Journalism the answer to AI ‘age of abundance’: panel
Artificial intelligence is rapidly changing the existing publishing and advertising models, with many businesses scrambling to adapt or die.
But, as Phil Sim, CEO of Mediaconnect Group, explained during a panel on AI and publishing in Sydney on Thursday evening, the fundamental change for publishers had already come with Google Ads and SEO (Search Engine Optimisation). Sim argued that marketers and publishers alike betrayed their own principles and the disruption of of artificial intelligence holds possibilities for both industries to get back on track.
“I’m not crying, because I feel SEO made irrefutable damage to media,” he told the audience of a panel named ‘Publishing, AI and Safeguarding the Fourth Estate’, hosted by Innovation Aus. He was joined by Justin Hendry, editor of Innovation Aus, and Corrie McLeod, Innovation Aus publisher, and director at the National Press Club.
Phil Sim, Corrie McLeod, and Justin Hendry
“The journalism that I used to practice, which was about meeting people and talking to people, that got killed by what people are now trying to predict or assume,” he said. “So the fact that you would write content for machines and the Google engine rather than the audience was always the antithesis of what I thought media was about.”
Sim said AI is ushering in “an age of abundance” that means the practices that rose with SEO — search engine optimisation, in which publishers would game content in order to gain favourable Google search results — might die out as artificial intelligence encroaches.
“The only way that you stand out in an age of abundance is with something that’s different and something that’s unique. I think media companies, as they’re looking at this, have to go back to traditional journalistic principles and write content for a particular audience.”
Sim recalled that SEO quickly led to a market where B2B publishers where “putting up clickbait articles to bring in consumers, because they were reporting hits for advertisers. There was a very dishonest period and no one knew what they were doing.”
Phil Sim
Sim also took aim at “the marketers whose dollars support whatever media models are there”. He believes they have an important role to play in this shifting landscape.
“Part of what happened in that Google era, is marketers took very easy options to just give their money to Google and let Google place ads while Google took half of the money.” He noted that the Department of Justice in the US has taken steps to dismantle Google based on this abuse of power. But, he warns, they wouldn’t have had such power without willing marketers happy to feed the machine for easy distribution.
“I often hear marketers talking about the death of journalists and they’ve got no one to pitch to.
“I’m sorry, but you kinda caused that problem by not investing in media and advertising – because the financial models are fundamentally broken, and that’s what every publisher needs to work out now.”
Corrie McLeod
McLeod said she “100% agrees” with Sim’s take, and adds that publishers are shifting away from clicks to towards media where they can directly control both the audience reach and the marketing sold around their content.
“Yes, traffic to your website’s great, but we want to have those relationships via the newsletter,” she notes. “[Publishers] were trying to break the dependence on the newsletter as a distribution, and now we’re speaking the opposite.”
As a director of the National Press Club, McLeod recently gave a downbeat presentation to her fellow board members, who she describes as “hardcore press gallery journalists, going toe-to-toe with politicians all the time.”
She saw the disconnect between how they view the news as a vital public service, and the current media situation.
“They were looking at this destruction of these institutions as if — ‘but, but this is important’.
“It was a bit of a shock that the actual commercial realities and the dynamics – they kind of inform the role of the journalists. No-one’s talking about that.”
Justin Hendry
Hendry tracks the traffic and SEO optimisation for InnovationAus. He believes the true breaking point for media and marketers alike happened a few years ago, when Google started changing its algorithm. This, he feels was far more damaging than the recent introduction of AI-fuelled search.
“I feel like that was a big killer. Not even so much AI, but how they treated small publishers. We just don’t get the ranking on Google that we did before, and so we are relying more and more on products like newsletters – and so are many other independent publishers.
“I think it’s a super interesting time, even before we talk about the impact of AI on what we can do on any given day. But, certainly the changes to algorithms that Google made about a year ago. That was big. I think a lot of publishers took a big hit after that.”
Sim said a lot of the panic around the disruption of AI in regards to advertising and journalism is rooted in “trying to protect big media,” which he argues is misguided.
“Has big media deserved their place in our society? Have they always done the right thing by citizens to deserve to be protected any more than big tech has?
“I’m very passionate about independent media and protecting independent media by everything that we’ve done. So the Media Bargaining Code, for example, gave money to about 20 big publishers. It did nothing for independent media. And in many ways, the tearing down of the structures actually provides space for independent media.
“Regional media is a fantastic example of the bigger media companies getting out of small country towns, and then a retired person pops up and makes a newspaper that doesn’t make nearly enough money for a big media company to do it – but, arguably, it’s a better product because they’re passionate.”
When the quality rises, readers are engaged, and advertisers pay to share in this engagement. Very simliar to old media models.
“I believe there’s always space,” Sim said. “You have to take a philosophical position with all these things. Google’s a really good example. You reap what you sow, right? And all of these companies that mistrust. If you mistrust, if you treat the populace badly, it eventually comes back to you.
“And in many ways, what’s happening to big media is: You took advantage of your power.”
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Nathan Jolly is the Features Editor at Mumbrella. He joined the team in July, 2023.
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