E&P has also reported on other communities that have suffered from downsized Gannett newsrooms, like Hutchinson, KS, a city of over 40,000 that had the family-owned, Pulitzer Prize-winning Hutchinson Newsfor years. Gannett bought the newspaper from the Harris family in 2016 and laid off most of the news staff, creating such a void that a local high-school junior, Michael Glenn, became frustrated with their coverage. In 2023, Glenn recruited a team of journalists and started the competing Hutchinson Tribune, where some days he out-reports the Gannett property ten to one on local stories.
However, things at Gannett seemed to be changing recently, with more and more announcements of local reporters, managers and sales reps hired at the United States’ largest media company.
On this episode of “E&P Reports,” we get the inside story on Gannett Media’s major hiring frenzy from their chief content officer, Kristin Roberts, and chief revenue officer, Jason Taylor. We learn about what is being called their “turnaround plan,” which has created hundreds of new local news media industry jobs in dozens of their markets across the U.S. Both Taylor and Roberts directly address the negative reporting that has been pointed at this media empire and how they are both bullish on the company’s plans to continue serving their readers and advertisers.
Darren Samuelson, a seasoned journalist known for his insightful political reporting, first made his mark at Politico, a Washington-based digital newspaper company founded by American banker and media executive Robert Allbritton. During his nearly 10 years there, Samuelson demonstrated a keen ability to dissect complex political issues and provide readers with comprehensive analysis.
After establishing himself as a respected figure in journalism, Samuelson embarked on a new chapter in his career after being recruited in April of 2023 by The Messenger, a 50 million dollar digital news startup founded by part-owner of The Hollywood Reporter and The Hill, Jimmy Finkelstein.
For 10 months, Samuelson focused on his work as part of a team of over 200 journalists with a mission to become a national, politically-centered news brand that would cover politics, business, entertainment and sports.
Finkelstein stated in his first interview that he was creating an alternative to a national news media that he says has come under the sway of partisan influences. The site would be free and supported by advertising revenue, which he projected would be over 100 million dollars at the end of the first year.
But alas, that did not happen as news reporting began to reveal The Messenger facing major financial headwinds just 10 months after startup. Axios posted a story on January 4th, 2024, that The Messenger was seeking an additional 20 million dollars to remain in business.
A few weeks later, on January 31st, the news media industry learned that The Messenger was shutting down when Finkelstein emailed its 300-plus employees, stating, “We exhausted every option available.” He went on to state that he was “personally devastated.”
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we go inside the newsroom of the now-defunct digital news startup, The Messenger, by going one-on-one with their former senior editor, Darren Samuelson. We learn first-hand about The Messenger's initial 50 million dollar mission to become the unbiased, new national news source and how the hundreds of journalists reacted to their recent firings just 10 months after startup.
On Tuesday January 23, 2024, one of the 100-plus reporters who was laid off via Webinar from the Los Angeles Times, stated it was “like a drive-by,” as it was clear that very few at this iconic 142-year-old newspaper had any idea, that in a matter of minutes, they were told that more than 20% of their staff was to be let go.
And when events like this take place within a unionized newsroom, the workforce looks towards their guild leadership for help and support. Those tasks fell quickly on the shoulders of Matt Pearce, an 11-year veteran reporter at the Times and for past 4-years President of the Media Guild of the West, a chapter of the NewsGuild-CWA, representing over one-thousand journalists at the Los Angeles Times along with the Dallas Morning News, Arizona Republic, Southern California News Group, Austin American-Statesman, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Phoenix New Times and Desert Sun and other properties.
It was only five years ago when the news team cheered when they were introduced to Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, the American transplant surgeon, billionaire, businessman and bio scientist who returned the paper to local ownership after 18 years, when he purchased for $500-million dollars, the Times, along with the San Diego Union-Tribune, from Chicago-based tronc. 2018 reporting directly after the deal was announced, stated that Shiong had “grand plans to restore the Times to greatness, stating: ‘The legacy of this paper is important to save, so what price is that worth?”
Shiong announced the hiring of well-respected executive editor, former Wall Street Journal and Time Inc. Exec Norman Pearlstine along 80 new staffers, that including New York Times columnist Sewell Chan and former Slate editor in chief Julia Turner. It was later reported in The Wall Street Journal hat Shiong by investing strongly in news assets would easily achieve profitably by massively growing their digital subscriber base. In 2019 Shiong proclaimed: “I have made a decision to invest what it will take to make sure that the Los Angeles Times remains a viable business for at least another 100 years. When we get to five million ultimately, that will make that possible.”
In July of 2023, the digital subscriber base was reported at slightly over 500-thousand, when the Times announced the launching of De Los, a new brand focused on identity and culture targeted to English-speaking Gen Z and millennial Latinos in the U.S. However, on January 23, 2023, it looks like this new venture will cease, since the union’s negotiated “first in, first out” departure strategy reportedly resulted in that a large portion of those layoffs, included newly hired diverse staffers.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we finally get an inside look at the newsroom of the LA Times, just a week after the surprising firing of over 20% of their unionized workforce from News Media West Guild president, Matt Pearce. We learn about how the firing process took place via Webinar, how the Union reacted to the unexpected downsizing, and what they are doing now in retaliation.
As publisher of the Chattanooga Times in 1877, Adolph Ochs (who would later purchase the New York Times) added a slogan to the paper's masthead: "To give the news impartially, without fear or favor." This quote remains on top of current issues of the Chattanooga Times Free Press today, now owned by WEHCO Media.
WEHCO, a fourth-generation, family-owned, 115-year-old newspaper company, is under the leadership of the founder's grandson, Walter E. Hussman, Jr., who proudly prints that exact phrase on the top page 2's Statement of Core Values, within their flagship paper, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. At the bottom of the space, Hussman displays a quote from his father, the late Walter Hussman, Sr.: “A newspaper has five constituencies, including first its readers, then advertisers, then employees, then creditors, then shareholders. As long as the newspaper keeps those constituencies in that order, especially its readers first, all constituencies will be well served.”
Hussman explained that he began displaying those values in each edition in 2017 because of his increasing concern at the loss of public trust in news reporting. He cited a Gallup Poll with the Knight Foundation that surveyed 20,000 people in all 50 states, revealing this lack of trust was worse than ever and at record lows. Gallup now does the same yearly poll, which recently showed that confidence in newspapers was down to 16% — a new record low.
“Our family thinks a center to explain the virtues of impartiality, fairness and objectivity in news reporting is greatly needed,” states Hussman. “Hence, this is our reason to trademark the name 'Center for Integrity in New Reporting.' And we decided the first thing to do is reward the best examples of that in news reporting across all news media, print, broadcast, cable television, and digital.”
With this in mind, Hussman is announcing that the new Center is hosting the inaugural "$100,000 of Awards for News Reporting," which consists of four individual $25,000 awards (print, broadcast, cable & digital), for "The most fair, impartial, objective news reporting that has the courage to not fear and the discipline to not favor." The Newspaper Association Managers organization will judge entries.
The call for entries begins on Monday, January 29th, 2024. Entries can be submitted online at JournalismAwards.unc.edu (Note: This link will be live on 1/29/2024). Questions can be sent via email to JournalismAwards@unc.edu.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we chat with WHECO Media CEO Walter E. Hussman, Jr. about his fourth generational family commitment to supporting fairness in journalistic reporting and how those tenets have motivated their family foundation to offer $100,000 in cash prizes to recolonize the best in fair, impartial and objective news reporting.
The Word in Black website states a mission: "To be the most trusted news and information source for, about, and by Black people.”
Founded on June 7, 2021, just after the entire world witnessed the tragic death of George Floyd, 10 of the nation's most prestigious Black legacy newspaper publishers joined together to launch a collaborative online news presence to work together to serve their local readers and combine their resources and content into a single branded platform.
Word in Black was initially incubated inside the Local Media Foundation (LMF), a 501(c)(3) organization affiliated with the Local Media Association. As of January 1, 2024, as part of the original plan, the foundation has sold the assets to Word in Black's newly formed public benefit company. It will continue to provide support as a shareholder in the new entity.
Today, Word in Black boasts a newsroom with 10 full-time journalists and freelancers covering topics including health, education, finance, climate justice, religion and more — all outlined in their recently published Impact Report.
The 10 founding newspapers include:
· AFRO News
· The Atlanta Voice
· Dallas Weekly
· Houston Defender
· Michigan Chronicle
· New York Amsterdam News
· The Sacramento Observer
· The Seattle Medium
· The St. Louis American
· The Washington Informer
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we explore Word in Black. This three-year-old online news collaboration includes 10 of the most prestigious Black newspapers in America that announced its transition to public benefit company status. Appearing along with Nancy Lane, co-CEO of the Local Media Association, whose foundation helped incubate the project, are founding members: Dr. Frances “Toni” Draper, CEO and publisher of AFRO News, Elinor R. Tatum, publisher and editor-in-chief of the New York Amsterdam News and Patrick Washington, CEO/co-Publisher of the Dallas Weekly.
Chris Lytle, best-selling author of "The Accidental Salesperson" and "The Accidental Sales Manager," walked into an am radio station in 1972 with a political science degree, hoping to secure a news reporting job. The manager stated that the newsroom was full and offered Chris a sales job, which he accepted. That changed the course of his career forever.
Ten years later, after mastering the art of media sales, he started his own consulting business, Instant Sales Training. It has helped thousands of reps excel and hundreds of media companies grow their top-line revenues through decades of industry change and disruption.
Chris states on his website that he has a mission to "make successful people and companies even more successful." He advises you to "choose to become an expert. Become known for what you know and not just what you sell, and watch your sales, customer retention and referrals go through the roof."
After conducting more than 2200 seminars throughout the English-speaking world through the decades, Chris is still a sought-after speaker, trainer and consultant who continues to produce weekly sales training materials accessed by thousands online.
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with media sales training icon Chris Lytle, who advises on the traits, abilities and techniques that will continue to help produce winning salespeople and sales teams, within any media company. Chris also comments on how today's media consolidation has helped move the local sales process from a winning consultive approach to a reversal back to "commodity selling."
Rick Goldsmith’s website: New Day Films states that his mission as a filmmaker is to “tell stories that encourage social engagement and active participation in community life and the democratic process, and to stimulate young minds to question the world around them.”
And when one watches his latest work: “Stripped for Parts: American Journalism at the Crossroads,” a 90-minute documentary that tells the tale of how hedge fund Alden Global Capital’s entry into the news publishing industry has dismantled local newspapers “piece by piece,” creating a crises within the communities they serve, leaving “news deserts” and “ghost papers” in their wake.
A posted synopsis about the film by Goldsmith, states “Ours is a cautionary tale: What is lost when billionaires with no background nor interest in a civic mission, who are only concerned with profiteering, take over our most influential news organizations? What new models of news gathering, and dissemination show promise for our increasingly digital age? What can the public do to preserve and support vibrant journalism? Stripped for Parts addresses these questions and more. “Democracy dies in darkness” and the stakes could not be higher.”
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with twice Emmy nominated, documentarian Rick Goldsmith to learn why he spent more than 2-years creating his latest work: “Stripped for Parts “a film that tells the tale of how newspapers business model is faltering, not just because of the loss of advertising and digital disruption; but also to capitalist greed, as hedge funds and corporate America buy them, sell their assets and leave the communities they serve without their local “voice” and a final check on power.
In late November, the entire news publishing industry was surprised to hear that Canada's government reached a deal with Google for the company to contribute $100 million Canadian annually to the country's news industry to comply with Canada’s Online News Act (Bill c-18), requiring tech companies to pay publishers for their content.
Actual verbiage on the government's website pages that describe the bill read, "News outlets play a vital role in maintaining a healthy democracy. News and journalism serve to inform communities, drive civic engagement, and counter the rise of disinformation. Our news industry fosters an informed citizenry by providing them with critical information that helps them fully benefit and participate in a democratic society. The Online News Act aims to ensure that dominant platforms compensate news businesses when their content is made available on their services.”
In March 2021, Australia became the first country to use competition law to push Google and then Facebook to pay for news. With Canada’s new law in place, other countries like Brazil, Indonesia, South Africa and New Zealand are expected to "follow suit." And, of course, the U.S. Congress is currently considering passage of S.673, The Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (JCPA), a bill sponsored by Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN). In California, debates continue on AB-886, the California Journalism Preservation Act (CJPA). This bill would require big tech companies to pay publishers a "journalism usage fee" each time they use local news content and sell advertising alongside it. In turn, the bill requires news publishers to invest 70% of the profits from the usage fee in journalism jobs.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we chat with Paul Degan, the president and CEO of News Media Canada, and Danielle Coffey, the president and CEO of the News/Media Alliance, about "big tech" compensation to North American news publishers, now that Canada's Online News Act goes into law, requiring Google to pay 100 million Canadian dollars a year to the Canadian news media industry, and the current complexity of two similar bills being considered by the California legislature and the U.S. Congress.
Shannon Kinney is the founder and client success officer of Dream Local Digital, a digital marketing agency headquartered in Rockland, Maine. Dream Local Digital works with newspapers, media companies, ad agencies and directly with small to medium-sized businesses on all aspects of their online marketing plans.
Kinney is also a news media digital pioneer who has held start-up positions at some of the industry's most iconic legacy brands, such as the New York Times and the Chicago Tribune, over the past 25 years. She was also on the cusp of helping move traditional classified advertising into the worldwide web. Kinney worked in the late nineties at Cars.com and later as Senior Director of Classifieds of Knight Ridder. She has also helped develop new industry initiatives as a Local Media Association board member.
Today, hundreds of media companies turn to Kinney and her "honey badgers" team for advice, training and product development, helping thousands of businesses acquire essential multimedia solutions.
Recently, Kinney issued a list of "tips" from her "entrepreneurial journey" in a newsletter. She offers valuable advice to anyone who wishes to do business in a disruptive environment. She also points out how some of her frustrating experiences trying to get legacy media companies to adapt will offer hard lessons for anyone who resists change.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we chat with respected media executive Shannon Kinney about the entrepreneurial advice she offers that is derived from her 25+ year journey, starting as an integral part of legacy media's early adoption of the digital world to today's massively complex multimedia ecosystem.
Recent reports concerning the future of the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) have stated, with one September post from NiemanLab saying that both membership and revenues are so low that the organization is set to "end the year $391,000 in the red," according to an audit prepared by an external accountant and dated August 2023. The same article by Sarah Scire featured the sub-head, "If we don’t change our thinking, the next incoming president will be the last president.”
That new president was sworn in at the October 1, 2023, annual convention in Las Vegas. She is an Emmy Award-winning journalist, journalism professor and associate dean for the Center for Media Design at the Santa Monica College, Ashanti Blaize-Hopkins.
Hopkins also made history on that date as the first black woman ever to be elected to that post.
Hopkins feels confident that the financial issues reported are not insurmountable, stating during this interview with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder, "I can firmly and unequivocally say that I will not be the last president of the SPJ. All of the journalism organizations across the country are facing financial situations. We have the benefit of having a foundation that was created to be in support of the society. That foundation has $12 million in the bank." She continued, "We are on our way to 'righting the ship,' and I can firmly say that will happen before the end of my term."
Diversity within the SPJ and the journalism industry is another goal of Hopkin's. As quoted in the press release announcing her presidency, "I hesitated to join SPJ for several years because I just didn't see anyone who looked like me in leadership positions. It made me feel like I didn't belong in the organization. But I decided to be the change that I wanted to see in SPJ," she said. "Representation matters, and I hope to show through my leadership and diverse board of directors that there is a place for everyone at SPJ."
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with newly sworn-in Society of Professional Journalists President Ashanti Blaize-Hopkins to discuss how she plans to keep the organization prospering during a time of lagging membership and conference attendance, as well as her plans for SPJ's success. We also hear her views on the news media ecosystem as a whole and how we can define what is journalism in a world of disinformation and "fake news."
Martin (“Marty”) Baron may be best known in pop culture as a character played by actor Liv Schreiber in the 2015 Academy Award Winning film “Spotlight," which re-told the story of the Globe's 2003 Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporting on the Catholic Church sexual abuse scandals.
But many in our industry followed Baron closely years later when he moved from the Globe to The Washington Post, succeeding Marcus Brauchli in 2013 as executive editor. Shortly after the move, the Graham family announced they were selling the Post to Amazon Founder and CEO Jeff Bezos.
During the following years, under Baron's leadership, The Post received 10 Pulitzers — four for national reporting, two for explanatory reporting, and single wins for investigative reporting, criticism, feature photography and public service.
Some of the major stories the Post broke included coverage of the US Secret Service's security lapses, revealing Roy Moore’s sexual misconduct, plus constant, ongoing investigation of the Trump campaign and subsequent four-year administration, exposing many miss-truths and scandals. It is no wonder that Trump was quoted in 2018 as saying, "I will not allow our great country to be sold out by anti-Trump haters in the dying newspaper industry,” singling out The Post for writing “bad stories even on my very positive achievements.”
His new book, "Collision of Power: Trump, Bezos, and The Washington Post," opens with Baron telling the tale of his dinner at the White House. Donald Trump invited Baron, two other senior executives, and Bezos, intending to get The Post to tone down their coverage of his presidency and be "more fair to him." Baron describes Trump as "fundamentally a transactional individual, and if he granted us the favor of dinner, he would expect something in return."
But this book is not written as a personal memoir like Ben Bradlees’s “A Good Life.” "Collision of Power" focuses on his experiences managing The Post's newsroom during an extraordinary time. Washington was under Trump's influence, and the news publishing industry was changing from a legacy media world to one of social media, blogging and other digital disruptions.
In this episode, we go one-on-one with industry veteran Marty Baron, where we discuss his recently released book, "Collision of Power,” which offers an inside view of his time as executive editor of The Washington Post under Bezos' ownership and during Trump's presidency. We also hear his thoughts on managing a newsroom in today's challenging news media ecosystem.
In mid-November, the Medill School of Journalism, Media, and Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern University issued its annual "State of Local News Project" report, which now counts 6,000 newspapers in the United States, which comprises approximately 1,200 dailies and 4,790 weeklies.
This year, the study also reported on 550 digital-only local news outlets, 700 ethnic media organizations and 225 public broadcasting stations producing original local news.
The report's executive summary stated, "There was both good news and bad news for local journalism this past year. The good news raised the possibility that a range of proposals and programs could begin to arrest the steep loss of local news over the past two decades and, perhaps, revive journalism in some places that have lost their news. The headlines on the bad news resoundingly conveyed the message that urgent action is needed in many venues — from boardrooms to the halls of Congress — and by many, including civic-minded organizations and entrepreneurs."
Some of the report's key findings include:
- There are now 204 counties with no local news outlet. Of the 3,143 counties in the U.S., more than half, or 1,766, have either no local news source or only one remaining outlet, typically a weekly newspaper.
- The loss of local newspapers ticked higher in 2023 to an average of 2.5 per week, up from two per week last year. There were more than 130 confirmed newspaper closings or mergers this past year.
- Since 2005, the U.S. has lost nearly 2,900 newspapers. The nation is on pace to lose one-third of all its newspapers by the end of next year. About 6,000 newspapers remain — the vast majority of which are weeklies.
- The country has lost almost two-thirds of its newspaper journalists, or 43,000, during that same time. Most of those journalists were employed by large metro and regional newspapers.
- There are about 550 digital-only local news sites, many of which launched in the past decade, but they are primarily clustered in metro areas. In the past five years, the number of local digital startups has roughly equaled the number that shuttered.
- Based on the demographics and economics of current news desert counties, Medill’s modeling estimates that 228 counties are at an elevated risk of becoming news deserts in the next five years. Most of those “Watch List” counties are in high-poverty areas in the South and Midwest, and many serve communities with significant African-American, Hispanic, and Native American populations.
New this year was a "Bright Spots" map that showed the local news startups in the U.S., highlighting 17 outlets they labeled “with promising new business models for the future.”
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we un-pack Medill's 2023 "State of Local News" report with co-authors Senior Associate Dean Tim Franklin and Visiting Professor Penelope Muse ("Penny") Abernathy as we investigate their latest findings and methodology, as well as what this data means when it comes to the future of local journalism in the U.S.
On September 11, 2023, Jason Sethre, publisher of the Fillmore County (MN) Journal, posted an op-ed with the headline: "One Moment, Please… Hutchinson News in Kansas or Minnesota?" Within the piece, he reported that subscribers to the Hutchinson (KS) News were greeted one day with a front page showing a group of senior citizens having an outing on a lake in Hutchinson, Minnesota, with a headline of a story showing how the Hutchinson Senior Center keeps seniors busy with an array of activities… in Hutchinson, Minnesota.
With a sartorial slant, Sethre wrote, "Apparently, The Hutchinson News in Hutchinson, Kansas, covers stories about what's happening in Hutchinson, Minnesota — 628 miles away.” However, he explained to his readers how once-thriving newspapers, bought by large corporations (in this case, Gannett), have downsized operations so much that there is minimal local reporting, and mistakes such as this made by an out-of-town editor can happen. Sethre wrote, "For the community of Hutchinson, Kansas, it's an absolute disaster with what has happened to their local newspaper. Gannett bought the newspaper from the Harris family in 2016 and ran it into the ground rather quickly. They laid off nearly all the staff that made this once Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper.” He added that staff "live in other states and write about what is happening in a community in which they have no connection. The designers working on the publication layout don't live in that area either. The story on the front page of The Hutchinson News that had nothing to do with Hutchinson, Kansas, is the result of a media company that is completely disconnected from the communities they serve. And this is one of the many problems with newspapers owned by corporations. They don't care about the communities they serve. They only care about satisfying shareholders.”
However, all is not lost for the citizens of Hutchinson, Kansas, because 16-year-old high school student Michael Glenn has launched a new online-only news publication — The Hutchinson Tribune, which now covers important meetings, elections, culture and even high school sports for this community of over 40,000. Using Substack for a CMS, the Tribune now offers the news people crave, plus provides a subscription plan for expanded content for as low as $8 a month. In addition, Glenn has recruited several adult reporters to submit content to the venture.
Is there a benefit to visiting this new site for a Hutchinson resident who craves a local journalistic voice?
On the day of this posting, the Gannett-owned Hutchinson News (HutchNews.com) had only six stories posted within one week that reported on a local city issue or included a local Hutchinson source or event. The new Tribune site had 27 articles, two op-eds and seven local sports pieces. Plus, if you click on any local headline on the news site, you hit the Gannett hard paywall, asking for just 23 cents a week to get the two weekly issues of the printed paper, see USA Today's digital crossword and see all the "features" of an undefined "Essential Digital." For an additional $1, you can get six months of site content and the newspaper's digital replica as well.
However, all the stories on HutchTribune.com can be accessed up to the 1st four paragraphs. However, each page has a plea to subscribe and contribute to support the site.
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with 16-year-old Hutchinson, Kansas high school student Michael Glenn, who became frustrated when his local Pulitzer Prize-winning newspaper, The Hutchinson News, was sold to Gannett and downsized over a few years to a "ghost paper" of two local employees, with most content being generated from out of state. So, in the summer of 2023, Glenn recruited a team of journalists and started the competing Hutchinson Tribune at HutchTribune.com, which now out-reports the HutchNews.com site 36 local stories to six (on the day of this posting).
Friday, October 13th, 2023, was a scary day for the citizens of Meeker, the largest town in Colorado's Rio Blanco County, nestled on the Rockies' western slope, with a population of slightly over 6,500.
It was on this day that Niki Turner and Caitlin Walker, the mother and daughter owners of the area's primary local news source, the Rio Blanco Herald Times, sent out an email with the subject line: "Crisis alert: Save your community paper." Within this ominous message, Niki and Caitlin revealed to their community the harsh realities of local news publishing and their own newspaper's critical financial status. They admitted that the operation only had enough money left to publish two more issues of the weekly newspaper and stated that they would shut down on October 26th.
Unlike most businesses (and newspapers) who would fear revealing such a poor bottom line to their customers, these publishers decided that an honest, open, truthful message was the right thing to do as a warning that Rio Blanco would soon be a “news desert,” like so many other small communities throughout the US.
Niki and Caitlin informed the public that the newspaper’s reach was at an all-time high, stating that: “Readership numbers continue to grow, with the Herald being read by more than 2,200 people every week. On top of that, 1,600 of you get our weekly email, 3,000 visit the website each week, and we have excellent social media engagement.” They went on to say that: “We will be letting our only full-time reporter go. We are cutting the number of papers we print and distribute to the bone. We are cutting every other extraneous expense we can think of, including our own paychecks. As a last resort, we’ll try cutting the print edition entirely and go digital-only.
Then came their plea for help, frankly asking that the citizens of Rio Blanco County "help to save your community newspaper.”
On October 19th, Niki penned her weekly printed editorial with the headline: "If a town loses its paper, it's less of a town," a quote borrowed from Al Cross, Director emeritus of the Institute for Rural Journalism and Community Issues at the University of Kentucky. She wrote, "When we became aware of a precarious financial situation last week, we went into emergency mode. As 'keepers of the flame' — stewards of a community newspaper that's one of the oldest businesses in the county — and as journalists who believe strongly in the free press and the need for independent local news, we're not willing to go down without a fight."
By the end of October, the Herald Times had an additional $33,000 in their bank account from over 200 people donating to the cause, which helped keep "the presses rolling."
The October 26th front page displayed a red headline: “This would have been the last edition of the Herald, ever.” The 1st paragraph of the article proudly stated: “The Herald is ecstatic to announce 100% funding, 100% from Community Supporters, through the end of 2023. That is a VERY long way from where we were two newspapers ago.
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with Rio Blanco Herald Times Owner/Editor Niki Turner, who made the difficult choice of offering complete transparency about the newspaper's dire financial situation to the western Colorado citizens they serve. Turner truthfully revealed in an email that the company would cease operation within two weeks unless the community offered their support, which resulted in $33,000 in contributions that saved the weekly publication, which has been printed since 1885, from extinction.
Ryan Dohrn is an Emmy award-winning, globally recognized media revenue consultant who has worked with hundreds of media companies, trained over 30,000 ad sales reps, and, through his proven sales training methods, has helped create over half a billion dollars in new sales and event sponsorship.
Holding a Psychology of Leadership Certification from Cornell University, Dohrn’s resume includes time in promotions and sales at The NY Times Company, Disney, Cumulus, Citadel Comm, Vance Publishing, Morris Publishing, and PennWell.
His latest best-selling book, "Selling Forward," offers proven sales advice and methods to reinvent a company’s approach when “selling to emotionally drained, inbox-dazed, virtual meeting-bored, sales-resistant customers in a post-pandemic fatigued business world.”
Dhorn is also the president/founder of Brain Swell Media, a boutique revenue strategy, sales training, and coaching firm. Plus, he is the owner/CEO of Niche Media, an organization that hosts events focused on helping publishers generate more multimedia revenue.
E&P's publisher, Mike Blinder, is no novice when it comes to media ad sales as well, having spent 20+ years as a sales consultant, trainer and revenue generator for media companies worldwide. Blinder has helped generate over $100 million in new, local multimedia ad revenue through his own proven sales methods.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” sales consultant, coach, and trainer Ryan Dohrn talks one-on-one with E&P's Mike Blinder, offering actionable, real-world advice on maximizing ad sales in 2024. Topics covered in this fast-paced, idea-driven interview include better prospecting for new business, how to find and retain quality sales talent and the best qualities and methods of leadership in today's competitive, ever-changing local media sales ecosystem.
Morgantown, North Carolina, the county seat of Burke County, is now a two-paper town. The nonprofit The Paper proudly reports local news online and in a weekly, Saturday-home-delivery, 30-plus-page full-color print product.
Founder and Publisher Allen VanNoppen is no stranger to news media, having spent his first years out of college as a reporter for the then family-owned local newspaper of record, The Morgantown News Herald, and later at the nearby Greensboro (NC) News & Record. Continuing to write a weekly syndicated column, he left his full-time work as a journalist in 1985 to enter the business world, eventually opening a local marketing agency his children now run. However, as he watched the News Herald be bought and sold over the years, finally being corporately downsized by Lee Enterprises, in August of 2022, he started Morganton Media Group, LLC (MMG) with a dba of The Paper.
The Paper's website states they’re a “blend of a registered LLC with nonprofit 501(c)3 fiscal sponsors.” And “will be owned by the community through tiered memberships" and "be led by an expert local Board of Directors.” So far, they have hired as their Editor-in-Chief Bill Poteat, a former editor & political reporter for The News Herald, along with others — bringing the newsroom count to eight.
In a recent press release announcing three new hires, The Paper claimed to be "Burke County’s only home-delivered, all-local print and digital newspaper." It also claimed, "The Paper was launched on Feb. 4, 2023, to fill a growing local news desert similar to those seen nationally. Sensational community response, including steady increases in advertising and circulation, coupled with charitable contributions, enabled the addition to the reporting staff.”
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we take you to Morgantown, North Carolina, the county seat for Burke County, where Lee Enterprises' News Herald has been publishing for over 120 years. However, it is now a two-newspaper town, as The Paper, a local nonprofit, is in its 36th week of publishing both print and online. Appearing in the broadcast is Allen VanNoppen, The Paper’s founder and publisher, who speaks to why he decided to start a competing local printed product, how the business is going more than eight months in and what advice he gives to others who may want to start a local, nonprofit, digital and print news operation.
Borrell Associates has been tracking U.S. advertising since 2001, providing data that encompasses every facet of local marketing expenditures, including promotions, marketing services, research, public relations, loyalty marketing and digital services.
Recently, Borrell released its 2024 forecasts revealing that U.S. local advertising will grow a healthy 4.4% in 2024 to $157.1 billion. On top of that, Borrell’s recent “Business Barometer” showed a strong uptick in local advertiser optimism about the 2023 holiday shopping season and the general economy. There was also good news for legacy media providers, such as newspapers, radio and TV, forecasting a moderation in previous years' declines.
Along with the forecast for 2024, Borrell just released the data from their survey conducted in the second quarter 0f 2023, which included advertising insights collected from over 2,000 respondents. One of the major takeaways from this August 2023 report is a major decrease in respondents who consider themselves "novices" at understanding media concepts, thus offering local media companies more knowledgeable buyers within their markets. Some respondents stated that local media companies should “take more time to listen to what the client is asking for” and “come with more creative ideas about their business.”
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we break down the data recently released by Borrell Associates in their latest survey, conducted April through June in 2023, entitled: "New Insights About Today’s Local Ad Buyers." Appearing in this vodcast is Borrell Associates' President Jim Brown, who will discuss the latest trends they have uncovered in local advertiser spending, which media types are showing the most demand and how legacy media such as newspapers, radio and TV can capture the predicted 4% increase of overall marketing dollars being invested by local businesses.
On January 31, 2022, some would say industry history was made when Chicago Public Media, owners of the PBS affiliate WBEZ announced the acquisition of the iconic, daily tabloid: The Chicago Sun-Times. Chicago Public Media raised $61 million in multiyear philanthropic commitments for the acquisition and then transitioned the publication to nonprofit ownership.
At the time of the announcement the New York Times reported that the merger of: “The hard-hitting tone of tabloid journalism and the measured voice of public radio make for an unlikely combination.”
Tim Franklin, senior associate dean of Northwestern University’s Medill journalism school and the former president of the Poynter Institute stated: “It’s kind of hard to overstate how profound this development is. I think in some ways it could be a model for the nation.”
Just a few months later, more industry “history” was made with the announcement of the hiring of Jennifer Kho, former managing editor of HuffPost and Guardian US, as the paper’s executive editor. Kho was the first woman and the first person of color to lead its newsroom.
Since Kho’s appointment, there have been many changes at the paper, that include the dropping of their paywall for access to all digital content. A “right to be forgotten” policy, that allows people who have been reported on to seek a review and possibly have stories removed from internet searches. And the addition of twelve Sun-Times’ “Next Voices,” who are guest columnists that were selected from reader submitted entries.
In this episode of E&P Reports, we check in with Chicago Public Media, owners of PBS affiliate WBEZ, to find out how their 2022 acquisition of the 149-year-old Chicago Sun-Times is going. Appearing on the program are Jennifer Kho, executive editor for the newspaper and Tracy Brown, chief content officer for the parent company, who discuss their new initiatives, collaborative efforts and how the blending of these two major market brands is working to expand their audience.
On July 17th, 2023, Bedford County, Tennessee, and its county seat of Shelbyville lost their 149-year-old newspaper of record, the Times-Gazette, as Holler Media locked the doors and fired the staff of all six community publications they owned that served counties around Nashville.
Within a matter of just a few weeks, Morristown, Tennessee-based Lakeway Publishers, who owns and operates nine other community newspapers in the state plus others in Missouri and Virginia, had hired a number of the Holler staff. They also announced they were starting two new publications — The Bedford County Post and The Marshall County Post — to provide news coverage to the Shelbyville and Lewisburg, Tennessee areas.
In a recent interview, Lakeway Senior Vice President Keith Ponder stated, "As Shelbyville’s long-time newspaper closed abruptly, we saw a need to serve the community with locally produced community-based journalism. We kept the team together and have worked hard to tell the stories of Bedford County. A great community needs a great community newspaper, and we want to meet that need here — just like we have in Tullahoma for nearly 50 years. We have a strong tradition of service while producing award-winning work.”
“I can't stress enough that we were devastated when these communities were left without a newspaper,” said Michael Fishman, president of Lakeway Publishing. "And being in the adjoining counties in this region, it just felt that we had the resources and the experience to return a local newspaper to these communities. News deserts — we're totally opposed to that happening," Fishman said. "And while we can't go all over Tennessee, by any means, we were founded on providing quality, local journalism to communities so they would have news and information. And we also feel a lot that it supports the economic vitality of that community to have a good local newspaper."
In this episode of E&P Reports, we go beyond reporting on news publishers by focusing on the impact on a population when they learn they may lose their newspaper of record. Appearing in this interview and speaking about the value of local journalism as it affects the people and public policy of their community are Bedford County, Tennessee’s Chris White, director of planning, Greg Vick, county commissioner for District 2 and Curt Cobb, county clerk & master.
Cristi Hegranes is an award-winning journalist and founder of the Global Press Institute (GPI), a nonprofit organization that builds and maintains news bureaus in some of the world’s least-covered locations, like: Cameroon, Haiti, Kashmir, Mongolia, Nepal, Zambia and more.
The organization recruits local women in the areas and then implements a 16-week training-to-employment program in which they learn the principles and practice of investigative journalism. Upon completion, graduates are offered full-time, paid employment as reporters with GPI’s Global Press Journal (GPJ), which aims to “produce ethical, accurate news, to create a more just and informed world, with team members who are guided by four core values: dignity, diversity, transparency and excellence.”
In September 2023, Hegranes released her new book: “BYLINE: How Local Journalists Can Improve the Global News Industry and Change the World,” which features original interviews with some of the biggest names in journalism, including Nicholas Kristof, Carroll Bogert, Bobby Ghosh, Lauren Williams, as well as Global Press reporters across the planet.
In the book, Hegranes states that international coverage led by local journalists can restore trust in the entire news publishing industry. She explains, “to enact this solution, the industry will have to let go of many outdated assumptions about what news people want, who has a right to tell their story.”
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with award-winning journalist and founder of the Global Press Institute (GPI) Cristi Hegranes, whose new book: “Byline” makes a case that the global news publishing industry can become more sustainable by rethinking how it provides global news coverage by focusing on local news sourcing — as opposed to: “The flawed discipline of parachute journalism.”
Within the interview with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder, Hegranes cites recent GPI research indicating, “There is a deep reservoir of untapped demand from readers in the United States — across a wide range of demographics, including noncitizen, diaspora, and migrant populations — for international journalism that is local, precise and representative.”
Lisa Simpson, the former executive director of Arizona Newspapers Association, and Chris Kline, the former president/ CEO of Arizona Broadcasters Association, have known each other for years since they both lobby on issues that affect their association's members similarly. The major difference between the two is Lisa's members are from newspapers, and Chris' are broadcasters.
But in a world where more and more media content is being shared and consumed on the same devices by the same audiences, to some, it seems archaic and a bit outdated to define a news media company primarily by its legacy platform of delivery (such as a press or transmitter). Moreover, most agree that a broadcaster and a legacy news company compete less with each other for ad dollars, where both lose the lion's share of local media revenue to big tech companies like Google and Meta/ Facebook.
Add to that how corporate media empires have grouped more and more local outlets under common ownership, depleting association membership numbers. It seemed only logical to these two state media leaders that merging resources would be a logical way to strengthen the support provided to both association memberships.
So on August 20, 2023, history was made when two separate media associations that for years considered themselves competitive for audience and ad dollars — Arizona Newspapers Association and Arizona Broadcasters Association — announced that their boards approved that they would become one on September 1, 2023. Arizona Media Association was created.
Both Kline and Simpson will remain on board in leadership roles, with Kline taking the "top chair" of CEO and president. Kline was quoted in the initial announcement: "There is a significant amount of line-blurring between platforms. For most news consumers, all local outlets fall under the umbrella of local news, making the merger a logical next step for the industry organizations in Arizona." He added, "It gives us a lot of extra room to stand boldly," Kline said of the partnership, "with hundreds of companies across platforms.”
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we explore the groundbreaking move by two organizations that considered themselves competitive for decades. Arizona Newspapers Association and Arizona Broadcasters Association merge into Arizona Media Association. We chat about the "whys and hows" of the union with Lisa Simpson, the former executive director of Arizona Newspapers Association, and Chris Kline, the former president/ CEO of Arizona Broadcasters Association. We also learn their future plans for advancing the industry and serving their combined membership.
In the spring of 2018, Kenny Katzgrau, CEO of Broadstreet, a SaaS ad management company designed for media companies and direct sales teams, penned and published an online 34-page white paper entitled “10 Advantages That Small Publishers Have Over Tech Giants in Selling Ads.” His purpose for the document was to offer encouragement and advice to smaller news publishers on how they can use some of their competitive advantages to gain back some of the 70%+ of local ad dollars captured by big tech companies like Google and Meta (Facebook).
Katzgrau lists these opportunities as:
- Community Support & Affinity
- The Direct Relationship
- Autonomy, Flexibility and Creativity (Compelling Creatives)
- Section Sponsorships
- The Ability to Tell a Compelling Story with Sponsored Content
- Sustainable and Sensible Pricing
- Newsletter Sponsorships
- Optimal Placement
- Transparent Reporting
- Better Overall Performance
But it was a specific section of the document entitled: “KNOW YOUR ENEMY, PART II: The Key Weaknesses of Google, Facebook & Networks,” that would wind up more than three years later having Katzgrau subpoenaed to appear as a witness for the defense, in Google's pending January 2023 lawsuit filed by the US Justice Department, along with the Attorneys General of California, Colorado, Connecticut, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Virginia, charging the tech giant for monopolizing multiple digital advertising technology products in violation of Sections 1 and 2 of the Sherman Act.
The specific section of Katzgrau’s paper that caught Google’s law firm’s attention was where he stated, "Small publishers can retain and regain business that was once theirs by closely examining the weaknesses inherent with all networks of scale. Just as Google and Facebook’s strengths map to a small publisher’s weaknesses, their weaknesses map back to a small publisher’s greatest strengths." It can only be assumed that he will be "called to the stand" due to his expertise of more than 15 years as a media software engineer (that included two years at Yahoo!), to try to prove that Google may not be as overpowering as media companies claim.
The irony is that, at best, Katzgrau will be a hostile witness since he has written several op-eds and spoken at numerous conferences about how important it is for big tech not to maintain its monopolistic hold over the media industry.
On July 17th, 2023, Katzgrau wrote for his local news publishing website, which he recently became publisher, RedBankGreen.com, an op-ed entitled “Livin’ On a Prayer: “So, Google — you mindless and largely indifferent collective: I hope the DOJ helps chop you up into thousands of unrecognizable pieces. Google à la Bell.”
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we explore the recent Google Antitrust suit filed by the DOJ through one of the witnesses for the defense, news media industry digital ad software provider Kenny Katzgrau, CEO of Broadstreet. Katzgrau, who wrote an op-ed three years ago offering advice to small news publishers on how they can compete with big-tech local media advertising dollars, now finds that his words will likely become evidence presented by Google that they may be a less-dominant media giant than has been reported. Katzgrau, a local news publisher, discusses how even though he believes that Google is a powerful, dominant, monopolistic player in the local ad space, he may find himself sitting on a stand offering evidence for the defense.
Media industry veteran John Ellis has been a political analyst for NBC News, a columnist for The Boston Globe, a political editor for Business Insider, a News Corp advisor and SVP at the Fox Business Network.
In 2016, he launched News Items, which became The Wall Street Journal CEO Council’s morning newsletter. Ellis restarted News Items as an independent newsletter in August 2019. His articles have been published in Fast Company, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Real Clear Politics, and Business Insider.
News Items is “a collection of news stories, commentaries, analyses, essays and research reports that are interesting or important (or both).” Each “item” posted is usually two or three sentences long and resides in one of four “baskets:”
· World in Disarray,
· Financialization of Everything,
· Advances in Science and Technology,
· Electoral politics, foreign and domestic.
Those who subscribe claim that Ellis and the team have proved their value by being “the first newsletter to devote extensive coverage to Covid-19, accurately calling the invasion of Ukraine by Russia almost to the day and being one of the first news sources to forecast the enormous importance of AI and the leadership roles taken by Google, Meta, and Weibu.”
In this episode of E&P Reports, we go one-on-one with news media industry veteran John Ellis about his 40+ year journey from NBC News in the 70s and 80s, columnist for the Boston Globe and LA Times in the 90s, leadership roles in the 21st century at CNBC, and FOX News and eventual founder and editor today of the daily newsletter, News Items. We also chat with Ellis on how he sees journalism and news publishing in general have changed over the decades, where the industry is today and how he feels it will evolve in the years to come.
Reporting on the news publishing industry’s fight for survival amid circulation and advertising revenue declines has been focusing more and more on the continuing closure of news outlets, propagating "news deserts," and the downsizing of newsrooms creating "ghost papers."
However, some media companies are finding opportunities during these troubling times by exploring underserved communities' need for local journalism and utilizing current resources to enter these markets with news brands that are finding new audiences and revenues. Recently, E&P reported on the Charleston Post and Courier’s statewide expansion into new South Carolina markets, where existing newspaper newsrooms had been downsized so much that these communities welcomed and embraced the new brands.
Now, similar expansion is taking place in Louisiana as Georges Media Group, the state’s largest news publisher and owners of The Times-Picayune | NOLA.com, The Advocate, Gambit and the Acadiana Advocate, have launched the Shreveport-Bossier City Advocate, a brand new, digital-only news operation in the state’s third largest metropolitan area.
“We were sending reporters up to Shreveport and kept hearing ‘there’s no local reporting of any size, in that market,” stated Judi Terzotis, Publisher of Georges Media Group. "We went on a three-month 'listening tour,' and what we heard was almost jaw-dropping. 'Where do you get your news?' we would ask, and they would literally say, 'There's this guy on Facebook, and he sometimes goes to City Council."
In their July 2023 announcement, the new managing editor Barbara Leader stated, "Shreveport-Bossier is a metro area that is hungry for local news coverage. I'm eager to lead and be part of this group of journalists dedicated to telling stories of the area's arts and culture, business, education, and health care community, as well as crime and local government.”
During this interview with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder, Terzotis admitted, "During our pre-launch 'listening tour,' we were very explicit that we want to bring a 10-person newsroom to Shreveport." She continued to explain that they then asked civic leaders and large business owners to "come to the table" and contribute to make it happen. Terzotis stated that the original goal was to raise $1.5 million in donations for the first three years, and they have reached to date over $500,000.
In this episode of E&P Reports, we chat with Judi Terzotis, the publisher of Georges Media Group, Louisiana's largest local news media company and owners of the New Orleans' Times-Picayune | NOLA.com about their expansion into the state's third largest metro area with the newly launched, digital-only Shreveport-Bossier City Advocate. Also appearing in the interview to explain more about why this new investment fits into their business model and how the news outlet will serve the community are Georges Media Group President Kevin Hall and the new Managing Editor of the Shreveport-Bossier Advocate Barbara Leader.
In August of 2022, Gannett, the nation’s largest newspaper chain, with more than 200 dailies, terminated 3% of its workforce (around 400 employees) after posting a loss of $54 million, on revenues of $749 million, in its second quarter.
One of the layoffs included Mary Cadden, who spent 17 years as editor of the USA TODAY Best-Selling Books List, a weekly ranking of the 150 top-selling titles based on U.S. book sales. Caden started at USA TODAY in 1995 as a researcher. After the layoff was announced, Gannett issued a separate statementannouncing that the book list will be on hiatus for the remainder of the year (2022), a move that surprised many in the industry since USA Today’s list has been highly valued by authors, agents and publishers, who also look to the weekly rankings as an alternative to other popular lists citing its “length, diversity and transparency, since The New York Times breaks down its charts into various categories of 10 or more bestsellers where USA Today, combined everything into one list of 150.
Now some six months later, Gannett announced the coveted USA TODAY Best-Selling Books List is back, placing longtime Arts & Entertainment Journalist Critic for the Arizona Republic, a Gannett/ USA TODAY newspaper, Barbara VanDenburgh as the new editor.
Although VanDenburgh has achieved journalistic recognition, winning the “Best of the West Award" for short-form feature writing in 2018 and the 2015 Arizona Press Club award for arts criticism, she is also shown a high degree of mastery of the digital publishing side of the industry. VanDenburgh started at the Republic as a Digital Innovation Strategist, where she won the Gannett Innovation Challenge after developing new audience strategies.
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we meet the new editor of the rereleased USA TODAY Best-Selling Books List, Barbara VanDenburgh. We talk with VanDenburgh about why bringing back the USA Today lists is important and how she feels about her new role with national influence over the very competitive book publishing industry.
In early June of 2023, The Opinions and “Next Gen" teams of The Washington Post announced that Renee Yaseen would be their newest Op-Ed columnist. But unlike some venerable, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists who publish their prose under the iconic one hundred fifty-year-old Post masthead, Yaseen is not listed as a company employee but instead uses the title in her byline: Post Grad Intern.
Her twice-weekly column, Post Grad, is published as a free newsletter inviting readers to gain “tips and advice from a recent graduate who will help navigate job hunting, moving, budgeting, relationships and more.”
Yaseen did graduate from the University of Notre Dame with a BA in economics and minors in theology and PPE (Philosophy, Politics & Economics). While attending classes remotely during COVID, she founded a tech startup called FriendOver, a company designed to help young children stay active and social during the pandemic. FriendOver helped thousands and won major Notre Dame awards that included the McCloskey New Venture Competition, the Lookup Startup Competition and others.
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we chat with the newest addition to The Washington Post's Op-Ed team, Renee Yaseem, a GenZ intern who pens a twice-weekly newsletter called Post Grad. Although just a few weeks in, Yaseen has a vast following that reads her advice and perspective on the many challenges that face today's young adults. We ask Yaseem what it is like to publish to such a large audience under the auspices of The Post masthead and how she feels about the responsibility of having so much "influence" at such a young age.
In June of, 2021, U.S. Representatives Ann Kirkpatrick, D-Arizona, and Dan Newhouse, R-Washington, introduced H.R. 3940, the Local Journalism Sustainability Act (LJSA), a bipartisan bill designed to help local newspapers sustain financial viability through a series of tax credits..
The LJSA was originally the brainchild of Arizona-based Francis Wick, CEO of Wick Communications and fellow news publisher Alan Fisco, President of the Seattle Times, who each, along with support from America’s Newspapers, lobbied their local congress members, to introduce the bill that was hoped to provide some needed financial assistance to help abate the widespread proliferation of newspaper shutdowns nationwide.
For months the LJSA was debated and modified with hopes that its passage would become a reality. Its closest chance came In November of 2021, with the modified, stripped-down version that only offered tax credits for hiring and retaining journalists. H.R. 390 was then included in the draft text of the Biden Administration’s Build Back Better reconciliation package. But the LJSA was not to be; last-minute lobbying by Big Tech and others squashed the bill, "pushing it to the curb" for possible resurrection in the next Congress.
Now, a new piece of legislation, which offers tax incentives to both local news media that employ journalists and the local businesses that help support the media outlet through their advertising dollars, has surfaced as the Community News and Small Business Support Act (H.R.4756). The new bill was introduced on Thursday, July 20, 2023, by Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY) and Suzan DelBene (D-WA).
At its core, H.R. 4756 lays out a five-year plan to provide payroll tax credits to local/community news outlets expressly to hire and retain local news reporters across the country. Small businesses (those with fewer than 50 employees) that advertise in local newspapers, digital news sites, on local radio or with local T.V. stations are also eligible for tax credits.
In this episode of E&P Reports, we go one-on-one with one of the key players in helping champion tax incentive-based legislation through the U.S. Congress, Dean Ridings, CEO of America's Newspapers, one of North America's largest news media trade organizations. Ridings offers a quick history of the new Community News and Small Business Support Act (H.R.4756), a bill designed to help sustain local journalism through tax breaks for those who pay newsroom salaries and small businesses who support local journalism through their advertising dollars. Ridings also speaks frankly about the chances of eventual passage of the bill and what each local news publisher can do to help make it happen.
Brock Berry has spent the last two decades as an advertising and marketing leader in the news media industry during what many call the "digital revolution." Just as more and more news consumers were accessing local content online, Berry found his comfort with digital concepts a vital asset as he became the head of the advertising sales department at the Denver Post. And when that major market newspaper underwent ownership changes, he found himself designing and leading the parent company's digital services division, Digital First Media’s AdTaxi Network.
Today, Berry is the founder and CEO of AdCellerantx, a Denver-based digital advertising and technology company that partners with hundreds of media companies and agencies in markets across North America to provide a complete menu of digital solutions to tens of thousands of local businesses.
Since starting AdCellerant in 2011, the company experienced over 4,000% growth — from zero to over $75 million in revenue in less than three years. Because of its success, Inc. Magazine recognized it as the 83rd fastest-growing company in the US.
Berry also is a business and technology columnist for Newsweek and was named CEO of the year by the Colorado Technology Association and top “40 under 40” by the Denver Business Journal.
In this Episode of "E&P Reports," we explore the challenges in selling digital solutions to small businesses in a competitive marketplace with senior executive, entrepreneur and media advertising expert Brock Berry, CEO and founder of AdCellerant. Utilizing Berry's real-world experience leading a major technology company providing digital solutions to hundreds of local media companies for thousands of businesses, we gain his insights on the most effective ways we can serve, sell and maintain local advertising revenue through the sale of all forms of multimedia solutions. Berry also offers his advice to local advertising executives on how to build a winning local sales environment.
Some might say that one of the most important dates to affect the future of the North American local news media industry was June 22, 2023. On that day, Canada’s Senate passed Bill C-18, a law requiring Google and Meta to pay media outlets for news content that they share or otherwise repurpose on their platforms.
Many pundits are now blogging and editorializing about the upside and downside of C-18's passage and how it will likely impact pending similar legislation currently being discussed in committee in the U.S. Senate. The 2023 Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (JCPA) — a law very similar to Canada's — will allow small and mid-sized news organizations to negotiate jointly for compensation from digital platforms that access their content without allowing them to profit from their journalism. The legislation (like C-18) also allows news publishers to demand arbitration if they reach an impasse in negotiations with digital platforms.
And if anyone doubts how important this ruling is to Big Tech, just look at what happened almost immediately once C-18 became law. Two days after passage, Meta announced it would end access to news on Facebook and Instagram in Canada. And a few days after that, Google’s president of Global Affairs, Kent Walker, announced in a blog that it would remove links to Canadian news from Search, News and Discover products and would no longer operate Google News Showcase in Canada. Not to be topped, shortly after Google and Facebook’s actions, the Canadian government announced they would stop buying ads on Facebook and Instagram in return.
To offer some background, the Canadian local news media industry has experienced some of the same significant challenges their U.S. counterparts have in maintaining "top line" revenues impacted by digital disruption. Jobs, homes and cars, the three main "pillars" of the classified advertising category, have virtually disappeared from newspapers over the last 10 years. Inserts, and pre-press, which used to be a huge revenue stream for news publishers, are no longer being placed within the printed newspaper for local distribution, as major retailers prefer less expensive online couponing and digital loyalty programs.
But there's no question that, just like in the U.S., Canadian news publishers have lost the lion’s share of local advertising dollars to platforms like Google and Facebook, which garner a good deal of their audience through the news content they access for free from the local news media, and then monetize it.
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we look at the last few weeks in the life of Canadian news publishing through the eyes of Paul Deegan, president and CEO of the country’s largest industry trade organization, News Media Canada. Deegan unpacks the similarities and differences between Canada and the U.S. in national advocacy of Big Tech compensation legislation. He also discusses the battles that are now going on between Google /Facebook and the Canadian government as the digital platforms threaten to remove news content within the country, and Ottawa fights back by pulling ad dollars from the platforms.
Each year, Borrell Associates, an advertising and marketing research firm with customers across the U.S. and Canada, surveys local advertisers and ad agencies. Participants are invited through the active advertiser lists of various media companies nationwide.
Although companies would need to purchase the local results for their individual markets, Borrell does release to the industry several insights and predictions garnered from the aggregate results.
This week Borrell released the findings of the spring 2023 survey that included 1,938 respondents from more than 100 different business categories. These participating local advertisers from communities across the U.S. responded to over 35 questions concerning the types of media they purchase, plan to purchase, plan to discontinue and how they decide on and perceive the effectiveness of the many advertising solutions available in today's multimedia landscape.
Most are "optimistic" and plan to increase their advertising spend.In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we asked Corey Elliott, Borrell’s Executive Vice President of Local Market Insights, to unpack the most important data points that impact the news publishing industry uncovered from the survey. During the 20-minute interview with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder, Elliott offered the following significant findings, that included that even though recent political polls show a major concern from most as to the future of the American economy, most of the respondents said they are "optimistic" about their business’s economic future, with 62% stating they plan to spend more on advertising in 2023.
Social media, events and radio advertising leadLeading the list of the top advertising solutions purchased is "social media," with 60% of the respondents claiming they invest their dollars in these various platforms. 49% said they participate in events and sponsorships to generate new customers.
Radio led the list of legacy media options coming in third, with 47% saying they buy broadcast commercials on a local station. However, when Elliot was asked why such a vulnerable media is so dominant when it is being impacted by competitive mobile audio streaming options for local listeners, his response implied that radio was the last to have its audience impacted by digital competition, giving the industry more time to prepare for the disruption to come. He also revealed that radio advertising retention showed ominous signs within the data, with only 6% of survey respondents stating they would be increasing their spending. And 12% said they were dropping radio from their 2023 marketing plans.
Newspaper advertising spend is holding its ownElliott broke down the results concerning printed newspaper advertising revealing that print came in with a respectable 6th position on the ad spend category list, with 39% of the respondents stating they purchase space in local newspapers. The good news for these publishers is that the retention numbers for this media are almost the reverse of radio, with 24% of newspaper advertisers stating they will stay or increase their investment and only 12% claiming they will drop the media.
Advertisers need helpElliott was adamant during the interview that one of the most critical insights revealed by the data Borrell collected and analyzed is that local advertisers are lost when it comes to a strong understanding of how to invest their marketing dollars. But instead of seeking advice and building a relationship with the local media ad representative (or advertising agency), 39% claimed they are resigned to learning how to do it themselves, with over one-third stating they would seek a friend, network contact, employee, or co-worker for assistance.
But when the same question was asked of those respondents who purchase advertising from a local newspaper company, the data revealed even less sense that local media ad reps have the knowledge and ability to supply them with multimedia marketing guidance, with 45% learning on their own and close to 40% from friends and co-workers. When Elliott unpacked these findings for E&P during the interview, he stated: "I swear to God, it's less about the media and more about the marketing. If you can provide me with a transparent, complete marketing plan, I'll follow you off a cliff!”
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we unpack the latest data from the Borrell Associates 2023 Local Advertising Survey with Borrell EVP Corey Elliott. We get a first look and analysis at the reported types of media being purchased and how local advertisers decide on and perceive the effectiveness of the many advertising solutions available in today’s multimedia landscape.
Danielle Coffey’s first few weeks as the News/Media Alliance (NMA) chief executive were anything but "business as usual." After being appointed the new president and CEO of this leading trade organization, representing over 2,000 news and magazine media outlets worldwide, some of the most critical issues and advocacy concerning Western news media's future required immediate attention. That list includes Gannett’s recent stand-alone antitrust filing against Google; Canada's final passage of the Canadian Journalism Compensation Bill, which will require big-tech companies like Google & Facebook to pay news organizations for the content they monetize; and how this may impact the U.S. Congress passing laws that would offer similar compensation to American news outlets. In addition, the congressional support of the Local Journalism Sustainability Act (LJSA) has reemerged — legislation that would help fund local journalism via tax incentives to publishers for salaries, businesses who invest in advertising support and even the news consumers for any fees or subscriptions, paid to access the content created by local newsrooms.
And if that slate of issues is not enough to keep the NMA staff working overtime, add to the pile the expanding concern by both readers and publishers with the growth of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and how the creation of news content via algorithms without human intervention, is amplifying the already existing fears of how truth can be maintained in the multimedia news ecosystem.
Luckily, Coffey is no novice when it comes to understanding the challenges of the business of creating credible, journalistic news within a sustainable business model since her promotion to NMA CEO came from within, having previously held the position of Executive Vice President and General Counsel since 2015, when the organization operated under the name of The Newspaper Association of America.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with the new President/ CEO of the News/Media Alliance (NMA), Danielle Coffey, with a high-speed interview that gains her perspective on some of the most critical legislative issues the news publishing industry is facing today, like "big tech" compensation, local journalism tax credits, AI and more. Coffey offers a frank, well-researched background and analysis of where the industry stands today and how she is leading the NMA to help us all navigate these challenges in the future.
Gannett Co., Inc. filed a federal lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York against Google for “monopolization of advertising technology markets and deceptive commercial practices.” According to Gannett’s press release, “The lawsuit seeks to restore competition in the digital advertising marketplace and end Google’s monopoly, which will encourage investment in newsrooms and news content throughout the country.”
Others have filed similar lawsuits. A bipartisan group of 17 State Attorneys Generals filed a similar lawsuit against Google for ad-tech monopolization in December 2020. Then, the U.S. Department of Justice, joined by a bipartisan group of 17 additional states, filed an ad-tech lawsuit against Google earlier this year. Both lawsuits are ongoing.
Last week, the European Union’s competition authority filed an ad-tech lawsuit against Google, citing similar circumstances. Both the DOJ and EU suits are seeking monetary damages and fines, as well as the breakup of Google’s ad-tech business. Gannett, as the largest publisher in the U.S. — with USA TODAY and more than 200 local news publications — has now thrown its hat in the ring with today’s filing.
Mike Reed, Gannett’s chairman and chief executive officer, spoke with E&P this morning in an exclusive interview about the lawsuit and his thoughts about the future possibilities of news media and journalism.
When asked why Gannett filed a standalone suit, Reed said, “The actions that Google has operated under have been monopolistic business practices. They have impacted us for a long period of time, and you could argue that maybe the lawsuit should have been filed sooner. There does seem to be some good momentum right now behind this action, given the DOJ’s federal lawsuit against Google for the same infractions around their digital ad technology… This action that we’ve taken at Gannett is really driven by Google’s business practices and their impact on our company and on journalism at the end of the day.”
Reed defended Gannett’s timing and the standalone filing: “You know, as far as us going by ourselves, we just felt like we had the right size, we had the right legal counsel, and we felt like we didn't want to wait. We’re ready to go.”
Although the lawsuit does not name an amount for damages sought, Reed is hopeful that the outcome helps all news publications. He stated, “You know, consumers want content. They want local news, national news and content producers like ourselves, which have produced that news for a couple hundred years and have built a business model around advertising. In the digital arena, now that 90% of consumers read their news on the digital platform, you would think digital advertising, which has exploded to a $200 billion industry, would have benefited publishers who produce the content, given consumers are coming to them to digest and engage with the content. Google has inserted themselves in the middle, and they control every aspect of the digital advertising marketplace, from ad placement to the ad exchanges to pricing.
“It's odd for the middleman in this equation to make all the money,” Reed continued. “Our hope is that we get the right outcome for the entire industry and that journalism can survive for the next a hundred years because we get a level playing field around the digital advertising marketplace.”
Google’s VP of Google Ads, Dan Taylor, responded to the lawsuit, “These claims are simply wrong. Publishers have many options to choose from when it comes to using advertising technology to monetize – in fact, Gannett uses dozens of competing ad services, including Google Ad Manager. And when publishers choose to use Google tools, they keep the vast majority of revenue. We’ll show the court how our advertising products benefit publishers and help them fund their content online.”
Many in the industry are applauding Gannett’s action. Danielle Coffey, president and CEO, News/Media Alliance said, “Gannett’s filing in the ad tech case against Google makes a statement that news publishers have a voice and recourse thanks to the DOJ’s solid investigation, and the resulting federal and AG lawsuits. We will continue to actively support this case. Google is not above the law.”
Dean Ridings, CEO of America’s Newspapers, remarked, “Gannett’s legal pursuit of addressing the imbalance in the digital marketplace is a good move. The monopolistic actions in the digital marketplace have stifled the news industry for years, and it is past time to address this issue that has decimated local ad revenue.”
Gordon Borrell, CEO, Borrell Associates said, “Glad to see Gannett adding its weight to the effort to break up the monopoly. One company controls 93% of the ad-exchange market, let alone have a tremendous amount of control and influence over content. Since 2000, the market share for the content-rich newspaper industry has completely flipped to tech companies who make scant investments in content and merely aggregate everyone else's. With the pile-on of other lawsuits and government intervention abroad, we could see some relief that leads to a more equitable environment for local media.”
Not everyone is bullish on Gannett’s approach. Jeff Jarvis, director of the Tow-Knight Center for Entrepreneurial Journalism at the City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism, had this to say, “It is tragic that once-great Gannett is resorting to protectionism and retribution against its competitors rather than have a strategy for innovation and growth in a changed marketplace. There are legitimate questions to be addressed regarding Google's power in both sides of the advertising market and authorities in both Europe and the US are investigating them. But for Gannett to blame Google's alleged monopoly for its present troubles is just sad. It is also ironic, for in New Jersey, where I live, Gannett is a would-be monopoly, buying up nine newspaper brands and promptly cutting back newsrooms, reducing the coverage and quality of journalism serving this state.”
Mike Reed still believes that the news business and journalism have a bright future. “I see a robust future for journalism, for local news, regional news, national news. Consumers still engage with news every single day. We have 150 million ‘uniques’ to our news platform here in the U.S. every month. So, there’s engagement. Consumers want news. We spend all the money creating the news, and Google makes all the money on the advertising side on the back of our news. That’s what needs to change. … Others make money off our news on their platform and don't pay us fair use for it. We do need to get these things corrected through fair playing fields and fair compensation, and I think we will. And when we do, I think local, regional and national news will thrive, and you’ll see the number of journalists in this country going up versus going down.”
To say that Peter Bhatia is a successful newspaper editor would be akin to stating that Tom Brady was a good quarterback. As Bhatia reminisces during this vodcast interview with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder, when he left Stanford in 1975 to begin his journalism career, the first operation he worked at was using "hot type” typesetting to lay out the daily edition.
Since those early days, Bhatia has managed newsrooms that collectively have won 10 Pulitzer Prizes. He spent time in academia as the Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism director at Arizona State University's Cronkite School of Journalism. Bhatia was president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors and received the 2020 "Benjamin Bradlee Editor of the Year Award" from the National Press Foundation. He is the first journalist of South Asian descent to lead a major daily newspaper in the U.S. And was featured on the cover of E&P Magazine as our 2008 "Editor of the Year."
For the last seven years, Bhatia was part of the Gannett/ USA Today company, serving as vice president and editor for the Cincinnati Enquirer from 2015-2017. He then worked for the Detroit Free Press until January 2023, when he decided to be one of eight to take a voluntary severance departure, sacrificing his job to save others from being laid off the next month.
Some thought now that Peter would take advantage of a long and prosperous career, perhaps watching the rest of us struggle to swim in the turbulent waters of today's news publishing industry from his front porch rocking chair. However, that was not to be the case.
A few months after he departed from Gannett, Bhatia announced that he was launching a nonprofit, free-access local news website in the nation's fourth largest metropolitan area, entitled Houston Landing.
Stating its core mission is to be “an independent, nonpartisan news organization devoted to public service journalism that seeks to strengthen democracy and improve the lives of all Houstonians one story at a time," the Landing was started with a 7 million dollar seed investment from three Houston philanthropies – the Houston Endowment, Arnold Ventures and Kinder Foundation.
Bhatia states that the Landing was born out of a study spearheaded by the American Journalism Project that found many Houstonians do not feel they have access to a trusted source for deeply reported stories that impact their daily lives. As of the time of this interview, they have used those funds to hire over 20 journalists led by Editor-in-Chief Mizanur Rahman, who spent 15 years in the same post at the Houston Chronicle.
On June 7th, 2023, Bhatia announced the Houston Landing's launch in an editorial where he states: “We formally launch today, without the legacy that traditional journalistic outlets face based on long years of practices and viewpoints. (We will not have an “editorial page," nor will we endorse political candidates.) We are unburdened with debates about the past. Ours is a clean slate, bolstered by the nonprofit, nonpartisan, no-paywall principles we embrace, and by carving an independent way to make Houston a better place, but to do so through truthful, thoroughly reported, and fair journalism.”
In this episode of E&P reports, we go one-on-one with Pulitzer Prize-winning newsroom leader Peter Bhatia, who recently exited his post as editor-in-chief of Gannett's Detroit Free Press to lead a new free-access, nonprofit, Texas-based digital local news startup, Houston Landing. We ask Bhatia why he believes this new project lacking paywalls, editorials and local sports can become a sustainable business in today's news ecosystem. We also ask his thoughts on managing newsrooms for over seven years at major market Gannett newspapers and where he sees the news media industry today and the future for its survival.
As E&P Reported in our February 2023 cover story, "Labor puts it all on the line,” 2022 was a very active year for union membership, walkouts and strikes. And perhaps no one knows this more than Jon Schleuss, the president of The NewsGuild - Communications Workers of America (TNG-CWA).
Schleuss grew up in rural Arkansas, as he admits, in a "very republican world," where the idea of unions and strikes was far from the political discourse he and his family would ever discuss. Schleuss entered journalism at a young age at his college radio station. After graduation, he worked for Wehco Media as the online editor of their second-largest newspaper, The Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Later, he joined the Los Angeles Times as a data and graphics journalist, becoming involved in organized labor by being one of a small group that helped unionize the Times in 2018. In 2019, Schleuss ran for and won the presidency of the NewsGuild, where he has led their membership of more than 25,000 workers within over 200 media organizations throughout the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico.
Jon Schleuss keeps an office at the union’s headquarters in Washington, D.C, but spends much of his time "on the road," where many management vs. labor disputes are happening within our industry.
In the E&P cover story, Schleuss admitted, "I've spent much of my time working around the country, advocating for local unions and lobbying for legislation. In the last year, we had more strikes and one-day walkouts (or longer) than ever in the Guild's history."
When asked what he attributes to that growth and the particularly contentious year between news business owners and labor, Schleuss cited consolidation, "bad owners," and the startling number of jobs lost over a decade or more.
On May 23, 2023, Schleuss joined several Gannett/ Guild employees on a NewsGuild-CWA hosted webinar, where they discussed the “damage Chairman / CEO Mike Reed has done to the company." They stated, "Mike Reed's tenure has been a disaster for investors, communities and employees."
During the broadcast, Schleuss stated: “Mike Reed has been an utter disaster for Gannett. Rather than investing in the journalists at the heart of Gannett's success, Reed is destroying newsrooms and alienating readers while raking in millions. It's no surprise that Reed's slash-and-burn management style has sunk Gannett's stock price and driven talented journalists into the arms of its competitors. It's time for shareholders to show Mike Reed their disapproval — or risk even further damage to local newsrooms across the country."
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with The NewsGuild - Communications Workers of America's President Jon Schleuss on why the past 12 months have had more strikes and walkouts than in the history of the Guild. He also offers insights on how hedge fund owners' entry and subsequent downsizing of so many news media properties today are hurting the workers they employ, the communities they serve and our democracy as a whole.
There are hundreds of Evan Brandts in our industry today, doing their jobs alone or in a greatly reduced newsroom, working the same beats covered by tens or hundreds more just a few years ago.
It’s easy to cite the reasons for the growth of what many today call "ghost papers," where a community is being underserved in local news coverage. Some blame it on the unregulated "Big Tech" industry that monetizes content while also absorbing local advertising revenues that rightly belong to the news publisher. Others call it evolution, where "survival of the fittest" is tested as legacy media adapts to a multimedia culture. And many blame the corporate greed of hedge funds, which found a quick way to generate short-term profits, by buying up local newspapers and selling off their assets, with little regard for the mission to their local communities — providing that independent, constitutionally-mandated "check on power."
Before his April 2022 appearance on "60 Minutes," odds are you never even heard of Evan Brandt unless you lived over the past 25-plus years in Pottstown, Pennsylvania, a suburban Philadelphia community of 40,000 plus. Brandt has worked as a reporter for The Mercury, one of the 160-plus titles under the control of Media News Group, a company owned by the hedge fund Alden Global Capital.
And Evan Brandt has one significant distinction over the other overworked journalists working alone in downsized newsrooms. His union contract protects his employment, allowing him to speak out about how his once robust newspaper has been bought and sold by companies in and out of bankruptcy, leaving him alone without an office within the town he reports on.
And speaking out is what Evan has done, writing numerous pieces for The News Guild-Communication Workers of America and being interviewed by publications like The New York Times, PBS and Mother Jones about how corporate downsizing has affected his hometown. Brandt even drove his Corolla to the Long Island mansion of Heath Freeman, managing director of Alden Global Capitol, wearing his #News Matters tee shirt and carrying a sign his wife made him that said, "Invest in us or Sell us!"
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with the outspoken reporter for Media News Group's Pottstown (PA) Mercury, Evan Brandt, where we explore what it is like to be the last local journalist remaining at this "ghost paper" that serves a suburban Philadelphia community of over 40,000. Brandt offers insight into his 25+ years at The Mercury, the several ownership bankruptcies that created years of serial downsizing, and how today he works out of his own attic to cover beats once reported on by a team of 30+ reporters.
In 1952, Arthur and Morley Ballantine wanted to enter the news publishing industry, and they picked southwest Colorado as the place to do it — purchasing a publication that is now the Durango Herald.
Over the years, the company expanded, adding new titles, video services, digital services, and local phone directories to its publishing empire. And today, their son, Richard G. Ballentine is chairman of the board ofBallentine Communications, continuing a mission of serving the readers and businesses of the region.
Recently, the company announced it was opening offices and hiring staff just 60 miles away, in Farmington, New Mexico, to start a brand new, free tabloid called the Tri-City Record that will print five days a week.
Farmington has a population of 46,000+ and is the largest city in San Juan County (population 120,000). The city has been served by its newspaper of record, The Farmington Daily Times, for over 120 years. However, today that Gannett publication might be labeled by some as a “ghost paper,” having dropped their staff numbers to a single reporter to work and serve the entire area.
Ballentine initially explored the venture by bringing in the owner of the nearby Aspen (CO) Times, David Cook. Cook worked as a consultant, meeting business leaders, evaluating reader acceptance and making recommendations on the project's viability. It was later agreed that Cook would manage the New Mexico operation for Ballentine as the Record’s new publisher.
In a recent interview, Cook stated, "Forget about state lines. There’s no question that the Four Corners region has many economic tie-ins for sure.” Ballentine added to that sentiment, saying, "There are increasing connections between southwest Colorado and northwest New Mexico in news topics and advertising needs.”
In response to why a new newspaper should enter an area that already has a newspaper in place for over a century, Cook stated, "There were some real gaps in the beat reporting. So I saw a real opportunity. San Juan is the fifth largest population center in New Mexico — and in my estimation … it was slowly becoming a news desert.”
In this episode of "E&P Reports," we explore the Tri-City Record, a new, five-day-a-week free publication serving San Juan County, New Mexico, being launched by Ballentine Communications, the owners of the Durango (CO) Herald. We learn from board chairman/ owner Richard G. Ballentine and new Record Publisher David Cook why they believe there is a real opportunity for expansion into this area already served by an existing Gannett title since that paper has drastically cut back on staff and content over the past few years.
For over 15 years, Mickey H. Osterreicher has served as general counsel to the National Press Photographers Association (NPPA), where he helps support, train and advocate for First Amendment rights. Starting his journalism career in the 1970s, Mickey was a staff photojournalist as an undergraduate for his campus newspaper at the University of Buffalo. He later became an award-winning photojournalist whose work has been published and broadcast over the years by the New York Times, Time Magazine, Newsweek, USA Today, ABC World News Tonight, Nightline, Good Morning America, NBC Nightly News and ESPN. Mickey returned to UB to get his law degree in 1998, where he served as an adjunct professor.
However, not only does Osterreicher have an extensive news media background, but he also wears a shield — serving for over 30 years as a reserve deputy for the Erie County Sheriff’s Office. He was recognized as their ‘Reserve Deputy of the Year’ in 2017.
The Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) honored Osterreicher in 2015 as a “Fellow of the Society,” the highest professional honor given by the SPJ. And in 2021, he was inducted into the Buffalo Broadcasters Hall of Fame.
Today, most of Mickey's time revolves around training journalists and police officers about how to respect the 1st Amendment and generally get along better since both perform necessary work, usually in close proximity, especially during times of crime and crises.
In the recent May 2023 E&P Cover Story: “The shifting balances of press powers. While First Amendment champions work to affirm the free press, others seek to undermine it,” Osterreicher stated, “(Saying) ‘I know my rights’ to a police officer today — whether you’re covering a news event, or a demonstration or protest — is often the last sentence you say before they order you to turn around and put your hands behind your back."
Mickey also shares the same concerns as many leaders in our industry about the blurred lines of defining who is a journalist in today’s multiplatform, social media-driven news ecosystem. Osterreicher stated, “When I was a journalist, it was pretty obvious. I was the noob with three Nikon SLRs around my neck, and nobody else had a camera. Or when I was in television, and I had a big Beta camera on my shoulder and press credentials,” he recalled. “Now, you’ve got young folks who are being sent out — whether they’re reporters or photographers — with iPhones. They look the same as the protesters.”
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with National Press Photographers Association (NPPA)’s general counsel, Mickey Osterreicher, to gain some advice on how both the news industry and the nation's law enforcement can work better together to respect the 1st Amendment, while each goes about their tough jobs during times of crime and crises. We also chat with him about his perspectives on helping define who a journalist is, especially now, as so many citizens are recording news on their personal devices.
The daily Portland Press Herald and its statewide sister publication Maine Sunday Telegram were, for over a century, the leading news and information providers to residents of Maine. Based in the state's largest city of Portland, these two major newspapers were the cornerstones of Guy Gannett Communications. This Maine-based family-owned business also owned a handful of television stations.
In 1998, Guy Gannett decided to sell the entire company, with the newspaper holdings eventually purchased by the owners of The Seattle Times, the fourth generation of the Blethen family. Ten years later, during the 2008 recession, these titles began a journey of cutbacks and downsizing like so many other media companies. And, citing economic concerns, the Blethens announced they were putting the Press Herald and its other Maine newspaper properties up for sale.
The next seven years, the newspapers went through two controversial ownership changes — eventually finding themselves in 2015 in the hands of Maine-based publisher Reade Brower, who consolidated the holdings, brought in new senior management and, by all accounts, "righted the ship." Brower kept these iconic news media brands alive until recently when he announced his intention to sell all the media holdings — now under the corporate name of “Masthead Maine.”
And that is where today's story begins, where a handful of Maine-based, retired news media execs have come together in hopes of keeping their home as it is today — the only state in the U.S. that does not have one newspaper owned by an out-of-state, corporate media empire.
One of those retirees is a locally well-known, longtime columnist for the Press Herald, Bill Nemitz, who leads a group that includes the recently retired president and CEO of Graham Media Group, Emily Barr. Together they serve on the board of directors for the new Maine Journalism Foundation (MaineJF). This nonprofit organization's mission is to "Preserve and nurture Maine’s reputation as a bastion for independent local news.”
MaineJF seems to be moving now in over-drive, working quickly to assemble a group of local and national donors to acquire $15 million in hopes of purchasing Masthead Maine from Reade Brower and turning it into a nonprofit, statewide news operation, similar to others E&P has reported on such as The Baltimore Banner and The Salt Lake City Tribune.
Nemitz recently penned an editorial for the Portland Press Herald, outlining the two major reasons why the MaineJF is working to take over these titles and save them from outside ownership. He wrote, "First, we've all seen what happens when venture capital firms — the predominant for-profit buyers of local newspapers these days — swoop into a market seeking only instant payback on their investment. Real estate and other hard assets get liquidated. Newsrooms get decimated. News — from the workings of local government to the drama of high school sports — goes unreported. And just like that, readers like you are left in the dark. In the timeless words of Joni Mitchell, 'Don't it always seem to go that you don't know what you've got till it's gone.'"
Nemitz then goes on to argue that MaineJF’s goal is to turn the media company into a nonprofit entity, stating, "(As) a nonprofit, we exist solely to enhance the journalism, to enlighten our communities, to enrich the public square with real facts, with informed analysis and, most fundamentally in this age of 'fake news' and disinformation, with the truth."
In this 187th episode of "E&P Reports," we chat with two of the founding board members of the new Maine Journalism Foundation (MaineJF). This organization is racing to raise $15 million to purchase and keep the now-for-sale Masthead Maine out of corporate hands. Masthead Maine is a locally-owned, statewide media company publishing 23 newspapers. In this episode are MaineJF president and well-known retired local journalist Bill Nemitz and board member and Maine resident Emily Barr, who recently retired as the president & CEO of Graham Media Group.
A recent Gallup/Knight Foundation study revealed, "Only 26% of Americans have a favorable opinion of the news media, the lowest level since Gallup and Knight began tracking in 2017.” But this study also suggests: "Many Americans are not solely skeptical of news today — they feel distrust on an emotional level, believing news organizations intend to mislead them and are indifferent to the social and political impact of their reporting.”
The main takeaway from the study may be that it states: “Emotional trust is more deeply rooted and is especially important to understand in the context of the news media. This study shows that emotional trust has a strong relationship to perceptions and behaviors that could harm the critical, mutually beneficial relationship between the health of the press and the health of U.S. democracy. The more emotional trust Americans have in the news, the more likely they are to say news organizations balance staying in business and serving the public well.”
These findings, published by Knight in February of 2023, help reaffirm the need for the news media industry to apply some form of self-directed standards to evaluate and score a news platform's level of credibility and trust.
One of the organizations that has been working towards this goal is the nonprofit, nonpartisan Trust Project, which defines itself as "a global network of news organizations working to affirm and amplify journalism's commitment to transparency, accuracy and inclusion." The method behind the scoring of a participating partner's news media platform is their eight Trust Indicators® which is "a collaborative, journalism-generated standard for news that helps both regular people and the technology companies’ machines easily assess the authority and integrity of news.”
As E&P has been reporting, the Trust Project has added media partners and "top line" funds to its spreadsheets, thanks to a recent $500,000 contribution from longtime supporter Craig Newmark Philanthropies.
The Trust Project operates as a consortium of top news companies led by founder and award-winning journalist Sally Lehrman.
In this episode of "E&P Reports," Lehrman talks about the Trust Project's research of news consumers — called interview sets. Initial studies revealed that “many people work very hard to check and cross-check the news to be sure they can trust it. Others feel overwhelmed by the quantity of news. Still, others are frustrated and angry by what they feel is misrepresentation.” The Trust Project found out that “people wanted a lot more information about, as one interviewee put it, ‘how the story was built.” A summary of the project’s first round of interviews appears in Lehrman’s 2017 essay in The Atlantic: “What People Really Want From News Organizations.”
Lehrman goes on to say that more recent findings reveal that in 2020, everyone became more engaged with news, but there was a lot of anxiety as well. She stated, "(People) were upset about what they were reading in the news and anxious about it. They were worried that they'd heard about all the mis- and disinformation. They were worried that they would get fooled by it.”
Lehrman went on to say, "There's this middle group that I call the anxious middle who are ready and open for news they can trust. And it's just for us to walk into... In through the door that's open for us by them.”
In this 186th episode of “E&P Reports,” we explore the nonprofit, nonpartisan Trust Project as we chat one-on-one with its founder and CEO, Peabody Award-winning journalist Sally Lehrman, who talks about the organizations founding in 2014 and the methods they employ today to: "Help news organizations make it clear that we do have standards and policies and rules that help journalists walk this path of independence and away from any kind of personal agenda, business agenda, or government agenda.”
To those media executives that attend major conferences or keep their "ears to the ground" through industry news blogs and sites, Guy Tasaka is already well known as an expert and resource that many have followed to stay on top of technology and navigate the turbulent waters of the ever-changing media landscape.
Guy's innovative career spans decades as senior director of product management at WideOrbit, general manager of mobile at GateHouse Media, vice president and chief digital officer at Calkins Media, a sales and strategic leader at The New York Times, and most recently, the founding manager of the Google News Initiative (GNI) funded Local Media Association Technology Resource Center. Beginning this month, Guy has added another position to his LinkedIn profile: Technology Columnist for Editor & Publisher Magazine (E&P).
Guy's first assignment for E&P was to cover the world’s largest gathering (65,000+) of electronic media professionals and innovators — the 2023 National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) annual convention in Las Vegas. His mission was to dissect the most important takeaways that could benefit the news publishing industry: "Three takeaways from NAB — In a period of disruption for broadcast, there are opportunities for newspapers.”
In this 185th episode of "E&P Reports," we chat with Editor & Publisher's new Technology Columnist, well-known media consultant Guy Tasaka about his recent report on the NAB 2023 annual convention to learn what the news publishing industry should know from the world's largest gathering of broadcast professionals.
According to a recent report from the Dorothy A. Johnson Center for Philanthropy, total giving from all sources in the U.S. rose from $124.31 billion in 1993 to just over $360 billion last year (2022). However, the report cites that the total giving figure has continued to track closely with the size of the U.S. economy, where the overall "giving " figure remained at roughly 2% of the national GDP over those 20 years.
What the report does show as a major shift is a change from total giving coming from individuals versus foundations, the giving coming from foundations rising significantly, from less than 7% in 1992 to nearly 19% of all giving today.
As more and more news publishers seek innovative sustainable new revenue models to offset the cost of their newsrooms, more and more money is becoming available to support local journalism through philanthropic entities. In this episode of E&P Reports, we explore "The Chronicle of Philanthropy" (CoP), a monthly magazine that covers the nonprofit world and is read by charity leaders, foundation executives, fundraisers, and others involved in philanthropy. The publication was founded in 1988 by Phil Semas and Stacy Palmer, who today is the editor. In May of 2022, CoP announced plans to spin off and become an independent, nonprofit organization that achieved its 501(c)(3) status in February of 2023 upon approval by the IRS.
In this one-on-one with CoP editor Stacy Palmer, we explore why the philanthropic world is becoming more interested in supporting local journalism and how we in the news media industry may be able to use our resources to help educate those in charge of giving. Palmer says: ” (it’s) fascinating right now is to watch how much interest there is in the foundation world and among big donors about funding local journalism. Grant givers are very, very concerned about the fact that democracy is falling apart because we don't have strong journalism. So, we are covering that and watching that a lot.”
Palmer stated, " I think philanthropy is distressed by the fact that there just aren't resources for local journalism. So, they know that quality journalism isn't happening. For example, when people aren't going and covering the school boards, that is not a good thing. That means people aren't voting in a way that makes sense because they don't have any information. That's what motivates foundations to say, "I want to make sure there is somebody who can go and cover those kinds of things."
In this 184th episode of “E&P Reports,” we explore the world of philanthropy through the eyes of those who are in charge of where the money goes with The Chronicle of Philanthropy's editor Stacy Palmer who offers insights into the whys and hows big donors are motivated to support local journalism.
Imagine you are managing a downsized, metro, state capital newsroom. Within four weeks, your newsroom covers once-in-a-generation tornado devastation, a school shooting that takes the lives of six individuals, a legislature that expels two minority members erupting into a globally watched real-time protest, the crash of two Black Hawk helicopters that took nine lives at nearby Fort Campbell and the passage of several local and statewide anti-LBGTQ bills, one that bans the performance of drag shows. Additionally, you are assigning reporters, shooters, and editors while operating on a hybrid schedule where not all in your newsroom work within a single location. Finally, add to that the fact that your newsroom not only has to feed multi-platform, real-time content to your statewide audience, but you are also under a mandate to act as the regional hub for a national network with all their readers turning their attention to the community you report on.
Well, you don’t have to imagine what that single month of journalism would be like because that was the real-life scenario that the Tennessean Editor Michael Anastasi and his management team continue to experience in Nashville, TN.
In this 183rd episode of E&P reports, we speak with the newsroom management team of the Tennessean in Nashville, Tennessean and explore four weeks of their hectic world reporting on deadly tornadoes, a school shooting that took the lives of six people (including three children), the state legislature expelling two minority representatives and the subsequent protests, the crash of two Black Hawk helicopters along with having to report on various anti LBTGQ bill passages. We'll ask how they covered these stories in a downsized, hybrid newsroom environment while simultaneously feeding the USA Today Network. Appearing are Editor Michael Anastasi, News Director Ben Goad, Breaking News Editor Gary Estwick, Content Strategist and City Editor Liz Shoebauer, Politics and Investigation Editor Duane Gang, along with Director of Multimedia Projects Ayrik Whitney and Visuals Director Jeremy Harmon.
On April 5, 2019, Alec Johnson, the editor & publisher of The Waterville Times, the flagship publication of the Johnson Newspaper Corporation, of which he is also president, penned an editorial entitled “Readers think newspapers are doing fine: here’s the truth.” Within the article, one can almost feel his frustrations, citing a Pew Research survey that stated 71% of Americans believed that local news media organizations were doing well financially, while just 14 percent said they have directly paid for "local news services.” Perhaps that article was intended as a “warning shot” to the readers within the communities his newspapers served; like many publishers, Johnson Newspapers could not continue financing his newsrooms at the same pace in a culture of declining circulation and advertising revenues.
In less than 60 days, on June 14, 2019, Johnson announced they were shutting down the only four newspapers that served the 100,000+ residents of St. Lawrence County, New York, which included the 100+-year-old Canton (NY) St. Lawrence Plain Dealer serving the county seat and the 160+-year-old Ogdensburg (NY) Journal, that served the largest city within St. Lawrence County.
For almost two years, these communities experienced what it was like to work, live and play within what we have labeled in our industry a "news desert," defined by Wikipedia as:
"a community that is no longer covered by a daily or nondaily newspaper." According to the June 2022 Northwestern University/ Medill study entitled "The State of Local News," more than one-fifth of Americans now live in an area with limited access to local news. Another study from the Center for Information, Technology and Public Life (CITAP) revealed, "The information vacuum left when communities lose dedicated news coverage can have wide-ranging effects." The study stated, "Without a source for local news, community members get most of their news from social media, leaving them vulnerable to mis- and disinformation and exacerbating political polarization.”
This special "E&P Reports," is part of the new initiative we call "The Local News Media Road Show,” produced in partnership with the Rebuild Local News Coalition, where we explore the local communities that have experienced the loss of local news coverage, and how the disappearance of local, authoritative, independent journalism has affected the residents, businesses and overall culture of the citizens who've lost their "voice." In this episode, we travel to St. Lawrence County, NY, where in June of 2019, the community lost all four local newspapers, causing businesses and citizens to rally together to help bring them back just two years later. Appearing in the broadcast are St. Lawrence County District 1 Legislator, Republican James Reagen andOgdensburg (NY) Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Laura Pearson. Also participating are the editors of the now revived Ogdensburg (NY) Journal and Canton (NY) St. Lawrence Plain Dealer.
There’s no question that Evening Post Publishing, owners of the Charleston Post and Courier (P&C), have been expanding their commitment to local journalism, while other media companies publishing in South Carolina have been downsizing their newsrooms. E&P initially reported in July of 2020 that the P&C had opened news operations in Greenville, where Gannett owned the legacy title, and in Myrtle Beach, a McClatchy market.
And again, in June of 2022, E&P published a feature story on how even though 10 South Carolina newspapers had already shut down during a global pandemic, the Post & Courier had launched their "Uncovered" project, adding and assigning journalists to different state regions to cover.
But recently, as Executive Editor Autumn Phillips stated, "The Post and Courier has gone all-in by strategically expanding from a core market publication to a statewide newsroom. In each new community, we’ve incubated different models to identify the combination of funding and beat approaches that would lead to a long-term sustainable business and address growing news deserts in South Carolina.”
An example of this expansion is now in Florence, where Lee Enterprises owns the local newspaper. Here the P&C partnered with Francis Marion University to create a learning newsroom funded by donors and digital subscriptions. With these monies, the market is being served by an editor, a publisher, three reporters and six interns.
In total, The Post and Courier has added 27 new reporters working in Columbia, Rock Hill, and Hilton Head (McClatchy markets) and across three other newsrooms as part of this statewide expansion. Phillips stated: "These investments were made with the belief that in-depth reporting in markets hungry for local news will grow digital subscriptions to a level by 2025 that will fully fund the statewide news organization.”
In this 181st episode of E&P Reports, we “look under the hood” at the Charleston Post and Courier's tailor-made, market-by-market, statewide expansion and why, while others are downsizing, they are finding innovative ways to provide quality local journalism throughout South Carolina. Appearing on this broadcast are P&C Executive Editor Autumn Phillips and Chief Opportunity & Marketing Officer Chris Zoeller, along with PJ Browning, president newspaper division at Evening Post Publishing.
On its website, the Journalism Funding Partners (JFP) states a mission to “Increase the depth, diversity and sustainability of local journalism by building and stewarding connections between funders and news organizations.” Founded as a 501 (C)(3) in 2019 by the former publisher of the Raleigh News & Observer, Orage Quarles and internationally recognized reporter and senior consultant for the Democracy Fund, Sheila Solomon. JFP has secured and managed more than $5 million in grants to help support new and existing journalism coverage.
One of the funding projects that the JFP coordinated allowed for the Nashville Tennessean to create its first beat solely dedicated to covering local First Amendment issues. Thanks to these funds, Angele Latham has been winning national attention with her local reporting on the Sumner County (TN) governing board’s passage of an amendment declaring that the county would uphold “Judeo-Christian values.” Latham also was responsible for recent, in-depth coverage of current Tennessee laws passed that restrict “drag show” performances within the state.
Funds managed by JFP also helped create a new beat at the Raleigh News and Observer, centering on climate change and the environment, covered by reporter Adam Wagner. Wagner’s recent investigative series centering on “Big Poultry” exposed how the more than 4,600 state poultry farms that raise more than 1 billion chickens and turkeys each year impact more than 230,000 North Carolina residents to un-checked odor and manure, which has proven to cause illness and reduce property values. Recently Wagner and his Editor Bill Church won the 2023 Victor K. McElheny Award for local and regional science journalism from this series.
In this 180th episode of “E&P Reports," we speak with two reporters covering beats that exist today, thanks to the funding managed by Journalism Funding Partners (JFP). Appearing are the Nashville Tennessean’s first reporter to be focused solely on First Amendment issues, Angele Latham and the Raleigh News and Observer's new climate change and environment reporter Adam Wagner. Explaining how JFP was able to help create these and other new local journalism initiatives is executive director Rusty Coats.
On February 21, 2023, six news publishing companies: The Baltimore Banner, Block Club Chicago, The Colorado Sun, the Daily Memphian, Long Beach Post and Lookout Local/Lookout Santa Cruz, announced they were forming an organization they collectively called the Alliance for Sustainable Local News (ASLN).
Their industry press release stated these six publishers all shared a “belief in the power of local news to make communities and people’s lives better.” These six have also “found common ground in the successful building of new high-quality, trustworthy, non-partisan news organizations, large enough to serve their communities’ primary news needs.” And “share fundamental values in the greater movement to revive, reinvent and renew the kind of local news journalism communities all across North America deserve.”
Over the last two decades, ASLN founding member, author and industry analyst Ken Doctor has been known not to “pull punches” regarding his opinions about how hedge funds and large corporations have been hurting the industry. When announcing the formation of the ASLN, Doctor stated, “It’s no longer a question of searching for models that might replace dailies whose owners have disinvested. Our members are doing that — and becoming the primary, go-to news sources for their communities.”
However, even though the new ASLN members claim they share “key in-common characteristics,” such as being mission-driven and business-driven in “believing sustainable local news of scale must establish itself largely on earned revenue,” there are several dissimilarities within this group of six. For example, three operate as non-profits, and one recently purchased a community, print-based newspaper group. Finally, one functions as a public-benefit corporation.
As far as the actual company leaders who started the ASLN, three come from a background of senior-level leadership in legacy media companies. Two come from legacy media senior editorial posts. And one came to the news publishing industry from a human resources and municipality public relations career.
However, even though each of these news publishing platforms and their leaders have different origins, these six have developed a strong bond, believing that they may have found a collective way to blend their ideas into a news publishing business sustainability “secret sauce.”
In this 179th episode of “E&P Reports,” we chat with five of the six news publishers who have banded together to form the Alliance for Sustainable Local News. This diverse group believes they collectively care about building a genuine, sustainable local news publishing business model. Speaking with host and E&P publisher Mike Blinder are Imtiaz Patel, CEO of the Baltimore Banner; Larry Ryckman, editor and president of The Colorado Sun; Eric Barnes, CEO of the Daily Memphian; David Sommers, CEO and publisher of the Long Beach Post and Ken Doctor, CEO of Lookout Local/Lookout Santa Cruz.
On February 8, 2023, the citizens of Pulaski, TN were shocked to hear that their 167-year-old newspaper was to be shut down. Then owner David Lake, along with publisher Scott Stewart announced in a statement that: “Declining advertising and subscription revenues combined with increasing costs, finally reached a point where maintaining the Pulaski (Tennessee) Citizen as a business has not been possible, and that county will have no newspaper or news platform dedicated solely to covering local news, sports, events, government and people.”
Pulaski is a city in the county seat of Giles County, located on the central-southern border of Tennessee, where Wikipedia shows a 2020 population recorded as 8,397. The city lies halfway between Nashville, TN and Huntsville, AL, on the I-65 corridor.
The paper’s publisher Scott Stewart, who was born in Pulaski and began as a reporter at the paper in 1995 stated in the closing announcement: “As devastating as this is for those of us who cherish what local news is and means to our community, so many people will never realize what they’ve lost until it’s gone. That may be the saddest part of the whole thing. Personally, I offer my apologies to everyone who does care that the PULASKI CITIZEN is going away. It went down on my watch, and I accept responsibility for my part in its demise."
But, as negative and sad as Stewart's words were, he possibly was unaware of how much the county's citizens actually supported the Citizen. Recently elected Pulaski Mayor J.J. Brindley stated in this interview with E&P that his family "always supported the newspaper" and (that he) relied on the Citizen to ensure pertinent information about the town could be placed. He went on to say: “I believed in the newspaper with everything I have.” And that he and other Pulaski residents were "scared" when the news about the closing was published. However, Mayor Brindley continued, "This almost HAD TO HAPPEN for people to see how valuable this paper is and how much they did to serve this community!”
However, within that same week the Citizen was publishing its last issue, word about the closing came to Dave Gould, the owner of Main Street Media, a company he founded in 2013 that publishes 12 local weekly newspapers in 10 Nashville-area counties. Once he got word via a Facebook post shared by one of his reporters, he quickly contacted then-owner David Lake. In a matter of hours, he negotiated a purchase and saved the publication from extinction.
Gould stated, "There was a passion for this newspaper within the community. There was a lot of angst and worry about it closing. So, we felt good about the purchase and have seen overwhelming support from the people of Pulaski.”
In this 178th episode of "E&P Reports," we explore a single week in the life of the 167-year-old Pulaski (TN) Citizen — a newspaper announced its closing, the citizen's reactions to the pending loss of their newspaper of record, and the last-minute saving of the publication as a new owner swooped in to purchase it. Chatting with the host and publisher of E&P Magazine, Mike Blinder, were recently-elected Pulaski Mayor J.J. Brindley, Citizen Publisher and Pulaski life-long resident Scott Stewart, and the new owner of the paper, Main Street Media's CEO and Founder Dave Gould.
For two decades, Dr. Richard Haass has been the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, an independent, nonpartisan think tank organization that states this mission on its website: “To help people better understand the world and the foreign policy choices facing the United States and other countries.”
Also, his expertise in international affairs and U.S. foreign policy has been tapped by our government, acting as the chair for the multiparty negotiations in Northern Ireland in 2012. From 2001 to 2003, Haass was the director of policy planning for the Department of State, acting as a principal advisor to Colin Powell during the war in Iraq.
However, most of us know Richard Haass from his many appearances on national newscasts and as a consultant to NBC News — providing context to stories centering on international relations and our foreign policy. And within these decades of work, he has managed to find time to author over a dozen books that center on helping us understand the complexities of our place in the world. These include the New York Times bestsellers: "The World: A Brief Introduction” (2020), “A World in Disarray: American Foreign Policy and the Crisis of the Old Order” (2017) and “War of Necessity, War of Choice: A Memoir of Two Iraq Wars” (2010).
However, this year, Richard Haass took a different turn in his writing, authoring his latest book: "The Bill of Obligations: The Ten Habits of Good Citizens” (2023), a bestseller that centers on his years of experience looking at the world and shifting that focus in taking a hard look at ourselves — the people of the United States — to help us define the meaning of our citizenship and what our obligations are to help maintain our democracy. Within the book, Dr. Haass argues, "We get the government and the country we deserve. Getting the one we need, however, is up to us.”
Within the book, Haass lists 10 “obligations” we have as citizens that include the need for us to remain civil, value norms, stay open to compromise, put our country first, get involved, promote the common good and others. However, the 1st of these obligations is “Be Informed,” stating, "An informed citizen is someone who puts himself or herself in a position to weigh what others say or write and contribute their own perspectives. Ideally, this individual would also know something of the country’s history and how it came to be what it is today, as it is impossible to understand the present without an appreciation of the past." Dr. Haass continues, "It is essential to differentiate among facts, misstatements, opinions, predictions and recommendations. Facts are assertions that can be demonstrated to be so, measured, and proved.”
In this 177th episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with Dr. Richard Haass, the president of the Council of Foreign Relations and author of the current New York Times bestseller: “The Bill of Obligations: The Ten Habits of Good Citizens,” where he looks at the things, we as Americans should do to maintain a healthy democracy. In this episode, E&P Publisher Mike
Ryan Dohrn is a motivational speaker, won an Emmy for sales & marketing, has been recognized by Forbes.com with the “Best of the Web” award for his business strategies and is considered one of the top media sales trainers in the world today.
Since 2008, Dohrn’s Brain Swell Media consulting company has helped over 200 media companies find new revenue through innovative sales strategies and his unique ad sales training.
Today, Dohrn is also the owner and CEO of Niche Media, an organization that claims its "ethos" is centered around creating events that bring together like-minded media pros to help drive revenue through niche publishing. Hundreds gather at the yearly Niche Media Conference to attend programs focusing on revenue generation, sales training, audience growth, and emerging media trends.
In this 176th episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with multimedia sales guru Ryan Dohrn to gain new ideas he shares on how news publishers can grow top-line revenue in the ever-increasing turbulence in a post-covid market. He offers innovative insights into how any media sales rep can build essential relationships with new advertisers in a very competitive media ecosystem. Dohrn also provides a sneak peek into what will be presented at the April 2023 Niche Media Conference in New Orleans and why any media company today should be "all in" on creating niche media products.
The Medford, Oregon Mail Tribune can trace its roots back to 1909 when the morning Medford Mail and afternoon Tribune merged under the Putnam family, creating what the paper claimed to be "The largest printing and publishing establishment in Southern Oregon.”
It was decades later that this venerable brand would begin a journey of "swap and sale," moving from Down jones/ Ottaway ownership to Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp., to Newcastle Investment Corp. (an affiliate of Fortress Investment Group) and later merging into the growing Gatehouse Media Group.
Gatehouse sold the Mail Tribune in 2017 to media businessman Steven Saslow and its sister paper, the Ashland Daily Tidings, for $15 million. Saslow then reportedly secured financing from the right-wing-centered Sinclair broadcast group that same week, according to public records obtained by Jefferson Public Radio. Shortly after the purchase, the paper began working under the ownership name of Rosebud Media in conjunction with the Sinclair-owned TV station in Medford, KTVL. In a very short time, many of the newspaper's newsroom employees were let go, replacing most of the website content with video programming. In 2018, Mail Tribune online viewers were 1st greeted with a “Rosebud Update” video, which included national and local headlines from a studio in Florida and a right-wing oriented video op-ed section entitled Rosewood Commentary.
In August 2021, the Mail Tribune went from printing the newspaper seven days a week to four days per week. Then, on September 30, 2023, Saslow announced that the Mail Tribune would cease publication of a printed edition, stating that "printing and delivery costs for the newspaper were threatening the business.” And finally, on Wednesday, January 11, 2023, Saslow made the unexpected announcement that he was shutting down the online operations altogether and letting the entire team go — thus ending the over 100 years of publishing.
While the industry was grappling with the idea of Oregon’s fourth largest MDA with a population of over 200,000, losing its newspaper of record, news soon broke that EO Media Group, a fourth-generation family-owned company based in Oregon that publishes 18 titles, was going to launch a new newspaper to serve the Medford area, The Rouge Valley Tribune, with a debut print edition “hitting the streets” today, February 18, 2023.
EO Media Group stated that they will place an editorial staff of 14 in the newsroom. The editorial team will work for long-time Mail Tribune journalist and former editor David Smigelski, who EO Media COO Heidi Wright recently hired. Smigelski reminisced about his 16-plus years at Mail Tribune in his first editorial for the new Rouge Valley Tribune, stating, "We became pawns in a multinational media chess game." He then said, "The Mail Tribune was abruptly closed on January 13, with just two days' notice to employees. Ten days later, I was standing inside the JC Penney building in Medford with Bulletin publisher Heidi Wright, figuring out where to put desks and phones. As we planned, she used words I could understand. “We know newspapers aren’t a cash cow, but we’re not here to get rich,” she said. “We want to do this because it’s important.” I wanted to hug her, but I thought it might be unprofessional. Crying was probably poor form, as well, but I couldn’t stop a little mist from building up. After 16 years, I feel like I'm back home. With newspaper people — family people.”
In this 175th episode of "E&P Reports," we explore how EO Media Group is replacing the now shut-down Medford, Oregon Mail Tribune with its new start-up publication: "The Rouge Valley Tribune." We speak with EO Media Group's COO Heidi Wright and EO Media Group Board Member and Director of Audience Development Susan Forester Rana about why and how the company is committing to launch a new print publication during such tumultuous times. Also joining in the dialogue is David Smigelski, former editor of the Mail Tribune, now in his first week of print publishing as editor of the new The Rouge Valley Tribune.
In May of 2020, The Anchorage Daily News (ADN) was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for their yearlong series entitled “Lawless,” which provided an in-depth look at the criminal justice system's failures across Alaska.
The team who created the series was led by ADN special projects editor Kyle Hopkins who had the assistance of ProPublica, the nonprofit entity that assists news publishers nationwide with investigative reporting projects.
As “Lawless” was being picked up by national news sources resulting in a visit by then U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr, Hopkins started hearing from TV and movie producers who began showing interest in adapting the stories the ADN was uncovering. It was Tom McCarthy, the well-known writer and director of the 2016 Emmy Award-winning movie "Spotlight," centered on the Boston Globe's investigation of sexual abuse by the Roman Catholic clergy, who had been thinking of creating a show that went deeper inside the workings of a newspaper newsroom. He eventually brought the ADN into the national spotlight by making the current popular ABC TV series "Alaska Daily."
McCarthy came to Alaska, met with Hopkins and spent time exploring the workings of the Daily News. Due to industry cost-cutting, the ADN moved from its huge stoic downtown building to its current strip mall location. Hopkins eventually was made an executive producer for "Alaska Daily," traveling to the Vancouver studios and working with the actors and writers to help them understand the current world of local journalism.
In a recent interview with Alaska Public Media, Hopkins described the TV show as "a fictional workplace drama that shares a lot in common with the Anchorage Daily News. And it's meant to kind of be about how local news is made. I mean, you know how it is. The stories that we cover are, there are times where you think, "Boy, you couldn't make this up." And so, I don't know that this fiction is stranger than truth; it's just different in this case.”
In this 174th episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with Alaska Daily News, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and executive producer of the ABC TV series "Alaska Daily," Kyle Hopkins. E&P Publisher Mike Blinder speaks with Hopkins not only about his role in making the show, but how his original reporting on the failures of the criminal justice system across Alaska inspired the stories the actors are telling
In the January 2023 issue of Editor & Publisher Magazine, E&P featured an article about Dr. Peter Laufer's book, “Slow News: A Manifesto for the Critical News Consumer,” and the subsequent film documentary "Slow News" that speaks to how media companies chasing "clicks" in a digital age has led to the erosion of quality journalism and the public’s trust.
However, what this professor of journalism and James N. Wallace Chair of Journalism at the University of Oregon was chasing was a personal dream to save the local cities newspaper — The Eugene (OR) Register-Guard.
In a recent article for the local weekly entitled "How to Save the 'Guarded-Register, ' Dr. Laufer writes, "We in Eugene are witnessing the slow murder of our daily newspaper. But maybe, just maybe, what’s rapidly becoming too thin to wrap fish and line the bird cage, can still be saved." He goes on to state, "When what's now the Gannett Company — the corporate monster that owns more U.S. newspapers than any other — bought the R-G, butchery began: de facto pink slips to venerable reporters and editors and photographers in the form of buyouts, and local news coverage replaced with outdated reporting from elsewhere via Gannett’s USA TODAY network.”
Dr. Laufer also recently published an op-ed for Inside Higher Ed entitled "A Plan to Save the Daily Paper." He told the story of how he approached Gannett to explore the idea of having his students take over the newspaper writing. Within the piece, he reports that he began the process by calling CEO Mike Reed and was connected to Amalie Nash, the Gannett senior vice president of local news and audience development, who performed a “gracious” entrée to Gannett’s senior vice president for corporate development, Jay Fogarty.
Laufer states that Fogarty wrote a note to him saying that “the Register-Guard is a paper we plan to own and operate long-term." However, in a subsequent phone conversation about the idea of offering the paper to the University, Laufer writes that Fogarty said, "I'm all for it when the paper stops making money. Glad we're talking. But at this point, it does make some money."
In this 173rd episode of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with Peter Laufer, Ph.D., an award-winning journalist, professor of journalism, James N. Wallace Chair of Journalism at the University of Oregon and author of "Slow News: A Manifesto for the Critical News Consumer." We ask Laufer about his recent campaign to get Gannett to donate the city’s paper of record, The Eugene Register-Guard, to the school and his views on the media industry today.
The numbers are staggering. As the U.S. population grows, the number of local newsroom employees continues to decline, as an average of two newspapers shut down each week. Moreover, research shows that a shortage of local news harms the very fabric of our communities. With less new coverage comes more government corruption and local apathy regarding voting or civic involvement.
And today, with large corporations and hedge funds who now own what was once vibrant family-owned local news operations and seek more profit by gutting newsrooms, less and less local reporting is taking place. This has created "ghost newspapers" that generate only a handful of stories each week that serve the common good.
Over the past few years, some controversial bills have been introduced into Congress to tap into the large amount of locally available ad revenue that has been gobbled up by "big tech." Historically, that revenue was used to help fund local newsrooms. One of the bills that did not gain complete industry support was the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act" (JCPA), which, if passed, would give news publishers the ability to collectively negotiate with “big tech” platforms for content compensation. Other bills, like the Local Journalism Sustainability Act (LJSA), were floated to offer tax credits to help fund news operations.
Some have said that the challenge facing our industry's advocacy has been our lack of ability to work with one common "voice," with different media associations working separately with other priorities and agendas.
Today with the core mission of helping to advance public policies to counter the collapse of local news, revitalize community journalism and strengthen democracy, the Rebuild Local News Coalition (RLN) was started by Steven Waldman, who initially incubated the GroundTruth Project and Report for America. A recent RLN press release that announced the organization’s gaining non-profit status lists members that include the Institute for Nonprofit News, the Local Media Consortium (LMC), the National Newspaper Publishers Association, the Association of Alternative Newsmedia (AAN), the National Association of Hispanic Publishers and the Local Independent Online News Association (LION). The News Guild-CWA, one of the largest news labor unions in the country, is also part of the coalition.
When asked why large, established industry lobbying and advocacy organizations like the News/Media Alliance (NMA), National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) and America’s Newspapers were notably absent from the list, Waldman responded that the coalition wished to maintain a more local focus when it came to member news media organizations. And even though these groups were not listed members of the RLN, they have and will coordinate with them when it is warranted.
The RLN has reportedly raised close to $1-million dollars in philanthropic donations from Ford Foundation, Knight Foundation, MacArthur Foundation and Microsoft Corporation.
In this 172nd episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with Steven Waldman, co-founder of Report for America and chair of the Rebuild Local News Coalition, an alliance of local news organizations that has recently become an independent nonprofit planning to advance a range of public policies addressing the accelerating crisis in local news threatening so many communities. E&P Publisher Mike Blinder asks Waldman why the new coalition is necessary and what its priorities are, what initiatives they are championing and how they can help move public policies along on a state and national level, including payroll tax credits, proposals to target government advertising spending toward local news instead of social media and reducing the influence of hedge funds on local newspapers.
For just under two decades, residents in Bucks County, Penn., a suburb of Philadelphia, were served by the Bucks County Herald, a weekly publication started by Bridget Wingert and her late husband, Joseph T. Wingert.
In 2020, as a global pandemic ravaged its advertising base, the family ownership, now including Bridget's son and Publisher Joseph Wingert, had to face the possibility of ceasing publication, which so many other community news publishers did, leaving voids in local cities across the nation.
However, the community support for having a local voice was so strong that in the fall of 2020, the Wingerts donated their ownership to a new charitable entity which formed the Bucks County Herald Foundation, a registered 501(c)(3) non-profit organization, which through private and business donations along with advertising revenue has produced a sustainable business model that serves over 200,000 readers each week.
Recently, the foundation produced a compelling video, viewed by thousands, entitled "Miracle in Bucks County," which even features a testimonial from CNN and SiriusXM host Michael Smerconish.
In this 171st episode of E&P Reports, we reveal the story of the re-birth of suburban Philly weekly, The Bucks County Herald, which rose from the ashes of the global pandemic through a transformation from a family-owned to a non-profit foundation-run local news enterprise. E&P Publisher Mike Blinder question Bridget Wingert, founding editor, and her son Joe Winegert, publisher, on how they formed the new entity, what the community support is like and is this business model one that others can easily replicate.
On December 5th, 2022, well-known news publishing analyst Ken Doctor, published a 2800-plus word updatevia Nieman Lab on the 2-year progress of his innovative Santa Cruz, CA digital news start-up, Lookout Local.
Within the document, Doctor pulls no punches about his opinion on the state of legacy media and its desire to help bolster a sustainable business model via big tech compensation by writing: "Lookout Local has never been about money itself, but money to the end of the mission — money that can prove out the proposition that a robust replacement for suicidal dailies can, indeed, be built. That’s especially important in the age of Gannett’s trainwreck, Axios Local’s skimming, and the misguided Journalism Competition and Preservation act currently before Congress.”
He also claims good progress, with a digital-only local news enterprise reporting that without print costs, 80% of his bottom-line expenses are a staff of 15 full-time people, with 10 working in the newsroom and five on the business side. He also states proudly, "We’re old-fashioned, working in a real office, with face-to-face communication throughout the week." The lengthy article also offers industry advice crafted as 11 important "takeaways" as lessons learned over the past 2-years. They include being patient and aggressive, planning but being improvisational, making good friends, leaning on them, and including students in your newsroom.
In this 170th episode of E&P reports, we check in again with media analyst Ken Doctor on how the last 2-years have gone in his quest to build a perfect, sustainable model in local journalism he calls Lookout Local. We also ask him about his opinions on the future of legacy media and why he was so publicly against the recently failed, Local Journalism Sustainability Act (JCPA). Also appearing is Ashley Harmon (Holmes), Lookout Local’s new director of sales & marketing.
As Executive Vice President and General Counsel for the News Media Alliance, Danielle Coffey leads the advocacy efforts for the NMA's over 2000 news and magazine publishing members worldwide.
2022 was a busy year for Coffey as the U.S. Congress held committee meetings to consider passage of the well-publicized “Journalism Competition and Preservation Act” (JCPA), introduced in the House (H.R. 1735) by Rep. David Cicilline (D-RI) and Rep. Ken Buck (R-CO), and in the Senate (S. 673) by Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA). If made into law, this legislation, greatly supported by the news publishing industry, would allow news publishers to collectively negotiate with “big tech” platforms like Google and Facebook for fair compensation for using the news content these publishers generate.
The NMA has been promoting a number of cogent arguments as to why the JCPA is necessary to help local news publishers maintain sustainable business models. These "talking points" include:
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“News publishers provide must-have content for the platforms to capture viewers. Between 16% and 40% of Google search results are news content. Publishers deserve fair compensation for the value they offer. By not paying them fairly for their content, Big Tech has driven many local outlets out of business.”
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“For every dollar made in digital advertising, the platforms take as much as 70% of the revenue, leaving publishers with a scant 30%. Meanwhile, publishers are paying an additional "ad-tech tax" to the platforms, leaving even less for publishers. As a result of diminished revenues, thousands of journalists have been laid off, and local newspapers have shuttered.”
In mid-December of 2022, it looked like the JCPA might pass into law as an attachment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), a necessary bill designed to keep the military funded. However, the legislation was "erased" from the NDAA at the last minute.
Then as a final attempt to help the JCPA become law before the end of the 177th Congress, legislators attempted to attach it to the controversial $1.7 trillion omnibus spending bill. However, last-minute lobbying from consumer, trade and civil society advocates like the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU); Free Press Action; the Center for Democracy & Technology; and Local Independent Online News Publishers (LION) deluged Congressional leaders with last-minute media that argued against the bill, stating that the JCPA included nothing to guarantee that the monies ultimately paid to news publishers (through negotiation or arbitration) would be used to pay or hire journalists. Their messaging also suggested that the JCPA would favor large media conglomerates, which might “dominate negotiations,” disenfranchising smaller, independent outlets.
In this 169th episode of E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with Danielle Coffey, Executive Vice President and General Counsel for the News Media Alliance (NMA), to gain her perspective on what really happened in 2022 to the nearly passed Journalism Competition and Preservation Act” (JCPA). She'll also address why this controversial legislation, designed to allow news publishers to collectively negotiate with “big tech” platforms like Google and Facebook for fair compensation for their use of the news content they monetize, failed to become the law of the land. Coffey also reviews the next steps the NMA will take to keep this legislation alive and the possible future of other content pending compensation models like publisher tax credits and several pending antitrust suits currently being filed by local media companies.
Dave Stevens is an athlete, a seven-time Emmy Award-winning sports broadcasting professional, and the only person to ever play college football and minor league baseball without legs.
Stevens, a congenital amputee, always had a passion for sports. In high school, he was a three-sport athlete playing football, baseball, and wrestling. Later, he tried out for the Dallas Cowboys, the Cincinnati Reds, and the Minnesota Twins. Stevens even played outfield with former Major League players Barry Bonds and Oddibie McDowell.
Stevens entered media as an Assignment Desk Manager at ESPN, then as the Coverage and Content editor. He worked at ESPN for 20 years, covering 11 Super Bowls, 3 World Series, 3 NCAA Final Fours, and various other historic sports events.
Today he is a reporter for the Disability Channel, where he interviews some of the biggest names in sports and entertainment history. He co-hosts a Celebrity Amputee Golf tournament and is a professional in residence at the School of Communications at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut, where he has founded Ability Media, a program that addresses the lack of representation of people with different abilities across all forms of media.
Stevens states, "Over 20.3 million families in the U.S. have a member with a disability — this includes service men and women in the U.S. Armed Forces who acquired a disability while in service to their country. Yet the disability community has no large single media platform, community leaders or geographic centralization. Existing mainstream T.V. generally lacks role models although people with different abilities appear in commercials and disability themes are finding their way into television and films.”
In this 168th episode of "E&P Reports," we interview Dave Stevens, an Emmy award-winning broadcaster born without legs, who is helping others with disabilities find careers across all forms of media. Stevens chats with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder about his passion for sports, media, and motivating others to look beyond their personal challenges and those of others.
Learn more about Dave Stevens at https://www.davestevensspeaks.com.
Serving as a forum for personal and professional networking is a benefit of social media, but its global reach and popularity have resulted in the posting of information — often described as “news” — from less-than-transparent and unverifiable sources. In this environment, the public has difficulty trusting what they read, hear or see, even when it’s the work of professional journalists and media organizations.
To make it easier for the public to recognize trustworthy journalism, Reporters Without Borders created the Journalism Trust Initiative (JTI) in 2019. It has a three-step process to help media outlets distinguish themselves from the myriad of other sources sharing information on the internet and social media.
This was the topic for discussion during a recent E&P Reports vodcast hosted by Mike Blinder, publisher of Editor & Publisher. His guests were Beth Potter, Ph.D., U.S. regional manager of the Journalism Trust Initiative; Paul Samyn, editor of the Winnipeg Free Press; and Kevin Rehberg, vice president of client development at the Alliance for Audited Media (AAM).
According to Potter, the three-step process was developed in Europe by a panel of journalists convened by the European Commission to determine a set of standards. A web application was created for the JTI website where media outlets can use a questionnaire to judge themselves against these standards.
The three-step process includes the following:
- An internal self-assessment of journalistic policies
- Public disclosure of that assessment in a transparency report
- An independent audit from a licensed, certified body, such as the AAM
“As a former journalist, I don’t think journalists and media outlets market themselves well enough. We should be proud of having standards and explain that we actually do the real work to serve the public. The JTI process can ensure the public that what they are reading comes from media outlets with stated ethics, and the AAM or similar independent bodies have audited them for those ethics and transparency,” Potter said.
The AAM’s traditional function has been to certify the audience a media outlet claims any advertiser will reach when placing advertising with that outlet. Rehberg explained that the AAM has been an independent, nonprofit identity for more than 100 years, differentiating quality news media from all other sources.
“When we learned about the Journalism Trust Initiative, we knew it was right in our wheelhouse. We decided to become part of the Initiative to support journalism in general, but also because JTI’s mission fits so well with ours. We’re now partnering with JTI as one of the certifiers,” Rehberg said.
Samyn and the Winnipeg Free Press have completed the JTI’s three-step process as an additional source of accreditation. The system works differently in Canada than in the United States. The Canadian federal government provides financial support to newspapers that are accredited by a journalism organization based on the number of newsroom employees. This was an effort by the government and the Canadian newspaper industry association to help newspapers overcome the challenge of social media and search engines, such as Google, capturing a substantial portion of advertising revenues those newspapers would otherwise receive.
“We consider trust a point of pride, giving us more strength to serve our readership. For years, any correspondence I have with readers usually ends with the following line before my signature: ‘I hope we continue to earn your trust.’ That’s why we’ve taken the step to certify with Journalism Trust Initiative,” Samyn said.
Publishers and news and media outlets interested in more information about the Journalism Trust Initiative can visit its website at journalismtrustinitiative.org and contact Beth Potter directly at bpotter@rss.org.
Rob Tornoe is a journalist/ cartoonist for the award-winning Philadelphia Inquirer, where some of his work (including political spoofs from Al Gore to Peanuts) is syndicated and internationally recognized. Tornoe also writes & illustrates each month for Editor & Publisher about the many aspects of the news publishing industry.
In this 166th episode of “E&P Reports,” internationally recognized journalist/ cartoonist Rob Tornoe reviews some of his 2022 monthly contributions to E&P Magazine, which include his March 2022 interview with The New York Times's David Leonhardt on “The polarization of pandemic reporting.” An April 2022 column looked at editorial cartoonist David Fitzsimmons. May 2022’s look at how the Pulitzer prize category changes left illustrators feeling slighted. An August 2022 in-depth column looked at Twitter’s possible overuse by newsrooms. A well-researched and sourced piece in September 2022 examined how to keep political reporting from becoming polarized. And there's so much more.
See all of Rob Torne's monthly cartoons for E&P Magaine.
Doug Phares is a passionate business consultant who helps executives find ways to get past all the hurdles and challenges that slow us down. From small-scale work like examining product bundling to assisting decision-makers in developing 3-year plans, Phares has seen it all over the course of his career.
In his news media career, Phares was most recently the CEO of the Sandusky Newspaper Group (SNG), a media holding company operating in Michigan, Ohio, and Tennessee. Before that, he was Boone Newspapers's group president and managed Copley properties.
Today, Phares is managing director of Silverwind Enterprises, a Florida-based firm that provides executive-level business services. He's also the board chair of the Professional Association of Résumé Writers and Career Coaches, an organization with 3,000-plus international members comprised of independent business owners and non-profit career centers such as colleges and universities, military bases, workforce development offices and state Departments of Labor in North America.
In this 165th episode of “E&P Reports," we review this year's contributions to Editor & Publisher Magazine from consultant Dough Phares's "The Corner Office, his monthly advice column for c-suite executives. Topics we cover include how to better onboard and retain quality talent, increasing productivity with what he calls a "Big Mac Presentation," and how to bolster sales by "Getting to the no," increasing a manager's self-awareness by asking, "Are you managing or doing?" And there's much more.
Recently Meta (formally Facebook) made it official that it was leaving the news business, as they included most of the staff that worked within their “Meta Journalism Project Accelerator Program" in the 11,000 company positions eliminated in their mid-November 2022 mass layoffs.
Since 2019, the U.S.-based Local Media Association (LMA) and associated Local Media Foundation worked in partnership with Meta as a facilitator providing administrative services and publishing case studies about how over $16.8 million in funds were distributed across North America to local publishers. The funds were to assist them in initiatives that included building reader revenue, monetarizing branded content and others.
Some within the news publishing industry have criticized big tech companies like Google and Meta’s journalistic philanthropy, stating it was just a means to help them lobby against pending legislation. That legislation — the Journalism Competition & Preservation Act (JCPA) (H.R. 1735 and S. 673) — would allow news publishers to collectively negotiate with the tech platforms for fair compensation for the use of their content.
Others, like former ProPublica president Dick Tofel, have been adding their voice to many who feel that there are flaws in how these hundreds of millions in big-tech philanthropy have been allocated through organizations and not directly from the providers themselves.
However, LMA CEO Nancy Lane has been very outspoken lately in defending the positive impact the Meta Journalism Project has had on the industry, posting a statement about their organization's Meta dollars, "Most of the $16.8 million ($12+ million) was distributed through the COVID-19 relief fund and nearly 80 percent of recipients were family- or independently-owned.”
Lane stated: “More than half of the funds were used to benefit publishers by or for communities of color; nearly 40% were digitally native publishers, and over 1/3 were nonprofits." She also stated that "82% used the grants to expand their local reporting on COVID-19 issues. 23% said the funding outright saved their newsrooms from extinction.”
In this 164th episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with Local Media Association (LMA) and associated Local Media Foundation CEO Nancy Lane on her impressions of how the millions of dollars that Meta/ Facebook has donated to the news publishing industry since 2019 has benefited local journalism and the impact it may have in the future as those funds cease to exist. We also posed questions on the future of local news enterprises and what she feels are viable, sustainable business models for local journalism.
After senior management positions at Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal, Dick Tofel helped start and eventually led the well-known, nonprofit investigative journalistic entity ProPublica for 15 years. Today he consultants the industry as the principal of Gallatin Advisory. However, Tofel recently "lit up the Twittersphere" when he posted on his blog, "Second Rough Draft," an unabashed and unvarnished assessment and warning about how philanthropic funds are awarded to journalistic enterprises. He stated how there may be flaws within the process that some organizations and associations employ today — questioning that "Given limited resources, shouldn't more money go to news orgs directly, even if that means making hard choices?”
In the November 3, 2022 post entitled "A Few Words of Warning About Funding Intermediaries and Philanthropy’s Leaky Bucket,” Tofel states that he is concerned that organizations like LION (Local Independent Online News) Publishers, the Knight Foundationand others “may be getting a bit out of scale” in handling the millions of dollars of funds they allocate. He sees a "more pressing need for funding nonprofit news organizations directly." Tofel states, "To put a finer point on it, I am increasingly worried when I observe what I see as the increasing fragility of many nonprofit newsrooms juxtaposed with the robust growth of the intermediaries whose mission is to support them.”
Within the piece, later "picked up" and published by Harvard's NiemanLab, Tofel cites data showing how half of LION Publishers' members, between the years 2020 and 2021, showed no revenue growth at all, while the association itself had in the same period revenue growth from less than $700,000 to $3.8 million. And The Knight Foundation spent more than $10 million on staff and trustees in 2020 to make $71 million in grants, while the much larger and more diversified Ford Foundation spent on staff and trustees in the same year about as much as Knight spent on grantees ($71 million again) to make about $805 million in grants.
In this 163rd episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with ProPublica founder Dick Tofel, first on his latest opinion piece on how there may be some flaws in how organizations like LION Publishers and the Knight Foundation award millions in philanthropic journalistic funds. And his views that the only sustainable model for local journalism will be nonprofit enterprises.
After senior management positions at Dow Jones and The Wall Street Journal, Dick Tofel helped start and eventually led the well-known, nonprofit investigative journalistic entity ProPublica for 15 years. Today he consultants the industry as the principal of Gallatin Advisory. However, Tofel recently "lit up the Twittersphere" when he posted on his blog, "Second Rough Draft," an unabashed and unvarnished assessment and warning about how philanthropic funds are awarded to journalistic enterprises. He stated how there may be flaws within the process that some organizations and associations employ today — questioning that "Given limited resources, shouldn't more money go to news orgs directly, even if that means making hard choices?”
In the November 3, 2022 post entitled "A Few Words of Warning About Funding Intermediaries and Philanthropy’s Leaky Bucket,” Tofel states that he is concerned that organizations like LION (Local Independent Online News) Publishers, the Knight Foundationand others “may be getting a bit out of scale” in handling the millions of dollars of funds they allocate. He sees a "more pressing need for funding nonprofit news organizations directly." Tofel states, "To put a finer point on it, I am increasingly worried when I observe what I see as the increasing fragility of many nonprofit newsrooms juxtaposed with the robust growth of the intermediaries whose mission is to support them.”
Within the piece, later "picked up" and published by Harvard's NiemanLab, Tofel cites data showing how half of LION Publishers' members, between the years 2020 and 2021, showed no revenue growth at all, while the association itself had in the same period revenue growth from less than $700,000 to $3.8 million. And The Knight Foundation spent more than $10 million on staff and trustees in 2020 to make $71 million in grants, while the much larger and more diversified Ford Foundation spent on staff and trustees in the same year about as much as Knight spent on grantees ($71 million again) to make about $805 million in grants.
In this 163rd episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with ProPublica founder Dick Tofel, first on his latest opinion piece on how there may be some flaws in how organizations like LION Publishers and the Knight Foundation award millions in philanthropic journalistic funds. And his views that the only sustainable model for local journalism will be nonprofit enterprises.
As the news publishing industry continues to fight the big tech giants, Google & Facebook, for what is considered fair compensation for the content journalists create and that the tech companies monetize via clicks and posts, one voice tweets to over 170,000 followers: "Klobuchar's JCPA is shit legislation” and “Protectionism is not a business model. Whining is not a business model. Handouts are not a business model. Lobbying politicians is not a business model. Adding value to communities and their conversations, helping them meet their goals: that is the only model worth pursuing.”
Those tweets and comments belong to the director of the Tow-Knight Center at the Craig Newmark Graduate School at CUNY, Jeff Jarvis, who also posts that “paywalls damage democracy." He states, "When disinformation is free, how can we restrict quality information to the privileged who choose to afford it?”
Jarvis is not a newcomer to our industry, starting in the '70s as a columnist at the San Francisco Examiner, spending most of the '90s as president and creative director at advance.net, the digital arm of Newhouse Newspapers, Conde Nast magazines, Fairchild Publications and Bright House Cable. He eventually began consulting and blogging about digital transformation and teaching at CUNY. He has authored over five books, including: "What Would Google Do?: Reverse-Engineering the Fastest Growing Company in the History of the World (2009)” and “Public Parts: How Sharing in the Digital Age Improves the Way We Work and Live."
In his latest Kindle Single offering, "Guttenberg the Geek,” Jarvis claims that Johannes Gutenberg was our first “geek” and our “patron saint of entrepreneurs," being the original technology entrepreneur, facing the same challenges a Silicon Valley startup deals with today. He even draws a parallel between Guttenberg and Steve Jobs on how they both had to raise capital and mitigate risk to innovate how we would receive our content for centuries.
In this 162nd episode of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with the director of the Tow-Knight Center at the Craig Newmark Graduate School at CUNY, asking Jeff Jarvis his reasons for not supporting current congressional fair compensation efforts and antitrust legislation to help local news publishers continue to find sustainable business models. Why is the industry making a big mistake moving toward paid content models? Why he believes "Media forms have half-lives, newspapers & magazines are fading, and broadcast's age is ending."
As the news publishing industry continues to fight the big tech giants, Google & Facebook, for what is considered fair compensation for the content journalists create and that the tech companies monetize via clicks and posts, one voice tweets to over 170,000 followers: "Klobuchar's JCPA is shit legislation” and “Protectionism is not a business model. Whining is not a business model. Handouts are not a business model. Lobbying politicians is not a business model. Adding value to communities and their conversations, helping them meet their goals: that is the only model worth pursuing.”
Those tweets and comments belong to the director of the Tow-Knight Center at the Craig Newmark Graduate School at CUNY, Jeff Jarvis, who also posts that “paywalls damage democracy." He states, "When disinformation is free, how can we restrict quality information to the privileged who choose to afford it?”
Jarvis is not a newcomer to our industry, starting in the '70s as a columnist at the San Francisco Examiner, spending most of the '90s as president and creative director at advance.net, the digital arm of Newhouse Newspapers, Conde Nast magazines, Fairchild Publications and Bright House Cable. He eventually began consulting and blogging about digital transformation and teaching at CUNY. He has authored over five books, including: "What Would Google Do?: Reverse-Engineering the Fastest Growing Company in the History of the World (2009)” and “Public Parts: How Sharing in the Digital Age Improves the Way We Work and Live."
In his latest Kindle Single offering, "Guttenberg the Geek,” Jarvis claims that Johannes Gutenberg was our first “geek” and our “patron saint of entrepreneurs," being the original technology entrepreneur, facing the same challenges a Silicon Valley startup deals with today. He even draws a parallel between Guttenberg and Steve Jobs on how they both had to raise capital and mitigate risk to innovate how we would receive our content for centuries.
In this 162nd episode of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with the director of the Tow-Knight Center at the Craig Newmark Graduate School at CUNY, asking Jeff Jarvis his reasons for not supporting current congressional fair compensation efforts and antitrust legislation to help local news publishers continue to find sustainable business models. Why is the industry making a big mistake moving toward paid content models? Why he believes "Media forms have half-lives, newspapers & magazines are fading, and broadcast's age is ending."
In 2005 John Garrett started Community Impact Newspaper from the game room of his home with his wife and best friend, Jennifer. They began with the creation of the Pflugerville, Texas edition. Today that one paper is part of a growing empire of over 30 monthly printed and 24/7 digital hyperlocal community news platforms that serves four Texas metropolitan areas.
In 2016, printing and mailing over 2.5-million papers required John to open a 36,000-square-foot printing facility housing a $10 million press operation that works twenty-four hours a day.
Over the years, Community Impact has now received 106 awards for writing and design from the National Newspaper Association. It was also named to Inc. Magazine's top 5000 fastest-growing companies for seven consecutive years.
In this 161st edition of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with John Garrett, CEO and founder of Community Impact, a community newspaper publishing company that mails over 2.5-million editions monthly to over 60 Texas communities while employing over 200 journalists, salespeople and support staff. E&P Publisher Mike Blinder and contributing writer Victoria Holmes ask Garett how he maintains growth and profitability in a news ecosystem that has compressed and shrunk its commitment to people and print.
Andrew Conte, founding director of the Center for Media Innovation at Point Park University, has been receiving wide industry acclaim for his latest book “Death of the Daily News,” which tells the story of how residents in one Pennsylvania community have identified and sorted local news and information since their local newspaper stopped publishing after 131 years. The book also addresses how “citizen gatekeepers” run a new local newspaper and an online news outlet, post to social media sites and seek other platforms for sharing information.
“The massive changes that have caused so much disruption and pain for our industry also are creating opportunities for the future of local journalism,” Conte stated. “While the book focuses on a motif of ‘death,’ the narrative tells a story of rebirth that should give hope for all of us who care about local news and the democratic institutions it supports.”
“The hardest part was probably getting people to trust me enough to talk about what was going on in a community where people are wary of outsiders,” says Conte. “They want to know your intentions and why you are interested in their community before they start talking to you and opening up. And so that took a long time.”
In this 160th episode of “E&P Reports,” we interview veteran reporter-turned-educator Andrew Conte, who founded the Center for Media Innovation at Point Park University in Pittsburgh. He is also the author of “Death of the Daily News,” his latest book, which takes an in-depth look, via local reporting, at what happens when one local community loses its newspaper of record and flounders to find other forms of local journalism.
Andrew Conte, founding director of the Center for Media Innovation at Point Park University, has been receiving wide industry acclaim for his latest book “Death of the Daily News,” which tells the story of how residents in one Pennsylvania community have identified and sorted local news and information since their local newspaper stopped publishing after 131 years. The book also addresses how “citizen gatekeepers” run a new local newspaper and an online news outlet, post to social media sites and seek other platforms for sharing information.
“The massive changes that have caused so much disruption and pain for our industry also are creating opportunities for the future of local journalism,” Conte stated. “While the book focuses on a motif of ‘death,’ the narrative tells a story of rebirth that should give hope for all of us who care about local news and the democratic institutions it supports.”
“The hardest part was probably getting people to trust me enough to talk about what was going on in a community where people are wary of outsiders,” says Conte. “They want to know your intentions and why you are interested in their community before they start talking to you and opening up. And so that took a long time.”
In this 160th episode of “E&P Reports,” we interview veteran reporter-turned-educator Andrew Conte, who founded the Center for Media Innovation at Point Park University in Pittsburgh. He is also the author of “Death of the Daily News,” his latest book, which takes an in-depth look, via local reporting, at what happens when one local community loses its newspaper of record and flounders to find other forms of local journalism.
Most United States municipalities have laws requiring that all public notices must be published by a third-party independent newspaper — a concept that dates to the 1700s. This practice is based on the idea that the people of a democracy have the right to know what is going on with their government and the legal proceedings that occur within their community.
There is no question that the newspaper industry, especially on individual state levels, spends a good deal of resources to maintain that precedent, not only because the public notice linage creates necessary revenues that fund our newsrooms. These small, innocuous postings have helped provide, in many cases, another level of transparency within local governments that has uncovered and delivered a final check on graft and possible theft of tax dollars.
Over time some states and municipalities have found various reasons to try to stop the practice of placing public notices within newspapers of record. For example, in a March 2022 episode of "E&P Reports," this magazine reported on how the state of Florida passed sweeping legislation, reversing their stance on the practice in what was rumored to be the result of a vendetta between the state's governor and a hard hitting investigative reporter (“Florida's public notice reversal”).
More recently, the small town of Westmorland, Kansas' city council took advantage of a loophole in the state charter that allowed certain city governments to opt out of having to place these notices within a newspaper by declaring home rule in the exemption. The council's claim for the change was simply a way to save taxpayer money.
On August 11, 2022, Ned Seaton, the GM and editor-in-chief of the Manhattan (KS) Mercury and the Times of Pottawatomie County Kansas, the newspaper of record of Westmorland, stood in front of the council and pled a case that reminded the council members of the three key implications of the government’s choice to remove notices from newspapers: Budget, transparency, and liability. Within the very text of the recorded speech, Seaton stated to the group: “I am asking you to reverse your vote last month and instead continue to stand for transparency. I am asking you to designate – as your predecessors have designated for decades – an independent, subscription-supported printed newspaper as the verifiable method of notifying the public of what you're doing. By doing so, you'll be not only supporting a regional family-owned business and its employees who cover your meetings, and you'll be using a cost-effective medium and making a statement that you value government accountability — at least to the extent of four-tenths of one percent of your budget." His compelling argument worked; the council voted to reinstate the practice directly after.
In this 159th episode of "E&P Reports," we interview Ned Seaton, the GM and editor-in-chief of the Manhattan (KS) Mercury and the Times of Pottawatomie County Kansas, the newspaper of record of Westmorland, KS. The town decided to suspend the placement of public notices in the local newspaper and then reverse itself when reminded by Seaton of the value and overall benefit the practice itself has for the community as a whole. Also appearing is Emily Bradbury - Executive Director of the Kansas Press Association. She offers her perspective on how important it is that news publishers help in all ways possible to keep this practice in place.
Most United States municipalities have laws requiring that all public notices must be published by a third-party independent newspaper — a concept that dates to the 1700s. This practice is based on the idea that the people of a democracy have the right to know what is going on with their government and the legal proceedings that occur within their community.
There is no question that the newspaper industry, especially on individual state levels, spends a good deal of resources to maintain that precedent, not only because the public notice linage creates necessary revenues that fund our newsrooms. These small, innocuous postings have helped provide, in many cases, another level of transparency within local governments that has uncovered and delivered a final check on graft and possible theft of tax dollars.
Over time some states and municipalities have found various reasons to try to stop the practice of placing public notices within newspapers of record. For example, in a March 2022 episode of "E&P Reports," this magazine reported on how the state of Florida passed sweeping legislation, reversing their stance on the practice in what was rumored to be the result of a vendetta between the state's governor and a hard hitting investigative reporter (“Florida's public notice reversal”).
More recently, the small town of Westmorland, Kansas' city council took advantage of a loophole in the state charter that allowed certain city governments to opt out of having to place these notices within a newspaper by declaring home rule in the exemption. The council's claim for the change was simply a way to save taxpayer money.
On August 11, 2022, Ned Seaton, the GM and editor-in-chief of the Manhattan (KS) Mercury and the Times of Pottawatomie County Kansas, the newspaper of record of Westmorland, stood in front of the council and pled a case that reminded the council members of the three key implications of the government’s choice to remove notices from newspapers: Budget, transparency, and liability. Within the very text of the recorded speech, Seaton stated to the group: “I am asking you to reverse your vote last month and instead continue to stand for transparency. I am asking you to designate – as your predecessors have designated for decades – an independent, subscription-supported printed newspaper as the verifiable method of notifying the public of what you're doing. By doing so, you'll be not only supporting a regional family-owned business and its employees who cover your meetings, and you'll be using a cost-effective medium and making a statement that you value government accountability — at least to the extent of four-tenths of one percent of your budget." His compelling argument worked; the council voted to reinstate the practice directly after.
In this 159th episode of "E&P Reports," we interview Ned Seaton, the GM and editor-in-chief of the Manhattan (KS) Mercury and the Times of Pottawatomie County Kansas, the newspaper of record of Westmorland, KS. The town decided to suspend the placement of public notices in the local newspaper and then reverse itself when reminded by Seaton of the value and overall benefit the practice itself has for the community as a whole. Also appearing is Emily Bradbury - Executive Director of the Kansas Press Association. She offers her perspective on how important it is that news publishers help in all ways possible to keep this practice in place.
The Denton Record-Chronicle, the main newspaper for the city of Denton and Denton County Texas, a suburb of the Dallas/ Fort Worth “Metroplex” with a population slightly under 1-million, recently announced that it is being acquired by KERA public media, the regional public broadcasting facility of north Texas. Assisting to make the deal happen is the National Trust for Local News, a non-profit entity that has a focus on developing the financial end of new business models for local news. And who heled put together the Colorado News Conservancy, a public benefit corporation, which along with a large regional news website has now purchased a number of suburban newspapers near Denver, CO (“Denver News Disruptor Colorado Sun Purchases Suburban Weeklies”).
In this 158th episode of “E&P Reports” we interview Bill Patterson, Publisher of the Denton (TX) Daily Record-Chronicle, Elizabeth Hansen Shapiro, CEO and Co-Founder at The National Trust for Local News (NTLN), Senior Research Fellow at the Tow Center for Digital Journalism and Nico Leone, President & CEO of KERA the public broadcasting outlet in North Texas that just announced the purchase of the Daily Record with the assistance of NTLN. Patterson speaks to how and why he sought out the sale of his 3-generation family-owned media company, while Leone talks about the benefit to public broadcasting expanding into local legacy news and Shapiro explains how deals like this are made and how they may be become much more common in the future.
The Denton Record-Chronicle, the main newspaper for the city of Denton and Denton County Texas, a suburb of the Dallas/ Fort Worth “Metroplex” with a population slightly under 1-million, recently announced that it is being acquired by KERA public media, the regional public broadcasting facility of north Texas. Assisting to make the deal happen is the National Trust for Local News, a non-profit entity that has a focus on developing the financial end of new business models for local news. And who heled put together the Colorado News Conservancy, a public benefit corporation, which along with a large regional news website has now purchased a number of suburban newspapers near Denver, CO (“Denver News Disruptor Colorado Sun Purchases Suburban Weeklies”).
In this 158th episode of “E&P Reports” we interview Bill Patterson, Publisher of the Denton (TX) Daily Record-Chronicle, Elizabeth Hansen Shapiro, CEO and Co-Founder at The National Trust for Local News (NTLN), Senior Research Fellow at the Tow Center for Digital Journalism and Nico Leone, President & CEO of KERA the public broadcasting outlet in North Texas that just announced the purchase of the Daily Record with the assistance of NTLN. Patterson speaks to how and why he sought out the sale of his 3-generation family-owned media company, while Leone talks about the benefit to public broadcasting expanding into local legacy news and Shapiro explains how deals like this are made and how they may be become much more common in the future.
It has only been a few years since the February 2018 announcement that Nicole Carroll was to succeed Joanne Lipman as editor-in-chief of USA Today. She was by no means an outsider to the operation, being part of their Network of more than 200 local digital properties in 45 states. As an editor and vice president of news at The Arizona Republic, Carroll led a team that won a Pulitzer Prize in Explanatory Reporting.
Today, Carroll not only manages this Gannett flagship, but she is also one of the 19 members of the Pulitzer Board, comprising leading journalists, news executives and academics who preside over the judging process.
In this 157th episode of “E&P Reports,” E&P Publisher Mike Blinder speaks with Nicole Carroll, president of news and editor-in-chief of USA TODAY, about the past 40 years for this iconic news media brand and its evolution to a multi-platform national information outlet. Their conversation occurred in the immediate aftermath of Hurricane Ian, a devastating storm for Florida, where Gannett operates 18 daily operations, including in Ft. Myers and Naples. Carroll reported to Blinder that at least three of their journalists’ homes were no longer habitable.
She marveled at the tenacity and resilience of their journalists. “Daylight came, and they could not wait to get back out there, helping their community, and that has been their focus,” Carroll told Blinder.
Having Gannett’s newsrooms across the country and abroad connected through digital communications enables journalists to share information and build on stories. Journalists chat about important public interest topics — in this case, a catastrophic weather event. Through chat conversations, they began planning their approach to coverage approach when the storm was still a far-off tropical depression.
Carroll and Blinder also spoke about the USA TODAY’s 40th Anniversary and the brand’s evolution. Earlier in her career, she was a Gannett reporter “on loan” — or “loaners” — to USA TODAY. “You would work three- or six-month shifts, and then you’d go back to your home paper,” she explained to Blinder.
Content that is factual, informative, and accessible is foundational to the brand. “We always say that we’re expert, not elitist,” she said. That resonates with readers. USA TODAY continues to have strong single-copy and home-delivery figures, she suggested, plus distribution at partner hotels. This brilliant marketing strategy introduced an untold number of travelers to USA TODAY’s colorful front page, predictably placed just outside their hotel room door each morning. The website attracts an impressive audience, as well, including a segment that represents younger news consumers.
“We have, on average, 100 million unique visitors every month to USA TODAY,” Carroll reported. “We are leaning into our heritage of innovation. We were innovative 40 years ago. We still are today. So, just this morning, we created out of Hurricane Ian a text chat where people can sign up for texts about the hurricane. Some of them are getting cell service, but they’re not getting internet, or they don’t have power, and we’re giving them constant updates via text to the readers. And we were up to more than 5,000 people in about 24 hours who’ve signed up for that. So, that’s one small daily innovation we’re doing to connect readers to the news they need when they need it.”
Having seen USA Today mature over decades, Carroll credits the editorial coverage for its longevity and popularity. “Our editors were just in tune with what America was talking about,” she reflected.
When Editor & Publisher Magazine (E&P) opened the nomination process for the yearly "25 over 50" salute, one entry from Emily Metzgar, a director at the School of Media & Journalism at Kent State University, stated that Kevin Dilley, the director of Kent State Student Media,
“Has built one of the largest media operations you’ve never heard about.” Emily wrote E&P that “Kevin wrangles a $750,000 budget annual budget, 400+ students each semester, nine distinct media outlets, one business office and 30+ platforms.” She also mentioned that Dilley tackled challenges stemming from COVID-19, where he was able to keep the student-run TV station on the air even while being directed to operate remotely.
There is no question that Kevin Dilley deserved to be recognized as a "25 over 50" in the September edition of E&P Magazine. However, after some investigation into the many successful ongoing programs that Kent State Student Media has developed and the numerous awards their journalism continues to win, E&P decided to go one step further and introduce you to the leader of this large campus-based media operation.
In this 156th episode of E&P Reports, meet Kevin Dilley, the director of Kent State University Media, where we explore the work the 400+ students produce for 10 distinct media outlets and 30+ media platforms. Plus, E&P Publisher Mike Blinder and contributing journalist Victoria Holmes ask Dilley how he feels about the future of News Publishing as being one of the educators that helps today's students become tomorrow's industry leaders.
When Editor & Publisher Magazine (E&P) opened the nomination process for the yearly "25 over 50" salute, one entry from Emily Metzgar, a director at the School of Media & Journalism at Kent State University, stated that Kevin Dilley, the director of Kent State Student Media,
“Has built one of the largest media operations you’ve never heard about.” Emily wrote E&P that “Kevin wrangles a $750,000 budget annual budget, 400+ students each semester, nine distinct media outlets, one business office and 30+ platforms.” She also mentioned that Dilley tackled challenges stemming from COVID-19, where he was able to keep the student-run TV station on the air even while being directed to operate remotely.
There is no question that Kevin Dilley deserved to be recognized as a "25 over 50" in the September edition of E&P Magazine. However, after some investigation into the many successful ongoing programs that Kent State Student Media has developed and the numerous awards their journalism continues to win, E&P decided to go one step further and introduce you to the leader of this large campus-based media operation.
In this 156th episode of E&P Reports, meet Kevin Dilley, the director of Kent State University Media, where we explore the work the 400+ students produce for 10 distinct media outlets and 30+ media platforms. Plus, E&P Publisher Mike Blinder and contributing journalist Victoria Holmes ask Dilley how he feels about the future of News Publishing as being one of the educators that helps today's students become tomorrow's industry leaders.
Before joining Fox News, Chris Stirewalt served as political editor for the Washington Examiner. As a top editor and election forecaster for Fox News’ decision desk during the 2020 election, Stirewalt stood firm to defend the network being the first to correctly call Arizona for Joe Biden on election night — the first sign that Donald Trump would lose the 2020 presidential race. What resulted was a backlash from Trump, his supporters and even calls for his being imprisoned as part of an election fraud conspiracy.
In his latest book “Broken News: Why the Media Rage Machine Divides America and How to Fight Back,” Stirewalt states that some news organizations (like Fox News, MSNBC and others) have developed a philosophy of fanning the anger within their core audience in what he calls “rage revenue” practices that leans towards bias coverage that helps stoke the political division and culture wars within the U.S. In “Broken News,” Stirewalt offers some inside insight into these news operations about how they reward this form of coverage because it is easier and more profitable than investigative journalism.
But all is not lost because not only does “Broken News” point out the problems within the news industry, but it also offers the reader a solution to become better news consumers for the sake of the future of our democracy.
In this 155th episode of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with Chris Stirewalt, Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), contributing editor for The Dispatch and author of his new book, “Broken News: Why the Media Rage Machine Divides America and How to Fight Back,” where he writes about his time as the top political editor and election forecaster for the Fox News channel and how he became famous (and subsequently vilified) for being the first to correctly call the 2020 election results for the state of Arizona in favor of Biden. Stirewalt offers some inside intelligence and perspective on how the biased reporting of news media outlets like MSNBC and Fox News channel are helping divide our country and advises on how we, the news consumer, can help find some common ground.
Before joining Fox News, Chris Stirewalt served as political editor for the Washington Examiner. As a top editor and election forecaster for Fox News’ decision desk during the 2020 election, Stirewalt stood firm to defend the network being the first to correctly call Arizona for Joe Biden on election night — the first sign that Donald Trump would lose the 2020 presidential race. What resulted was a backlash from Trump, his supporters and even calls for his being imprisoned as part of an election fraud conspiracy.
In his latest book “Broken News: Why the Media Rage Machine Divides America and How to Fight Back,” Stirewalt states that some news organizations (like Fox News, MSNBC and others) have developed a philosophy of fanning the anger within their core audience in what he calls “rage revenue” practices that leans towards bias coverage that helps stoke the political division and culture wars within the U.S. In “Broken News,” Stirewalt offers some inside insight into these news operations about how they reward this form of coverage because it is easier and more profitable than investigative journalism.
But all is not lost because not only does “Broken News” point out the problems within the news industry, but it also offers the reader a solution to become better news consumers for the sake of the future of our democracy.
In this 155th episode of “E&P Reports,” we go one-on-one with Chris Stirewalt, Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), contributing editor for The Dispatch and author of his new book, “Broken News: Why the Media Rage Machine Divides America and How to Fight Back,” where he writes about his time as the top political editor and election forecaster for the Fox News channel and how he became famous (and subsequently vilified) for being the first to correctly call the 2020 election results for the state of Arizona in favor of Biden. Stirewalt offers some inside intelligence and perspective on how the biased reporting of news media outlets like MSNBC and Fox News channel are helping divide our country and advises on how we, the news consumer, can help find some common ground.
One of the 2022 inductees for the National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) Hall of Fame included the publisher/editor of Dallas, Texas-based I Messenger Media: Cheryl Smith. This latest honor was presented at the August 2022 NABJ Annual Convention in Las Vegas, where her numerous awards, years of service to the industry and contributions to black journalism were recognized.
Smith has more than 35 years of experience in the news publishing industry. She is the current executive director and publisher of I Messenger Media News Group, the owners of Texas Metro News, Garland Journal and I Messenger newspapers. She is also the region IV president for the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), a board member of the Society of Professional Journalists and the immediate past president of the Dallas-Fort Worth Association of Black Journalists (DFW/ABJ).
Smith was also recognized in the September issue of E&P Magazine within the 2022 “Class of 25 over 50,” a yearly group of news executives chosen based on an industry-wide nomination process. Her name was submitted by Eva D. Colman, NABJ region III director of the NABJ, where she cited that "Cheryl has dedicated her entire career to the betterment of our industry, those who serve in it, want to become a part of it and consume all that we bring to it." Colman said, "Watching Cheryl tirelessly pursue diversity and fairness at all costs has been inspirational to myself and others, not only in Dallas-Fort Worth, however globally as well. Leaders throughout the African diaspora seek her guidance in messaging, advocacy, human rights initiatives and so much more.”
In this 154th episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with Cheryl Smith, owner/ publisher of I Messenger Media News Group & 2022 inductee in the National Association of Black Journalists’ (NABJ) Hall of Fame, where we discuss her career not only as a successful news publishing executive, but also her views on the industry as a whole, where it is heading, and how we can achieve more diversity, equity and inclusion to better represent the communities we serve.
One of the 2022 inductees for the National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) Hall of Fame included the publisher/editor of Dallas, Texas-based I Messenger Media: Cheryl Smith. This latest honor was presented at the August 2022 NABJ Annual Convention in Las Vegas, where her numerous awards, years of service to the industry and contributions to black journalism were recognized.
Smith has more than 35 years of experience in the news publishing industry. She is the current executive director and publisher of I Messenger Media News Group, the owners of Texas Metro News, Garland Journal and I Messenger newspapers. She is also the region IV president for the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), a board member of the Society of Professional Journalists and the immediate past president of the Dallas-Fort Worth Association of Black Journalists (DFW/ABJ).
Smith was also recognized in the September issue of E&P Magazine within the 2022 “Class of 25 over 50,” a yearly group of news executives chosen based on an industry-wide nomination process. Her name was submitted by Eva D. Colman, NABJ region III director of the NABJ, where she cited that "Cheryl has dedicated her entire career to the betterment of our industry, those who serve in it, want to become a part of it and consume all that we bring to it." Colman said, "Watching Cheryl tirelessly pursue diversity and fairness at all costs has been inspirational to myself and others, not only in Dallas-Fort Worth, however globally as well. Leaders throughout the African diaspora seek her guidance in messaging, advocacy, human rights initiatives and so much more.”
In this 154th episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with Cheryl Smith, owner/ publisher of I Messenger Media News Group & 2022 inductee in the National Association of Black Journalists’ (NABJ) Hall of Fame, where we discuss her career not only as a successful news publishing executive, but also her views on the industry as a whole, where it is heading, and how we can achieve more diversity, equity and inclusion to better represent the communities we serve.
With elections, law enforcement agencies, the courts, elected officials, branches of the government and the very rule of law under sustained and concerted attack by its own citizens and elected leaders, there is no question that the media has an essential role to play in addressing these important issues. E&P’s September 2022 cover story “American Democracy in Crisis” reports on the need for the news media industry to reframe democracy coverage during this perilous & critical moment in U.S. history.
Award-winning print and broadcast journalist Mike Barnicle is no stranger to this topic as a regular contributor on MSNBC’s popular Morning Joe, where he discusses the news of the day with prominent guests, scholars, political leaders, and fellow journalists.
Barnicle began his career in the 1960’s as a young speech writer for John Tunney, Edmund Muskie, and the late Robert F. Kennedy. He then moved on to become one the nation’s most respected newspaper columnists, penning more than 4,000 pieces, for over 25-years for the Boston Herald, New York Daily News, and The Boston Globe. Today, his work is seen regularly on the pages of Newsweek, The Baily Beast, The Huffington Post, ESPN, Esquire and other publications.
In this 153rd episode of “E&P Reports” Publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with well-known TV commentator and journalist Mike Barnicle, where they discuss the state of the news media industry, and the challenges journalists are facing in reporting on the culture wars and political polarization that is affecting our society.
With elections, law enforcement agencies, the courts, elected officials, branches of the government and the very rule of law under sustained and concerted attack by its own citizens and elected leaders, there is no question that the media has an essential role to play in addressing these important issues. E&P’s September 2022 cover story “American Democracy in Crisis” reports on the need for the news media industry to reframe democracy coverage during this perilous & critical moment in U.S. history.
Award-winning print and broadcast journalist Mike Barnicle is no stranger to this topic as a regular contributor on MSNBC’s popular Morning Joe, where he discusses the news of the day with prominent guests, scholars, political leaders, and fellow journalists.
Barnicle began his career in the 1960’s as a young speech writer for John Tunney, Edmund Muskie, and the late Robert F. Kennedy. He then moved on to become one the nation’s most respected newspaper columnists, penning more than 4,000 pieces, for over 25-years for the Boston Herald, New York Daily News, and The Boston Globe. Today, his work is seen regularly on the pages of Newsweek, The Baily Beast, The Huffington Post, ESPN, Esquire and other publications.
In this 153rd episode of “E&P Reports” Publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with well-known TV commentator and journalist Mike Barnicle, where they discuss the state of the news media industry, and the challenges journalists are facing in reporting on the culture wars and political polarization that is affecting our society.
The latest Gallup poll came with a warning flare: “Americans’ confidence in two facets of the news media — newspapers and television news — has fallen to all-time low points.”
Since 1973, Washington, D.C.-based Gallup, Inc. has polled Americans about their trust in newspapers and, in 1993, began tracking American sentiments about television/cable news.
A mere 16% of Americans “have a great deal/quite a lot of confidence in newspapers,” Gallup’s Research Consultant Megan Brenan summarized the July 2022 findings. Television news fared even worse, with just 11% of the respondents having “some degree of confidence” in the news service cable and network news provides.
Gordon Crovitz and Steven Brill co-founded NewsGuard in 2018 to help the public discern what is trusted, reliable news on the internet.
Crovitz and Brill were guests on E&P Reports’ 152nd vodcast episode to talk about trust in news and misinformation online.
“At least when you were reading your first newspaper, you knew you were reading a Hearst newspaper. You sort of knew what you were getting,” Crovitz said.
“If you think about where we are today, the metaphor I like to use is: Imagine right now, if you walk into a library, books are neatly arranged on shelves, the magazines are arranged on shelves according to topic. You can pick up the book. You can read the book jacket. You know who the author is. You know who the publisher is. … Now, imagine instead you walked into the library, and there are just a trillion pieces of paper flying around in the air, and you grab one out of the air and start reading it. You don’t know who wrote it; you don’t know who’s financing it. You don’t know what their backgrounds are. There’s no librarian. You’re on your own,” he explained.
Using a transparent and weighted set of nine criteria, NewsGuard rates news sites on a scale of 100. It assigns symbols from red to green based on the scoring and provides users with a “Nutrition Label” that explains the site's score.
On July 22, 2022, NewsGuard circulated a press release about its “downgrade” of MSNBC’s and Fox News’ websites, which read in part: “For the first time since NewsGuard launched in 2018, both the Fox News and MSNBC sites are rated red, meaning they have earned an overall score of less than 60 out of 100. Their readers are urged to proceed with caution when they encounter content from these websites. … In both cases, NewsGuard analysts have now found that the most opinionated programming on the cable outlets, often based on clearly false claims, is now so extensively published and heavily promoted on the websites that a significant portion of the websites’ content fails to adhere to basic journalistic practices.”
The latest Gallup poll came with a warning flare: “Americans’ confidence in two facets of the news media — newspapers and television news — has fallen to all-time low points.”
Since 1973, Washington, D.C.-based Gallup, Inc. has polled Americans about their trust in newspapers and, in 1993, began tracking American sentiments about television/cable news.
A mere 16% of Americans “have a great deal/quite a lot of confidence in newspapers,” Gallup’s Research Consultant Megan Brenan summarized the July 2022 findings. Television news fared even worse, with just 11% of the respondents having “some degree of confidence” in the news service cable and network news provides.
Gordon Crovitz and Steven Brill co-founded NewsGuard in 2018 to help the public discern what is trusted, reliable news on the internet.
Crovitz and Brill were guests on E&P Reports’ 152nd vodcast episode to talk about trust in news and misinformation online.
“At least when you were reading your first newspaper, you knew you were reading a Hearst newspaper. You sort of knew what you were getting,” Crovitz said.
“If you think about where we are today, the metaphor I like to use is: Imagine right now, if you walk into a library, books are neatly arranged on shelves, the magazines are arranged on shelves according to topic. You can pick up the book. You can read the book jacket. You know who the author is. You know who the publisher is. … Now, imagine instead you walked into the library, and there are just a trillion pieces of paper flying around in the air, and you grab one out of the air and start reading it. You don’t know who wrote it; you don’t know who’s financing it. You don’t know what their backgrounds are. There’s no librarian. You’re on your own,” he explained.
Using a transparent and weighted set of nine criteria, NewsGuard rates news sites on a scale of 100. It assigns symbols from red to green based on the scoring and provides users with a “Nutrition Label” that explains the site's score.
On July 22, 2022, NewsGuard circulated a press release about its “downgrade” of MSNBC’s and Fox News’ websites, which read in part: “For the first time since NewsGuard launched in 2018, both the Fox News and MSNBC sites are rated red, meaning they have earned an overall score of less than 60 out of 100. Their readers are urged to proceed with caution when they encounter content from these websites. … In both cases, NewsGuard analysts have now found that the most opinionated programming on the cable outlets, often based on clearly false claims, is now so extensively published and heavily promoted on the websites that a significant portion of the websites’ content fails to adhere to basic journalistic practices.”
Aequalitas is Latin for “equality.” But it would be hard to find an industry executive equal to Aqualitas Media Group founder and executive director DJ Doran, who spent 23 years as a U.S. Air Force Reserve Pilot before purchasing a hotel and entering the news publishing industry. Today, Doran owns eight online publications targeted to the LGBTQ+ reader in several U.S. major markets, including his hometown of Chicago. Doran, who is openly gay, is now planning a run for Chicago mayor in the upcoming 2023 election as a Democrat.
In this 151st episode of “E&P Reports,” host Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with LGBTQ+ media publisher DJ Doran on how he kept his major market media enterprises thriving during a global pandemic, his news publishing plans for the future and his recent announcement to run as an openly gay candidate for Mayor of Chicago.
Related link:
More information about DJ Doran’s mayoral run
On January 28th, 2022, The Dallas Morning News reported on the purchase of a local, suburban metroplex group of weekly newspapers, stating, "Instead of a trip to Hawaii to celebrate 25 years together, Rick and Elizabeth Rogers bought a community newspaper company.” That company is Star Local Media, a community publishing group based in the affluent northeast suburb of Plano, Texas, that prints 14 community newspapers across cities in Denton, Collin, and Dallas counties, with some titles more than 100 years old.
Rick Rogers is not unknown to most in the news publishing business, with his most recent job as Chief Revenue Officer at TownNews. His previous life offered 25 years of editorial, publishing and management experience with corporate roles at ACM and Gatehouse Media in Missouri and Texas.
Rick and his wife Elizabeth have resided for the past 11 years in Frisco — a market served by Star Local Media with the Frisco Enterprise, making them both quite familiar with the communities they serve.
In this 150th episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with a longtime industry veteran and recent CRO of TownNews. Rick Rogers' journey from serving media companies as a vendor to becoming owner/ publisher of the Dallas suburban weekly newspaper group, Star Local Media, is highlighted. He talks frankly about why he chose to invest in local media, how he and his wife/ partner Elizabeth are facing the challenges of news publishing in today’s challenging marketplace and how his 1st quarter P & L fared.
Damian Daniels had three encounters with the local police during the last 48 hours of his life. The Army veteran was in his home in August 2020, amid a mental health crisis, when his brother — 800 miles away in Colorado — called the Red Cross for help. The agency, in turn, called 9-1-1, and police officers were dispatched for a welfare check that turned deadly, culminating in an officer shooting Daniels twice, killing him.
Tragedies like this — when a person in the throes of a mental health crisis is shot and killed by police officers — aren’t rare. Washington Post reporters Jon Gerberg and Alice Li found 178 similar cases over the course of three years. They wrote about Daniel’s death in “When a call to the police for help turns deadly,” part of the Washington Post’s “Unaccountable” investigative series — a deep dive into how the police serve the communities they’re tasked to protect.
Jon Gerberg is a senior video journalist for the Washington Post and a member of the investigative team. He's been with the news organization since 2017, and before that, he reported for The New York Times, the Associated Press, TIME, and worked as a foreign affairs producer for “PBS NewsHour.”
As the database editor for the investigations unit at the Washington Post, Steven Rich knows data and how integral it is to investigative stories. Rich and Gerberg were E&P Publisher Mike Blinder's guests on E&P Reports 149th episode. They were joined by E&P contributor Gretchen A. Peck for a conversation about data and the “Unaccountable” series.
“I got the job here at The Post through an internship,” Rich recalled during the vodcast. “I turned that internship into a second internship and into a job. At the time, there was not as much data capacity at The Post. They sort of needed me, and I was focused largely on large investigative projects.”
Though the term “data journalism” may be relatively recent on the news-evolution timeline, the practice is hardly novel. “Data journalism has kind of been under the surface for a very long time,” Rich said, citing Ida B. Wells as an example, who in effect collected data about lynchings in the south.
Rich sees data as a way to offer larger context to otherwise anecdotal stories. “My job is to take your anecdotes and to tell you how often they happen,” he said.
For roughly seven years, The Post’s data team has been building a publicly available database of police shootings across the country, populating it, mining it, and gleaning patterns and revelations to inform their reporting.
For example, they track the number and location of police-involved shootings, whether the victim was armed, and where it took place — for instance, in a private home versus in a public setting. They also seek insight into why the police are on the scene at all — if a call to 9-1-1 was the only option for help.
The investigative team knew that Damian Daniel’s death was not unique. They knew of other high-profile incidents when the police were called to help people in mental crisis, only to kill them during the course of that interaction. They cited Daniel Prude in Rochester, New York and Walter Wallace, Jr. in Philadelphia.
“But we wanted to know how often this is actually happening, and that’s where we turn to colleagues like Steven, who have actually been compiling this database,” he added.
With the help of a team of journalism students from American University, The Post’s investigative team could look at approximately 1,000 police shooting cases and drill down to those for which mental health was a suspected or known factor.
They found 178 such occurrences, representing victims of all ages, races and genders.
There were some things the data didn't reveal, which required the investigative team to find answers in other ways. For example, the database doesn't currently track officers' disciplinary records or suspensions, whether they were involved in prior similar incidents, or whether they've been violent outside of the job.
“My approach to data journalism is and has always been as a way to take a great story and make it excellent,” Rich said.
“The most important part of data journalism is the journalism itself. … It’s one thing to collect data, but you have to actually extract the meaning out of it,” Rich suggested.
The “Fatal Force” database continues to inform the investigative team’s reporting. “It’s kind of a gift that keeps on giving, from a storytelling and reporting perspective,” Gerberg told Blinder and Peck.
"Data really is the fundamental spine of our reporting because why are we telling these stories if they do not tell us something about the world in which we live? I would just add that if you kind of take the inverse of that, if you only have the data and are never taking stories out of that, what does it mean in the first place? I think a crucial part of our job is to take that data and identify those trends, but also work to really illuminate and understand what kind of consequences these trends are having in the lives of everyday people,” Gerberg concluded.
The team’s reporting of this story inspired change in Bexar County, Texas. “Bexar County had a mental-health response unit within its own police department,” Gerberg explained. “The problem was, Mr. Daniels was actually in the jurisdiction of the Bear County Sheriff’s, rather than the [San Antonio Police Department] — so, a different jurisdiction. But since Mr. Daniel’s killing, the judge there has implemented a secondary program to increase mental health options for the rest of the county, as well.”
Jennifer Kho loves that Chicago is a “two-newspaper town.” She’s the new executive editor at one of those two newspapers, the Chicago Sun-Times.
Kho was E&P Publisher Mike Blinder’s guest on this 148th episode of E&P Reports vodcast. Prior to being named executive editor, Kho was the managing editor at HuffPost and, before that, managing editor at The Guardian (US). While at HuffPost, she became the director for strategic innovation and created an innovation team. She was laid off by the digital news outlet and spent approximately 14 months looking for a job and bridging the employment gap by offering consultative services.
Kho hadn’t even fully moved from Los Angeles to Chicago when the Chicago Sun-Times’ newsroom faced the monumental and solemn challenge of reporting on the July 4th mass shooting in Highland Park. That day, a single shooter, with the aid of high-capacity weapons, murdered seven people and injured dozens, terrorizing and traumatizing the community.
Delano Massey was covering several executive-level jobs at CNN, including supervising producer of both race and equity and crime and justice reporting, when he joined the team at Axios as managing editor of Local, just as the company launched a dozen new markets.
Having spent over three years at AP and attending Maynard Institute's Media Academy at Harvard University, he gained national recognition when he was selected as one of MIPAD’s 2021 “Most Influential People of African Descent.”
But over the years, Massey's journalism career took different turns, spending almost a decade as the metro editor at the Lexington Herald-Leader and then leaving to work as a senior digital producer in TV broadcast news.
In this 147th episode of "E&P Reports," we go one-on-one with Delano Massey, Managing Editor of Axios Local, exploring their mission to continue to provide "smart brevity" reporting not only at a national news level but now expanding into dozens of local markets, with plans to launch more by year's end. We also talked with Massey about his views on establishing equity, diversity & inclusion within our newsrooms, based predominantly on his experiences working with then CNN President Jeff Zucker on creating the network's Race & Equity team.
On their website, JaxTrib.com, the team of Jacksonville, Florida's newest news outlet, posted, "Before it’s too late, we must rethink what news will look like and how it will be delivered in our community. For the Tributary, the future of local journalism is about accountability and accessibility. This nonprofit news hub feeds investigative stories to area partners, filling a gap in coverage of entrenched problems and solutions to strengthen the entire Northeast Florida news ecosystem.”
Founded by two newsroom veterans of Gannett’s Jacksonville (FL) Times-Union, Andrew Pantazi, the founding editor and Deirdre Conner, board chairman, worked for over one year to establish the nonprofit entity and find the necessary funding to establish an investigative news outlet that proudly shares their stories with other area media companies.
Moreover, Pantazi, who, while working for Gannett, helped organize the Times-Union’s newsroom into the NewsGuild-CWA, now boasts in his recruitment ads that the Tributary operates as a “workplace democracy” where the team makes all decisions collectively on hiring, compensation, budgeting, and the actual stories they cover and how they are edited before being published.
In this 146th episode of "E&P Reports," you will meet two integral founders of Jacksonville, Florida's newest nonprofit news start-up, The Tributary. On this broadcast are Andrew Pantazi, the founding editor and Deirdre Conner, board chairman, who will talk about the challenges of building a nonprofit media entity along with their new, innovative model of providing an investigative news outlet that shares content with other local news media.
On June 29th, 2022, the Local News Initiative at The Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications of Northwestern University released their latest study, “The State of Local News 2022, Expanding News Deserts, Growing Gaps, Emerging Models.” The primary author of the report is Penelope Muse Abernathy, who is nationally known for her “news deserts” research and acts as visiting professor at Northwestern and has served as Knight Chair in Journalism at the University of North Carolina. Abernathy has also held executive positions with The New York Times and Wall Street Journal.
The study confirms that U.S. newspapers rapidly continue to close at an average rate of more than two a week, with the country losing more than one-fourth since 2005 as of publication date leaving only 6,377 surviving papers with 1,230 reported as dailies and 5,147 as weeklies.
Moreover, the study states that this loss of local journalism has been accompanied by the “malignant spread of misinformation and disinformation, political polarization, eroding trust in media, and a yawning digital and economic divide among citizens.” And when a local news source dies, so does voter participation while corruption in both government and business rise along with taxes.
In this 145th episode of E&P Reports, we have an insightful dialogue with Penelope (Penny) Muse Abernathy, visiting professor at Northwestern University Medill School of Journalism and Tim Franklin, Senior Associate Dean, Professor and John M. Mutz Chair in Local News, about the Local News Initiative’s latest study on the “State of Local News 2022." It reveals that U.S. newspapers continue to close down rapidly, creating "news deserts" that become fertile ground for the growth of misinformation, government corruption and lack of voter participation.
Juana Summers knew she wanted to be a reporter since high school in Kansas City, where she started writing for her school newspaper. After graduating in 2009 from the University of Missouri with a degree in Convergence Journalism, she has quickly established a remarkable career with reporting positions covering politics for CNN, AP, Mashable and National Public Radio (NPR).
Summers will join All Things Considered Starting on June 27th, filling the hosting position left vacant by Audie Cornish and will be joining the show at a time when questions about NPR’s diversity in its internal structure and within its audience have been making industry headlines.
In a recent NPR interview, Summers, who is Black, said she "hopes to further expand All Things Considered's reach to new and diverse audiences. She aims to reach more people whose experiences are not typically represented in the media and empower them to tell their stories on air. She also said she hopes to do more in digital spaces to reach younger audiences.”
In this 144th episode of E&P Reports, meet National Public Radio’s (NPR) new cohost of 'All Things Considered,’ Juana Summers, who will talk about her new job, the internal culture of NPR and offer some advice to young journalists of color on how to advance within the industry.
While most news publishing outlets are downsizing, the Hearst Connecticut Media Group (HCMG) continues to grow its operations with a recent expansion statewide and in Greater Hartford, the backyard of the now hedge fund-owned Harford Courant. In March 2022, HCMG announced hiring 13 new staff members, including 11 journalists who will focus their reporting on statewide topics, and local news and enterprise in the state capital area. They will publish that content online within the one-year-old CTInsider.com website and eight daily newspapers and community weekly publications.
As E&P reported one year ago, CTInsider.com began a major expansion for HCMG to become a statewide news powerhouse. Today it seems that they are well on their way to achieving their goal of having 100,000+ paid print and digital subscribers across their entire network. Furthermore, HCMG has also seen consecutive monthly growth in digital subscriptions since early 2019.
In this 143rd episode of "E&P Reports," we revisit with Mike DeLuca, Group Publisher and President of Hearst Connecticut (HCMG), and Wendy Metcalfe, the Senior Vice President of Content & Editor-in-Chief, about the strategies and formulas they are deploying to become what is now is arguably the most successful local news operation in the nation in achieving reader growth.
In the summer of 2019, the Boston Globe surprised the industry by launching an initiative just 53 miles down the I-95 corridor in neighboring Providence, Rhode Island. When most local news operations were aggressively downsizing, the Globe had already shown an appetite for expansion by hiring more journalists and launching new verticals covering marijuana, health, life sciences and even the Catholic Church.
However, this expansion placed them in the backyard of one of the nation's most respected news outlets: The Providence Journal, which in its heyday had multiple bureaus with hundreds of journalists and a lengthy list of Pulitzers and Peabodys for their famous investigative reporting. Today, due to subscriber and advertising revenue declines and Gannett corporate downsizing, there are less than thirty full-time reporters at the ProJo.
Perhaps that is one of the reasons that The Boston Globe is increasing its commitment to their Providence bureau that contributes daily to their online vertical dedicated to the Ocean State, called "Globe Rhode Island." The team includes ProJo veterans Maria Caporizzo, Edward Fitzpatrick, Amanda Milkovitz and Brian Amaral, Providence Business News alumna Alexa Gagosz, former WPRI-TV reporter Dan McGowan, and digital and audience engagement editor Carlos Munoz, who moved to Rhode Island from Florida to join the team. Together, they cover politics, business, health, education, the economy, the arts, and more, along with a popular weekly Podcast called "Rhode Island Report" and a new RI Food & Dining section. Plus, with Gannett now cutting back on providing editorial content throughout the company, Globe Rhode Island has also expanded its Commentary platform.
The Globe has already had a strong impact on the local media landscape: subscriptions to the digital product and its email newsletters are growing rapidly, and the Globe Rhode Island team recently won 27 reporting awards from the Rhode Island Press Association, sweeping the Investigative and Health Care reporting categories.
In this 142nd episode of E&P Reports, meet the Boston Globe Rhode Island's editor, Lylah M. Alphonse, and one of the original bureau hires, Dan McGowan, who produces their daily “Rhode Map” newsletter. They will talk about the Globe's growing southward expansion and their commitment to providing statewide news content. Also appearing is Michelle Micone, the Boston Globe’s Vice President, Innovation and Strategic Initiatives, who will speak to the Globe’s overall strategy in expanding into new content areas and neighboring markets.
Children of celebrities often have difficulty finding their path. There are countless stories of their wrong choices. However, Peter Funt, son of Allen Funt, creator of Candid Camera, one of TV's longest-running and most popular shows, was able to walk the fine line between honoring his father’s achievements and forging his own – and very successfully.
Peter became a member of the Candid Camera family at an early age. He portrayed a shoeshine boy at the age of 3 and offered shines to businessmen on the streets of New York. Peter was instructed to ask for $10 per shoe he shined, an outrageous charge at the time, to elicit those “candid” and amusing reactions that were the show’s premise.
During a recent “E&P Reports” Vodcast episode Funt was asked about his life, his love of newspapers, his views on news media’s current and future status, which have often been the topics of his many op-ed pieces and the books he has published.
“Many people mistakenly assume the Funt homelife was one practical joke after another,” said Funt. “My father wasn’t a practical joker. He created Candid Camera to reveal people truly as themselves when they didn’t know they were being observed.
“My dad and I spent our lives finding things that tickled us. It didn’t have to be a big deal and didn’t even have to be laugh-out-loud funny, but enough to be amused. He looked at life that way, and so do I.” (An excerpt from Peter Funt’s book: Self-Amused: A Tell-Some Memoir. Now available at most local and online bookstores.)
Although Peter continued his affiliation with Candid Camera, becoming a co-host during 1987 and eventually the producer and host, his goal at an early age was to be a journalist.
Interestingly, his parents bought Peter a subscription to Editor & Publisher. They also included the annual Data Book, listing all the newspapers in America, among Peter’s Christmas gifts every year from the age of 10. Many children would have thought they had received a giant lump of coal, but Peter used the gift to contact many of the listed newspapers, asking for a recent issue and even the paper mache mattes of the front page.
Peter earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in mass communications and journalism at the University of Denver. His early days as a freelance journalist in New York were the starting point for a career in journalism, eventually writing op-ed pieces for The New York Times, USA Today and The Wall Street Journal.
“In my view, America can’t afford to lose the very biggest and very smallest papers. The biggest papers report in-depth about the most important international and national news. The smallest newspapers are the informational glue that holds local communities together. People need to know about the last school board meeting and the workings of their local government.
“I think the renewed focus on community newspapers is a great opportunity for young people who want to enter journalism and gain valuable experience. Local dailies are anxious to hire people to write for them, even if they have no journalism experience or degree,” added Funt.
In this 141st episode of “E&P Reports,” meet TV host/ producer and columnist, Peter Funt who today still stars in and produces the iconic TV show “Candid Camera,” along with penning op-eds for The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times as well as a weekly column, distributed by the Cagle Syndicate. His book, “Cautiously Optimistic” contains dozens of his best columns and essays. In this episode Peter chats with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder and Associate Publisher Robin Blinder about his years in media from black & white TV to the digital world of today
Francesca Chambers is the new White House Correspondent for USA Today. However, she is not new to reporting on D.C. politics, having covered presidents, vice presidents and politicians, including former Presidents Obama and Trump, former Vice President Pence, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Senators Bernie Sanders, Cory Booker, and Lindsey Graham. Before this new position at USA Today, Chambers covered politics and the White House for McClatchy, DailyMail.com and the Daily Mail.
In this 1140th episode of "E&P Reports," publisher Mike Blinder interviews Chambers about what's it like to be part of the White House press pool and what advice she can offer other aspiring journalists who may have a passion for politics on how to advance and grow within the industry.
- Follow Francesca Chambers on Twitter
- Read Francesca Chambers latest reporting for USA Today=
- Learn more about the White House Correspondents’ Association
Jon Marshall teaches media history and reporting as an associate professor at Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism, Media and Integrated Marketing Communications. In his new book “Clash: Presidents and the Press in Times of Crisis,” he examines the adversarial relationship between presidents and journalists amid periods of national crisis.
Some administrations he explores within the pages of “Clash” include how in 1798, John Adams used a newly enacted Alien and Sedition Act to muzzle his press critics. Or, how in 1917, Woodrow Wilson, who had similar ideas to cease the probing of his administration by white house reporters, used legislation outlawing expressions of disloyalty to prosecute and jail journalists. And it was in the late ‘60s that Richard Nixon was the first to attempt to delegitimize journalists by being the first to brand them as “elites” and describing them as “the media,” to change the public perception of the press as something that was wrong with America, not unlike crime or drugs.
In this 139th episode of “E&P Reports,” professor and media historian Jon Marshall offers an overview of his latest book, “Clash: Presidents and the Press in Times of Crisis.” During the broadcast, he discusses some of the most interesting ways that over 200 years of various white house administrations dealt with the press.
In 1913, Victoriano Manteiga came to the United States from Cuba and went to work as a “lector,” reading the news of the day to the immigrant workers of the Morgan Cigar Factory in Ybor City, a National Historic Landmark District in Tampa. In 1922 he founded a newspaper for those workers that is now celebrating 100-years of service. Today Victoriano’s grandson Patrick Manteiga is “at the helm" of La Gaceta, the nation’s only trilingual newspaper still informing, influencing, and thriving as it publishes weekly in English, Spanish and Italian.
In this 138th episode of “E&P Reports,” meet Patrick Manteiga, the editor, publisher and owner of the 100-year-old, Tampa Bay based La Gaceta, the nation’s only trilingual newspaper, as he speaks about heritage, history politics and more. Also appearing is Assistant Editor Gene Siudut.
Today, two of the premier industry associations representing news and magazine publishers join forces.
It’s official: the News Media Alliance (NMA) will merge today with the Association of Magazine Media, still fondly known by its former acronym, “MPA,” or the Magazine Publishers Association. News businesses and magazine publishers have largely traveled similar but parallel paths since the advent of the internet. They’ve been challenged to build digital products and attract new audiences to them. They’ve both endured a revolution in the print space, with former analog print processes replaced by digital workflow and computer-to-plate (CTP) imaging. Both have been through consolidation, paper price hikes, changes to postal regulations, the disruption of their advertising and revenue models and more than a few lean years when austerity seemed the only path to sustainability. Though news businesses and magazines across the genre spectrum also had their unique challenges along the way, they share a lot in common — in the past and certainly in the present.
“We’ve had different paths, but we have the same future,” said David Chavern, president and CEO of News Media Alliance.
For the 137th episode of the E&P Reports vodcast, Chavern joined Rita Cohen, president and CEO of the MPA, and E&P Publisher Mike Blinder on the eve of the merger’s resolution, to talk about the newly formed organization and its advocacy plans.
Cohen has been with the MPA since 1995 and just assumed the president and CEO role in April of this year. Before that, she'd served as senior vice president of legislative and regulatory policy.
“I think it’s going to be a wonderful group together. … We feel, going forward, our issues are even more aligned than they have been in the past,” Cohen said.
Founded in 1992 and headquartered in Washington, DC, the NMA represents more than 2,000 membership organizations, from small, local news outlets to large international media corporations.
The MPA is a national trade association representing more than 500 consumer magazine publishers with print, online, and mobile app titles.
The new organization will be known as the News/Media Alliance.
"When we originally came up with that name, it was really designed with aspirations to represent everybody who creates great journalism — and great journalism of all kinds,” Chavern explained.
Cohen will stay on in a new role as a senior advisor. Seven board members from the MPA will join the NMA’s Board.
Moving forward, they’ll collaborate on events, including conferences, and form a unified front on advocacy.
Blinder asked his guests, “How big will the organization be once the dust settles from this merger?”
Chavern estimated they’ll have a dedicated staff of 25 to 30. They’ll have a lot on their plate. The News/Media Alliance will now represent two formidable domestic industries. Chavern said the news publishing industry is a $20 billion a year industry, and magazines weigh in at roughly $25 billion a year.
“Together, we’re representing $45 billion of business annually in the U.S.,” Chavern said. “And just to put that into context, the U.S. recorded music industry is about $15 billion. “Between the two memberships, we’re about three times larger than recorded music in the U.S. — so, a lot of economic activity, a lot of needs, a lot of challenges, … also huge amounts of opportunities.”
The two associations already shared some members before the merger — for example, Condé Nast or Hearst Media, which publishes both print and digital magazines and news.
Their members naturally have differing approaches to the platform — some still bullish and dependent on print revenues, and on the other end of the spectrum, digital-centric businesses. And in the middle, there are a great many platform agnostics. Nevertheless, all will benefit from their collective advocacy. They’ll continue to work on postal reforms and champion the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (JCPA), which would impact both news and magazine publishers. They’ll also pick up the mantle of data governance and the appropriate use of data.
“We have many, many more readers than we ever did,” Chavern said. "And by 'ever,' I mean ever, including whatever the golden era of print was. We have a huge and growing demand for the content. The challenge we have … is that we now have many intermediaries between our customers and us, who take a lot of value."
“Our business models are just like the ones the magazine industry has faced, and we’re going to solve them together,” Chavern said.
The Baltimore Banner website proudly displays a mission: to be the leading provider of news and lifestyle content in the Baltimore metro area, which Nielsen ranks as the 26th largest Designated Market Area (DMA) in the United States. Currently, the city has 11 newspapers, four broadcast TV news operations and a full-time news/talk radio outlet.
But when the well-known CEO of Choice Hotels International and philanthropist Stewart Bainum’s battle with Alden Capitol to acquire the Baltimore Sun from Tribune media failed, he turned to an already strategized "Plan B." He pledged $50 million of his own money to enter the market as a standalone, digital-only, nonprofit news platform: The Baltimore Banner.
E&P’s May 2022 cover story features an extensive piece from Contributing Editor Gretchen A. Peck, focusing on the formation of The Banner’s team that has assembled in their new waterfront offices downtown, the newsroom structure and the entire culture of the people behind this new news start-up.
But in this 136th episode of "E&P Reports," Publisher Mike Blinder interviews The Venetoulis Institute for Local Journalism's, Founder & Chairman Stewart Bainum, Jr. and CEO Imtiaz Patel, about their 18-month journey together, first to try to acquire the 184-year-old Baltimore Sun and then their "pivot" to launch a nonprofit news start-up The Baltimore Banner, to accomplish their mission to become Baltimore’s “leading provider of news and lifestyle content.”
You may already be familiar with "deep fakes" — the colloquial term for manipulating video, warping its reality with a particular rhetorical objective in mind. But how pervasive, easy to use and convincing have deep fakes gotten in recent years?
On this 135th episode of E&P Reports, Host and E&P Publisher Mike Blinder; guest Sam Gregory, program director at WITNESS.org; and E&P contributor Gretchen Peck discuss Artificial Intelligence (AI) in video and audio and how computer-generated graphics (CGI) technologies have gotten exponentially more sophisticated and accessible in recent years.
Hear how AI will be used to take this very vodcast recording and translate the host's voice into Spanish — as though Blinder himself was speaking the language. It's allowing E&P Reports to reach much wider Spanish-speaking audiences here in the U.S. and worldwide.
The group also discussed the infamous Tom Cruise deep fake that circulated on TikTok and how a Russian propaganda deep-fake appeared to show Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy encouraging his country and troops to surrender to Russia. It was a stark example of how potentially dangerous deep-fake deployment can be.
How much of a threat are deep fakes to journalism, journalists and truth itself? It now falls on the shoulders of journalists and documentarians to invest resources in digital forensics to verify the veracity and sources of video content, so they can be part of the solution to stop the spread of disinformation.
Listen/watch now, and check out E&P’s May issue for a deeper dive on deep fakes.
The latest Borrell Benchmarking report from Borrell Associates was just released, showing that local digital advertising will grow 9% to over $92 billion, which will amount to almost two-thirds of all available local advertising dollars, rising to nearly three-quarters by 2025.
The major shift in purchase behaviors during the COVID-19 pandemic seems to center on how local businesses moved a good deal of their budgets from Google paid search to targeted banners served programmatically. The report also revealed that almost 20% of media companies stated that video streaming (OTT) has become their number one digital product purchased by local advertisers, with spending projected to surpass paid search within three years.
Other data within the 66-page report showed that for the 1st time, TV stations have surpassed newspapers in terms of average digital dollars, with 50% stating that OTT is their No. 1 source of digital revenue, with no newspapers making that claim.
In this 134th episode of "E&P Reports," Borrell Associates CEO Gordon Borrell breaks down the numbers in their latest Local Digital Advertising Benchmark Study. Also joining in the conversation to offer insight into how this information can benefit the news media industry are Angela Betasso, president and CEO, JDA Media andTom Sly, VP, revenue national media at The E.W. Scripps Company.
Related links:
Borrell 2022 Annual Benchmarking Report
Local Media Consortium 2022 Spring Conference
JDA Media Boot Camp
Liz White, Publisher & Executive Vice President of Record-Journal Publishing Company (R-J Media), states during this “E&P Reports” interview, "I got the idea from reading my own newspaper." White explains how she learned that their city of Meriden, Connecticut was receiving $36 million in American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding to help the community recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. White said upon learning that the funds would be allocated by a local American Rescue Plan Steering Committee, she reached out to the Meriden Economic Development Director to see if they could put together a program that would allow local businesses to tap some of the funds to drive business through local advertising. Soon, the local chamber of commerce came on board, and the “Meriden Business Boost” program was presented and subsequently approved by the committee.
“Meriden Business Boost” is a simple program that allows any local business or non-profit organization, regardless of size, if they need to market to the local community, apply to receive a $4,000 advertising program placed across R-J Media. $2,000 of funding for each business campaign will be paid from federal funding, and $2,000 will be matched by the R-J Media Group. Plus, the Chamber of Commerce will provide a $50 discount for new members or a $50 credit for existing members to use towards advertising as well. The initial round of the program will be limited to the 1st 150 businesses that apply. Once this round is completed, there is a pending plan to allow a second group of 150 to participate as well.
In this 129th episode of “E&P Reports,” Liz White, Publisher & Executive Vice President of Record-Journal Publishing Company (R-J Media), is joined by Strategic Sales Manager Jaime Gianini to explain how they developed, presented and eventually gained approval for the “Meriden Business Boost” program, that allows 150 local businesses to tap into American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funding to advertise with their company for free!
On September 1, 2021, E&P reported that The Chief-Leader, the 100+-year-old, family-owned NYC weekly, whose nearly 30,000 subscribers are almost entirely New York City municipal workers, was sold to Ben August.
August has no roots in journalism or media, having sold a lucrative human resource services company he built. And since then, devoting himself to his Napa Valley vineyard and a nonprofit group that investigates who really wrote the plays attributed to Shakespeare.
But his passion for supporting the “worker” compelled him to enter our industry to steward The Chief, whose masthead proclaims it “A Voice for Workers,” bulleting: “Good Pay, Safety, Opportunity and Equity” as the publications’ key missions to its readers.
Now with a new editorial team, design and website, August said his mission is to expand this century-old brand (whose name stems from its 1897 founding as the independent newspaper for NYC firefighters) to be the voice of workers beyond the borders of New York City.
In this 132nd episode of E&P Reports, Ben August, the new owner and publisher of The Chief, New York City’s weekly newspaper for municipal workers, explains why he is spending less time on his Napa Vineyard and more time devoted to transforming a more than 100-year-old newspaper into a modernized voice for workers everywhere. Also on this episode is a well-known industry consultant and founder of Creative Circle Media Solutions, Bill Ostendorf, who explains the transformation process of the paper's print design and website and plans for its expansion over the months to come.
In the March issue of Editor & Publisher, the Cordova Times was featured as an “honorable mention” in “10 That Do it Right,” E&P’s yearly salute to top news media companies. The small weekly in remote South-Central Alaska (only accessible by boat or plane) was awarded “Best Comprehensive Coverage of the COVID Pandemic” across all media, broadcast and print, and “Alaska’s Best Weekly” for two years in a row by the Alaska Press Club.
The Cordova Times covers local news, city government, community features, commercial fisheries, environmental news, the Alaska legislature, Alaska Native news, arts, science, history and Alaskan culture. Unfortunately, The Cordova Times is struggling to remain in business since its current owners, The Native Village of Eyak (NVE), has recently announced that if a suitable owner does not come forward, the tribe will simply stop the newspaper. And the price? Free!
Tribal Council Chair Mark Hoover is quoted as saying: “We are open to any proposals and will work with any group that might be interested.” Interested parties should contact NVE Deputy Director Brooke Mallory for more information at brooke.mallory@eyak-nsn.gov.
In this 131st episode of “E&P Reports,” we explore the world of publishing a weekly newspaper in a remote Alaskan community with Editor Annette Potter and contributing writer Zachary Snowdon Smith of The Cordova Times. This tribal publication needs to find a new owner whose only investment will be to live in what Niche.com describes as "one of the best places to live in Alaska."
Appalachian news veterans exit the daily newspaper to start a growing non-profit — The Cardinal News. On February 27th, the Washington Post’s Margaret Sullivan published a story entitled, “This rural news start-up has two reporters and an editor with no broadband. Already, it’s made an impact,” and suddenly, the entire world is made aware of the story of an Appalachian digital-only news site called The Cardinal News. Founded in July of 2021 and going live a few months later, this online-only, non-profit news operation owes its start to a grant of $100,000 and now survives on donations from individuals, corporations and foundations. And with this initial seed money, some local key editorial veterans were able to elect to exit the largest daily newspaper in the area, Lee Enterprises' Roanoke (VA) Times, to build this news start-up. As funding grows, so does the influence of their reporting. The Cardinal News' November of 2021 story on a major flood that ravaged the small community of Hurley, VA, helped amplify the resident's plight so they could get the help needed from the state government. In fact, the website's audience is not just their primary area of service defined as "Southwest and Southside Virginia." Their daily Google Analytics clearly shows that their second-largest audience "cluster" is the state capital of Richmond.
In this 128th episode of "E&P Reports," meet two former editorial staff members of Lee Enterprises’ Roanoke (VA) Times, Luanne Rife and Dwayne Yancey, who both resigned to start this growing online-only, non-profit start-up, The Cardinal News, as their Executive Director/ Chief Development Officer and Editor-in-Chief (respectively).
As E&P reported earlier this week (Florida legislators put news publishers — in the state and beyond — on notice), the news publishing industry was stunned to learn that the Florida State Senate voted in favor of a bill that changed the requirement for government entities to place public notices in local newspapers. The amendment that changed the existing bill, which just went into effect a few weeks earlier, will now allow local governments and private parties to provide notice about government meetings, zoning changes, and legal proceedings to appear on obscure government websites rather than being placed first on the floridapublicnotices.com website run by the Florida Press Association.
There may be many reasons on why this sudden reversal took place, including that this quick change of course could actually be a vendetta that starts as high as Governor Ron DeSantis and State Senate President Wilton Simpson against the Florida newspaper industry because of critical reporting — one reporter, in particular at the Miami Herald, Mary Ellen Klas, the newspaper’s state capital bureau chief, whom Simpson accused of “collusion” with Democrats over a contentious redistricting debate happening among the legislators.
Regardless of the reason, most critics agree that legislation like this reduces government transparency and reduces an important revenue stream that supports local journalism.
In this 129th episode of "E&P Reports," Editor & Publisher hosts a panel of news publishing leaders on how this reversal may have been avoided and what the future may hold as states might be compelled to mimic Florida's actions. Speaking on this topic are Dean Ridings, CEO of America's Newspapers; Jim Fogler, President & CEO; Florida Press Assoc., Brad Thompson, CEO Detroit Legal News; Don Craven, President & CEO, Illinois Press Assoc.; Samuel Morley, General Counsel, Florida Press Assoc. and Bill Barker, Founder & CEO, Barker Strategic Solutions and past Regional President for Gannett Florida.
Stay tuned for Part 2 of E&P’s coverage on public notice legislation across the country.
On Thursday, March 10, 2022, the Florida State Senate voted in favor of a bill (FL HB 7049) that changed state government entities' requirements to place public notices in local newspapers. The amendment that passed changed some language from the existing bill, which was just approved in 2021, allowing public notices to remain in the public domain through newspapers, their websites, and online at www.floridapublicnotices.com. The floridapublicnotices site is a free and independent site operated by the Florida Press Association and provided to Florida and several other states by Column, a public benefit corporation founded by its CEO Jake Seaton.
In short, just approved Florida Senate House Bill 7049, which now heads to Governor DeSantis' desk, will eliminate the requirement for local governments to publish publicnotices in a newspaper. Instead, governments would be allowed to post them on a county website.
Critics of this latest change argue that, under the new bill, the state's legal notices could be strewn across 67 different county websites instead of the centralized platform run by the Florida Press Association and Column.
In this 128th episode of “E&P Reports,” Column founder and CEO Jake Seaton talks with E&P about the compelling data his company compiled, showing how efficiently the current public notice system in Florida is working, as well as his experiences meeting with legislators and giving testimony to try to keep a 68-day old law from being repealed
The Chicago Tribune states proudly, "Rex Huppke is considered (by himself) to be America's most-beloved columnist, though there is no empirical evidence of that.” And recently, after almost 20 years at the “Trib,” this famous satirical humorist announced that he would be “jumping ship” to pen his thoughts for a larger international audience at USA TODAY. Rex’s first column for Gannett did not disappoint, as he took a comedic swipe at the far-right anti-COVID-mandate truckers by suggesting that he was working with them to help “overturn” the results of the New York Times “totally rigged” Wordle. The exact words he wrote in the debut piece included, "My Wordle victory was stolen from me, and the American people will not stand idly by and let this crime of the century go unnoticed. To paraphrase former President Donald Trump on the day he definitely didn’t incite a crowd of angry supporters to violently disrupt the peaceful transfer of power, ‘If you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a Wordle anymore.'"
But the very next day, during his first week on the job, history stepped in as Russia invaded Ukraine. So, Rex's next pieces start to take an even more serious note, with titles that include (on February 23rd) — "Knock off the ugly partisanship as Ukraine hangs in the balance. We all deserve better.” And on February 26th — “America's kids are watching Russia's war on Ukraine. We should pay attention." Finally, on February 28th — "Marjorie Taylor Greene at a white nationalist conference? Probably Joe Biden’s fault.”
In this 127th episode of “E&P Reports,” syndicated columnist Rex Huppke discusses how in his youth, he made a change from a career in chemical engineering to journalism and what it is like today to write his style of political humor in such a polarized country. Plus, E&P Publisher Mike Blinder asks Rex how he comes up with his topics and reviews those debut columns for USA TODAY as war breaks out in Europe.
Meet Russell Midori, a New York City freelance news photographer, documentary filmmaker and co-founder and president of the Military Veterans in Journalism (MVJ), a relatively new professional association that builds community for vets, supports their career growth and advocates for diversifying newsrooms through hiring and promoting more vets. Midori served as a combat correspondent in the Marine Corps from 2008 to 2012, working as a video producer for Marine Forces Europe and Africa and the NCOIC of the Parris Island Public Affairs Office. During his enlistment, he held the rank of sergeant and was twice named an honor graduate of courses at the Defense Information School. According to U.S. Census data, even though military veterans make up 7% of the population, approximately 2% percent of those who work in U.S. media are post-9/11 veterans. Why is this important? A recent Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) sponsored study conducted by the RAND Corporation and Syracuse University's Institute for Veterans revealed that organizations gain employees with extensive experience and competencies when they hire veterans. The study states, “Vets deliver subject matter expertise, years of on-the-job training and advanced skills in everything from information technology to transportation logistics and from supply-chain management to public relations. Vets can raise a company’s workforce to the next level in many areas.”
The MVJ is led and run by military veterans such as Midori and co-founder Zack Baddorf who acts as the Executive Director. Their work includes creating opportunities for veterans to break into the media industry and to also serve as a career pipeline by providing news outlets access to talent and diversity for their members.
In this 126th episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder is joined by Russell Midori, co-founder and President of Military Veterans in Journalism (MVJ), to discuss the organization’s goals of supporting career growth for vets in the news publishing industry and diversifying newsrooms through hiring and promoting more vets. Joining the discussion is Lori King, host and producer of the MVJ podcast “*Sword & Pen”* and a journalism instructor at The University of Toledo and Kent State University.
Check Out DFW proudly states on the site that it is: “The first-of-its-kind real estate and local recommendations product that helps locals live more enjoyable lives.” Launched in the fall of 2021 in a very media crowded Dallas/ Ft. Worth metroplex market, Jed Williams, who spent one year as Chief Revenue Officer at Ken Doctor's experimental start-up Lookout Local and close to four years managing strategy and innovation for the Local Media Association, teamed up with well-known industry veteran David Arkin (who led content initiatives for Gatehouse, Local Media Association, Community Impact Newspapers and others) to go all-in with sponsored content in this new venture. Arkin is Check Out DFW’s chief content officer, and Williams is chief revenue officer.
Right now, the platform focuses on the area’s most affluent and growing communities offering content "verticals" for each area defined as Schools, Subdivisions, Resources, Guides, Things to do, Profiles, New to town, New to Texas and more. Plus, there is a growing newsletter database as well. However, all content is sponsored by a local business crafted as a marketing partnership between Check Out DFW and the Advertiser.
In this 125th episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder interviews industry veterans Jed Williams and David Arkin about why they decided to move entirely into the sponsored content space with Check Out DFW. And what they see as the opportunity for initially growing audience and revenue in Dallas, Ft. Worth with this new model, and then moving into other markets as well.
In a recent post from the American Press Institute, they cited: "Concentrated efforts to highlight diversity are necessary for reaching new audiences and staying relevant to younger changing audiences. Readers pay attention to the content that speaks to or serves their identity. Diversity is a journalism imperative.”
The API goes on to add that more diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) within the news publishing industry is imperative because: "Without accounting for the range of lived experiences, we fail to serve parts of our communities. Journalism, in its truest form, should be produced for the benefit of all, not only those who wield a particular power, class or authority.”
In a recent press release, Editor & Publisher (E&P) announced a new partnership with The Diversity Pledge Institute (DPI), a nonprofit organization addressing newsroom diversity by working with employers to improve hiring and retention of journalists of color and by identifying skilled journalists of color and preparing them for news careers. E&P and DPI have launched a new resource site called “Diversity Spotlight” that features exclusive editorial content and links to all relevant resources and stories to help publishers find relevant content in one location and create a more diverse and inclusive workplace.
Also included with that platform is information and access to the many training sessions around diversity, equity and inclusion offered by The Poynter Institute.
In this 124th episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder interviews Larry Grahm, founder and executive of The Diversity Pledge Institute, along with Doris Truong,
Director of Training and Diversity at The Poynter Institute, about the importance of achieving more diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) within the news publishing industry and what resources are available now to help executives accomplish those goals.
On Nov. 18, 2020, the Del Rio News-Herald printed its final edition leaving this border town of 35,000+ without a local news outlet. But just one month later, a weekly free tabloid entitled The 830 Times (named after the local area code) appeared throughout the town and surrounding Val Verde County. The new newspaper grew out of a then 5-month-old entertainment-based local website started by 56-year-old air force veteran Joel Langton. Langton relocated to the area 16 years before when he was assigned as a public affairs officer at nearby Laughlin Air Force Base.
Joel states in his LinkedIn profile: “I've got 30 years with the Air Force in Public Affairs where I've been involved in media, internal communications and many consider my strength to be community engagement. However, I've got plenty of experience in all of it, and I'm a big proponent of causes bigger than myself.”
Today the Times publishes more than 40 pages a week, with a 50%+ ad count. The newspaper gained national attention uncovering how a proposed Chinese-owned wind farm would disrupt military operations (Chinese Reps Defend Proposed Wind Farm). And with their live coverage of the estimated 15,000 to 20,000 Haitian immigrants who camped under the Del Rio International Bridge last September.
Joel’s publishing accomplishments even awarded him national attention in the January 2021 New York Times article: “In a Widening News Desert on the Border, a Tabloid Start-Up Defies the Odds."
In this 123rd episode of "E&P Reports," Publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Joel Langton, the air force public affairs veteran who saved a Texas border town from becoming a news desert with a thriving, local news outlet publishing an ad packed, free weekly newspaper.
The Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (JCPA) hopes to bring big tech to the bargaining table with U.S. news publishers. On this 122nd episode of E&P Reports, Danielle Coffey, executive vice president and general counsel for the News Media Alliance (NMA), and economist Dr. Hal Singer, managing director, Econ One discuss why this legislation is urgently needed and offer advance insight into this week’s Congressional hearing before the Senate's Antitrust Committee, where the JCPA will be debated and Dr. Singer will be testifying.
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the median number of years an employee works for a company is four years and one month. The "exception to that rule" might be Kurt Jackson, who has worked atSoftware Consulting Services (SCS), according to his Linkedin profile: "28 years and ten months." Kurt started his career in news publishing in 1989 as a circulation executive for the Journal Register Company. As new digital technology was evolving, Kurt's passion for helping innovate compelled him to work in the vendor space. He first traveled to hundreds of newspapers as an installation specialist of advertising systems and eventually found a home as VP of operations at SCS, then owned by Martha and Richard Cichellii. He has been there since. In September of 2021, the Cichelli’s sold the company to him, stating, "We are so happy to be able to turn the company over to Kurt who knows the industry so well..”
In this 121st episode of "E&P Reports," Publisher Mike Blinder chats with industry technology veteran Kurt Jackson about his views about all aspects of news publishing, including opinions on those who cut back on print frequency, how he believes selling digital ads CAN support a local newsroom, why Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act should be repealed and lots more.
In this 120th episode of “E&P Reports” American Journalism Project (AJP) CEO Sarabeth Berman and AJP’s Co-Founder and Vice President for Portfolio Success Anna Nirmala talk about several AJP grants they recently awarded including $1.6 million given to Block Club Chicago and their contribution to the 20 million in seed being given to a new, nonprofit, Houston based local news outlet. Joining in on the discussion is Block Club Chicago’s Publisher and Co-Founder Shamus Toomey and Co-Executive Editor and Co-Founder Stephanie Lulay.
Borrell Associates' latest study: 2022 Local Automotive Advertising Outlook, released on Monday, Jan 7, 2022, predicts significant changes in this highly lucrative media advertising category for the next few years. Within the 30-page report, 18 charts and graphs reveal that local dealers spent an estimated $8.7 billion on advertising in 2021, a 15% increase over 2020.
In 2022, the forecast is for an 8.8% increase in ad spend. However, due to a "steep decline" in available inventory to sell, the dealers will be using these dollars to "rebrand themselves, educate consumers on what their stores have to offer and drive buyers to their websites to interact.
The report states that “the new advertising environment is shifting from excitement around new cars on the lot and manufacturer’s rebates – both of which are in short supply – to other things. That opened up new opportunities to advertise.” Some of these new reasons that dealers will be advertising will include: Buying back consumer vehicles, meeting online buyers in person, promoting electric cars and ancillary services they offer within their finance and service departments.
The report also predicts a significant shift in what media local auto dealers will be purchasing as they move substantial dollars away from broadcast radio & TV ads into newspapers (an 11.9% increase) and OTT (Over the Top Advertising), where their video message is placed on streaming services that deliver content over the internet.
In this 119th episode of E&P Reports, E&P Publisher Mike Blinder is joined by Jim Brown, President of Borrell Associates, who reviews the findings of their newly released Auto Advertising Outlook study. Joining the discussion is a long-time automotive industry veteran and JDA media’s SVP of revenue initiatives Pat Norris along with E&P's "Ad Sales Life" contributor Richard E. Brown, head of digital subscriber churn for Gannett | USA Today.
Slides used during broadcast are available on the Vodcast episode page
E&P devoted its January 2022 cover story (“At the front lines, on the homefront”) to memorializing the January 6th assault on the nation’s Capitol and to inform our readers — news publishers — about what it’s like to report on domestic extremism; what the perils are to journalists; how to prepare for potentially violent or dangerous conflicts; and why these stories matter nationally and within our local communities.
In this 118th episode of E&P Reports, E&P Publisher Mike Blinder is joined by Roxanne Cooper, executive editor and publisher at Raw Story and two of the journalists who shared their reporting experiences with E&P contributor Gretchen Peck for the cover story — Jordan Green, staff reporter at Raw Story, and Christopher Jones, a former U.S. Marine turned Report for America journalist who now reports for the GroundTruth Project and 100 Days in Appalachia, the 2021 recipient of the Edward R. Murrow Award for hard news reporting.
As newspapers’ online presence matures, many still struggle with monetizing it. Often, an outside perspective is where new ideas are born. They disrupt the norm and reveal new monetization opportunities.
That realization is how Ryan Johnston, a former commercial real estate professional, and Ryan Heafy, a former engineer, envisioned 6AM City. Its 24 editions (currently) in most regions of the U.S., joins Axios Local, Patch, WhereBy.Us and other news disruptors in the local digital newsletter space.
In one sense, 6AM City integrates news and social media in a new way, and in another, it may be a precursor of a local news platform that could reside in the Metaverse.
In this 117th episode of "E&P Reports" Publisher Mike Blinder speaks with 6AM City CEO Ryan Johnston about the growth of this local news "disruptor" that now publishes newsletters 5 days-a-week in 24 U.S. cities.
As live conferences return and industry moguls get a chance to mingle again, there is no question that Borrell Miami on March 6-8th at the Miami Hilton will once again be a "who's who" of C-suite executives from all sectors of media.
This year's event is entitled "The Path to 2032," with a predicted audience of 300 or more, and promotes itself online as the “skip the hype/follow the money” conference with “crisp information that flows from the stage that’s chocked full of new data.”
E&P is proud to be the media publication sponsor and is offering readers a $200 discount code of “EP200” when they register at: https://borrellmiami.borrellassociates.com. In addition, all who attend will receive a complimentary full-year subscription to Editor & Publisher Magazine.
In this 116th episode of E&P Reports, Publisher Mike Blinder welcomes Gordon Borrell, CEO of Borrell Associates, who offers a preview of what to expect at Borrell Miami 2022.
In this 115th episode of "E&P Reports," Mike Blinder the Publisher of E&P chats with David Chavern, President / CEO of the News Media Alliance and Lee Wolverton, VP News/ Executive Editor at HD Media about the latest developments in the class action lawsuit naming both Google and Facebook as defendants in a federal antitrust lawsuit. Also on the panel is Gretchen Peck E&P's Contributing Editor.
Howard Owens published his first newspaper in fourth grade, which is likely why soon after graduating from Point Loma Nazarene University with a degree in literature, he and a partner became owners of The Beacon, a biweekly newspaper in the City of San Diego. After that, he decided to branch out to other publishing companies as a reporter and editor. In 1995, he and a partner founded East County Online (ECO), the first chain of weekly newspapers with Web sites. ECO featured not only content from six community weeklies but original content, a Web directory of local businesses, reader submissions (now called user-generated content) and a community club (now called virtual community). In 1995, a Wired Magazine poll found that ECO was the 66th most popular news Web site in the world.
After Owen's success in pioneering digital publishing at East County Online and holding senior management positions in digital media at the Ventura County Star and Bakersfield Californian, he was hired by Gatehouse Media as Director of Digital Publishing. In 2008, one of his duties was to launch The Batavian, an experimental online-only newspaper in Batavia, NY. When Gatehouse decided to scrap the project one year later, Owens negotiated a deal with Gatehouse to take over the Website, and the rest is history.
Since 2008, Howard Owens has been living in Batavia, NY, as the Owner and Publisher of The Batavian, a popular, local news operation that serves Genesse County, NY (population 60,000). Even though some industry pundits think Owen's online publishing model, which includes having over 100 ads on his home page alone, is flawed and outdated, The Batavian is highly read. Moreover, it churns out enough profit to allow Owens and his wife Billie to enjoy a comfortable living while employing a local sales and editorial support team.
In this 114th episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with industry veteran and founding board member of Local Independent Online News Publishers (LION), Howard Owens about his 14 years as a local online-only news publisher and his feelings on the future of the industry as a whole.
In this 113th episode of “E&P Reports, Alan Leveritt publisher of the Arkansas Times and ACLU Senior Staff Attorney Brian Hauss join Editor & Publisher’s (E&P) publisher, Mike Blinder, and E and P contributing editor Gretchen Peck to talk about a two year battle, that has gained international prominence, between the Times and the state of Arkansas, on the newspapers’ refusal to sign a pledge to support Israel in order to continue receiving advertising dollars from the state university. Also, on the program appears award winning film producer Julia Bacha, who has just completed a documentary on the impact of state legislation designed to penalize individuals and companies that choose to boycott Israel due to its human rights record.
In 2018, news media analyst Ken Doctor penned a column that, in part, read: “Alden Global Capital is making so much money wrecking local journalism, it might not want to stop any time soon.”
Now, fewer than five months since the ink dried on Alden Global Capital’s acquisition of the Tribune titles, it’s making a formal play for Lee Enterprises, a digital marketing services company and publisher of local newspapers across 26 U.S. states. The initial offer was for $24/share. The news sent Lee Enterprises stock upward. As E&P’s Publisher Mike Blinder assembled a panel of news media experts on November 23rd to discuss the bid, LEE stock was at $24.10/share.
On this 112th episode of E&P Reports, Host Mike Blinder speaks with Gordon Borrell, founder and principal of Borrell Associates; Rick Edmonds, media business analyst for Poynter Institute; Steven Waldman, president and co-founder of Report for America; and Gretchen A. Peck, contributing editor at E&P, about the hedge fund company's intentions. They talk about the offer, the timing, the oncoming culture clash if the deal goes through, the possibility of pleading an anti-trust case, and so much more.
For the past 30 years, Jim Doyle has been helping salespeople make more money as one of the top sales trainers for the broadcast industry. His latest book, Selling with a Servant Heart, outlines ten lessons that ultimately lead to greater joy in sales while also increasing income.
Doyle describes the concept by saying: “When you commit to serving customers as a ‘Servant Heart Seller,’ you’ll find more success, greater customer loyalty, and far less churn. And you’ll have a lot more fun, too.” He goes on to add: “Lots of good sellers would describe themselves as 'Customer Focused.' But think about a level that is even above that. ‘Servant Heart Sellers’ would better be described as 'Customer Obsessed.' Obsessed that the products they sell and their work personally provide the absolute best outcomes for the client. They are outcome-focused, not just customer-focused.”
In this 111th episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Jim Doyle to learn more about the concept of “Servant Heart Selling” and how any salesperson, sales manager or media company as a whole can benefit from adopting this approach to advertising sales.
More information about Jim Doyle and “Selling with a Servant Heart: Ten Lessons on the Path to Joy and Increased Income" can be found at https://servantsellingbook.com.
Pre-order “Selling with a Servant Heart” on Amazon:
On this 110th episode of "E&P Reports," Publisher and Host Mike Blinder sat down with the National Newspapers Association’s (NNA) chair, Brett Wesner, and E&P contributing editor Gretchen Peck to talk about the urgency for advocacy for the Local Journalism Sustainability Act (LJSA). On Friday afternoon, November 5th, word had come that at least part of the LJSA — payroll tax credits for newsrooms — remained in the Build Back Better Reconciliation bill being bandied about in Congress. It’s legislation that the NAA, America’s Newspapers, Report for America and other industry associations have tenaciously lobbied for in Washington, DC, and perhaps to everyone’s surprise, got traction and even a little bipartisan for it.
Community newspapers serve an obvious role that most people inherently understand. Their local newspaper — whether they read it in print or online — is the very best source of local information about what’s happening in the community around them and why it should matter to them. A local newspaper fulfills other roles that may be less overt but are nonetheless integral to the health and prosperity of the community.
“If we don’t exist, no one’s there, because you’re not going to get major metros covering small towns anymore,” Brett Wesner warned. Wesner is both the chair of the NNA and the CEO of Wesner Publications, a community newspaper publisher based in Cordell, Oklahoma.
“When you don’t have a newspaper, the bond rates increase,” Wesner continued. “If there is nobody guarding the chicken house, the fox has free rein. We do play an important role in the business of communities and also in terms of creating community. I mean, in these small towns, if you don’t have a binding element of some kind, you really lose that sense that we’re all in this together.”
The LJSA’s future remained uncertain as E&P Reports wrapped on Friday afternoon. Nothing’s a done deal until it reaches the President’s signing desk. While the associations and their lobbyists continue to implore Congress to adopt the LJSA, local newspapers around the country might use the coming week to rally their newsrooms and their readers, reminding them, we’re all in this together.
While a student at Southern Methodist University, Adam Darsky was bitten by the "journalism bug" writing for "The Daily Campus," so upon graduation, he took an entry-level job as a sports reporter at a small newspaper outside of Dallas. It wasn't long before he jumped from newspapers to broadcast, landing an internship at the Dallas all-sports radio station.
Darsky leaped from radio to TV, beginning his 25-years as a broadcast TV news producer running the prompter and ripping scripts at KXAS-TV in Dallas to
producing and management jobs in Savannah, Tucson, Houston and Charlotte. Finally, he wound up in New York City as Executive Producer of the nation’s #1 TV morning show.
Today, you'll find Adam Darsky as the new Director of Content for the much-talked-about local news disruptor, TapInto. TapInto is a network of over 90 hyper-local franchised, online-only news websites most in New Jersey, one of the nation's most populated and media-saturated corridors.
In this 109th episode of "E&P Reports," Publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Darsky to learn about his leap from broadcast TV to hyper-local, pureplay news and what he thinks about the future of online-only news publishing.
There are over 550 federally recognized tribal governments and more than 300 Indian reservations in the United States. Tribal reservations are sovereign nations and are not required to comply with many federal or state laws, including freedom of information and open meetings laws. Legally, tribe members enjoy the same constitutional rights as every American, but there is no independent safeguard on reservations to protect those rights, such as freedom of the press. Since tribal councils own the vast majority of the approximately 200 Native American newspapers, little leeway is given to any analysis of government activity. Reporters are often prohibited from writing critical stories about tribal leaders, and access to tribal records on most reservations is nonexistent. As a result, reporters who dare to question the tribal government will often find themselves out of a job or their newsrooms shut down.
Native American journalists often complain that government ownership of the tribal press runs counter to their roles as the watchdogs of their communities. They have long sought independence in their reporting on tribal reservations. Some tribes have enacted laws guaranteeing press freedoms, but governing councils have often displayed a willingness to ignore those laws, as well as orders by tribal courts.
Recently the citizens of Oklahoma-based Muscogee Nation, the fourth largest reservation in the U.S, voted 1,914 to 596 to amend their constitution to include press protections and mandate funding for Mvskoke Media, the tribes' newspaper, radio and TV news outlet.
The Muscogee amendment allows Mvskoke Media to operate “free from political interest or undue influence, harassment, censorship, control or restrictions from any department” of the tribe’s government.
In this 108th episode of "E&P Reports," Publisher Mike Blinder explores Native American news publishing and its challenges in providing free and unfettered news to the indigenous American populations it serves. Guests include Rob Collins, project manager with the Oklahoma Media Center and president-elect of Freedom of Information Oklahoma; Angel Ellis, director of Mvskoke Media, the independent tribal media agency of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation; and Sterling Cosper, membership manager of the Native American Journalists Association.
As live events slowly return, America's Newspapers' Senior Leadership Conference took place live at the Broadmoor Resort in Colorado Springs. Just under 200 attended sessions on growing audience, maximizing revenue, building a better internal culture for our operations and more. On Monday, October 18th, 2021, Editor & Publisher's participation included the announcement of the 2021 Publisher of the Year recipient: Judi Terzotis, followed by the moderation of a robust lunchtime panel discussion by news publishing leaders on their views and predictions on the future of the industry.
Topics covered during this lively discussion included:
- Print frequency and what it may look like in the years to come
- Should Google & Facebook be made to pay for the content they monetize from our journalists?
- The future of funding our newsrooms and can local journalism survive on just ad and reader revenue?
- Finding talent and what it will take to recruit and keep employees
- The return of local ownership and how this impacts the future of local journalism
In this 107th episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder moderates, live from America's Newspaper's Senior Leadership Conference, a panel of industry executives that includes Heidi Wright, COO and Publisher, EO Media Group; Tim Prince, Senior Vice President, Boone Newspapers, Inc; PJ Browning, President and Publisher, The Post and Courier and John Rung, President and CEO, Shaw Media who address the most important and predictions on what the future holds for news publishers.
In September of 2021, Cherry Road Media, a Parsippany, New Jersey-based technology company, announced it had acquired 20 newspapers from the Gannett company, bringing their total count of publications owned to 27. Their list of titles now stretches across seven states: Kansas, Arkansas, Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri, Minnesota and Alabama.
Cherry Road CEO Jeremy Gulban stated in a recent press release that "This was his way to give back to local communities by supporting media houses that add so much value to our daily lives but are suffering the brunt of a digital age by losing subscriptions."
In the October 2021 E&P cover story entitled: "Under New Management," Sara April, from Dirks, Van Essen & April, the media merger and acquisition firm that represented Gannett in the sale of the 20 properties to Gulban, described the current mergers-and-acquisition landscape as "dynamic," noting that buyer trends have changed in the past three years. April stated: "Before that, the industry saw a lot of large corporate owners buying newspapers. Then, just a few years later, some of those organizations, including Gannett, are now selling off some of them, especially local titles."
In this 107th episode of "E&P Reports," Publisher Mike Blinder interviews Cherry Road's CEO Jeremy Gulban about why his technology company is "all-in" with newspaper ownership and his plans for managing their 27 local publications. And does his future include more growth in the news publishing industry? Also appearing in this episode is Sara April, from Dirks, Van Essen & April, who talks about the recent sale and offers her perspective on the current mergers & acquisition landscape for both buyers and sellers.
Newspapers owned by Cherry Road Media now include:
- Pratt (KS) Tribune
- Kiowa County (KS) Signal
- Hiawatha (KS) Penny Press
- Butler County (KS) Times-Gazette
- McPherson (KS) Sentinel
- The Leavenworth (KS) Times
- Wellington (KS) Daily News
- Dodge City (KS) Daily Globe
- Newton (KS) Kansan
- Garden City (KS) Telegram
- St John (KS) News
- Hays (KS) Daily News
- Ottawa (KS) Herald
Raw Story is an American progressive news website founded in 2004 by John K. Byrne. It describes its mission as bringing attention to stories they see as downplayed or ignored by other media outlets.
Raw Story’s recent reporting has focused on homegrown extremism. One such story entitled “We’re gonna kill Congress”: Trump’s far-right supporters promise violence at today’s DC protests,” was published the morning of the Jan. 6, 2021 riot, predicting exactly what would happen on that fateful day.
A few years ago, Raw Story began a partnership with Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist David Cay Johnston and the website he founded, DCReport.org, as part of a significant push into increasing their investigative reporting. DCReport’s team of journalists produces content for RawStory.com’s ad-free subscription program. In return, Raw Story funds (through donations) DCReport. Raw Story hosts exclusively this content first, but then allows any publisher to use it (with attribution) after 72 hours.
In this 105th Episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder explores Raw Story’s editorial mission and the today’s news media ecosystem as a whole, with their Publisher, Roxanne Cooper, staff reporter Jordon Green and contributor David Cay Johnston.
For decades many federal agencies have been prohibiting reporters from talking to anyone without first requesting access through a public information officer (PIO). And over those years, these “PIO chokepoints” have gotten tighter and tighter, including oversight on conversations and demands for questions ahead of any interview. Reporters today are often not allowed to speak to anyone, even after acquiescing to censorship and controls.
First Amendment attorney and head of the Brechner Center, Frank LoMonte, wrote in a 2019 article: “Although the practice of gagging public employees from giving unapproved interviews is pervasive across all levels of government, decades’ worth of First Amendment caselaw demonstrates that blanket restrictions on speaking to the media are legally unenforceable.”
In July, twenty-five journalism organizations, including the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) and the Society of Environmental Journalists (SEJ) , called on the Biden administration to end these prohibitions and allow reporters to interview government sources without oversight.
In this 104th episode of “E&P Reports,” publisher Mike Blinder speaks with SPJ immediate past president and opinion editor at the San Diego News and Tribune, Matt Hall along with Chair of the SEJ and an editor at the Chesapeake Bay Journal, Tim Wheeler about how their two organizations (along with others) are working towards helping the industry
With a mission to help Black-owned newspapers to "survive and thrive," ten Black newspapers have joined forces to create Word in Black, a platform to “amplify the Black experience by reporting, collecting and sharing stories about real people in communities across the country,” The initiative is part of the Fund for Black Journalism, founded last year by the Local Media Association (LMA), who initially received funding from the Walton Family Foundation to do stories about COVID-19 and education. The idea was to create a national site to house the ten newspapers' stories about the issues. That site became WordInBlack.com, which soft-launched in May and covers racial equity, K-12 education, police reform, healthcare disparities, social justice, politics, opinion, sports and LGBTQ issues and rights.
The ten participating newspapers include:
- New York Amsterdam News
- Atlanta Voice
- Houston Defender
- Washington Informer
- Dallas Weekly
- Baltimore/Washington Afro
- Michigan Chronicle
- Seattle Medium
- Sacramento Observer
- Louis American
In this 103rd episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder speaks with Nick Charles,
The Managing Director for Word in Black, Francis (Toni) Draper, CEO/Publisher The Baltimore/ Washington AFRO and Larry Lee, President, Publisher at The Sacramento Observer. They discuss the state of the Black-owned newspaper industry and what Word in Black is doing to support these publishers.
JournalList.net is a non-profit membership organization that originated and currently maintains the trust.txt reference document. Trust.txt is a simple page of code with the goal that it would be used worldwide to distinguish legitimate news organizations from non-legitimate ones.
The idea of having a universal code that achieves mass adoption by digital platforms is not a new one. Back as early as 1994, before the internet reached widespread use, a company called Nexor initiated the robots.txt reference document to aid early search engines, like WebCrawler, Lycos and AltaVista, to correctly crawl and index page contents correctly within any Website. Today it is estimated that over 90% of global sites have this file placed within their route directly that anyone can see (https://www.nytimes.com/robots.txt, https://www.cnn.com/robots.txt ).
Just a few years ago, the ads.txt file was created by The Internet Advertising Bureau to allow online buyers to check the validity of the sellers from whom they buy for internet fraud detection.
Now comes Scott Yates, a lifelong journalist and entrepreneur. In the past three years, he has devoted most of his time and energy establishing JournalList.net with a mission to introduce and promote the adoption of a new reference document —Trust.txt. This is a file that news publishers will add to their websites to signal their affiliations with other trusted news organizations.
In this 102nd episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder speaks with JournalList.net founder and Executive Director Scott Yates about their mission to have the Trust.txt reference document adopted and utilized by journalistic sites worldwide as a means to establish their authority as a trusted, credible, legitimate news outlet.
The Radically Rural Summit started in 2018 as a partnership between The Keene Sentinel and a local non-profit called The Hannah Grimes Center for Entrepreneurship. This organization provides space, tools and connections to assist in the successful development of entrepreneurs who are committed to building a vibrant community. Each year Radically Rural hosts an event with a mission to help share ideas and build networks tailored to rural communities and give a stage to those who have found solutions to rural problems so that others can learn and implement them in their communities.
This year’s event will take place on September 22 and 23rd, 2021 and will specifically feature sessions focused on sustaining community journalism, which will include
- Building Trust: Measures to secure faith in local journalism
- Funding News: Media organizations successfully find philanthropic help for their missions
- Crazy Good: Tools to make you a better – and more efficient – journalist
In this episode of E&P reports, Publisher Mike Blinder interviews Terrence Williams, President & COO of the Keene Sentinel and Julianna Dodson, the director of Radically Rural, on how their yearly "Summit" has grown from a small-town gathering to an event attended by people from across North America. We also discuss how this year's event focuses on helping to ensure the financial health of local journalism.
Perhaps you know Henry Scott from years in senior management positions at the New York Times or as VP/ CMO at Creative Loafing. However, you may not know that Henry decided in 2012 to move to West Hollywood, California to start a digital-only local news presence he called WEHOville.com. In 8-years, he built a viable, profitable business with a sizable audience consuming award-winning content across multiple platforms. Then, just a few months ago, Scott sold the site to enter the world of media consulting, hoping to help others gain the same success he did as a local "news disruptor." As part of this mission, he has crafted a lengthy, fact-filled manifesto he calls: "Want to Launch a Local News Website? Been There. Done That. Here’s What You Need to Know.”
In this 20-page, 11,000+ word document, Henry Scott offers actionable, real-world advice for anyone who wants to enter the world of news publishing as a pure play digital-only platform. Sections within the document include:
- “Where’s the Money?”
- “What is News…”
- “Creating the Site”
- “Clicks? Impressions? What Did We Charge and Why?”
- “There’s More Than a Simple Display Ad”
- “How to Get Your Name Out There”
- “How to Gain Subscriptions”
- “Sell, Sell, Sell”
And more!
In this 100th Episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with industry veteran Henry Scott on why he spent 8-years dedicated to building a successful, profitable local news Website and what key lessons he learned others could use to mimic that success.
With a mission to “investigate inequality with and for the people who are affected by it,” The Center for Public Integrity(CPI) is one of the oldest nonprofit investigative news organizations in the country.
Over the years, their reporting has led to hundreds of law and policy changes, forced the federal and state governments to release information critical to the public interest, and held corporations to account for abuses of power. It was also recognized with the Pulitzer Prize and countless other news publishing industry awards.
CPI collaborates with other organizations, particularly local news outlets, to publish data-driven and narrative journalism that reveals the causes and effects of inequality and exposes discriminatory systems in employment, housing, health care, education, and access to democracy.
Recently CPI announced the appointment of Paul Cheung as their new Chief Executive Officer. Cheung's background includes 20 years of experience in leading industry digital transformation working for NBC News Digital, The Associated Press, The Miami Herald, and The Wall Street Journal, as well as managing a multimillion dollars investment portfolio for the Knight Foundation.
In this episode of E&P Reports, Publisher Mike Blinder speaks with CPI's new CEO Paul Cheung and CPI's Editor-in-Chief Matt DeRienzo about the organization's near-term plans. They also discuss how Cheung's digital background may affect their methods to continue in their mission to fight inequality in America.
Overstory Media Group (OMG) is a startup media group that operates newsletter-based local media outlets and currently manages ten local brands in British Columbia, Canada. Recently they announced plans to hire 250 new journalists and launch 50 new outlets within the next 24-months.
The growth is financed by Canadian tech entrepreneur Andrew Wilkinson who partnered with a local digital journalist Farhan Mohamed to manage OMG.
OMG will provide salaries, benefits, and legal support for the journalists they hire and rely exclusively on local advertising as their primary revenue stream and hopes to add an audience revenue model in the future.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Canadian digital news disruptor Observer Media Group’s CEO and Co-Founder Farhan Mohamed about their business model, editorial focus and plans for expansion across North America.
Related Links:
Overstory Media Group (OMG)
OMG’s flagship platform: Capital Daily
Editor & Publisher’s July 2021 article about OMG Media
Greg Little has been a journalist since his first efforts at a small newspaper while he attended junior high school. His career has spanned five decades, winning a number of awards for reporting that helped an Indian reservation in Montana stop violent crime to stopping illegal dumping of sewage sludge in Tennessee. He has worked for large companies and family owners and spent time teaching journalism. Today he currently lives in Mariposa, California, with his wife, Nicole where they own the Mariposa Gazette, the oldest continually published weekly newspaper in the state of California.
Greg recently published a book called “-30- Why Small-Town American Print Journalism is Anything But Dead,” a book he describes as an “outline on how the road of journalism can sometimes be bumpy. But along the way, the business of small-town journalism can also be rewarding.” The book also speaks to why local journalism is so important in America and why it must survive. Little gives real-world advice to up and coming journalists on how they can pursue a rewarding career that can make a big difference in the communities they serve.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder speaks with Greg Little about why he wrote the book, his opinions on the future of community journalism, and what advice he would give any budding journalist who wishes to enter the industry.
Related Links:
“-30- Why Small-Town American Print Journalism is Anything But Dead” on Amazon.com: https://amzn.to/3xv5CG6
Mariposa (CA) Gazette: https://www.mariposagazette.com
On June 16, 2021, U.S. Representatives Ann Kirkpatrick, D-Arizona, and Dan Newhouse, R-Washington, introduced H.R. 3940, the Local Journalism Sustainability Act (LJSA) for the 117th Congress, a bipartisan bill that seeks to help local newspapers sustain financial viability through a series of three tax credits:
- A local newspaper subscription credit that incentives Americans to subscribe
- A local newspaper journalist compensation credit that provides publications the ability to hire
- A local newspaper and local media advertising credit that provides small businesses financial flexibility to spend on advertising in local newspapers and media
Five weeks later three senators, Mark Kelly, D-Arizona, Maria Cantwell, D-Washington, and Ron Wyden, D-Oregon, introduced the bill to the U.S. Senate as co-sponsors. Today the bill has wide bipartisan support in both the House and the Senate.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” publisher Mike Blinder discusses LJSA with Alan Fisco, president of America’s Newspapers, Dean Ridings, CEO of America’s Newspapers, and Francis Wick, CEO of Wick Communications. They consider why the next few weeks are critical for all news publishers to lobby their local representatives to support the bill.
Access more infomration about the LJSA at: http://www.Newspapers.org/ljsa
In January 2021, the Google News Initiative, in partnership with the Association of Alternative Newsmedia (AAN), the National Association of Hispanic Publications (NAHP), and the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), kicked off the GNI Ad Transformation Lab: A six month program to help Black and Latino news publishers in the U.S. and Canada advance their advertising strategies and grow digital revenue. Twenty-eight different organizations participated in the program. Over the six-month period, each publisher received coaching to address their organization’s path for business growth, including improving digital publishing tools and advertising capabilities and developing new digital skill sets. Participating publishers were advised on better methods for digital content distribution, better optimization tactics, how to maximize their digital advertising and programmatic capabilities, and most importantly, how to act on these improvements to attract more advertisers and generate incremental revenue streams.
The participating publications of the GNI Ad Transformation Lab include: Afro-American Newspapers, Al Día en América, Blavity News, The Cincinnati Herald, The Dallas Examiner, El Latino, The Houston Defender, Houston Forward Times, Impacto Latino, La Mega Media Cleveland, La Noticia, La Opinion, The Los Angeles Sentinel, Michigan Chronicle, The Mississippi Link, Noti Bomba, Post News Group, Our Weekly Los Angeles Newspaper, The Philadelphia Tribune, Precinct Reporter, Prensa Arizona, QCity Metro, The Sacramento Observer, The Seattle Medium, Texas Metro News, The Tri-State Defender, Vida Newspaper and Westchester Hispano.
On June 22, 2021, E&P Publisher Mike Blinder hosted a panel discussion about the GNI Ad Transformation Lab at the Association of Alternative Newsmedia annual conference: 2021 BostAAN at the Boston Park Plaza Hotel. This Episode of “E&P Reports” is a recording of that live panel discussion about the program’s work to help Black and Latino news publishers advance their advertising strategies and grow digital revenue.
Panelists include:
John Heaston, Publisher, Pioneer Publishing, Vice President of AAN, and a board alternate of the National Association of Hispanic Publications.
Todd Stauffer, Publisher , Jackson (MS) Free Press and Digital Specialist for the AAN GNI Ad Transformation Lab.
Alvaro Gurdián, VP of Operations, La Noticia, Vice President of the Board of Directors of the National Association of Hispanic Publications. Treasurer of Local Independent Online News (LION).
Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis President/ CEO, National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA): The Black Press of America. Board member of the National Association for Equal Opportunity in Higher Education (NAFEO).
Dana Peck Director of Digital Solutions, AFRO American Newspaper.
Brian Taylor VP Publishing, Mega Media, Inc.
If you have been involved in any form of production and operations over the past three decades, odds are you have spoken with the Southern Lithoplate's (SLP) Senior Vice President of Sales & Marketing, Steve Mattingly. Mattingly joined SLP in 1989 and helped this small, privately-held North Carolina lithoplate manufacturer become one of the leading consumables suppliers to North American printers and one of the top five largest manufacturers in the world. During those 30-plus years, Mattingly has been a voice for the operations sector as a board member of the international newspaper group as well as a frequent speaker at many industry conferences. In this episode of "E&P Reports," Publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Mattingly to gain his insight into the future of the still vital production / operations sector of the news publishing business. Topics include how the industry consolidation will affect bottom lines and what the future is for print as a profitable platform for news content.
Hearst Connecticut Media Group (HCMG) has made a big investment in a new online platform offering statewide news called: CTinsider.com. The new site provides a mix of original content and articles selected from across all 24 HCMG sites, offering hard news, features, sports and opinion columns. The articles CTinsider.com are chosen by a central editorial team working with editors from each site who also suggest what content should go statewide. The new site will likely augment the growing reader revenue being achieved by the entire group which now boasts more than 1,000 percent growth in its digital subscriptions since September 2019. Print and digital subscriptions have also increased by 18 percent during the same time period.
In this episode of “E & P Reports,” Publisher Mike Blinder chats with Group Publisher & President, Hearst Connecticut Media Group, Mike DeLuca along with VP of Content &, Editor-in-Chief Wendy Metcalfe about the new website along with what it took to realize such strong print and digital subscription growth.
Related Links:
CTinsider.com
Recent Article Posted “Policing the Police Investigation”
CT Post premium version:
https://www.ctpost.com/projects/2021/police-misconduct/
CTinsider.com posts on same article:
https://www.ctinsider.com/news/article/CT-s-secretive-police-disciplinary-system-16266189.php
https://www.ctinsider.com/news/article/Four-key-takeaways-from-Hearst-CT-s-16273587.php
Ryan Dohrn is a well-known industry sales coach who has traveled far and wide helping media companies of all sizes perform better (and he writes our monthly Ad Sales Life column). On his website, it states, “Ryan actively sells print, digital, broadcast, event sponsorships, exhibit space, and radio.” On his Twitter account, his description reads: Ryan Dohrn is a “motivational speaker, 28-year sales and marketing strategist.” And on the top of his LinkedIn page, there are just six words: “Sales Strategist – Keynote Speaker – Emmy Winner.” There is no question that when you watch Dohrn speak, there is always a true transference of positive energy emitting from him
In this episode of “E&P Reports” publisher Mike Blinder chats with Dohrn about how ad sellers should adapt to a post-pandemic world. Dohrn offers actionable advice on how we can find, recruit, and keep sales talent. What are our best target business categories to prospect? How do we interact properly in a new Zoom world and use it to your advantage with potential and existing advertisers? There’s a lot of usable content packed into this “E&P Reports” where two industry sales veterans take a deep dive into the best practices to adopt in ad sales strategies.
Juneteenth is widely considered the final “nail in the coffin” of slavery in the U.S. The New York Times reported that the first written reference of the term occurred in the Galveston (Texas) Daily News. Owned by Southern Newspapers, the masthead proudly states it is the oldest newspaper in Texas, published since 1842. Even the original announcement of General Granger’s words freeing the slaves was recorded on the pages of the Daily News.
Daily News publisher Leonard Woolsey states that their company has been “pushing lawmakers, editorializing, and promoting Juneteenth’s accent for as long as anyone can recall.” They even published a special 150-year magazine a few years back and have worked with local community members, as well staff members, to lend their voices to help move the important day to the national spotlight.
In this episode of “E&P Reports,” publisher Mike Blinder chats with Woolsey and the Daily News’ editor Michael Smith about what it was like to report locally in a city that quickly gained worldwide prominence. How is the paper integrating into the community? And what steps will they take to continue to provide a voice for all Galveston residents?
Related links:
Galveston Daily News: https://www.galvnews.com
Galveston News “Juneteenth Magazine:” https://resources.galvnews.com/sections/juneteenth150/#page=8
According to Google, the word “unpublish” is defined as a verb that means “to make content that has previously been published online unavailable to the public. As in ‘The magazine first amended and then unpublished the article.”
Years ago, publishers did not face problems of information permanence when a daily printed product was quickly discarded the next day. But more and more news publishers today are receiving requests from individuals to remove, obscure or significantly alter once-accurate information published about them in the past. In some cases, these requests are happening many years after a story was initially published online.
A recent survey also suggests that more than 80 percent of North American news publishers believe all news organizations should follow a set of standard guidelines about what information can and cannot be removed from their archives. But are such standards being compiled?
Exploring this issue is Deborah Dwyer, PHD candidate UNC Chapel Hill Hussman School of Journalism and Media who is working on a current initiative to create a single repository of newsroom unpublishing policies. Her latest project is a Website: unpublishingthenews.com, described as “a place on the web where news leaders and advocates can hash out the conundrum of “unpublishing” (in its broader context).” Here any editor or journalism can find a blog centering on the issue, along with resources that provides a growing list of policies and best practices, research, codes of ethics and more.
In this segment of “E&P Reports,” publisher Mike Blinder speaks with Dwyer about her research and work on compiling best practices of “unpublishing” the news. Also appearing is one of the initiative’s advisors Kathy English, chair of the Canadian Journalism Foundation.
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What do two millennial media execs from New York City do when they move to Texas? They buy a small market weekly newspaper and transform it into the center of the community. And how do they do this? By purchasing and renovating a building to house not only the newspaper’s office but a restaurant/ bar/ coffee shop and banquet center called The Sentinel.
In this segment of “E&P Reports” Publisher Mike Blinder interviews Max Kabat the co-founder of a New York City-based brand consultancy firm, who along with his Emmy Award-winning, documentary filmmaker wife, Maisie Crow, purchased The Big Bend Sentinel, a weekly newspaper in Marfa, Texas. After purchasing the newspaper just two years ago, they are funding a vibrant newsroom and building their audience up with out-of-the-box thinking that not only creates revenue but connects their publication with the community.
Watch This Episode on YouTube:https://youtu.be/xz3AZ5hSCwU
Related links:
Big Bend Sentinel: https://bigbendsentinel.com
The Sentinel (Restaurant/ Bar) Website: https://www.thesentinelmarfa.com
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For 15 years, Ken Doctor has been preaching innovative news publishing business models through Newsonomics, his own company and website. Six months ago, he started his experiment Lookout Local, which launched with Lookout Santa Cruz, the company’s first site based in Santa Cruz County, Calif. Doctor’s intention with the site is to show the industry his vision on what is needed to be the local news leader this decade. Today he boasts over 12,000+ email followers and just under 1,000 paid website subscribers after just three months of putting his content behind a paywall.
Lookout Local was started with $2.5-million dollars donated by the Knight Foundation, Google News Innovation Challenge, The Lenfest Institute for Journalism, and various other foundations. One of his news publishing competitors is Dan Pulcrano, CEO of Metro Newspapers and owner of Good Times a free-circulation weekly newspaper based in Santa Cruz. Pulcrano recently penned an editorial claiming that the $2.5 million Doctor raised was partly due to his shopping a false narrative that Santa Cruz is a ‘news desert,’ a community without reporting, one that’s uninformed and parched for news—it is anything but. For decades.”
In this episode of Editor & Publisher’s Vodcast: “E&P Reports,” publisher Mike Blinder checks in with Doctor and Jed Williams, founding chief revenue officer at Lookout Local, on how their business model is doing after launching during a pandemic.
Watch this Vodcast on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/7uTMrE5ygkQ
Related Links:
Lookout Local Santa Cruz Website: https://lookout.co/santacruz/
Ken Doctor’s Email message on Lookout Local’s 6-month anniversary:
https://lookout.co/santacruz/business-technology/local-business/story/2021-05-25/six-months-in-we-at-lookout-thank-you
Dan Pulcrano's Editorial: "Lookout Local: Ken Doctor’s False Narrative About Santa Cruz:" https://goodtimes.sc/santa-cruz-news/lookout-local-ken-doctor-false-narrative/
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In the June 2021 Editor and Publisher cover story, editor-in-chief Nu Yang takes an in-depth look at how a number of Minneapolis journalists covered the events from George Floyd’s death to the conviction of the police officer deemed responsible.
In this edition of E&P’s Vodcast series “E&P Reports,” publisher Mike Blinder has a frank discussion with the Minneapolis Star Tribune’s editorial management on what it was like to run a newsroom remotely, while covering one of the biggest stories of our time. Moreover, with all the global attention focused on their city, was it hard to hold to journalistic standards of balance of fairness in each story filed? Plus, with reporters receiving death threats and being shot at with rubber bullets, how did they maintain safety for each team member in the field? As they reflect a year later, how did the incidents and issues effect the Star Tribune’s own feelings and policies on diversity and inclusion?
Learn what it was like to manage a newsroom through crises with Star Tribune editor and senior vice president Rene Sanchez, managing editor and vice president Suki Dardarian, and newly appointed managing editor for diversity and community Kyndell Harkness.
Watch This Episode on YouTube:https://youtu.be/Uu0p3RTlMEc
Related Links:
E&P June 2021 Cover Story "How Minnesota Journalists Covered a Year of Crisis: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/how-minnesota-journalists-covered-a-year-of-crisis,194200?
For years, many media companies used remnant inventory as reciprocal trade in order to receive in-kind goods and services, such as prizes or meals. But what if there were new start-up companies willing to give you equity in their business in exchange for being able to market to your readers and viewers? That opportunity is now available from a new venture capital firm called Arrandale Ventures.
Founded by two industry veterans, Zach Richner (Richner Communications) and Jeremy Mims (Spoken Layer/OwnLocal), Arrandale Ventures’ job is to seek out growing B2C and B2B startups that serve local residents, businesses, and governments, and match them with marketing services across a national footprint of local media. Today, they have hundreds of media companies onboard who are gaining equity in exchange for the advertising services they provide.
In this segment of “E&P Reports,” publisher Mike Blinder chats with Richner and Mims about how their new venture capital firm works, and what the benefits and risks are for a media company to participate.
Related LinksArrandale Ventures Website: https://arrandaleventures.com/
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Raymond Alcide Joseph is arguably one of the most remarkable news publishers in our industry today. In 1971, while working as a reporter for the Wall Street Journal, he founded, with his brother Léo, the Haiti Observateur, a weekly newspaper and 24/7 website that publishes in four languages (Haitian Creole, French, and English). Today, it remains the free voice of the Haitian people.
For five years, Joseph served as Haiti's ambassador to the U.S., and during the massive 2010 earthquake, he was essentially the functioning government since the capitol, Port au Prince, was substantially damaged, and the country's elected leadership could not be reached.
Joseph is credited by The American Bible Society as the original translator of the New Testament with the Psalms from original languages and French to Haitian Creole. His autobiographical book, "For Whom the Dogs Spy," reveals Joseph’s insider’s account—having served under four presidents—of Haiti’s struggle to build a democracy during the tyrannical reign of dictator François “Papa Doc” Duvalier, who used the legend of voodoo to bewitch the country into fearing him.
In this segment of “E&P Reports,” publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Joseph on topics that range from the start of his newspaper and how he influenced change during a cruel dictatorship to his opinions on the importance of a free press, not just in Haiti but here in the U.S. as well.
Watch this Episode on YouTube:https://youtu.be/mco-0lUqgj4
Related Links:
More information about Ambassador Raymond Alcide Joseph: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raymond_Joseph
Haïti Observateur Website: http://www.haiti-observateur.ca
Ambassador Joseph’s Autobiography, “For Whom the Dogs Spy:” https://www.amazon.com/Whom-Dogs-Spy-Dictatorships-Earthquake-ebook/dp/B00R3L7692/ref=sr_1_3?dchild=1&keywords=For+Whom+the+Dogs+Spy%2C&qid=1621338011&sr=8-3
Alec Johnson is the fourth generation to manage Johnson Newspaper Corporation, owners of the Watertown Daily Times, a newspaper serving New York's North Country region since 1861. Today the Johnson family's media company has five daily publications, several weeklies, and magazines. They have a solid commitment to multimedia with a company-wide website, NNY360.com, that serves the entire region with news and classifieds.
In 2019, Johnson made the difficult decision to shutter the Ogdensburg Journal, one their publications that dated back to 1858, serving a city of 10,000+ residents along the St. Lawrence River. However, starting in June, the paper will begin to print again.
In this segment of ‘E&P REPORTS' Publisher Mike Blinder discusses with President & COO Alec Johnson why the company decided to bring back the Journal and their strong commitment to printing a quality product in a growing digital world.
Johnson Newspaper’s Webiste NNY 360: https://www.nny360.com
In 2018, ten former employees of The Denver Post started The Colorado Sun in response to multiple layoffs after the Post's acquisition by the private equity firm Alden Global Capital.
Initially started with a combination of financial and technical support from Civil, a blockchain platform for news organization and from a Kickstarter campaign, The Sun was able to hire the staff and build the business disrupt the news ecosystem of this major market.
Today the Sun remains journalist-owned and is growing audience relying on member support and sponsorships in order to pay the bills. And now, thanks to help from The National Trust for Local News the Sun has purchased Colorado Community Media, which has 24 weekly and monthly newspapers serving eight counties including and surrounding Denver.
In this segment of “E&P Reports” E&P Publisher Mike Blinder chats with Larry Ryckman Editor at the Sun, along Elizabeth Hansen Shapiro Co-Founder at The National Trust for Local News and Senior Research Fellow at the Tow Center for Digital Journalism on how and how the forming of public benefit corporations could be the next news model to help keep legacy newspaper brands alive.
Related links
Colorado Sun Website: https://coloradosun.com
Old Town Media Website: http://oldtownmedia.nyc
Dr. Iris Chyi is an associate professor at the University of Texas at Austin, specializing in media economics, and well-known for benchmarking reader demand for the print and digital content provided by major market newspapers.
A few years ago, she caused a stir in the industry by describing through data that the digital content that the top 50 newspapers provide was being perceived as an “inferior good” by their readers. She went on to compare digital non-replica news sites as “Raman noodles,” and the print editions to steak, stating that people tend to perceive online newspapers as less likable and less satisfying. In her book, “Trial and Error: U.S. Newspapers’ Digital Struggles toward Inferiority,” she challenges U.S. newspapers’ technology-driven strategy, calling for a critical reassessment of the future of the industry.
In her latest research, “The Impact of COVID-19 on 20 U.S. Newspapers’ Print and Digital Circulation,” Dr. Chyi takes a hard look at empirical data on the impact of COVID-19 with these selected publications. The report reveals that even through digital subscriptions went up by 64 percent between 2019 and Q3 2020, print circulation dropped by an average of 21 percent. Data showed that the average price charged for digital access is now $181 a year, while seven-day print subscription rates are $1,052 a year. The report states that this price gap shows it takes nearly six new digital subscribers to make up for the loss of one print subscriber.
In this edition of “E&P REPORTS,” Dr. Chyi reviews the findings of her April 2021 report with E&P publisher Mike Blinder.
Dr. Chyi's 2020 Report: The Impact of Covid-19 on 20 U.S. Newspapers’ Print and Digital Circulation
Dr. Chyis' 2017 Report: An Empirical Analysis of 50 U.S. Newspapers’ Digital Subscription Results
In his byline, Lansing’s City Pulse Managing Editor Kyle Kaminski proudly states he is “a cannabis enthusiast who has been smoking marijuana just about every day for the last decade.” So, it is no wonder that this alternative weekly in Michigan’s state capitol has become, arguably, the state’s authority on everything you need to know about cannabis.
The April 14 issue features images of pot on the cover, back, and 10 inside pages of the 32 total in this latest edition. And many of those images are on the tons of ads they get each week from the local “Provisionaries,” legal since December 2019 to dispense recreational marijuana to residents over the age of 21.
In this edition of “E&P REPORTS,” Publisher Mike Blinder chats with City Pulse’s Owner and Publisher Berl Schwartz and Managing Editor Kyle Kaminski about how cannabis has built an audience and needed revenue for their media company. Plus, they’ll share their views on covering Michigan state politics as Governor Gretchen Whitmer gains national attention in a politically polarized country.
Lansing City Pulse: http://www.LansingCityPulse.com
Paul Glader is an award-winning journalist, who spent 10 years as a staff writer for The Wall Street Journal with bylines for numerous publications including The New York Times, The Washington Post,TheNewYorker.com, The Indianapolis Star, The Associated Press, Der Spiegel Online, FastCompany.com, USA Today and ESPN.com.
Today, Glader is an associate professor at The King's College in New York City; director of The McCandlish Phillips Journalism Institute; executive director of The Media Project, a global non-profit journalism training organization; and executive editor of its award-winning, nonprofit news outlet ReligionUnplugged.com. He is also founder of Vett Incorporated, a Knight Foundation-funded start-up. Vett Inc. has built a new tool called VettNews Cx that is “reimagining how modern newsrooms handle corrections.” It is now gaining a lot of traction with key industry partners including more than a dozen news organizations, Poynter.org, and the Radio Television Digital News Association (RTDNA).
In this segment of “E&P Reports,” E&P publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Glader to discuss why new methods of handling consumer feedback can help us not only provide more accurate information but provide better audience loyalty.
Related Links:
Video that explains VettNews Cx:
https://vimeo.com/399003124
Press Release: VettNews offers corrections management tool to RTDNA members https://www.vettnews.com/press/vettnews-offers-corrections-management-tool-to-rtdna-members
With a world permanently changed from a global pandemic, what is in store for the news publishers, and how should we best meet the challenges ahead. E&P assembled four industry leaders to offer their thoughts on:
- The value of media companies today and what will we be worth as we put COVID-19 behind us
- Are Philanthropic revenue opportunities or non-profit models a realistic way to help offset content creation costs?
- What is the future of maximizing consumer revenue for the news we produce, and can we expect it to grow in the months to come
- Should we look at partnerships with tech media like Facebook and Google or continue to fight for compensation for the news they monetize
- How do we find new talent and build critical diversity in our industry, and what priority should we place on having our newsrooms reflect the communities we serve?
In this segment of "E&P REPORTS," Publisher Mike Blinder poses these questions and more to-
Dave Chavern
President and CEO at New Media Alliance
Nancy Lane
CEO at Local Media Association & Local Media Foundation
Dean Ridings
CEO at America's Newspapers
Tracie Powell
Program Officer at Borealis Philanthropy
Shaw Media claims to be “the third oldest, continuously owned and operated family newspaper in the nation.” Today, Shaw Media has more than 300 employees working at 53 newspapers and magazines across Illinois and Iowa.
Tom Shaw, who has worked at various levels within the company, currently holds the position of vice president and chief product officer. He recently led the launch of a news consolidation model called Shaw Local, designed to better their communities that contributed to their yearly double-digit growth in reader revenues.
In this segment of “E&P Reports,” publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Shaw to learn more about how news consolidation models may not just benefit their company, but the industry as a whole. Plus, we learn Shaw's thoughts about the industry’s relationship and future with Google and Facebook, growing advertising revenue, building diversity in our newsrooms, and Shaw Media’s plans for growth in the future.
Related Links:
Shaw Local, Shaw Media’s new consolidated news platform:
https://www.shawlocal.com
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/shaw-media-creates-digital-news-network-for-northern-illinois,188311?
Shaw Media’s corporate website:
https://www.shawmedia.com
Talking Glass Media (TGM) recently celebrated 6 million page views on its flagship “good news” website SignalsAZ.com, launched in March 2018 by Brad Fain, CEO of its parent company: Fain Signature Group, a multi-generational land holdings and real estate group based in Prescott Valley, Ariz.
Today, TGM publishes two regional magazines, the area’s premiere recreational guide, broadcasts podcasts and videos, and offers outdoor digital display marketing along with a complete suite of digital services for local businesses. TGM’s executive editor Guy Roginson’s background is not from the legacy media side of the business. He was brought in from an advertising agency to build TGM by “bringing together highly motivated professionals, dynamic content, the latest technologies and regional assets to deliver essential information, events, entertainment and news to a place once aptly named Lonesome Valley,” as stated on their website.
In this edition of “E&P Reports,” publisher Mike Blinder discusses with Roginson about how TGM operates, and what their vision is for maintaining growth in both readership and revenue.
It’s true that over the years we have seen the Borrell Associates’ Advertiser Research Studies show a downward trend in local advertiser spending for printed newspapers. But today, Borrell Associates CEO Gordon Borrell feels that those same newspaper companies are now in the right position to gain larger shares of local digital dollars as those advertisers look to shift their expenditures to those companies with the right solutions. According to Borrell’s latest newspaper study, most local ad directors feel they are poised for significant growth over the next year. It’s all part of a new study being performed by Borrell Associates and America’s Newspapers to help the industry find the best opportunities for growth in 2021.
In this segment of E&P Reports, publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Borrell on initial findings and what opportunities are available now for garnering new ad dollars.
Related links:
More information about participating in the Borrell/America’s Newspapers Study:
https://newspapers.org/stories/research-study,4157875?
Borrell Associates Website:
http://www.BorrellAssocaites.com
Damian Radcliffe is the Carolyn S. Chambers Professor in Journalism at University of Oregon and also a fellow of the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University. However, most of us know Professor Radcliffe as the author of numerous studies that provide insight into the global journalism ecosystem. His latest study on the impact of COVID-19 on journalism was just released in conjunction with The Thomson Reuters Foundation. It reveals the pandemic’s impact on the personal safety and welfare of journalists, the structure of newsrooms and disruption to business models and the proliferation of fake news, and surging threats to media freedom. The study also identifies best practice and innovative approaches that have been developed as a response to the challenges of COVID-19.
In this segment of E&P Reports, publisher Mike Blinder chats with Radcliffe about his current findings from this study and what trends he is seeing in the other research projects he is currently working on.
Related links:
More about Damian Radcliffe:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/damianradcliffe/
Download the entire Thomson Reuters Foundation study
http://covid-report.trust.org
Many know newspaper industry veteran John Kelly, who has spent over 30-years in sales leadership positions for Cox, Gannett and others. John is still consulting today and publishing a daily newsletter as well as speaking his mind when it comes to the state of the industry today and what he sees as our biggest challenges when it comes to ad sales. Mike Blinder, Publisher of E&P Magazine has known John for most of the 25-years he has spent providing media ad sales training and revenue generation services to hundreds of newspapers worldwide.
Join Mike & John, as these two old sales “war horses” talk about their views on what it takes to succeed in ad sales as well as the challenges we face in a world of pandemics and corporate takeovers.
With help from the Local Media Association (LMA), three Ohio News Publishers are uniting together in a new initiative called “Amplify Ohio” with a goal of publishing stories together that focuses on health disparities impacting the local Ohio Black and LGBTQ communities they serve. Their collaborative storytelling will use available tools such as podcasts, videos, explainers and more.
On the business side, the LMA team will work with consultants to launch a community contribution portal for all three publishers: Black Girl Media, Columbus Black and the Buckeye Flame, with hopes to create a common technology stack and seamless user experience that can possibly be deployed in other local markets to help provide an innovative system for publishers to collaborate together on common topics.
In this segment of E&P Reports, publisher Mike Blinder chats with Nancy Lane, CEO of The Local Media Association who is helping fund and guide the project, along with: Shana Black, founder and publisher of Black Girl Media; Kevin Lloyd, founder and chief executive officer of Columbus Black and Ken Schneck, editor of The Buckeye Flame speak on their common goals to help address the health care disparities their readers experience, plus other common topics of concern their communities share with each other.
Related links:
More about Amplify Ohio:
https://www.localmedia.org/lma-launches-amplify-ohio-a-diverse-digital-media-coalition/
Black Girl Media Website:
https://www.blackgirl.media
Columbus Black Website:
https://columbusblack.com
Buckeye Flame Website:
There was a lot of industry buzz last month when it was announced that Editor and Publisher Magazine was supplying more than a hundred years of editions digitally for free via a partnership with The Internet Archive, one of the largest libraries in the world.
Founded by Brewster Kale, a passionate advocate for public internet access and a successful entrepreneur, Kahle has spent his career intent on a singular focus: providing universal access to all knowledge. Soon after graduating from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he studied artificial intelligence, Kahle helped found Thinking Machines, a parallel supercomputer maker. In 1989, Kahle created the internet's first publishing system called Wide Area Information Server (WAIS), later selling the company to AOL. In 1996, Kahle co-founded Alexa Internet, which helps catalog the web, selling it to Amazon in 1999. The Internet Archive, which he founded in 1996, now preserves 20 petabytes of data—the books, web pages, music, television, and software of our cultural heritage, working with more than 400 library and university partners to create a digital library and making it accessible to all.
In 2005, Kale was honored by the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2008, he received the Robert B. Downs Intellectual Freedom Award from the University of Illinois. In 2010, he received his Honorary Doctor of Laws from the University of Alberta, and in 2012, Kale was inducted into the Internet Hall of Fame.
In the segment of E&P Reports, publisher Mike Blinder has a lively conversation with Kale who speaks about how he feels about digital privacy, the future of content distribution and compensation, and why the preservation and access to historical content is a matter of paramount importance.
Related links:
More about Brewster Kale:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brewster_Kahle
The Internet Archive:
https://archive.org
Editor and Publisher’s 100+ years of Archives:
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/archives/
For more than 66 years, the Parker family has owned the 14 weekly newspapers of the New Jersey Hills Media Group, which serves 50 communities in north central New Jersey. With a combined circulation of just under 100,000, it is the largest weekly newspaper group in the state.
When the current owners, Liz and Steve Parker, reached out to Grimes, McGovern & Associates to explore the possibility of sale, little did they know that an ensuing deal would be consummated that ended up creating a new non-profit entity that would eventually own and manage the group. With letters of intent now signed, the Corporation for NJ Local Media (CNJLM) will take over the operation and start a major fundraising initiative to achieve the goal of “building strong communities through journalism and civic engagement.” Moreover, the two leaders of CNJLM: executive director Amanda Richardson and founding chair Nic Platt met each other as opposing candidates for a local election.
Learn more about how this transition took place and what plans are underway in converting this family-owned group to a non-profit local news entity as E&P publisher Mike Blinder interviews Richardson and Jim McDonald, senior associate for Grimes, McGovern & Associates.
HD Media, the West Virginia-based publisher of the Pulitzer Prize-winning Charleston Gazette-Mail and the Herald-Dispatch, is making its own news with the recent announcement that they have filed a federal antitrust lawsuit against Google and Facebook. The purpose is to hopefully help the entire industry receive some form of compensation from the 70%+ of local advertising revenue these tech giants make from the content they exploit.
In this segment of E&P Reports, publisher Mike Blinder has an in-depth conversation with lawsuit co-council Paul T. Farrell Jr. and HD Media’s VP of news and executive editor Lee Wolverton to uncover how the lawsuit started and what they want to see happen as a result of their actions. Farrell and Wolverton also speak to how they feel about the need for local journalism and how this suit is not just about ad dollars but also the survival of the news industry as a whole.
Related links:
Download a copy of the class action lawsuit
https://www.scribd.com/document/492607988/Complaint-HD-Media-Co-LLC-v-Google#from_embed
“Investigation of Competition in Digital Markets” House Judiciary Committee October 2020 Report on antitrust and anticompetitive conduct by Google and Facebook
https://judiciary.house.gov/uploadedfiles/competition_in_digital_markets.pdf?utm_campaign=4493-519
HD Media Wikipedia Page
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HD_Media
Paul T Farrell Jr Wikipedia Page
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_T._Farrell_Jr.
It wasn’t too long ago that the family-owned Silver City (N.M.) Daily Press Publishing Co. announced that it would print its final edition. But, 24 hours later, it was still printing under new, local ownership. It was then-general manager Nickolas Siebel (now publisher) who quickly reached out to local civic leaders for help in putting together a loan to allow him to keep this hometown paper alive. Today, the Press is thriving under Siebel’s leadership, even in a COVID-19 world, with healthy subscription numbers and advertising revenue. Plus, the Press has expanded its offerings to provide varsity football broadcasts, an auction to help local businesses during the pandemic, and even publishing a special report for the local municipal league this year.
In this segment of E&P Reports, E&P publisher Mike Blinder chats with Siebel on what it takes to takeover a local publication and keep it thriving even in challenging economic times.
Printing 300,000+ dailies, 160,000+ weeklies and 180,000+ shoppers, Trib Total Media (TTM) still has a strong commitment to print. But their focus on digital is just as impressive with more than 40 people employed by 535 Media, their full-service agency that works with some of Western Pennsylvania’s most prestigious businesses. And even in a COVID-19 impacted marketplace, TTM achieved close to 90 percent of last year’s revenue.
Perhaps the secret to their success is their strong commitment to staff, due to an ownership mandate to support their employees; or it could be their diversification into other industries, which help support and fund their award-winning editorial team. Maybe it’s their leadership that focuses on making sure that TTM has the staff, audience and advertising solutions it needs on an ongoing basis.
TTM CEO Jennifer (Wolfe) Bertetto is not new to the company. Starting as a sales rep in 1998, she successfully led Trib Total Media’s 200+ employees through a tumultuous year, with plans to launch some exciting new programs in 2021.
In this edition of E&P Reports, publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Bertetto to explore what it takes to lead such a company and what advice she would give to be successful, even in these challenging times.
Related Links:
Trib Total Media Website
Trib Total Media, Media Kit
Trib Total Media CEO Jennifer Bertetto named to international board
The Webster-Kirkwood (Mo.) Times is back in print following their shutdown in March due to Covid-19. The comeback is due to donations from loyal readers and the focus and energy of managers who worked with the local business community to craft a deal to keep this paper printing.
Today, the newspaper prints more than 35,000 full color copies each week to two suburban communities just southwest of St. Louis. The staff, although operating on a tight budget, boasts high ad count with tons of profitable classified ads.
In this edition of E&P Reports, E&P publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with two of the paper’s managers/owners: publisher Randy Drilingas and editor-in-chief Jaime Mowers, who detail their struggle to get the paper back in business and what they continue to do to keep it growing.
Related Links:
Back By Popular Demand! Webster-Kirkwood Times returns under employee ownership:
https://www.timesnewspapers.com/webster-kirkwoodtimes/back-by-popular-demand/article_8b7af5ae-fe6a-11ea-a066-b71b55d5e06d.html
In The News: Webster-Kirkwood Times Relaunch Makes Headlines:
https://www.timesnewspapers.com/webster-kirkwoodtimes/in-the-news-webster-kirkwood-times-relaunch-makes-headlines/article_4ce9f8e2-0ccc-11eb-bd33-57cfc5b76afc.html
Hello There! A word from publisher Randy Drilingas:
https://www.timesnewspapers.com/webster-kirkwoodtimes/1-hello-there/article_dca9b2fc-fe6b-11ea-936c-3bd557d9733a.html
Industry sales guru Ryan Dohrn is the creator of the 360 Ad Sales Training system and is a globally recognized media revenue consultant who has created more than 600 corporate sales strategy programs. To date, he has taught more than 20,000 business professionals how to sell better.
In this segment of E&P Reports, E&P publisher Mike Blinder, who also has a sales consulting background, goes one-on -one with Dohrn to discuss what tactics he would recommend to any media sales rep in order to prosper and win in 2021. Topics discussed include:
· Helping advertisers find the knowledge they lack · What should ad directors and publishers should know about selling via Zoom
· ”Recommendation selling” as opposed to the dated method of lengthy needs analysis and “open ended questioning”
· How to get “old sales dogs” to embrace new tricks
And lots, lots more!
Related links: Ryan Dohrn’s E&P Column “10 Ways to Close 2020 Media Sales Strong:” https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/10-ways-to-close-2020-media-sales-strong,181066
360 Ad Sales: https://360adsales.com
A recent study conducted by The Whitman Insight Strategies Initiative and Creative Circle Media Solutions takes a deep dive into how a global pandemic has affected the actual feelings and emotions of local media consumers.
One of the key takeaways revealed from "The Covid-19 Societal Impact Study" is that even though half of those polled say that they lack confidence in news media, those perceptions do not extend to local community media, where those same viewers and readers state they have a much higher trust. Moreover, when asked where they go for essential information about COVID-19, local news scored much higher than cable news and social media channels.
In this segment of "E&P Reports," Editor and Publisher's Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Ostendorf to talk about the study and what local news media can do to serve our audience better.
It was just a few years ago that a group of local citizens bought the Half Moon Bay (Calif.) Review from Wick Communications, a sale that included the 122-year-old newspaper, a pair of magazines and the building they occupied.
And just a few months ago, those same local entrepreneurs decided to expand their small, local media empire and purchase the Pacifica (Calif.) Tribune, which has served their neighboring county for almost 90 years.
Today, these two combined publications make up the new Coastside News Group, a locally owned, for- profit media company that continues to serve these two California communities.
In this segment of E&P Reports, Editor and Publisher's Mike Blinder interviews Coastside News Groups publisher Debra Hershon and editorial director Clay Lambert on how they were able to find investors to invest in local journalism and what it takes to build and maintain a local media company that is owned by local investors.
Schneps Media is Rocking New York With Hyperlocal Free Weeklies
In 1985, Victoria Schneps-Yunis began a community newspaper in her living room called the Queens Courier. Today, that one free weekly has turned into the largest local media company in New York State comprised of newspapers, magazines, websites and events.
Victoria’s son, Joshua Schneps, now serves CEO and publisher of more than 70 community newspapers and magazines, in addition to community websites, email newsletters and social media channels serving all five boroughs of New York City, Long Island and Westchester and more.
In this segment of E&P Repor
John C. Tompkins left college his junior year to buy his first newspaper. Today, he is owner of News Media Corporation, a company that owns 65 different newspaper titles in eight states, serving smaller cities and towns with populations between 5,000 and 50,000.
Tompkins also boasts good cash flow from his properties, even during a pandemic, and claims that the reason his newspapers maintain profitability is because he makes sure that all of his managers follow simple rules in monitoring their productivity via a system of metrics.
Tompkins is not only bullish on our industry, he thinks now is a great time for entrepreneurs to buy community newspapers. In this segment of E&P Reports, Mike Blinder, publisher of Editor and Publisher, goes one-on-one with Tompkins to learn his secrets to success.
“Vision25: Building Racial Equity in Newsrooms” is a new initiative started as a collaboration between the Online News Association, the Maynard Institute and OpenNews, with a goal to be a major catalyst creating social change within journalistic institutions that help newsrooms be anti-racist and collaborative, and where journalists of color feel like they truly belong. Vision25 is creating programs that any news organization can access, in order to effect change in leadership, workforce and partnerships that can result in building a truly anti-racists environment.
In this segment of “E&P Reports,” E&P Publisher Mike Blinder speaks with Vision25 founders: Irving Washington, Executive Director/CEO Online News Association; Sisi Wei, Director of Programs OpenNews; and Martin G. Reynolds Co-Executive Director, Robert C. Maynard Institute for Journalism Education, to learn why they feel there is such a need for such an initiative today, and, how news publishers can take advantage of the Vision25 resources.
The Branded Content Project, an initiative by the Local Media Consortium, Local Media Association and Facebook Journalism Project, today released the results of a report on content marketing in collaboration with Borrell Associates Inc., which found that, despite the effect Covid-19 had on businesses, content marketing remained relatively steady and is projected to be more of a priority in 2021.
"Sizing the Content Marketing Opportunity" measured how vast the content marketing space is, what types of media benefit most and what kind of businesses are most inclined to utilize it and at what rates.
In this segment of E&P Reports, Mike Blinder speaks with Julia Campbell of the Branded Content Project and Corey Elliott of Borrell Associates about the report's findings and what local media can do to seize the opportunities of content marketing.
Aequalitas is Latin for “equality.” But there is very little equal to today’s struggling media outlets at the growing Aequalitas Media Group, who now owns eight publications targeted to the LGBTQ+ Reader in several U.S. major markets. Plus, their sought after ad network has become popular with some very large brands that want to connect to their claim being a “single point of contact to almost 100% of all LGBTQ+ print/digital media now representing 2.2-Million+ readers they deliver each month.”
Aqualitas founder and executive director DJ Doran spent 23 years as a U.S. Air Force Reserve Pilot before working as a CEO for multiple corporations across varied industries. Today, he is a publisher who still believes in print and says he can turn around a niche publication from red to black in 45 days.
In this segment of E&P Reports, E&P publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Doran to not just learn more about the LGBTQ+ reader and why it is in demand by Madison Avenue but what secrets work for him in pushing profitability from these niche publications.
Related links: Aequalitas Media: https://aequalitasmedia.com
Aequalitas Media acquires Kansas City Missouri LGBTQ+ publication CAMP Magazine
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/aequalitas-media-acquires-kansas-city-missouri-lgbtq-camp-dj-doran/
CMI Community Marketing & Insights: 13th Annual LGBTQ Community Survey USA Summary Report
https://www.communitymarketinginc.com/documents/temp/CMI-13th_LGBTQ_Community_Survey_US_Profile.pdf
Dr. Samir Husni is “the country’s leading magazine expert,” according to Forbes magazine; “the nation’s leading authority on new magazines,” according to min:media industry newsletter; “a world-renowned expert on print journalism” according to CBS News Sunday Morning; and The Chicago Tribune dubbed him “the planet’s leading expert on new magazines.” It's no wonder he is better known in the industry as Mr. Magazine.
As founder and director of the Magazine Innovation Center at the University of Mississippi’s School of Journalism and New Media, Husni decided he needed to find out how magazines, printers, designers, digital media, and other business executives were coping with COVID-19. His free new book, Publishing During a Pandemic, is online on Issuu and goes behind the scenes with the leaders of the magazine and magazine media, including Stephen Bohlinger, senior vice president group publisher of Better Homes & Gardens and Kent Johnson, CEO of Highlights for Children, recording their stories during the 2020 pandemic.
In this segment of E&P Reports, E&P publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Husni to gain what insights he learned through the new book as well as how he feels about the future of news publishing and the survival of printed media. He offers tons of advice and information that any news publisher (print or pure play) can use to serve their audiences better.
Related links:
Publishing During A Pandemic by Samir "Mr. Magazine™" Husni https://issuu.com/mrmagazine123/docs/husni__pdap
Mr Magazine Website https://www.mrmagazine.com
One of the most anticipated media studies is the yearly release of the Borrell Associates’ Local Advertiser Survey where thousands of local advertisers complete more than 40 questions, yielding unique insights about current and future marketing plans. Although the study is being fielded now to be released in November, Borrell has been issuing “snaps” of the data they are accumulating via “chart of the week” releases.
In this segment of E&P Reports, E&P publisher Mike Blinder asks Gordon Borrell, CEO of Borrell Associates, if he would offer an exclusive preview of what they are seeing from the thousands of datasets being garnered for the survey.
Spoiler alert: Gordon is high on local media focusing on content marketing (which he calls “storytelling”) and OTT (Over the Top TV advertising). Plus, he also says now is the time to be 5G ready to stay competitive in your local market.
In Memphis, Tenn., the Daily Memphian just celebrated its second anniversary. The website currently boasts more than 14,000 digital-only subscribers each paying an average of $9/month for the content created by a team of more than 45 fulltime and freelance journalists. Plus, they push 20 different email newsletters to the more than 45,000 subscribers they’ve managed to garner in this short time.
But, Eric Barnes, founder and CEO, says even though they list themselves as a non-profit, the culture of this growing enterprise looks and acts just like any successful, aggressive news operation (print based or digital-only) that you would find in any city in the world. Moreover, their formula is not as innovative as you may think--it’s truly serving the community with good journalism.
In this edition of E&P Reports, E&P publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Barnes to uncover what they are doing to win in a very competitive news market.
This week’s installment of E&P Reports is a recording of a live broadcast, hosted by E&P publisher Mike Blinder for the Association of Alternative Newsmedia’s AANOVATION 2020 virtual annual conference. This one-hour roundtable is a discussion on the future of news media.
Topics include: Will reader revenue ever rise to a level to fund our newsrooms; how to recruit and maintain talent in turbulent times; should local media be compensated by Facebook & Google for the content these platforms monetize; how is hedge fund consolidation affecting the industry; and what does the future hold.
The panel includes:
* James Fallows, Atlantic national correspondent
* Nancy Lane, Local Media Association CEO
* Ken Doctor, Newsonomics CEO
* Cheryl Thompson-Morton, Lenfest Institute of Journalism Program Manager
Many people were shocked last April when the Tampa Bay Times, the flagship newspaper of the Poynter Institute and the largest newspaper in Florida, made the decision to reduce its print frequency to only twice a week on Wednesdays and Sundays. To this day, the 11th largest media market in the country has no daily print newspaper. It was reported that the reason for this decision was the effect that COVID-19 had on advertising revenue, with more than $1 million dollars of cancelations occurring in a two week period in early March.
Industry veteran Bruce Faulmann and the current VP of sales and marketing at the Tampa Bay Times was a part of the senior management team who made that decision. In this episode of E&P Reports, Bruce chats with Mike Blinder, publisher of E&P, about how the Times' digital edition, robust website and niche publications are helping them maintain a great audience and the advertising revenues necessary to keep their news operation working. He also talks about how he is leading this major media market’s sales organization in tough times.
Ken Doctor Finally Reveals Lookout Local
For more than a decade, media analyst Ken Doctor sat on the sidelines evaluating, commenting and even making sweeping predictions about where the news publishing industry was heading and how he felt about the factors that impacted it. But today, Ken has moved into the fray as CEO of a new startup he has been teasing the industry about called Lookout Local.
Lookout hopes to expand across the country, but it's first model will launch in Santa Cruz, Calif. (Ken’s hometown) with Lookout Santa Cruz with funding from the Knight Foundation, Google News Innovation Challenge, The Lenfest Institute for Journalism and various other foundations.
In this segment of E&P Reports, E&P publisher Mike Blinder interviews both Doctor and newly-announced Chief Revenue Officer Jed Williams who recently left the Local Media Association after a four-year stint as chief strategy officer.
Related links:
Lookout Local Announcement: https://lookoutlocal.com/lookout-local-launch-release/
Nieman Lab Article about Launch: http://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/in-the-arena-ken-doctor-is-moving-from-media-analyst-to-media-ceo-with-lookout-his-plan-for,170327
A new 10-minute survey is asking local journalists and news publishers to share their story and experiences as part of a project examining the health of local newspapers. The project is supported by the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University and is seeking to find how local news is coping with COVID-19, corporate downsizing, concerns about “fake news," mistrust in journalism, “news deserts,” and any and all factors influencing the local news publishing industry.
This new study builds on the findings of earlier research performed by Tow in 2016-17, which shared lessons from the perspective of 420 journalists across the United States. By revisiting this earlier study, researchers hope to compare--and contrast--the experience of local journalists in late 2016 and mid-2020, while also highlighting the contemporary characteristics of today’s media landscape. Fundamental to the research is also the desire to hear and amplify the experiences of local journalists working on the frontline during very troubling times.
In this segment of E&P Reports, Mike Blinder, publisher of Editor and Publisher Magazine, chats with Damian Radcliffe, the Carolyn S. Chambers Professor of Journalism at the University of Oregon and lead researcher on the project. Professor Radcliffe not only discusses the study but gives an overall perspective on the news publishing industry and how important these studies are in helping us navigate forward.
Related links:
10-Minute TOW Study sign-up: https://bit.ly/Tow2020
FAQ’s About the TOW Study: https://medium.com/damian-radcliffe/take-this-survey-about-the-health-and-future-of-local-newspapers-in-the-usa-5b6e8230e054
Background on the study and findings from the 2016 TOW study: https://medium.com/damian-radcliffe/local-news-is-changing-we-want-local-newspaper-journalists-to-tell-us-how-3ad8096d18b5
Damian Radcliffe’s “Article: “231 Ways Publishers Can Make Media Pay: https://whatsnewinpublishing.com/231-ways-publishers-can-make-media-pay/
This year, Christian Hendricks, president of the Local Media Consortium, will head-up the judging for Editor and Publisher’s EPPY Awards. He will work with a panel of judges made up of media leaders with backgrounds in website design, marketing/advertising, editorial, technology, education, and management. In 2019, EPPY winners included the Boston Globe, CNN, the Weather Channel, USA Today and the New York Times.
In this interview with E&P publisher, Mike Blinder, Hendricks urges small market digital leaders with limited resources who’ve created a platform or initiative that deserves recognition to make sure they enter the competition. He also would like to see more broadcast stations and universities participate as well.
Now in its 25th year, the EPPY Awards are open to all print, digital and broadcast media outlets to submit entries in 38 diverse categories. This year, the EPPY Awards has broadened its scope with new categories for college journalism and investigative reporting. Publications can also submit nominations for career achievement.
All entries to the EPPY Awards must be submitted online no later than Monday, Aug. 31, 2020, at 11:59 p.m. EST. Judging will take place Sept. 14 through
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused economic damage across virtually every sector of the news publishing industry with many newspapers already closing, and others are facing closure if the economic climate doesn’t change quickly. News deserts are being created by the end of local journalism, but HR 7640--The Local Journalism Sustainability Act (LJSA)--may be part of the solution.
The LJSA addresses many of the pressing issues and even helps local businesses by proposing three separate tax credits:
1) A credit for advertising in local newspapers and local media
2) A credit for local newspaper subscriptions
3) A payroll credit for compensation to the employers of local journalists
E&P publisher Mike Blinder checks-in with two of the bill’s founders: Francis Wick, president & CEO Wick Communications, and Alan Fisco, president of the Seattle Times. Also in this installment of E&P Reports, Paul Boyle, News Media Alliance's senior vice president of public policy, talks about how the lobbying in D.C. is going, and Dean Ridings, CEO of Americas’ Newspapers, speaks on why and how local news publishers can contact their legislators to urge them to support this legislation.
More information is available online at newspapers.org.
The Cushing (Okla.) Citizen has had many owners since its first issue came off the press in 1895. Today, (along with two other nearby publications), it is in the capable hands of J. D. Meisner, who purchased the paper with his wife, MaryLee, one month before COVID-19 wreaked havoc on the local economy. After downsizing, J.D. now maintains profitability while still serving his three small markets. Even while providing most of the management functions of writing, editing and selling ads, he still carved out some time to create a widely popular activity page along with MaryLee to help provide a critical benefit to the remedial students that she teaches in the local school system.
In this segment of E&P Reports, publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Citizen publisher J. D. Meisner to discuss small market survival during challenging times, along with their new homegrown activity page product that local readers are loving.
Last year, the Maag-Brown family, owners of The Youngstown (Ohio) Vindicator, announced it would shut down after serving its local community for 150 years. As a result, 144 employees and 250 carriers were laid off. Not finding a buyer, the family made an announcement to their 34,000+ subscribers in June 2019 that their last edition would be published Aug. 31. Hearing the news, Ogden Newspapers put together a plan to publish a daily product for Youngstown and the Mahoning County, Ohio residents from their operation 16 miles north at the Warren Tribune Chronicle. In just three months, the staff at the Tribune Chronicle approached the Maag-Brown family and negotiated the purchase of the masthead, subscription list and Vindicator website (Vindy.com), and began the task of generating a quality local news product for the residents. One year later, the investment has paid off with close to 70 percent of the Vindicator’s old subscribers receiving the new product.
E&P publisher Mike Blinder interviews Tribune Chronicle and Vindicator publisher, Charles Jarvis, to learn how they were able to save the Vindicator in such a short period of time and how they are doing today serving both counties with their dual products.
The Local Journalism Sustainability (LJS) Act is a bi-partisan bill that would provide tax credits to support subscriptions, advertising and journalists salaries for the news industry. Introduced in Congress on July 16 by Arizona Democratic Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick and Washington state Republican Rep. Dan Newhouse, the bill was the “brainchild” of Francis Wick, CEO of Wick Communications who began championing in March when he saw the effects the COVID-19 pandemic was having on the news industry's revenues. Currenetly, industry trade organizations, with more than 30 congressional leaders, have pledged support for the LJS Act in hopes that it can be fast-tracked through Congress in the very near future.
Mike Blinder, publisher E&P Magazine, goes one-on-one with Francis Wick to learn how the LSJ Act got started, where it is today and what is needed in order to get it passed.
Called a “take back the night” movement, The Relevance Project is a coordinated promotion and marketing campaign by The Newspaper Association Managers (NAM). It's designed to reposition, rebrand and harness the collective reach of 9,600 newspapers throughout the U.S. and Canada to create a uniform voice spreading important messages about the unique value community newspapers deliver to their readers and advertisers. Earlier this year, NAM hired industry veteran Tom Silvestri to lead and coordinate the project.
In this installment of E&P Reports, E&P publisher Mike Blinder interviews Silvestri, along with executive director of the New York Press Association Michelle Rea and Steve Nixon, NAM director and executive director of the Saskatchewan Weekly Newspapers Association, about how The Relevance Project is going. Plus, they discuss the newspaper industry’s current challenges and how to meet them.
The entire industry was stunned when WEHCO Media announced they were planning to stop printing their flagship statewide newspaper, The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, and only deliver it to their subscribers via a paid web/ APP based platform. After many market tests, their final solution to keep their audience was to purchase iPads and offer them to their print subscribers for free. Now more than a year later, the paper publishes just one print product a week, while profiting and retaining more than 70 percent of their audiences and saving hundreds of jobs as well.
E&P publisher Mike Blinder checks in with Walter E. Hussman Jr., WEHCO’s CEO and publisher of the Democrat-Gazette, to see how the project is going and how they have expanded the concept to other WEHCO properties. Hussman also chats about his thoughts on moving newspapers to non-profit status, surviving in a COVID-19 world, and if Facebook and Google should pay for the content they receive from the news publishing industry.
Ryan Dohrn is a globally recognized media revenue consultant who has helped newspapers, niche publications, broadcast stations and online publishers generate more than $500 million in new revenue. Recently, Dohrn and his company, 360 Ad Sales, reached out to media partners to send in their sales proposals that closed deals and those that did not. After analyzing the results, they learned what common factors helped gained orders and which ones failed to work.
In this one-on-one interview with E&P publisher Mike Blinder, Dohrn reveals to the industry the results of the study as well as reviews the best tactics and practices he sees in order to continue to drive revenue through COVID-19.
In March 2018, the McClatchy-owned Idaho Statesman began to print their newspaper in Twin Falls, a 2.5 hour drive from the Boise market. That June, the Adams Publishing Group's (APG) Idaho Press decided to take advantage of this change by implementing an aggressive plan to expand its news coverage and distribution area by doubling down on traditional print publications and increasing local news coverage and home delivery across the entire city of Boise. In addition, APG purchased the alt-weekly Boise Weekly and established a Boise bureau in their downtown office building. The result has been a steady decline in Statesman readership and a more than 40 percent growth in print subscriptions for the Idaho Press.
Matt Davison, publisher of the Idaho Press, outlines this entire winning strategy in this one-on-one interview with E&P publisher Mike Blinder
Read more here: https://www.idahostatesman.com/news/business/article202238419.html#storylink=cpy
With the unpredictability of COVID-19’s impact on the local advertising ecosystem, Borrell Associates has revised its 2020 advertising and marketing forecasts. The bad news is that the previous 2019 forecast, which revealed local ad spending would increase, has been revised to show a decrease of 13 percent with print, broadcast and radio advertising dropping even more. However, there is some good news in what local advertisers say that they will do with their ad dollars on the backside of the pandemic.
Mike Blinder, publisher of E&P, goes one on one with CEO of Borrell Associates Gordon Borrell to unpack these forecasts.
Evening Post Publishing, parent company of the Charleston (S.C.) Post and Courier, is investing in new markets, starting with Greenville and Myrtle Beach, S.C.
The newspaper will hire and station reporters and editors in both markets to cover news as it occurs--direct from the source in two markets who already have daily newspapers owned by Gannett (Greenville) and McClatchy (Myrtle Beach). With papers already in place in Columbia (the state capitol) and Aiken, does this mean that the Post and Courier could become the statewide newspaper for South Carolina, and how smart is this move when the economy and industry as a whole are both in such a flux?
Mike Blinder, publisher of E&P, goes one on one with SVP of Evening Post Publishing P.J. Browning and chief revenue/marketing officer Chris Zoeller to ask these questions and learn more about this new expansion.
Remote work, new products and workforce cuts are just some of the most likely outcomes predicted in a new study of Local Media Association (LMA) members. In May, 127 members responded to the survey that revealed in response to the COVID-19 crisis, new modes of communications with ad clients, new products and workforce cost reductions may have the most staying power once the crisis abates. Also, media leaders’ opinions vary regarding how long it will be before that happens: half said nine months or less, and the other half said more than nine months.
E&P publisher Mike Blinder discusses the findings with LMA COO Jay Small.
Second Street, an audience engagement software platform used by more than 4,000 media companies, is moving their 7th annual summit from a two-day conference in St. Louis to a free, month-long virtual series in June that anyone can attend. More than 15 speakers from a wide range of traditional and digital media are scheduled to present on topics covering lead generation, recurring revenue, database growth and email.
E&P publisher Mike Blinder chats with Second Street president and co-founder Matt Coen about the summit and why they decided to provide the content free of charge.
Google’s Support Local News campaign will begin running today in print and digital formats for the next six weeks across most local newspapers, TV, radio stations and online-only news outlets in the U.S. and Canada. Designed to help raise awareness about the need and importance of funding newsrooms, the campaign will direct people to visit the Support Local News website, where they can easily subscribe, advertise or donate — including an option to donate to a fund that supports local investigative reporting in newsrooms across North America.
Working together to coordinate the campaign are the Local Media Consortium (LMC), Local Media Association (LMA) in partnership and the Google News Initiative. E&P publisher Mike Blinder chats with Nancy Lane, CEO of LMA, and Fran Wills, CEO of LMC, to learn more about the entire initiative, how the advertising dollars are being allocated and what the metrics are to gauge the success.
For more than 25 years, Vin Crosbie has been one of the world’s most respected experts on media and its transformation into the digital world. Having just sold the Daily Chronicle of Willimantic, Connecticut (after 25-years of family ownership), Vin spends most of his time consulting and teaching a Master’s degree program for the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University in New York. When the Congressional Research Service briefed members of the U.S. Congress about the ongoing crisis in the nation’s newspaper industry, the first person--as well as the only academic and the only consultant--it quoted was Vin.
Over the years, Vin’s clients have included The Atlantic, the British Broadcasting Corporation, Gannett, India Abroad, Johnson & Johnson, Playboy magazine, Scientific American magazine and may others.
In this one-on-one interview with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder, Vin gives a very frank and unvarnished assessment of where the news publishing industry is today and it’s hope for survival in the years to come.
Since the beginning of the crisis, research company Magid has been assessing changes in advertiser and consumer attitudes, opinions, and needs in order to deliver insights that can help news publishers focus on their business strategy better so they can manage through it all. In their latest study, Magid reveals data that shows information on news consumption, concerns and behaviors, what emotions advertisers and readers are feeling, and projections on what comes next. Moreover, deep in this data is valuable information on how publishers can better position their sales teams to approach the re-opening of America.
Mike Blinder, E&P publisher, explores the entire report with Magid vice president Bill Day.
During the pandemic, people are staying apprised of national statistics and recommendations, but they also are seeking their local news outlets for information about their community.
With this large surge in local news consumption, the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association (PNA) has launched PACoronaNews.org, a new website that aggregates the COVID-19 content from more than 200 publications throughout the state. In one place, Pennsylvania residents can find stories of local interest that range from ideas about how to stay healthy and active at home, to teaching activities that busy parents can share with their children, to heart-warming tales about the acts of kindness that neighbors are performing to help those in need, and more.
Mike Blinder, publisher of E&P, speaks with PNA president Brad Simpson about the new site as well as how his members are dealing with the COVID-19 crisis.
Kelly Wirges has trained more than 200,000 sales professionals during her 27 years as president of ProMax, and even through the challenges of the COVID-19 crisis, she is still helping media companies find practical techniques that can be applied immediately for increased sales success.
Mike Blinder, publisher of E&P, chats with Kelly about what advice she is giving today to sales managers and their reps on how to maximize performance during this economic downturn. She even offers suggestions to those who have been downsized on how to get back in the game.
It's a three-prong approach. First, offer any local business that is open to advertise for free in both print and online. Then, have your sales force perform a “needs analysis” to learn marketing needs. And third, offer them a tailored solution where you match their investment, dollar-for-dollar. The result for the Adams Publishing Group's Florida market is more than 160 new local advertisers, resulting in millions of dollars in new revenue.
Learn more about this effective stimulus program and gain access to the marketing materials used as E&P publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Mike Beatty, president of APG Media of Florida.
We all know that there will be a backside to the crisis we are trying to manage through, but are you making time to realign your management structure so you're poised to recruit the best on the backside of this down-turn? Plus, if you’re currently furloughed or downsized out of your job, what are you doing now to ensure you will be at the top of the list when media companies find they need to infuse new talent into their teams?
To help answer those questions is Laurie Kahn, president/CEO of Media Staffing Network, who has helped media people connect to the right job and recruiters make the right hires for over 20 years. E&P publisher Mike Blinder speaks with Laurie about all facets of media staffing and how to manage through it during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“Local newspapers and their journalists are also among the front-line workers dedicated to serving their communities, ” says Dean Ridings, CEO of America’s Newspapers, an organization that just rolled out a new marketing campaign called
"Newspapers Have Your Back."
All newspapers are invited to download and use the free marketing materials that stress how important local newspapers are to the community. http://newspapers.org/americas-newspapers/marketing-campaign/
E&P publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Dean Ridings to learn how newspapers can best use these materials to not only increase their brand awareness, but also help build subscription and membership revenue during these critical times.
Most of us know Ken Doctor, the president of Newsonomics, who in 2010 predicted many of the industry disruptions that occurred over the last 10 years. Now he is working on “Lookout," a wide-reaching new model for local news that will launch later this year. Ken just released a new paper, based on intensive reporting, that predicts where the industry will be in 2025. As Ken looks forward to where we may be in a few short years, some may call his findings eye-opening and even sobering.
E&P publisher Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Ken Doctor as he predicts where our industry is heading with reader revenue, newsroom staffing, print frequency and more.
Alternative news publishers are feeling the impact of COVID-19 in a number of ways, especially since a large part of their advertising base comes from restaurants, clubs and performance venues. However, some are seeing major increases in membership revenue, and others are finding new revenue streams from offering new products.
John Heaston is publisher and editor of The Reader, the alternative publication in Omaha. He is also president of the Association of Alternative Newsmedia and serves on the board of the National Association of Hispanic Publications. In this one-on-one interview with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder, John maintains a very positive attitude about the alternative news industry’s ability to truly define itself during this crisis and come out of the pandemic even stronger.
The Association of Free Community Publications (AFCP) represents publishers of community papers from coast to coast who offer free circulation. AFCP’s executive director Loren Colburn has been in touch with hundreds of members during the Coronavirus pandemic to learn how they are coping with a number of different challenges, including the loss of revenue and key distribution points from the large number of restaurants and entertainment venues they conduct business with.
AFCP’s Loren Colburn goes one-on one with E&P’s publisher Mike Blinder discussing the new ways that free papers are dealing with COVID-19.
Borrell Associates is the nation’s leading provider of advertising trends and data for the media industry. Each month, hundreds of local businesses and advertising agencies are researched and compiled into ongoing reports. With this information at hand, Gordon Borrell, CEO of Borrell Associates, reveals what trends we can expect--and more importantly--what tactics and practices we can adopt to help stem the tide of revenue loss due to the coronavirus pandemic.
As the coronavirus spreads across the world, news media companies are grappling with so much more than coverage: work-from-home plans, coronavirus-related product development, advertising declines, and the impending fallout on the economy and advertising revenues. With more than 7,000 members in 80+ countries, the International News Media Association (INMA) is conducting ongoing research and outreach to its members to help advise on best practices in dealing with pandemic.
Mike Blinder, publisher of E&P, goes 1-on-1 with INMA CEO Earl Wilkinson to learn more about their findings.
Make Sure You Are Deemed "Essential" By Your Local/ State Government.
In Italy, which is currently under lockdown in an effort to halt the spread of the coronavirus, a debate is waging about the importance of print newspapers. Here in the US some states and cities are making sure that local newspapers have "essential" status in order to publish their products in this time of crisis.
Essential to this initiative is the News Media Alliance (NMA) as they have put together all the tools needed to make sure that we stay in business to serve our communities.
Mike Blinder, Publisher of E&P, speaks with Dave Chavern, CEO of the NMA on what they are doing to help us and what resources are available for you to make sure your town, city or local government gives you "essential" status to publish.
Mike also asks Dave about two other important initiatives that NMA is working on in our behalf: The News Impact Project and the Safe Harbor Bill.
The Facebook Journalism Project is partnering with the Lenfest Institute for Journalism and the Local Media Association (LMA) to offer a total of $1 million in grants to support US and Canadian local news organizations covering the coronavirus. These grants will help fill immediate gaps for resource-constrained newsrooms covering the impact of the coronavirus in their communities.
Mike Blinder, Publisher of E&P speaks with Jed Williams, Chief Strategy Officer of the LMA about the program
Apply for the great, here: http://bit.ly/33uB9dZ
The Financial Times understands what it’s like to be a digital leader. It launched its first paywall in 2002 and over the last decade, the paper has focused on a “north star” metric based on reader engagement. In April 2019, the FT reached 1 million paying readers, one year ahead of schedule. Due to its digital success, E&Precently named the FT as one of their 10 News Publishers That Do It Right. E&P editor-in-chief Nu Yang goes 1-on-1 with FT chief data officer Tom Betts to discuss their formula, the launch of their boutique consultancy firm FT Strategies, and how publishers can find their own metric "north star."
The 2nd Google NorthAmerican Innovation Challenge is now open for submissions focusing on projects that showcase diversification, equity and inclusion in journalism. “Googler” LaToya Drake, Global Outreach Lead for the Google News Initiative, chats with E&P Publisher Mike Blinder about this year’s challenge and how any publisher—no matter what size market—can enter.
Applications are now open, and the deadline to submit is May 12, 2020 at 11:59 p.m. PT. In addition, over the next 10 weeks, Google will hold workshops and bootcamps to get the word out and answer questions about the challenge. The first town hall will be on March 18 at 9 a.m. PT. Tune in using this link.
In 2018, Paxton Media Group acquired the Kentucky New Era and four smaller newspapers (Dawson Springs Progress, Princeton Times Leader, Providence Journal-Enterprise and Oak Grove Eagle Post). Since then, the New Era has experienced big changes like getting a new publisher, editor and a new office to call home. Publisher Brandon Cox shares what it was like to adopt these changes and what’s next for the group of newspapers.
Peter Newton was a huge part of GateHouse Media’s expansion into the digital service sector with the launch of their Propel and ThriveHive initiatives. But Newton was a big part of driving the entire industry into selling more than just advertising solutions to their customers. It was during those six years in senior management that the company had its most growth in market acquisitions. Now that Newton has left the country’s largest newspaper company, he continues to work within our industry consulting some of our digital partners as well as leading a drive to innovation through the Local Media Association’s Accelerate Local Project.
Mike Blinder goes one-on-one with Newton as the former GateHouse COO speaks about where he thinks the industry has been and where it is going today in our challenging times. He also gives advice to independent newspapers who lack some of the resources that large company company ownership can provide.
Joey Young purchased his first newspaper at the age of 27. Seven years later, his company, Kansas Publishing Ventures, owns six award-winning community publications with more than 30 employees that is growing audience and revenue against some big company dailies. Moreover, thanks to his passion for local journalism and keen ability to hire and maintain a motivated team, KPV continues to grow and prosper.
This week, E&P editor-in-chief Nu Yang and Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association Brad Simpson discuss this year’s America East News Media Summit March 30-April 1. The PNA has combined their three signature events: America East, PNA Advertising Conference and Publishers’ Convention, to build one robust conference. Simpson will go over what sessions he’s excited about and why news publishers should attend this premiere event. This year, E&P also joins the PNA in honoring the next generation of newsroom leaders with a 25 Under 35 awards ceremony.
ProPublica has become a leader in the industry when it comes to collaboration between newsrooms.Rachel Glickhouse, who managed ProPublica's three-year Documentating Hate project, talks to Editor & Publisher about getting newsrooms to work together, convincing readers to contribute, and plans to bring back Electionland to cover the 2020 presidential election.
E&P's Rob Tornoe goes 1-on-1 with Rachel Glickhouse
Since 2005, Community Impact Newspaper (CIN) has expanded into Texas, Arizona and Tennessee. This year, they're launching in the Atlanta metro region with the help of Allison Altobelli, a longtime newspaper executive. As the newest CIN publisher, Altobelli shares why CIN decided to expand into Atlanta, thoughts on opening a newsroom when so many others are closing, and why more newsrooms need to adopt their "Print is not dead" mentality Read the related story on EditorAndPublisher.com: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/a-section/community-impact-newspaper-expands-into-atlanta-region/
Ten years ago, Ken Doctor wrote "Newsonomics," a groundbreaking book that changed the way many approached news publishing in the last decade. Now, Ken is incubating a new business model for the newsrooms of the 2020s called Lookout. He does not tell us everything about it in this 45-minute interview, preferring to wait until his market test is complete, but he does reveal many of the concepts he claims can make news publishing thrive and profitable in today’s challenging world.
Plus, Mike looks into the industry predictions Ken made 10 years ago in "Newsonomics" to see if those prognostications are accurate today.
Twelve years ago Mike Shapiro left his lucrative position at a NYC law firm to work out of his house to publish a local online newspaper to serve his home town of New Providence, NJ. Today he is CEO of a network of over 80 local news sites with over 1 million monthly visitors. And, they are making money doing it.
Learn the history of this success story of how local journalism can grow and make money with a digital only offering.
Related links: http://www.TapInto.net
Today, Clay Jones, self-syndicated editorial cartoonist, talks to E&P Reports host Bob Andelman about a biting new collection of his work, Tales From the Trumpster Fire: A Cartoon Anthology.
Jones’ work is distributed to newspapers and news sites across the United States and around the world. He also draws a weekly cartoon for CNN Opinion’s weekly newsletter, Provoke/Persuade. He has been one of America’s hottest and fastest rising political cartoonists of the Trump era.
He was also the finalist for the 2019 Herblock Award and rejected a “free speech” award from the government of Iran.
Check out more of Clay Jones work by reading his personal blog and watching his cartooning videos when the interview is done at www.ClayToonz.com
Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new "E&P Reports" podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with "E&P Reports" host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening. Let’s talk, edit and publish again next week!
Today, Zack Baddorf, cofounder and executive director for Military Veterans in Journalism—a nonprofit association that advocates for veterans in the newsroom—talks to Editor & Publisher managing editor Evelyn Mateos. Baddorf shares what the organization is all about, the resources it provides and why the news publishing industry could use the voice and perspectives of veterans. Related Link:
• Military Veterans in Journalism: www.mvj.network Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new "E&P Reports" podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with "E&P Reports" host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening. Let’s talk, edit and publish again next week!
Today, Dean Ridings, the new CEO of America's Newspapers – an organization that resulted from the combination of the Inland Press Association and the Southern Newspaper Publishers Association – talks to Editor & Publisher editor-in-chief Nu Yang.
Ridings shares his thoughts on how America’s Newspapers will strengthen local journalism, where the news publishing industry is heading, and why newspapers are still an important part of the industry’s brand and mission.
“E&P Reports” is hosted by Bob Andelman.
Related Link:
• America's Newspapers:
http://newspapers.org/
• Complete 2019 EPPY Award winners list: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/2019-eppy-award-winners-announced/
Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new "E&P Reports" podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with "E&P Reports" host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening. Let’s talk, edit and publish again next week!
In our featured “E&P Reports” interview this week, Jason Kolnos, Digital Assignment Editor with the Cape Cod Times, talks to E&P editor-in-chief Nu Yang.
Kolnos, the 2019 EPPY Award winner for Best News or Event Feature under 1 million unique monthly visitors, used interviews and still photography to create a video about the one-year anniversary of the death of Police Sgt. Sean Gannon and the effects his death had in his community and with state lawmakers.
But first, Jere Hester talks to Nu about THE CITY, the newest independent, nonprofit news outlet dedicated to serving the people of New York.
THE CITY recently won three EPPY Awards in the under 1 million unique monthly visitors category for Best Daily News Website, plus Best Collaborative Investigative/Enterprise Reporting for “On the Brink of Being Homeless in a Sanctuary City” and Best News or Event Feature on a Website for “A Solitary Death Sparks Prison Reform Push.”
“E&P Reports” is hosted by Bob Andelman.
Related Links:
• Cape Cod Times winning entry:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kp4wJaUop08&t=1s
• THE CITY winning entries:
https://thecity.nyc/
https://thecity.nyc/2019/07/on-the-brink-of-being-homeless-in-a-sanctuary-city.html
https://thecity.nyc/2019/06/woman-who-died-at-rikers-island-was-in-solitary.html
• Complete 2019 EPPY Award winners list: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/2019-eppy-award-winners-announced/
Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new "E&P Reports" podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with "E&P Reports" host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening. Let’s talk, edit and publish again next week!
In our featured “E&P Reports” interview this week, Dennis Draughon talks to E&P contributing writer Rob Tornoe about what it means to be a political cartoonist … for Capitol Broadcasting/WRAL. Draughon, incidentally, is the 2019 EPPY Award winner for Best Editorial/Political Cartoon with under 1 million unique monthly visitors
In breaking news, the Salt Lake Tribune drew a lot of interest in recent weeks when it was announced that the legacy Utah daily uprooted its financial structure and became a nonprofit news publisher. Tribune editor Jennifer Napier-Pearce talks to E&P contributor Sean Wood about what it all means for Salt Lake City – and possibly for your paper as well.
Related links:
• Read Sean Wood's complete E&P story on the Salt Lake Tribune's switch to nonprofit status: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/feature/salt-lake-tribune-editor-in-the-next-three-to-four-months-well-be-ready-to-be-a-full-on-nonprofit/
• Complete 2019 EPPY Award winners list: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/2019-eppy-award-winners-announced/
Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new E&P Reports podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with E&P Reports host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening. Let’s talk, edit and publish again next week!
This week, 2019 E&P Publisher of the Year P.J. Browning, publisher of the Post and Courier in Charleston, SC, is the lead guest on “E&P Reports,” the official podcast of Editor & Publisher Magazine. E&P editor-in-chief Nu Yang talks to Browning about what it’s like being a publisher today and what it was like winning the ultimate recognition from the news publishing industry in the same year that she coped with a major cancer diagnosis.
In addition, Jed Williams, Local Media Association’s chief strategy officer, takes questions from E&P managing editor Evelyn Mateos about the Google News Initiative Subscriptions Lab and critical publisher benchmarks for digital subscription success.
Related links:
• Read "2019 E&P Publisher of the Year P.J. Browning, Post and Courier"by Nu Yang on Editor and Publisher Magazine's website: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/feature/2019-ep-publisher-of-the-year-p-j-browning-post-and-courier/
• Complete 2019 EPPY Award winners list: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/2019-eppy-award-winners-announced/
• Read "GNI Subscriptions Lab Aims to Help Find a Sustainable Business Model for Local News"by Evelyn Mateos on Editor and Publisher Magazine's website: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/a-section/gni-subscriptions-lab-aims-to-help-find-a-sustainable-business-model-for-local-news/
Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new E&P Reports podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with E&P Reports host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening. Let’s talk, edit and publish again next week!
This week, on “E&P Reports,” Editor & Publisher Magazine editor-in-chief Nu Yang talks with journalists from The Greenville News, winners of the 2019 EPPY Award for Best Community Service on a Media-Affiliated Website. Investigative reporter Nate Cary and visual journalist Josh Morg take listeners behind the scenes of their work on “Taken,” their series on civil asset forfeiture in South Carolina.
The Taken team scoured more than 3,200 forfeiture cases and spoke to dozens of targeted citizens plus more than 50 experts and officials. Additionally, the team contacted every law enforcement agency in the state. Related link:
• Read "Taken" on The Greenville News: https://www.greenvilleonline.com/in-depth/news/taken/2019/01/27/civil-forfeiture-south-carolina-police-property-seizures-taken-exclusive-investigation/2457838002/
• Complete 2019 EPPY Award winners list: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/2019-eppy-award-winners-announced/
Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new E&P Reports podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with E&P Reports host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening. Let’s talk, edit and publish again next week!
This week, Editor & Publisher Magazine's official weekly podcast, “E&P Reports,” mixes things up with two very different subject interviews—one on news design, the other on narrative news podcasting—and both offering tips on excellence in news publishing.
First up is legendary newspaper and magazine designer Roger Black, who talks about design as a competitve weapon. Fun fact: Black designed the current logo for Editor & Publisher about 20 years ago!
After Black, stick around for a behind-the-scenes conversation that Editor & Publisher editor-in-chief Nu Yang conducted with Davin Coburn, executive producer of audio for McClatchy Newspapers. Coburn worked with Charlotte Observer reporter Scott Fowler on “Carruth,” a narrative podcast about former NFL star Rae Carruth, his girlfriend, Cherica Adams—who was shot four times by a hitman—and their unborn son, Chancellor Lee. The narrative podcast they produced won this year’s EPPY Award for “Best Podcast” with more than 1 million unique visitors.
Related links:
• The Font Bureau/Roger Black Collection: https://fontbureau.typenetwork.com
• Type Magazine: https://www.typemag.org
• Society for News Design2012 Lifetime Achievement Award for Roger Black: https://www.snd.org/2012/10/lifetime-achievement-award-roger-black-innovator-leader-visionary/
• "Carruth" podcast (2019 EPPY Award winner) listen here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/carruth/id1438370053
Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com And please subscribe to this podcast for a new E&P Reports podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with E&P Reports host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening.
Let’s talk, edit and publish again next week!
This week, Editor & Publisher Magazine's official weekly podcast, “E&P Reports,” features an exclusive interview with Julia Wallace, co-author (with Kristin Gilger) of There's No Crying in Newsrooms: What Women Have Learned About What It Takes to Lead." The interview was conducted by E&P Managing Editor Evelyn Mateos:
Don’t miss Mateos’ related story, “A New Book Captures the Struggles and Successes of Women in News Media” online (plus an exclusive book excerpt) as well as in the October 2019 issue: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/a-section/a-new-book-captures-the-struggles-and-successes-of-women-in-news-media/
Here are related links for the week's top news headlines:
• "Australian Media Unites to Rally for Press Freedom, Taking Campaign to Front Pages and Airwaves" (Source: ABC News):
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/australian-media-unites-to-rally-for-press-freedom-taking-campaign-to-front-pages-and-airwaves/ • "California’s New 35-Story Limit for Freelancerss" (Source: CJR): https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/californias-new-35-story-limit-for-freelancers/ Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com And please subscribe to this podcast for a new E&P Reports podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with E&P Reports host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening.
This week, Editor & Publisher Magazine's official weekly podcast, “E&P Reports,” features two exclusive interviews conducted by managing editor Evelyn Mateos:
1) Nick Johnson, McClatchy head of advertising, and
2) Janet DeGeorge of Classified Executive Training.
Each discusses what today’s sales model would look like for media companies if they started from scratch. In addition, DeGeorge shares tips for ad reps and success stories taking place in newsrooms around the country.
Don’t miss Mateos’ related story, “Reinventing the Wheel” online and in the October 2019 issue.
BONUS: E&P Publisher Mike Blinder weighs in with a timely opinion piece about the untimely departure of anchor Shep Smith from Fox News: “Shep Say It Ain’t So!" https://www.editorandpublisher.com/category/columns/
Here are related links for the week's top news headlines:
• "Norah O’Donnell and Susan Zirinsky Ready ‘CBS Evening News’ for Streaming Wars" (Source: V ariety):
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/norah-odonnell-and-susan-zirinsky-ready-cbs-evening-news-for-streaming-wars/ • "CNN Condemns Pro-Trump Video Depicting Violence Against the Media, Political Rivals" (Source: The Hollywood Reporter): https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/cnn-condemns-pro-trump-video-depicting-violence-against-the-media-political-rivals/ • "Former Denver City Council Candidates Launch ‘Denver North Star Newspaper’" (Source: CBS 4 Denver): https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/former-denver-city-council-candidates-launch-denver-north-star-newspaper/ Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new E&P Reports podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with E&P Reports host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening.
The Editor & Publisher Magazine official podcast, “E&P Reports,” hosted by Bob Andelman (“Mr. Media"). This week: Post and Courier News Publisher P.J. Browning named "Publisher of the Year" by E&P contributing writer Rob Tornoe brings his October cover story, "Taking on the Tech Giants," to life with his interview of News Media Alliance CEO David Chavern; plus the week’s top headlines from E&P Managing Editor Evelyn Mateos.
Related story link:
• "Inland Press Association and Southern Newspaper Publishers Association Merge to Become America’s Newspapers": https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/inland-press-association-and-southern-newspaper-publishers-association-merge-to-become-americas-newspapers/
Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new E&P Reports podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with E&P Reports host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening.
Here’s what you’ll find in the latest edition of Editor & Publisher Magazine’s official podcast, “E&P Reports,” hosted by Bob Andelman (“Mr. Media”): interview with “For Better or For Worse” cartoonist Lynn Johnston; Poynter senior media writer Tom Jones on The New York Times’ decision to release details about The White House whistleblower’s identity; and the week’s top headlines from E&P Editor-in-chief Nu Yang.
• E&P News Headlines presented by Editor-in-Chief Nu Yang
Related story links:
"Jamal Khashoggi Murder ‘Happened Under My Watch,’ Saudi Crown Prince Tells PBS" (Washington Post): https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/opinions/global-opinions/jamal-khashoggi-one-year-later/
"In Leaked Audio, Mark Zuckerberg Rallies Facebook Employees Against Critics, Competitors, and the U.S. Government" (Verge): https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/in-leaked-audio-mark-zuckerberg-rallies-facebook-employees-against-critics-competitors-and-the-u-s-government/
• Breaking News: Tom Jones, senior media reporter for the Poynter Institute, talks about The New York Times controversial decision to publish identifying details about The White House whistleblower whose report led the House to began an impeachment inquiry.
Related story links:
"Blowing the whistle on the whistleblower" (The Poynter Report): https://www.poynter.org/newsletters/2019/did-the-nytimes-do-the-right-thing-in-its-whistleblower-coverage-plus-clinton-on-trump-and-why-sinclair-isnt-bothered-by-trumps-fake-news/
" The New York Times Was Right to Unmask the Whistleblower" (Politico): https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/09/26/new-york-times-whistleblower-trump-ukraine-228529
"I Am Part of the Resistance Inside the Trump Administration" (The New York Times): https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/05/opinion/trump-white-house-anonymous-resistance.html
• Bob Andelman interviews Lynn Johnston, cartoonist, about the 40th anniversary of her daily comic strip "For Better or For Worse"’s remarkable run.
Related story links:
"For Better or For Worse" official website: https://www.fborfw.com
"Lee Salem, Champion of Quirky Cartoonists, Is Dead at 73" (The New York Times): https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/18/business/media/lee-salem-dead.html
Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new E&P Reports podcast every week! It's free!
For more newsmaker conversations with E&P Reports host Bob Andelman, please check out his long-running podcast, “Mr. Media Interviews,” at https://MrMedia.com .
Thanks for watching; thanks for listening.
DEBUT! Editor & Publisher Magazine presents its first podcast, hosted by Bob Andelman ("Mr. Media"):
• E&P News Headlines presented by Editor-in-Chief Nu Yang
Related story links:
"How Newsrooms Across the Country are Covering the Climate Crisis" by Kerry Flynn (CNN Business): https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/how-newsrooms-across-the-country-are-covering-the-climate-crisis/
"The Growing Threat to Journalism Around the World" by A.G. Sulzberger (The New York Times):
https://www.editorandpublisher.com/news/the-growing-threat-to-journalism-around-the-world/
• Contributor Sean Wood talks about his E&P exclusive, "'Don’t Lose Local News’ Campaign Urges Kroger to Keep Weekly Papers in Stores"
Related story links:
Kroger media contacts: https://www.thekrogerco.com/newsroom/media-contacts/
Colorado Springs Independent:
https://www.csindy.com/
Memphis Flyer:
https://www.memphisflyer.com/
Lansing City Pulse:
https://www.lansingcitypulse.com/
City Pulse petition:
https://www.change.org/p/kroger-keep-city-pulse-in-kroger
• Bob Andelman interviews John Weiss, founding publisher, Colorado Springs Independent, about how the Kroger decision will affect his paper and other alt-weeklies around the U.S.
Colorado Springs Independent:
https://www.csindy.com/
Association of Alternative Newsmedia:
https://aan.org
Subscribe to daily headlines from Editor & Publisher Magazine: https://EditorAndPublisher.com
And please subscribe to this podcast for a new E&P Reports podcast every week! It's free!
This is 2-minute "trailer" from "E&P" Reports episode #93: Publisher Mike Blinder chats with Hearst Connecticut Media Group's senior management about their new statewide website along with what steps they took to realize such strong print and digital subscription growth over the past 2-years.