Among the predictions published in this series last year, none proved more prescient than Rachel Sklar’s “Women are Going to Get Loud.” It’s as if Rachel got an advance copy of Time’s Person of the Year issue — really advance.
The #MeToo movement has been an efficient juggernaut, blasting open decades of workplace hostility and harassment, and nowhere has it gotten more attention than in the field of media. (So much for “report the story, don’t become the story.”) Certainly, media is not the only industry so plagued by misogyny — there are others where it’s even more widespread. Nonetheless, it’s the media’s job to expose these outbreaks and it can’t even begin to help in that regard until it puts on its own oxygen mask.
The main consequences of this reckoning have been terminations, resignations, leaves of absence. And so it happens that there are suddenly a whole lot of vacancies in leadership roles across many media organizations. Already we’re seeing some of these roles filled by women. Expect that trend to accelerate and expand. There’s a surfeit of female talent that’s been sitting too long on the bench.
It never made sense for journalism to skew so heavily male at its highest ranks for so long. Media corporations can’t say with a straight face that it’s a “pipeline problem” with regards to women eager to study, work, and lead in journalism, as technology titans feebly do. According to Poynter, journalism schools award diplomas to women at a more than 2 to 1 ratio. Per ASNE, that ratio somehow flips in terms of newsroom supervisory roles, with women comprising only 37 percent. Media is storytelling, communication, information dissemination…we’re not talking about the defense industry or investment banking. These are skills women have long been stereotyped for having mastered — and yet, haven’t yet been deemed authoritative enough in to be awarded a mantle of leadership. Isn’t it ironic?
That all ends next year. My prediction is not solely that media leadership will be feminized, but that news itself will take on a new, more feminine, tone. No, this doesn’t mean more articles on weight loss and beauty trends. Instead, it means that women will be seen as reliable sources and the sexism embedded into articles about women’s issues and female public figures (“Who were they wearing?”) won’t make it past first edit. It also means we can expect newsroom resources dedicated to uncovering stories of other underserved and underreported communities. This means we can expect more two-way communication between storytellers and readers — something more authentic and constructive than a comments section.
I expect the female media takeover will bring also bring a novel remedy to the phenomenon of so-called fake news and the overall stratification of media along ideological lines. Don’t ask me how I know — it’s just my woman’s intuition. 2017 wasn’t pretty for our industry, but there’s hope for 2018. This time next year, “content is queen” will roll right off the tongue.
Jennifer Coogan is chief content officer of Newsela.
Brian Lam Sketchy ethics around product reviews
Sara M. Watson Feeds will open up to new user-determined filters
Damon Krukowski Reviving the alt-weekly soul
Heather Bryant Building the ecosystems for collaboration
Justin Kosslyn The year journalists become digital security experts
Mi-Ai Parrish Blockchain and trust
Rasmus Kleis Nielsen The Snapchat scenario and the risk of more closed platforms
Ruth Palmer Risks will grow for news subjects — especially minorities
Julia Beizer A longer view on the pivot
Valérie Bélair-Gagnon Seeking trust in fragmented spaces
Daniel Trielli The rich get richer, the poor scramble
Sam Ford The year of investing in processes
Michelle Ferrier The year of the great reckoning
Doris Truong Computer vision vs. the Internet vigilantes
Richard Tofel The platforms’ power demands more reporters’ attention
Matt Thompson Here come the attention managers
Rodney Benson Better, less read, and less trusted
Andrew Ramsammy The year ownership mattered
Nushin Rashidian Publishers seek ad dollar alternatives
Alice Antheaume Are you fluent in AI?
Vivian Schiller Pivot to tomorrow
Joyce Barnathan It will be harder to bury the news
Emily Goligoski Looking beyond news for inspiration
Hossein Derakhshan Television has won
Caitria O'Neill The new court of public opinion
Dan Shanoff You down with OTT? (Yeah, DTC)
Amy King Let’s amplify visual voice
Mariana Moura Santos Think local, act global
Joanne McNeil Gatekeeping the gatekeepers
Matt DeRienzo A recession, then a collapse
Edward Roussel Eyes, ears, and brains
Joanne Lipman Journalists inventing revenue streams
Will Sommer The year local media gets conservative
Jennifer Brandel and Mónica Guzmán The editorial meeting of the future
Mariano Blejman News games rule
Jassim Ahmad Thriving on change
Lucas Graves From algorithms to institutions
Kinsey Wilson Facebook and Google: Help out or pay up
Felix Salmon Covering bitcoin while owning bitcoin
Craig Newmark Working together toward sustainable solutions
Tanzina Vega It’s time for media companies to #PassTheMic
Andrew Haeg The year journalists become relationship builders
Tanya Cordrey Finally, the seeds of radical reinvention
Jarrod Dicker Honesty in advertising
Rachel Schallom Better design helps differentiate opinion and news
Millie Tran and Stine Bauer Dahlberg (Hint: It’s about your brand)
Jesse Holcomb Information disorder, coming to a congressional district near you
Sarah Marshall Loyalty as the key performance indicator
Alexios Mantzarlis Moving fake news research out of the lab
Mario García Storytelling finally adapts to mobile
Juliette De Maeyer A responsible press criticism
Rubina Madan Fillion Unlocking the potential of AI
Borja Echevarría TV goes digital, digital goes TV
Carlos Martínez de la Serna The new journalism commons
Jennifer Coogan The future is female
Mike Caulfield Refactoring media literacy for the networked age
Eric Nuzum Beyond the narrative arc
Zizi Papacharissi Women come back
Cristina Wilson The year of the Instagram Story
Monique Judge Letting black women tell their own stories
Michelle Garcia Navigating journalistic transparency
Amie Ferris-Rotman More female reporters abroad (please)
Niketa Patel Live journalism comes of age
Pete Brown Push alerts, personalized
Helen Havlak Keywords, not publishers, power the world’s biggest feeds
Laura E. Davis Writing answers before you know the question
Monika Bauerlein The firehose of falsehood
Kawandeep Virdee Zines had it right all along
Lanre Akinola Making noise is not a strategy
Tamar Charney We get serious about algorithms
Elizabeth Jensen Show your work
P. Kim Bui The reckoning is only beginning
Julia B. Chan Looking for loyalty in all the right places
Francesco Marconi The year of machine-to-machine journalism
Jacqui Cheng Retailers move into content
Ernst-Jan Pfauth Publishing less to give readers more
Alan Soon The rise of start of psychographic, micro-targeted media
Dheerja Kaur Fun with subscription products
Marcela Donini and Thiago Herdy Collaboration is the way forward for Brazilian journalism
Umbreen Bhatti The trust problem isn’t new
Luke O'Neil The end is already here
Eric Ulken The year local publishers get smart(er) about change
Alastair Coote The year of self-improvement
Sam Sanders Shine the light on ourselves
Aron Pilhofer We can’t leave the business to the business side any more
Betsy O'Donovan and Melody Kramer Skepticism and narcissism
Cindy Royal Your journalism curriculum is obsolete
Kristen Muller The year of the voter
José Zamora Revenue-first journalism
Cory Haik Suffering from realness, pivoting to impact
Ståle Grut Reclaiming audience interaction from social networks
Molly de Aguiar Good journalism won’t be enough
Trushar Barot The Jio-fication of India
David Skok Finding an information-life balance
C.W. Anderson The social media apocalypse
Federica Cherubini The rise of bridge roles in news organizations
Pia Frey Address users as individuals
Feli Sánchez The year for guerrilla user research
Steve Grove The midterms are an opportunity
Jessica Parker Gilbert Design connects storytelling and strategy
Sally Lehrman Trust comes first
Jennifer Choi Standing up for us and for each other
Corey Ford The empire strikes back
Bill Keller A growing turn to philanthropy
Debra Adams Simmons And a woman shall lead them
Errin Haines At the ballot, it’s time to count black women
Raney Aronson-Rath Transparency is the antidote to fake news
Nicholas Diakopoulos Fortifying social media from automated inauthenticity
Gordon Crovitz Serving readers over advertisers
S. Mitra Kalita The arc of news and audience
Christopher Meighan Passive partnership is in the rearview
Amy Webb Listen to weak signals
Kyle Ellis Let’s build our way out of this
Andrew Losowsky The year of resilience
Nik Usher The year of The Washington Post
Kim Fox Audience teams diversify their approach
Pablo Boczkowski The rise of skeptical reading
Imaeyen Ibanga Longform video leads the way
Dannagal G. Young Stop covering politics as a game
Carrie Brown Transparency finally takes off
Emma Carew Grovum Newsroom culture becomes a priority
Rick Berke Value is the watchword
Juleyka Lantigua Women of color will reclaim and monetize our time
Michael Kuntz The only pivot that might work
Claire Wardle Disinformation gets worse
Matt Carlson Attacks on the press will get worse
Rachel Davis Mersey AI, with real smarts
Sydette Harry Listen to your corner and watch for the hook
Mary Walter-Brown Show a little vulnerability
Raju Narisetti Mirror, mirror on the wall
AX Mina Memes and visuals come to the fore
Mary Meehan Real lives are at stake in rural areas
Jared Newman Venture funding and digital news don’t mix
Miguel Castro The arrival of the impact producer
Ray Soto VR reaches the next level
Adam Thomas Sharing is caring: The year of the mentor
Charo Henríquez Training is an investment, not an expense
Hannah Cassius The year of the echo-chamber escapists
Susie Banikarim R.I.P. Pivot to Video (2017–2017)
Vanessa K. DeLuca Women’s voices take center stage
Rodney Gibbs Tech workers turn to journalism
Jim Moroney Newspapers have to be good enough for readers to pay for
Evie Nagy Pivot to mobile video frustration
Renée Kaplan The year of quiet adjustments (shhh)
Corey Johnson The pro-fact resistance
Alfred Hermida Going beyond mobile-first
Jim Brady With the people, not just of the people
Taylor Lorenz Social and media will split
Mandy Velez texting is lit rn, fam
Mira Lowe The year of the local watchdog
Nicholas Quah Stop talking trash about young people
Basile Simon We need better career paths for news nerds
Manoush Zomorodi Self-help as a publishing strategy
Kathleen McElroy Building a news video experience native to mobile
Caitlin Thompson Podcasting models mature and diversify
Matt Boggie The intellectual equivalent of the Dead Sea
Tim Carmody Watch out for Spotify
Jamie Mottram From pageviews to t-shirts
Frédéric Filloux External forces