Spanish Media Leaders e-Summit

Since 2014 until today audio is definitely having its moment. Valued for their convenience, intimacy, and choice, podcasts are a unique growth point in today's media landscape. According to the latest Reuters Institute Digital News Report, the popularity of podcasts, despite the lockdown and the remote working culture, has not diminished, while the pandemic has been devastating to the economic side of the media industry. Audio offers publishers a unique and direct way to build a relationship with their audiences, increasing engagement and giving voice to new talent and communities. In this context, Zetland has found in audio an original formula to reach its readers and grow subscriptions. For the last 3 years, they have been publishing their articles in audio format (available to their members) giving voice to their brand, their stories, and the journalists behind them. According to them, 80% of articles are now consumed via audio by Zetland's paying members and audio articles tend to be listened to all the way through, in comparison with their longform articles which have a much quicker drop-off rate. To date, Zetland has more than 20,000 paying members, some of them actively involved in the editorial process increasing the sense of ownership, and aims to hit the 40,000 members milestone in the next five years.
This year we have seen the collapse of some of the pillars that sustained our business from the dramatic downfall of advertising revenues to the post-truth discourse that has undermined the credibility of the media and its ability to fulfill its core mission as a guarantor of democracy. At a time as troubling as this, in which we have almost all our energy focused on survival, it is difficult to think about our fundamental role in open societies. In the words of Jarvis, "Our house was already on fire; COVID threw gunpowder on the flames". While we stand on the ashes of the old world, a new nameless model and paradigm are emerging, and we have the responsibility to create what the new one is going to become. In this session we will talk about the possibilities offered by the internet, the need to create regulatory frameworks to keep the post-truth discourse in check, the need for transparency,, civic journalism and journalism as a public service, cultural change, diversity in newsrooms, the extinction of the business model and the different forces at play in this moment of uncertainty that threaten our profession and our survival, in short, what will be the future of journalism?
© 2021 WAN-IFRA - World Association of News Publishers
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