How can the Media Viability Manifesto help media survive and thrive?

Welcome to "Survive and Thrive," DW Akademie's dialogue with media managers on innovative and sustainable business models in a challenging global media landscape. We usually talk motivation, lessons learned, funding models, best practices, recipes for success and decisions – both good and bad. This time, in a special episode, we discuss the brand-new Media Viability Manifesto – a publication that is the culmination of input from 152 individuals from 55 countries and 86 organizations. It paves the way for more systematic exchange and learning, and for more strategic and coordinated action.   

Watch here or read the complete transcript below. 

 Janelle Dumalaon: Hello and welcome to Survive and Thrive, your media viability podcast. Now, if this isn't the first time you’re listening to us, you know that what we usually do is talk to media managers and decision-makers from outlets around the world and discuss the unique way they're affected by the common challenges involved in running a media operation and how they're staying viable despite those challenges, and are working towards some kind of viability. 

Today, however, we're doing something a little different. We're starting from the premise that media are not viable, that on a systemic level, something is broken. Our next guests have spent a lot of time looking at what exactly is broken and where we could begin to fix it. Clare Cook and Laura Moore are two of the authors of the Media Viability Manifesto, what they call a common framework for joint action. Welcome to the both of you. 

Laura Moore: Thank you. 

Clare Cook: Hi. 

 

Dumalaon: First we have a short round of introductory questions for both of you. This is usually a standard lightning round with short answers, but we've adapted them a little: The media viability manifesto in a catch phrase. 

Cook: It's really a call to action for the media development community to tackle the economic challenges facing media organizations. 

Moore: I would say this the first ever joint and widely agreed on suggestion from the media development sector to solve the economic crisis facing media with very concrete steps and actions that can be taken by the different stakeholders. 

 

Having looked at the challenges to media viability from a more meta, overarching perspective, would you say everything is lost? 

Moore: I would say no, even the contrary. I would say there's almost a window of opportunity now with all the developments around AI, with mis- and disinformation everywhere. I think there's a raising of awareness that we actually need a big change and there's also first initiatives for change. 

Cook: And I don't think the economics of media is entirely lost, but there are many aspects of it that still remain fundamentally broken, which means that for many, many media organizations around the globe, their financial status is really the biggest challenge and their most chronic difficulty. 

 

And I feel like this dives nicely into the next question: What would independent media need to thrive in the future, Clare? 

Cook: Really what we need more than ever is a combining of different approaches. What often happens is there is a little bit of blinkering where one particular approach becomes the favored approach and the lens turns on to that, whether that's reader revenues or the economic returns from Big Tech. But what we actually need to do is find a way to keep multiple approaches in the limelight at one time and coordinate and blend them more effectively. 

  

Within both of your answers, there are a lot of themes that we're going to get into this, this idea of joint coordination, this idea of fixing the economics of media, and this idea of using the moment that we have, at this particular time, also in view of the challenges of the future to do something about all of this. 

Now before anything else, one of the things that the manifesto is trying to do is get everyone on the same page with regard to what in fact we're talking about when we say viability. So what is it that we're talking about and what are we trying to do? 

Moore: What we did was really come together with a lot of people realizing we don't really have the answer to your question. What is it that we're actually talking about? And we're very happy that the manifesto now offers an answer for the first time, really an answer from almost 150 people that gave input to that. And we agreed that media viability is an overarching term for a field within the media development sector that really focuses on the enabling economic aspects and outlets and also media systems. 

Cook: Really, as Laura said, it was quite shocking to us that when we got many, many stakeholders in the room together with a conference that was using entitled media viability when probed, no one actually knew what we were talking about. The boundaries of this arena of work were very, very unclear and within that therefore very difficult to offer coordinated responses and priorities. 

 

So a lot of it concentrates on enabling the economic conditions that would allow media outlets to survive. But is it really just about business viability? 

Cook: This is an important distinction to make and it isn't just a conceptual one – it actually does really impact the way donors see their allocations, on the way that we organize research, the way that we advocate. Media viability is the sectoral level, as Laura has described, but business viability is really at the organizational level. And when we're talking about business viability, there are numerous different components that go into ensuring that an outlet, an organization can have viable or sustainable operations. 

Moore: The two words, viability and sustainability, are also used all the time. And we thought: What is actually the difference between the two? We found in our discussions over time that the difference between them mainly is this component of time. A media house can be viable when it is able to produce independent content that is important to their audience and community. But it could be that this only happens, for example, right before elections and then the media outlet stops the services. A sustainable media outlet is able to do that, to produce the content over time. So, the sustainability of a media outlet is basically something beyond viability. 

  

I think those are very good definitions. This idea that of course media is something that we are going to continue to need. We are going to continue to need media to not just be operational on a daily basis, but actually have long-term perspectives and be able to deliver what the audiences are, what the audience is. 

But let's look at the problem a little bit more. You've mentioned the economic conditions a lot. Why is it so hard for media to survive and even harder to thrive? 

Cook: There's obviously multifaceted challenges and it totally depends on which context media are in. There's all sorts of different states that they might find themselves in, from opening markets to closing environments to crisis or even exile. 

So, depending on those contexts already we'll have a huge bearing on what is even possible or feasible. But as well as that, you've got the global changes over the last sort of decade, unbundling of news information and audience fragmentation. 

This gap almost between the relationship between a media house and their organization and their audiences because of the platforms and their role in the distribution of news, which makes things very, very difficult and trying. And then of course, the platforms, this platform economy that we're in. I think nearly 50% of advertising now goes to the main platforms, which creates a very difficult situation where most are still using advertising as one of their revenue streams. 

And then, of course, you have all the other specific contextual factors, whether that's media capture, whether that is government interference in advertising placements or regulatory controls and weak digital infrastructures. So, at any one point there can be many, many, many different factors that are constantly in effect, bashing this problem into the face of media who are trying to defend public interest spaces. 

Moore: But I would add to this, because you specifically asked about surviving and thriving. And I think what we also, as media development organizations, have been focusing on for a long time is the surviving aspect – to really look at, OK, how can a media outlet innovate? How can you really look into your business model, business plans, capacity of staff and really see even in these very difficult environments what Clare just mentioned to survive on the everyday basis. And I think that's also what guests here on the podcast that we've heard here really describe, this kind of everyday struggle. And I think the thriving aspect to it is really OK. If you want to be able to thrive, you need to operate in a system that allows you as a media outlet to thrive, right? You can survive on an everyday basis, but you can't thrive without the environment that allows you to do that. And I think this is really important. 

Cook: One other really complicated aspect and dimension to this is also that it's not about all media surviving at all times. We want to support diverse and pluralistic media environments and media landscapes, but that might mean letting some media die out while others and new ones spring up. So, it's there's a lot of complicated factors, which really does mean that we can't take a binary approach at all. 

  

Both of you have alluded to the complexity of this topic and here on the show we've spoken to media managers in Zimbabwe, the Philippines, Ukraine, Bolivia and elsewhere, all with the sort of funding challenges you mentioned, all facing tough economic conditions, but all with also a set of problems that are unique to their situations, their particular media landscapes.  

What's the best way to collectively address media viability issues while keeping the specificity of everyone's sort of own circumstances in mind? 

Cook: That's one of the things that we've tried to achieve actually with the Media Viability Manifesto, which is an initiative that's gone on now for two years. As Laura said, more than 100 people, organizations are involved. And what we try to do is synthesize that really, to create this map which articulated a theory of change. 

But from my side, I would certainly identify three priority areas. The first we see continually is that there's a need for long-term core funding. What's very, very difficult for media is this short-term cash culture. There's a small grant here for this particular content theme that goes with this accelerated program. There's very little coordination and strategic thinking, and it creates this schizophrenia almost about how do I literally grab tiny bits of money here, there and everywhere. 

And that very much detracts from their own strategic thinking, their own entrepreneurialism, if and where there's a pocket for that to occur. So that I think it is a really important part, that what we need to work on is more coordination and more long-term strategic thinking. The second thing I'd say is there's not a lot of money usually put aside for organizing, whether that's supporting coalitions on the ground, collaborations, partnerships, shared services and actually those structural elements. If we can find ways to bake that into our programming and find ways to enable that, then I think that would be a really great thing moving forward. And the third area from my side, I really do think that we need a more varied portfolio of different ways of offering investments, grants, getting the public sector involved, as well as the private sector. 

So, that's really on many stakeholders’ minds, that need to in effect upskill their own knowledge around these varied mechanisms of getting more capital into the system, as well as distributing what exists already. 

Moore: I want to add to the question of how you make sure that you consider the local context and the special environments that media operate in. The manifesto here - and this is really important - offers this overview of things that should be looked at but really always from this context-specific perspective.  

So, if you're a media manager or media house dealing with problems in your media system, in your everyday life, you can really have a look at ‘what can I do to improve?’ There's the level of business and technical supports. There’s advocacy and coalitions, partnerships that Clare has already mentioned as well. Or you find that you need more information and more research, more insights into your specific context. 

So, all these are areas that are explained and that are kind of laid out in the manifesto, but it’s really to be understood as a basis for discussion and as a starting point. And then you actually have to really go deeper into it with this context-specific perspective. 

  

This might be quite an abstract question, so please bear with me. You've spent a lot of time out on the field. You've spent a lot of time gathering input for this report. There is an ideal that you lay out in the report that would provide perhaps more standing for these media outlets in order to be able to become more viable. How far is the current reality away from the one that the manifesto would like to see come to life? 

The reason I ask this is because there must be elements of this that are happening already, like some of these things people are already trying to enact. So, I suppose, yeah, maybe it's happening in a disjointed manner. It's happening to different degrees, different speeds around the world. So, this is why I'm asking: How far is there to go? 

Cook: That's a really good question. I think a long way. 

Moore: We, the different stakeholders – media managers, media development organizations, even donors – are really good at these more individual, quite specific activities of improving business models, looking into strategic planning. This is something that also we as media development organizations have really been focusing on in the past because we thought that this might be the answer to strengthening media organizations, to really have a good answer to this business and economic problem.  

And there we are very far away from the ideal situation that is outlined in the manifesto. It offers this broader joint, synchronized approach where we have to come together as different actors. And the point is – and you asked about providing more long-term money for media houses – this only functions if we have enough insights into where it actually makes sense to invest money, by whom, what the outcomes are, what impacts the different activities.  

So, we as media development organizations have to get better at coordinating and having a joint strategy of improving the situation of media viability. We need to share best practices – and more importantly, I would say, failures, mistakes and things that we have done that haven't really worked right. We need to learn from these and really come together to tackle that super complex problem. 

And as long as we don't do that, as long as the different stakeholders don't take their role in this puzzle – and this includes Big Tech, and this includes public actors, policy makers – as long as we don't come together and have a joint understanding of what is needed, it will be super hard to get closer to the solution. 

Cook: I think when we all exchanged on where we were strong there. There was a sense that there is support out there in terms of the capacity development of different media organizations. But that doesn't mean to say that that's won by any stretch. 

And I think most media are more aware about diversification of their revenue streams and they're doing what they can. They're putting emphasis on strategy, they're putting emphasis on leadership. So, they're trying really hard to do whatever they can to obviously fund their operations. I'd also say that there are many initiatives moving forward on media finance legislation, even in Indonesia and Brazil. We're seeing fledgling attempts in smaller countries and regions to try and have those dialogues with Big Tech platforms. So yes, attention goes there and then also organizing there. There's an appetite for local funds, national funds. 

There have been steps, as Laura's saying, but we are far away from getting towards that goal of keeping all of those in the air at once so that we actually have this blended and coordinated approach. 

  

Is there enough of a pie, if you see what I mean, when everybody gets together and tries to coordinate and mobilize the donor community, the private and public sector, other potential sources of revenue streams? 

Media are diverse enough that there's probably a niche for absolutely everything. But how do you square the circle of coordinating while also competing for the same finances that I can imagine are limited around the world? 

Cook: I mean the recent OECD funding allocations reveal that there really is not a lot of money put aside for media development. We know that we need more actors bringing in more capital, whether that's more open-minded philanthropists based in local environments, whether that is corporate social responsibility funding from the private sector, whether that's different government options or whether it's the media looking to diaspora audiences and alternative audience segments who might be able to fund journalism. 

The fact is that everyone's trying their best to have as many dimensions that they can look at as many avenues, but it does still make it very, very difficult, particularly when you have these ginormous crises, whether it's in Ukraine or the problems in MENA that naturally draw attention and require a different prioritization. It does make it very difficult for there to be a pie that's big enough for everyone to share. 

Moore: But on the other hand, there's also a lot of contexts and regions, sometimes on the national level as well, where there are so many media houses just because it's become much easier to found an outlet but there's just not the audience for it 

That makes it more important to really know as a media house who the audience is, what the audience needs and what the niche is. Where do I add value to the public interest and where’s the community that I can serve? That kind of hyper competition of media houses sometimes means that, as Clare said, not all media can survive.

So, say I'm a media manager, I have the media viability manifesto in my hands. How best to read it and use it? There's a lot of advice in there about coordination, about building coalitions, about organizing research. So, I have it in my hands. What do I do next? 

Moore: I think a lot of media work with donors and or media development organizations or other actors is that they are building strategies. The manifesto really is a good starting point to sit around the table. Take the Theory of Change, as we call it: Basically, it’s this map that shows you the steps and actions that the different actors have to take in order to achieve media viability. It's quite concrete.  

You can really take this as the starting point to build a strategy that then allows you to synchronize your different actions that you do with different partners and different people. This is the first opportunity that the manifesto gives you if you are a media owner or a media manager. 

Cook: Yeah. I would also say hopefully it would enable a practitioner to also pinpoint their needs, particularly in the first track, which is in the capacity development at the business organizational level. We've identified many different practitioners with lots of experience, the different steps that we think are critical factors in getting towards the desired change we want. 

It might help target and give a rationale for why there is a need for particular capacity development at any one of those stages, whether that is, for example, making more market research or audience data that's potentially lacking. We know there are huge black holes in the data that is available for media practitioners in order for them to build the strategies they need. So, it could be around that, or it could be around leadership training. It could be around impact. 

One of the big themes to come from this is that – and it fits with a global trend to better understand the value and the impact of journalism beyond measuring reach and other vanity metrics. So, from a practitioner's perspective, having that 360° view of what types of changes they're bringing around in their local communities, what kind of impact they're having, helps us all paint this picture of what is the role of journalism, why it needs funding. So, there's also really important contributions that we need that connect local to global. 

Moore: I think this podcast is also listened to by media development actors, right, and, and organizations. And here we really need to use the Media Viability Manifesto as a strong tool for our discussions with donors to really make the point. Look, it's not enough to do X, but you also have to be aware that you need to do Y, which is, for example, research and insights. That’s hardly funded at the moment. You don't really get grants to properly engage in action research and really dive deep into certain topics. Sometimes it’s a part of media development projects, the whole learning and research side, but it's really, really hard to get it funded. 

So, if you see the manifesto as a tool that gives you an idea of the overall different aspects needed, then you can also go and say, we need to get better at research, for example, or we need funding for advocacy. That's also another thing that's really hard. Advocacy doesn't just come from conversations. It has to be strategic, it has to be coordinated. That needs resources, right? So, this is another thing where I would say really the fact that it's developed by so many people from over 50 countries representing more than 80 organizations, we should use it as a strong tool and also with kind of verbalizing our needs as media development organizations towards donors. 

 

I wanted to go back to something that you said earlier, Clare, about the global connection here being, what is the role of journalism and why does it need funding? Do you feel that there is enough of an understanding of what journalism needs to thrive? 

Cook: No, I don't think there is. And there's a big piece to be played. Everybody is, I think, well-versed now in the Sustainable Development Goals, for example. But few recognize the importance of media in bringing about those changes and the important role that they play in stabilizing local communities, in meeting information needs, critical information needs. So I think as a sector we are trying to use the Media Viability Manifesto and other coordinating tools to make sure that we have the necessary evidence base to make that case. 

 

Laura, I also wanted to return to something that you said earlier. You've referred to this manifesto a few times as a starting point for discussion. Are we to understand the manifesto as a sort of living, evolving document? 

Moore: Yes, nothing is set in stone! This is the closest that we ever got to coordinating and finding a common strategy. So, this is a big achievement and something that will remain. But it definitely should be used as a living document because the environments that we are talking about and working in are changing all the time and there's new developments. Of course, AI at the moment changes lots of things. But with the environments changing and with the realities changing, of course also the strategies have to change. I think the manifesto is quite robust, but still it definitely needs to be used flexibly. 

 

I remember quite early in this conversation, Laura, you framed AI as an opportunity. Of course, it can also be a disruptor, a source of uncertainty for many a media manager in this business. And you've already made the point that the challenges don't really seem to end. They change or mutate. How does one take the media manifesto, the media viability manifesto along with them throughout these changes? 

Moore: I mean, to look at AI and this window of opportunity: I do think that we have a lot of things that we learned from this so-called “social media era,” real learnings from social media and the dependency on social media – and obviously the economic problems that come with the dominance of Big Tech. 

As a media development organization, we have also to some extent let partners down. We didn't realize quickly enough that it was a bigger problem, that it wasn't really about the individual media houses but rather the system’s problem. And I think that with the increasing importance of AI and all the developments that we are seeing now, the opportunity is that AI companies rely on up-to-date fact-based content which is often provided by independent media houses. 

This is why I'm saying that maybe there is a window of opportunity here, because there is a dependency on news and on media content. And this potentially gives media houses a better negotiating position with these companies. And here we should use the lessons learned, things that we missed in the discussions and the developments with social media and really try and do better this time. 

Cook: One really important dimension of that that's come up quite a lot is when I talked about supporting diverse and pluralistic ecosystems. A lot of smaller media rarely get the necessary seat at the table for discussions, nor do they get their appropriate share, whether that is from structural changes, from government ad placements or specific legislative deals around business based negotiations with platforms. 

So, what we're also looking at always is the health of the ecosystem and the provision of that to ensure that we really can make sure that this isn't just designed for corporate legacy or mainstream media, but that really does provide the necessary frameworks for all different types of producers. 

  

When we talk about the future of funding for diverse media around the world, not just the legacy media that for a long time has been based on advertising revenue or whose finances have been largely based on the advertising revenue, what is the future beyond, as you've pointed out earlier, sort of short-term grants, partnerships here and there, these piecemeal approaches to the financing that you've talked about? What does a coordinated synchronized funding model look like for a media outlet in a developing country? 

Moore: We are seeing some quick promising developments around national journalism funds, which is one way to distribute money, ideally independently to media and that have public interest. There's a lot of discussion about taxation at the moment, so-called bargaining codes, so kind of legal approaches to hold Big Tech to account and to make them pay for journalistic content. And the good thing is that often these conversations start at the so-called Global North level. But we see South Africa, Indonesia, Brazil, other countries really also opening up towards these new models and new ways of financing. And I think this is something that potentially is part of the solution for the future. 

Cook: That's almost what we would describe as the outside-in-approach. But from a practitioner's point of view, inside out, I think what we're also seeing is quite a lot more interest in entrepreneurial journalism. So, actually looking at diversification outside to adjacent products and services. And we've seen a lot of evidence of that, particularly in the MENA region and, in some contexts in, Asia. What we might have to be looking at is how do we actually support journalists and by developing different products and services and that might open up new opportunities for different styles of investment. 

 

I was also wondering because as they say, necessity is the mother of invention. Have you seen any sort of evidence on the field from all the outlets and the stakeholders that you've talked to, that smaller, more diverse media around the world might actually be faster at getting to these newer funder models, getting to these new sort of products that they could sell to audiences than perhaps legacy media is, just because they have had to be adaptable? 

Cook: Typically, local community startups, digital natives – there's very many different kinds of ways of describing what we're talking about here – they do tend to be excellent innovators, very good at making a little go far. They're very agile. They are very keen to explore different possibilities, but where that tends to have a little bit of a glass ceiling is, they simply don't have the technical, the software, the scale that's needed for market research to convert some of the options that are open to mainstream media. I'm thinking specifically around reader revenues, that it requires an enormous amount of software and data and technology to make it work. 

Moore: I’ve seen efforts in Colombia and Kenya that come to mind to diversify in a way that goes quite far beyond the journalistic approach and mission. Very often, it's really impressive - small community radios that are literally buying chickens in order to be able to sell eggs. We have seen examples of media houses selling wine from their region and the earnings go into the media house and the production services. Internet cafes as part of media houses and stuff like this. And this, as we said earlier, helps to survive on the everyday basis, but it also takes away resources and time from the journalistic work. 

So, while it is something that helps you to survive and potentially also to innovate in other ways with formats and in the journalistic work, it also can be a risk because it distracts you from your actual work and mission. 

Cook: Absolutely! And if we just draw attention to the fact that, ultimately the Media Viability Manifesto, at its beating heart, is trying to speak to these bigger agendas. For example, the OECD principles, increasing the overall volume of financing into the sector, acknowledging the public interest news and public interest media deserve funding as public goods. 

It's two sides of one coin: There are many different steps and activities that can be done at the business viability level, but there's a real appreciation that they should never be expected to do this on their own. In many environments, the market is so fundamentally broken, that it is impossible whether they're in exile or working in high hybridity, that actually the system needs much more investment and nurturing. 

  

I feel like this was a really wide range in conversation about media at large and what to do about the things in the system that are broken. I was just wondering if there's anything before we move on to the next best practice tips that perhaps got less attention in this conversation, that you especially want to highlight with regard to the Media Viability Manifesto? 

Cook: I think what's important to stress is this is not a Global North initiative. This is very much an appreciation, and working with and alongside, listening step-by-step with actors of all different sizes and shapes from many, many different areas. That really, for me, is the pride that I would have in this particular initiative: it is genuinely being done in an open and collaborative manner. And I hope that it becomes a springboard on which people are prepared to kind of move forward. 

Moore: We're also hoping to build a kind of community around that to see who's interested, who's already working or who has ideas, or what are the things that are maybe missing? We’re very open to criticism as well, because criticism brings us a step forward, right? If we are able to become a diverse and critical community around media viability, that's another step towards the answer and the solution hopefully of this crisis. 

  

That is definitely a call for discussion for anyone who is listening: Please read the Media Viability Manifesto and come with your comments and your critiques and let's make it the living document that it is supposed to be. 

It's a little strange to ask both of you what your three best practice tips are. This whole idea is that you were talking about a paper that you wrote that is essentially a set of recommendations. But for the sake of this format, I think we should try anyway. So, if we could start with you, Clare, what are your three best practice tips for media organizations or managers when it comes to media viability? 

Cook: My first one would be definitely to have a 360° view of your impact. Fundamentally, that will help with every aspect, whether that is doing pitch sessions for investors, whether that is doing grant applications or whether that is contributing and connecting your lived experiences with bigger pictures in the region, national or international level. So, definitely having this really nuanced understanding of your impact. 

The second speaks to, I think, very much the rationale at the moment: Take a user-centric approach to journalism. There are huge black holes in the data. So, the more that we can create comprehensive pictures of audience needs, of user needs, what that translates to in reality, I think that’s really important. 

The third I would say from my perspective, as a kind of business viability advisor, speaks to a point that Laura raised about developing differentiated products. That's a formal kind of way of saying really understand the value add of what you are doing, not because you think it's good and of value, but really proving that you have quality differentiated products in that local marketplace that serves the needs of that community.  

Moore: Just to add to this: find like-minded people, share your experience. What we often see is that when there's a chance to come together, you realize that you're not alone with the problems. We've seen a quite fruitful exchange of ideas. And also, just this feeling of, OK, we're not alone. 

The other thing is: really come to the table of discussions where possible. Often discussions about challenges of media really surprisingly and quite shockingly are happening without media at the table. Come if it is about your future, about your media system, about practices of journalism, really get to the table and become part of the discussions where possible. Also, on the international level this is something that I would say isn't really done enough. 

 

All right, so by my count, we have five best practice tips and if I can just summarize them, it's from Clare. You started by saying that you should have a 360° view of your impact. The second one is to make sure that your approach is user-centric, and you were making the point that there are a lot of black holes when it comes to the data. And the more complete idea, your idea is of your audience needs, the better it will be. Have different shaded products of quality. 

And from Laura we have: find likeminded people. Exchanges are very important. Realizing you're not alone is very important and be represented at the table at an international level. If possible, be present at the discussions about the future of media. Do not let them talk about media without the media being present.

So I think I think that is a good place to leave it there. Thank you so much for a guest. To our guests today, Clare Cook and Laura Moore. Thank you, dear. Listeners, appreciate you joining us today. 

 

This transcript of "Survive and Thrive: The Media Viability Podcast" has been lightly edited for clarity.    

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