WAN-IFRA’s World News Media Congress is a highlight on most global newsroom calendars, bringing together the collective wisdom of stakeholders from every sector of the industry, from reporters to policy makers. It’s a gathering that invigorates, not least because of the many unique insights gained, but also the various differing perspectives on core issues.

This year was exceptional by all accounts, with AI dominating all discussions, proving the most significant challenge to journalism, and the business of news.

This was fully unpacked in a session dedicated to “The Forces Shaping Journalism And What To Do About Them,” moderated by Emily Bell, Founder and Director of the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia Journalism School.

Panellists Phil Chetwynd, Global News Director for AFP (Agence France-Presse), Jennifer Wilton, Editor in Chief of Die Welt in Germany, and Maria Ressa, Co-Founder & CEO of Rappler in The Philippines, found agreement on who, what, why and how (Big Tech, AI, authoritarian policies and a disinformation ecosystem) journalism and the news industry is being decimated – though there was little consensus on solutions, and the path forward.

Undisputed is the need to constantly adapt to constant change, and to double down on authentic, transparent and investigative journalism.

Along with this, is a cry for greater, and more effective collaboration – and independence from the dominance of tech.

Same, but different: Amplifying the call for ‘Genuine Journalism’

“Politics and society are haunting, more than shaping, journalism. The answer to that is journalism – for us, getting back to what journalism means,” says Wilton.

“We have to really concentrate on what our core business is as journalists, to get back to good journalism, to send more people out in the field, to concentrate on reporting and investigations, and talking about investigation and of journalism. That’s really important. There has never been so much need for good journalism.”

AFP’s  Chetwynd agrees, and says AI presents an ”opportunity for authenticity, to focus on what is exceptional – what really matters and justifies our work as journalists: newsgathering on the ground, investigating… I’m excited by that, and by the extraordinary journalism we’ve had over the past 20 years. We need to double down on who we are and what we do – robots can’t do that at the moment.”

Power in partnerships: a call for unity

“It is a time of opportunity, but we need to think differently,” adds Ressa. “There is a path forward, it’s just not the way we’ve been doing it in the past: we’ve never worked together; we’ve always competed against each other.

News organisations are, now, talking more, notes Chetwynd: “Generally, there is more collaboration, and there has been more real discussion with direct competitors on Press Freedom, so there is an understanding of what the stakes are, and the need to come together.”

Ressa confirms that there is power in unity by referencing Press Freedom’s 80 media freedom groups that, collectively, campaigned for her freedom with the #HoldTheLine coalition. 

“Collectively, we have scale; collectively, we have thinking people; collectively, we have power,” notes Ressa.

Innovating revenue streams

During the past two decades especially, news organisations have had to be more flexible, if not agile, to meet tech and audience demands. 

AI now calls for more of the same, with even greater diligence, than during the digital revolution of the 1990s.

Wilton references Die Welt’s transformation over the period, from being one of the first newsrooms with a website in the 1990s, to converting from print to online, which geared it for sustainability. 

“You have to stick to certain values in journalism… , but you have to accept the environment, the media. and the platforms will change. And you have to be flexible,” she says.

Flexible, and fearless, proposes Ressa, who cites Rappler’s increase in traffic (from about 20 to 50%) when they pivoted in response to shutdown threats from the government, and had to find alternative revenue streams to survive.  

“Our monetisation, our business model is based on advertising, yet there are other ways,” she notes.

“So we have to find an in-between in maintaining the quality of content we, our people, deserve – while using the technology which is so imperfect because the people who built that tech didn’t care about quality, about ethics, about facts.

‘Our aim is to own our distribution.’

New possibilities: is there space for a global, independent news network?

There is a daring solution for united newsrooms to establish a decentralised form of united power: Ressa opens for the way forward with a Matrix protocol chat app that can connect to any news website. “Like Mastodon, this can be federated,” and with this, our aim is that we each take our distribution, and own it.”

Rappler has rolled out this tech with the launch of Rappler Communities (see our latest EDITOR TO EDITOR interview for more), and is actively campaigning for global newsrooms to join them in establishing a global, independent news network. 

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