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