You’re reading the My News Biz newsletter, which I will be sending you every other Thursday. My goal is to help you and other digital media entrepreneurs to find a viable business model that works for you. If you were forwarded this email, you can sign up here. Damian Radcliffe, Part 2: He tells students, 'You have to hustle'Also, public funding of journalism requires transparency with sponsors, consumers
You’re reading the Your News Biz newsletter. My goal is to help digital media entrepreneurs find viable business models.  Above: The video of our 34-minute conversation. In my previous post, I presented the first part of my interview with Damian Radcliffe, a British journalism professor, researcher, and expert in digital media, particularly news media. These days he’s teaching at the University of Oregon, in Eugene. In that post, we were talking about community-centered journalism, a grass-roots approach in which the people of a community set the news agenda. We talked also about how America is waking up to the fact that journalism has evolved to be less of a profitable business and more of a public service. That means the public has to pay for it rather than advertisers. Part 2In this post we’ll discuss:
James Breiner: You’ve talked about how Americans tend to be suspicious of public funding of journalism. Europeans see it differently. The BBC in the UK is probably the worldwide best example of news and information as a public service paid for out of public funds. [The interview has been edited for space and clarity. The bold-face emphasis in Damian’s comments below is mine. — James] Need for transparency, labelingDamian Radcliffe: When I first moved to Oregon, I brought very strong European sensibilities in terms of attitudes towards public funding for journalism and news media, which weren't really shared. Many of the people that I talked to saw a potential conflict of interest. The traditional church and state boundaries do feel a lot more blurred now, and in local newsrooms that has probably always been the case. In outlets that might have just one or two staff producing a weekly publication, you are the editor, you are the chief reporter, you are the person who does the sales. So those kinds of boundaries, I think, had always been blurred, but there's a much greater recognition of that now. There are models that you can look at that show how you can do this in a way that is still ethical. Most importantly, you have to communicate that to the audience. This is where our money is coming from. This is how we are funded. When we look at what's happening with AI and journalism, we see the same thing: there needs to be much greater conversation and with our audiences about how these technologies are being used and the implications of that, and a much greater volume of labeling as well as work to promote the media literacy of audiences by actually sharing what we do and how and why we do it. Careers in journalism and other mediaJames Breiner: Shifting to another topic that I get asked about a lot: What do you tell journalism and communication students — and more importantly, their parents — about what the realities are of the job market in journalism and communication? What do you tell them? Damian Radcliffe: I’m so glad you mentioned the parents, because I think that's actually a really vital conversation for students to have. When I ask the students, what do you want to do when you graduate, where do you want to go? Many of them will say, I want to be a beat reporter covering education for a certain paper. And I say, oh, okay, great. Do you read that paper? -No. Are you interested in education? -Not really. Okay, so, so why do you want to do that? And I think they feel that's the answer that they should give, and that is probably the answer that they give over Thanksgiving to their parents and extended family, rather than saying, well, actually, what I really want to do is cover eSports for such and such a site, because I'm really into that. What I try to encourage students to do is to recognize that, yes, the economic model is very challenging, but there are also more possibilities for us as journalists, as storytellers, as content creators than there ever have been. And that's also incredibly exciting, and I think a real source for optimism. And so I encourage them to follow their passions, their interests, the things that they watch, listen to and read — that's the place you should want to work. You have to hustle, be entrepreneurialIf students can’t find jobs doing the kinds of things that speak to them, I ask them, Could you potentially do something yourself? Could you be entrepreneurial and set up your own business, or work as an independent reporter? More and more of our students are doing that. Or they're doing that as a side hustle, because actually their day job in this space doesn't pay enough to make rent and car payments, and to have the kind of life that they want and deserve. So a lot of them are kind of hustling. And so we talk a lot about hustle culture, freelancing, and a recognition that there's no set career path anymore. You determine your own future and the direction of travel. The days of starting at your local paper, then going up to a metro and then to a national are gone. Or of joining a company and being with them for 20, 30, 40 years. You have to be your own best advocate, and you have to try and stay one step ahead of the curve in terms of whatever is coming down the line in terms of technology, changes in audience consumption habits and preferences, and really lean into that. You have to be ahead of the curve so that, if and when cuts come or when new opportunities arise, you can be at the front of the line because you have that knowledge and skill set that others don't, and that is your competitive advantage. Pink slime mediaJames Breiner: I did want to talk with you a little bit about a national trend in local media here in the US. There are thousands of local news publications that have popped up recently and are attempting to appear as trustworthy, reliable sources of news and information, but are actually pushing very specific political agendas. They're financed by big money backers of political agendas, and in particular conservative agendas. The Columbia Journalism Review calls these outlets “pink slime” and recently profiled one of them in my backyard here in Ohio. It’s a news site that advocates for oil and gas drilling and opposes public funding of solar energy farms. What's your understanding of pink slime? Damian Radcliffe: Oh, that's a great question. This is content that looks at first glance like legitimate news and information, but, as you say, is often pushing a partisan agenda. It will look like it's being produced for a specific community, but actually, in many cases, there will be hundreds, if not thousands of sites dotted all across the US that are pushing the exact same stories that have exactly the same look and feel and design. And one of the reasons why these sites can be so successful in terms of reaching audiences is that in many cases, they are targeting news deserts, areas that are devoid of fresh news and information, and where there is a vacuum, and nature abhors a vacuum. And these pink slime sites are able to tap into that. It's not necessarily obvious when you first look at these sites, that they do have an editorial agenda, that the information that they are pushing may not be correct or accurate or may be highly, highly biased. And the standard thing that we would say to folks would be, well, you know, double check or triple check your sources. But if you're in a news desert,, there is no other source to go to. Your sources are friends, family, the person you have a conversation with at Dollar General, Walmart, or on Main Street. So it's very easy to see why these sites can flourish. James Breiner: Are you worried? Damian Radcliffe: Yes. I think we all should be. It kind of points to why there needs to be more investment in journalism writ large, but particularly at a local level. And not just in terms of the production of news and information. We also need to be working with audiences to help them in terms of their news literacy, their ability to spot misinformation and disinformation online, which is only becoming more sophisticated by the day through AI. You know, accessing quality news and information behind a paywall is expensive. And I remember talking to a former student who was an editor of a weekly paper about 20 miles south of here, and she said families are having to make the decision of, do I fill up my car with gas, or do I take out a subscription to our paper? And those are the kinds of decisions people are having to weigh. We don't see, I think, enough innovation in terms of subscription models in particular to support people who are working or on lower incomes or in news deserts who can't necessarily afford to access some news, news and information. So they're gravitating towards free sources, understandably, and those sources are not necessarily reliable or accurate, right? Be differentJames Breiner: So, to wrap things up, Damian, What do you see as the biggest opportunities today for independent news media? Damian Radcliffe: I think there are a number of factors. First, I do think there's been a shift in terms of people's willingness to pay for content from where we were at, say, 10 years ago, and that there is more innovation in this space as well. When you see the emergence of independent creators using platforms like Patreon and so forth as ways to generate revenues and to engage with audiences, I think that shows us some interesting potential. And for me, a lot of the most interesting stuff — and what I think has the biggest potential for growth — is around niche media. We have so much commodity content, the same story everywhere, with very, very little variation. I think that through AI, we will see more of that [commodity journalism], just repurposing of press releases and very little differentiation across multiple sites and platforms. Those that will flourish and succeed will be the people who are doing something different, something distinctive, valuable, meeting community needs, be that a local community or a community of interest, and doing that in a variety of different places, from YouTube channels to Discord [an instant messaging platform] conversations to WhatsApp groups to newsletters. There's so many different ways in which you can serve those audiences, but you have to be doing something that is really valuable and unique, and if you do that, I do believe that audiences will pay for that content. James Breiner: Yes, I totally agree with that in terms of differentiation. There is way too much commodity coverage of national politics, for example, and not enough unique content that you can't get anywhere else. So the audiences, as you say, are going to be smaller in very narrowly defined niches, and that's where the opportunities lie. And in fact, that was my newspaper background, working for small weekly business publications all focused on news about local businesses that they couldn't get from the big metropolitan dailies. Thank you very much, Damian, for taking the time to talk with me. I know you're way busier than I am, especially since you’re teaching gobs of students. I know what that's like. Damian Radcliffe: Thanks so much, James, so great to chat with you. Damian has kindly shared with us WAN-IFRA's World Press Trends Outlook: "It marks a milestone as news publishers’ revenue structures become more diversified and less reliant on traditional print sources. For the first time in our research, print circulation and advertising revenues account for less than half of respondents’ total revenues." He is also the author of the new Thomson Reuters report, “Journalism in the AI Era,” which explores how journalists in the global south and emerging economies are using the technology. +++++Your feedbackHere are the results of your feedback so far. I’m disappointed that only seven people have responded! Respond below today! Let me know what you would like!
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