Since 2017, I’ve met with over 300 newsrooms to explore how to help them scale their audience and revenue goals.
The line “We take a holistic approach to reader revenue” has rolled off my tongue countless times. But what exactly does that mean? It means removing the barriers that typically stand between the business and editorial sides of the newsroom. It means aligning the entire organization around a shared understanding of priorities and stakes. It means we all play a role in reaching our goals.
Over the years, I’ve asked myself what journalism could look like if the entire industry took this holistic approach. What could we accomplish if we all aligned around a shared set of priorities? I have also seen a certain type of discourse play out on social media, on listservs, and at conferences, typically about who is getting funding and who is not. I get it. The industry is highly competitive with a strong independent streak, and funders can be fickle — and this can have the effect of pitting people against each other. Amid this, we lose sight of what’s really on the line — the communities that we serve, our strained talent pipelines, our culture, and our democracy.
Over the past five years, I’ve watched reader revenue (membership) and audience development go from being nice-to-haves to table stakes for many newsrooms. Similarly, in 2023, we’ll see news organizations adopt and embrace shared values as the way to succeed in the face of the industry’s collapse. Organizations won’t view these values as nice-to-haves, but essential to the future.
We can already look toward leaders that are working in collaboration to advance the sector together. In Chicago, 60+ news outlets joined forces to create the Chicago Independent Media Alliance and adopt a “lift-all-boats-model.” On #GivingTuesday, Enlace Latino, Documented NY and El Tímpano amplified each other’s fundraising campaigns. The Diversity Pledge Institute is rising to solve problems with people and culture that cannot wait any longer. And organizations like News Revenue Hub, the Institute for Nonprofit News, and LION Publishers are always collaborating to curate, share knowledge, and do real work to help new business models succeed.
This type of coordination is not just a win for newsrooms, but the communities they ultimately serve. If we don’t stand for communities, then what are we here for?
Christina Shih was SVP of revenue at the News Revenue Hub and an MBA candidate at UC San Diego.
Since 2017, I’ve met with over 300 newsrooms to explore how to help them scale their audience and revenue goals.
The line “We take a holistic approach to reader revenue” has rolled off my tongue countless times. But what exactly does that mean? It means removing the barriers that typically stand between the business and editorial sides of the newsroom. It means aligning the entire organization around a shared understanding of priorities and stakes. It means we all play a role in reaching our goals.
Over the years, I’ve asked myself what journalism could look like if the entire industry took this holistic approach. What could we accomplish if we all aligned around a shared set of priorities? I have also seen a certain type of discourse play out on social media, on listservs, and at conferences, typically about who is getting funding and who is not. I get it. The industry is highly competitive with a strong independent streak, and funders can be fickle — and this can have the effect of pitting people against each other. Amid this, we lose sight of what’s really on the line — the communities that we serve, our strained talent pipelines, our culture, and our democracy.
Over the past five years, I’ve watched reader revenue (membership) and audience development go from being nice-to-haves to table stakes for many newsrooms. Similarly, in 2023, we’ll see news organizations adopt and embrace shared values as the way to succeed in the face of the industry’s collapse. Organizations won’t view these values as nice-to-haves, but essential to the future.
We can already look toward leaders that are working in collaboration to advance the sector together. In Chicago, 60+ news outlets joined forces to create the Chicago Independent Media Alliance and adopt a “lift-all-boats-model.” On #GivingTuesday, Enlace Latino, Documented NY and El Tímpano amplified each other’s fundraising campaigns. The Diversity Pledge Institute is rising to solve problems with people and culture that cannot wait any longer. And organizations like News Revenue Hub, the Institute for Nonprofit News, and LION Publishers are always collaborating to curate, share knowledge, and do real work to help new business models succeed.
This type of coordination is not just a win for newsrooms, but the communities they ultimately serve. If we don’t stand for communities, then what are we here for?
Christina Shih was SVP of revenue at the News Revenue Hub and an MBA candidate at UC San Diego.
Janet Haven ChatGPT and the future of trust
Priyanjana Bengani Partisan local news networks will collaborate
Gina Chua The traditional story structure gets deconstructed
Sarah Marshall A web channel strategy won’t be enough
Jarrad Henderson Video editing will help people understand the media they consume
Ryan Kellett Airline-like loyalty programs try to tie down news readers
Juleyka Lantigua Newsrooms recognize women of color as the canaries in the coal mine
Ståle Grut Your newsroom experiences a Midjourney-gate, too
Laxmi Parthasarathy Unlocking the silent demand for international journalism
Brian Stelter Finding new ways to reach news avoiders
Lisa Heyamoto The independent news industry gets a roadmap to sustainability
Bill Adair The year of the fact-check (no, really!)
Rodney Gibbs Recalibrating how we work apart
Esther Kezia Thorpe Subscription pressures force product innovation
David Skok Renewed interest in human-powered reporting
Leezel Tanglao Community partnerships drive better reporting
Peter Bale Rising costs force more digital innovation
Daniel Trielli Trust in news will continue to fall. Just look at Brazil.
Joe Amditis AI throws a lifeline to local publishers
Anika Anand Independent news businesses lead the way on healthy work cultures
Don Day The news about the news is bad. I’m optimistic.
Moreno Cruz Osório Brazilian journalism turns wounds into action
Emma Carew Grovum The year to resist forgetting about diversity
Amethyst J. Davis The slight of the great contraction
Ryan Gantz “I’m sorry, but I’m a large language model”
Kathy Lu We need emotionally agile newsroom leaders
Jessica Maddox Journalists keep getting manipulated by internet culture
Mauricio Cabrera It’s no longer about audiences, it’s about communities
Cindy Royal Yes, journalists should learn to code, but…
Alan Henry A reckoning with why trust in news is so low
Michael Schudson Journalism gets more and more difficult
Matt Rasnic More newsroom workers turn to organized labor
Jesse Holcomb Buffeted, whipped, bullied, pulled
Sue Robinson Engagement journalism will have to confront a tougher reality
Parker Molloy We’ll reach new heights of moral panic
Nikki Usher This is the year of the RSS reader. (Really!)
Felicitas Carrique and Becca Aaronson News product goes from trend to standard
Julia Angwin Democracies will get serious about saving journalism
Ariel Zirulnick Journalism doubles down on user needs
Francesco Zaffarano There is no end of “social media”
Martina Efeyini Talk to Gen Z. They’re the experts of Gen Z.
Mar Cabra The inevitable mental health revolution
Peter Sterne AI enters the newsroom
Alex Perry New paths to transparency without Twitter
Cory Bergman The AI content flood
Molly de Aguiar and Mandy Van Deven Narrative change trend brings new money to journalism
Sue Cross Thinking and acting collectively to save the news
Jacob L. Nelson Despite it all, people will still want to be journalists
Nicholas Thompson The year AI actually changes the media business
Ayala Panievsky It’s time for PR for journalism
Cari Nazeer and Emily Goligoski News organizations step up their support for caregivers
Raney Aronson-Rath Journalists will band together to fight intimidation
Andrew Donohue We’ll find out whether journalism can, indeed, save democracy
A.J. Bauer Covering the right wrong
Burt Herman The year AI truly arrives — and with it the reckoning
Errin Haines Journalists on the campaign trail mend trust with the public
Alexandra Borchardt The year of the climate journalism strategy
Kaitlyn Wells We’ll prioritize media literacy for children
Alex Sujong Laughlin Credit where it’s due
Emily Nonko Incarcerated reporters get more bylines
Paul Cheung More news organizations will realize they are in the business of impact, not eyeballs
Brian Moritz Rebuilding the news bundle
Masuma Ahuja Journalism starts working for and with its communities
Sarabeth Berman Nonprofit local news shows that it can scale
Tre'vell Anderson Continued culpability in anti-trans campaigns
Joanne McNeil Facebook and the media kiss and make up
Richard Tofel The press might get better at vetting presidential candidates
Eric Nuzum A focus on people instead of power
Jim Friedlich Local journalism steps up to the challenge of civic coverage
Upasna Gautam Technology that performs at the speed of news
Anthony Nadler Confronting media gerrymandering
Zizi Papacharissi Platforms are over
Jonas Kaiser Rejecting the “free speech” frame
Jenna Weiss-Berman The economic downturn benefits the podcasting industry. (No, really!)
Sarah Stonbely Growth in public funding for news and information at the state and local levels
Ben Werdmuller The internet is up for grabs again
Jakob Moll Journalism startups will think beyond English
Anita Varma Journalism prioritizes the basic need for survival
Jaden Amos TikTok personality journalists continue to rise
Victor Pickard The year journalism and capitalism finally divorce
Hillary Frey Death to the labor-intensive memo for prospective hires
Tamar Charney Flux is the new stability
Valérie Bélair-Gagnon Well-being will become a core tenet of journalism
Julia Beizer News fatigue shows us a clear path forward
Barbara Raab More journalism funders will take more risks
Kirstin McCudden We’ll codify protection of journalism and newsgathering
John Davidow A year of intergenerational learning
Taylor Lorenz The “creator economy” will be astroturfed
Jennifer Brandel AI couldn’t care less. Journalists will care more.
Wilson Liévano Diaspora journalism takes the next step
Karina Montoya More reporters on the antitrust beat
Mariana Moura Santos A woman who speaks is a woman who changes the world
Kaitlin C. Miller Harassment in journalism won’t get better, but we’ll talk about it more openly
Eric Holthaus As social media fragments, marginalized voices gain more power
Joshua P. Darr Local to live, wire to wither
Gordon Crovitz The year advertisers stop funding misinformation
Christina Shih Shared values move from nice-to-haves to essentials
Elizabeth Bramson-Boudreau More of the same
Janelle Salanga Journalists work from a place of harm reduction
Doris Truong Workers demand to be paid what the job is worth
Jennifer Choi and Jonathan Jackson Funders finally bet on next-generation news entrepreneurs
Shanté Cosme The answer to “quiet quitting” is radical empathy
Rachel Glickhouse Humanizing newsrooms will be a badge of honor
Jessica Clark Open discourse retrenches
Dominic-Madori Davis Everyone finally realizes the need for diverse voices in tech reporting
Delano Massey The industry shakes its imposter syndrome
Megan Lucero and Shirish Kulkarni The future of journalism is not you
Elite Truong In platform collapse, an opportunity for community
Amy Schmitz Weiss Journalism education faces a crossroads
Walter Frick Journalists wake up to the power of prediction markets
Sarah Alvarez Dream bigger or lose out
Simon Galperin Philanthropy stops investing in corporate media
Ryan Nave Citizen journalism, but make it equitable
Susan Chira Equipping local journalism
David Cohn AI made this prediction
Stefanie Murray The year U.S. media stops screwing around and becomes pro-democracy
Laura E. Davis The year we embrace the robots — and ourselves
Nicholas Jackson There will be launches — and we’ll keep doing the work
Joni Deutsch Podcast collaboration — not competition — breeds excellence
Sam Gregory Synthetic media forces us to understand how media gets made
Basile Simon Towards supporting criminal accountability
S. Mitra Kalita “Everything sucks. Good luck to you.”
Al Lucca Digital news design gets interesting again
Nicholas Diakopoulos Journalists productively harness generative AI tools
Jim VandeHei There is no “peak newsletter”
Michael W. Wagner The backlash against pro-democracy reporting is coming
Mael Vallejo More threats to press freedom across the Americas
Danielle K. Brown and Kathleen Searles DEI efforts must consider mental health and online abuse
Gabe Schneider Well-funded journalism leaders stop making disparate pay
Mary Walter-Brown and Tristan Loper Mission-driven metrics become our North Star
J. Siguru Wahutu American journalism reckons with its colonialist tendencies
Kavya Sukumar Belling the cat: The rise of independent fact-checking at scale
Dana Lacey Tech will screw publishers over
Tim Carmody Newsletter writers need a new ethics
Khushbu Shah Global reporting will suffer
Anna Nirmala News organizations get new structures
Sumi Aggarwal Smart newsrooms will prioritize board development
Bill Grueskin Local news will come to rely on AI
Dannagal G. Young Stop rewarding elite performances of identity threat
Sam Guzik AI will start fact-checking. We may not like the results.
Jody Brannon We’ll embrace policy remedies
Mario García More newsrooms go mobile-first
Alexandra Svokos Working harder to reach audiences where they are
Pia Frey Publishers start polling their users at scale
Snigdha Sur Newsrooms get nimble in a recession
Christoph Mergerson The rot at the core of the news business
Josh Schwartz The AI spammers are coming
Kerri Hoffman Podcasting goes local
Eric Ulken Generative AI brings wrongness at scale
Eric Thurm Journalists think of themselves as workers
Andrew Losowsky Journalism realizes the replacement for Twitter is not a new Twitter
Surya Mattu Data journalists learn from photojournalists
Sue Schardt Toward a new poetics of journalism
Johannes Klingebiel The innovation team, R.I.P.
Cassandra Etienne Local news fellowships will help fight newsroom inequities