Attention Spans, Algorithms, and the Future of News

Local news fuels nearly every conversation we have, from politics to schools to the stories we share at work, yet the system that produces it is under real strain. 

In this episode, we sit down with Katy Locker of Bridge Michigan and BridgeDetroit, Annalise Frank of Axios Detroit, and Zoe Clark of Michigan Public to talk plainly about what’s changing and what’s worth protecting as journalism adapts to shrinking newsrooms, fractured audiences, and nonstop platform shifts. 

We dig into how people actually consume information today, from early morning newsletters to breaking news on the radio and fast-moving, personality-driven social platforms, while also examining the business realities behind local journalism, including paywalls, membership models, nonprofit funding, public media support, and the lasting impact of the “free news” era. Trust runs through it all, as we explore how misinformation spreads when local coverage disappears, how authenticity and transparency can rebuild credibility, and how partnerships can help fill gaps. 

We also tackle AI’s growing role, from tools that summarize news without clicks to the ethical lines newsrooms are drawing, and why human reporting still matters when presence, context, and care are required. 

The conversation closes with real examples of local journalism creating impact, from policy change to community pride. 

Subscribe for more conversations about media and civic life, and if this resonated, share it with a friend and leave a review to help others find the show. 

Transcript

Why The Media Still Matters

Craig Fahle 0:10

Hey greetings everybody. Welcome to the VVK Podcast. I'm Craig Fahle, and I'm glad you've made the choice to be with us today. It's a big deal. Now, before we jump in on today's subject, I should say that this topic is personal for me. You may be aware that I started my career in journalism and I've always had a deep respect for the craft and the people who do this work every day. In fact, I actually like journalists, which a lot of people are afraid of I am not. But that's one of the things that makes me uh enjoy my job so much is that I get to hang out with people and talk to people on a daily basis who are incredibly curious, hardworking, uh skeptical, and asking the right questions and frankly, um, you know, holding power to account, which is a huge, huge thing in our world these days. And even in this time of change, we've got shrinking newsrooms, we've seen this all over the place, evolving business models, and new ways that people consume information, which is adding to that challenge. The work that journalists do, though, still forms the basis for just about every conversation we have every single day, whether it's politics, business, sports, even celebrity gossip that you're chewing on, chances are the information that you're talking about came from somebody's reporting that is out there. So it's a huge, huge thing for us. And to see this see this industry struggle a little bit and and try to redefine itself, we thought it's important to sort of get a sense of the state of the media. A lot of people will say that it's dying. I think it's transforming, is what is happening. And we're going to talk a bit about that today. And I've got three people who know a lot about this and are working to solve this every single day in this challenging environment. Uh joining me are Katie Locker, who is the CEO of the Center for Michigan and publisher of Bridge Michigan and Bridge Detroit. Katie, welcome. It's a pleasure.

Katy Locker 1:51

Thanks for having me.

Craig Fahle 1:52

We also have Annalise Frank, a reporter for Axios Detroit. Thank you for being here. Good to be here. And Zoe Clark, political director and associate general manager of Michigan Public. Welcome.

Zoe Clark 2:02

Hello, Craig Faley.

Craig Fahle 2:03

Yeah, it's a pleasure to see all of you again. Um, and I I mean this. I really do enjoy uh my job because I still am connected to the news in in a lot of ways. But again, it's challenging for us on the PR side just because of how much is changing, and we do see that that you know reporters are dwindling and and we don't have as many staff positions as we used to. But there's still an appetite out there, is there not for this information? Do you get a sense that the attention span, I guess I should say, of of the average person is is still not hungry for news? I I I'm not sure who I want to start with. I'm gonna put this one on Katie first to get us started. But what do you think about the appetite for news that still exists out there?

Katy Locker 2:45

Aaron Ross Powell I don't think it's a change in an appetite for news and information. It it it you did use the term attention span. I think it's a change in attention span. And then people just have a tremendous number of options of where they might go find news or what they think is news or the information they think they're looking for. And it used to be something happened, we went to one or two newspapers, one or two radio stations, uh the main network news, and now you have an endless supply of where you could go.

Craig Fahle 3:16

Well, that's it. Go ahead, Zoe.

Zoe Clark 3:18

Oh, it's the distribution method. Yeah, right? I mean the news is still the news, the content is still the content, the story is still the story. Um what's changed now is the medium, and that you know, just sitting here having this conversation, I have this out. I'm not planning on even using it during this conversation, but I have it out, and this is what I check, right? I mean, I'm part of a radio station, and this is what I check in the morning. And then I tune in to what's going on, but we have gotten so accustomed to the change in the way that the content that we're eating up so voraciously is distributed. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Michigan Public Expands Beyond Radio

Craig Fahle 3:48

I do want to follow up on that for a little bit because you mentioned you work at a radio station. It used to be Michigan Public Radio. It's Michigan Public name change because you are delivering this in a in a number of different ways. And I think the mission has changed. We'll get into this a little bit later about the ways that you're doing getting out to the community and talking. But um how important was it for you to let people know that you're doing more than just what you had done for the previous 60 years?

Zoe Clark 4:12

It was, I mean, there was rationale, there was a reason behind it, which is to say we are not simply just radio. We are so lucky that we can still, in a breaking news situation, um, come on air as we did yesterday during a horrific attack at a local synagogue and can come on in real time, right? That's the distribution method. But we're also putting those stories up on the website. We're also putting those stories on Insta and TikTok where folks can find them if they don't have a radio dial, right? You know, we know that's just not necessarily how everybody, particularly younger audiences, are getting the news today. So it was an important milestone for us. It doesn't mean in any way that we're not doing radio anymore. In fact, if anything, I'm talking to younger folks who actually are sort of leaning into analog and are like, I like listening to the news. It's like really makes my heart happy to hear. But it was, it was an actual, you know, it was a thoughtful decision about who are we, what are we in our next 70 years.

Craig Fahle 5:11

Well, Annalise, um, Axios, interesting story that Axios has. I mean, they come on the scene nationally, uh probably about what, 15, 15 years ago or so, or something like that. Something like that. Make a big splash, but then they decided they needed to go a little bit more local and they started opening up local branches in cities across the country. Um, your newsletter is one that comes into my mailbox first thing in the morning every single day, as is Bridge and Bridge Detroit. Um and so it's like I open up my email inbox and I'm seeing what you and Joe are working on. Joe Ghean, by the way, just uh for that. But but talk a little bit about that because these are short snippets. You're telling us what we should be looking at, you're giving us opportunities to go deeper if we want to. Um talk about that curation process a little bit.

Axios Detroit And Newsletter Curation

Annalise Frank 5:54

Yeah, it's it's interesting because you know, every outlet is experimenting in different ways with how we deliver news, how we deal with shorter attention spans, different mediums. And, you know, I work for a news company, but I also sort of work for an email company. Like our our our product is email newsletters, and that's like what Axios expert is where their expertise lies, right? And you know, of course, we uh the the local newsletters that Axios operates, they experiment with social, we have a website, you know, we do all these other things too, but it is primarily a newsletter brand. And so you have to look at, you know, are people getting their news from email? And I mean, we found yes, they built a company on it, but there's a lot of thought about, you know, especially younger people, are they really getting their news from email? Are they getting it from social? How do you kind of combine those two streams together in some way? And I think that, you know, but but what the the local branch of Axios is built on is this idea that people want um news every day that's easy to access, that's really understandable, that tells them what's going on in their community. You know, it's sort of built off this idea of like pushing back against this theme that people don't care about local news, right? Like they do, they do, and they um maybe want to get it from a lot of different sources. And you know, one thing that I love about Axios um the local newsletters is that we have every day a little roundup of other stories from other publications. And so we try, of course, we want them to read us, but like we also want them to go out to these other publications and read and subscribe. You know, we do subscriber-only stories, we link to those, we link to free stories, like so. I think having a landscape that's fractured as it is, you want people to be able to kind of understand how to go publication to publication and get what they need because you have to navigate this fractured landscape to understand.

Craig Fahle 7:40

Well, and doing this work though, the the challenge is you know, you mentioned the word free a few times there. You said free. Uh bridge, I know, is something that is free. Of course, you encourage people to become members, uh, to, you know, donate and subscribe, which I of course do. Uh, Katie asked me directly. Exactly. I'm not stupid. And then I added to it because, you know, once I did that, my investment was there and I started, you know, using it a lot more, which is which is exactly what you're talking about.

Katy Locker 8:11

No. You're not.

Craig Fahle 8:12

Full disclosure, yes, my partner does work for Bridge. Um but not on the news side. Uh but you know, people have gotten accustomed to getting news for free. And I I look at the newspapers, and I mean, nobody thought twice about that kid coming around collecting his $2 for the newspaper every couple of weeks. It was just something you did. Once they went online, they started giving away the product for free, and people seem to like it that way. Uh you get a lot of people, a lot of frustration when there's paywalls, and if you want to link to something and there's a paywall, they're like, oh, I'm not paying. It's like, but we have to pay for it somehow. This has been the real challenge, I think, for legacy media in particular is finding out ways to monetize this, Katie. And you guys seem to have uh an interesting approach, especially for somebody that does the depth of stories that you do.

Katy Locker 8:59

Yeah, we have part of a model, but I I just want to say again that what my mom is a super duper like paper reader. She wants the paper. Um, and so she'll pay whatever she's she's outraged by how much she has to pay now, but she'll pay whatever she has to pay. But you paid for one paper and you got the reporting of like like the free press at one time had how many hundred reporters in the news, and and you got everything in one place. And now it's the same way as we are with streaming services, right? That that you can't just have one cable subscription, you're supposed to do all these things, and that's really frustrating for people. And I think it is difficult when you're aggregating news like Axios does, and we do some linking too, because you pass people off to a subscriber-only site, and it's it's frustrating. Um and no one has come up with a solution to that. For us, you know, a differentiator is that we're a nonprofit. This year's our 20-year anniversary of being a nonprofit, our 15-year anniversary of Publishing Bridge Michigan. And we can use a model that says not only are you supporting your the source for news, but it is a charitable donation. It's mission-oriented. We only do things that are mission-oriented, and then like public radio, it's for everybody. And so you're helping subsidize others accessing it who might not be able to.

Paywalls Nonprofit Models And Donations

Craig Fahle 10:17

You know, that that's interesting because if there's one thing I do understand about public radio, it's that we are absolutely shameless when it comes to letting people know how that how this gets made, how this gets done. Well, we have to be, but it it's interesting to see other people sort of struggling with well, when do I make the ask? How often do we make the ask? If you're listening to public radio, there's a message on there every single day from somebody reminding you that this is listener supported. Oh, and by the way, the government just yanked the funding for the CPB, and that's gonna affect all of us. So you gotta pony up a little bit more.

Zoe Clark 10:47

Yeah.

Craig Fahle 10:49

It seems people are stepping up.

Zoe Clark 10:51

Oh my goodness, people are stepping up.

Craig Fahle 10:53

It's I mean, it's it's but it's really interesting to sort of watch and see how this is gonna shake itself out because we we're okay for a little while.

Zoe Clark 11:01

Yeah.

Craig Fahle 11:01

But what's the big what's the big thing that you're worried about right now?

Zoe Clark 11:04

That's the question that that we're not in the headlines anymore, which is crazy to say because I never want us to be in the headlines. If we're in the headlines, something is wrong, right? Um this yeah last year has been unlike anything for public media, as we were the ones in the headlines. I can tell you for Michigan public, um, we lost six percent of our funding. That might not sound like a huge amount, but when you're talking about $560,000 a year and you're talking about salaries of reporters going to community meetings and telling you what's happening in your state, whether it's the legislature or a city council meeting again, like that matters. Those numbers matter. And so, you know, this past year, we didn't necessarily have to tell the story. The story was sort of told for us. So I think this next year and the years to come are going to be the storytelling of what it means to not have that federal funding anymore. Um, you know, only about six percent of people who listen to public media, and that's not just us, this is like about a general average across the country, actually give. So the thing is we have a really high ceiling. There is a group of folks we know who listen who just simply right now don't necessarily feel like they have to. And that's okay. They don't have to. That's how public radio works. But boy oh boy, if you can, if you have the ability to, right now is the time to jump in and do it for someone else. It's democratizing journalism, it's making sure that someone else in your community who can't, you know, buy every single subscription is still going to have access to news and information. And, you know, like in COVID, life-saving information, right? Sure. That was very pledge weeky.

unknown 12:44

Right.

Zoe Clark 12:44

888, 258. We are gearing up for one, can you tell? Yeah, I think.

Craig Fahle 12:49

Well, no, the funny thing was when I was scheduling this, I'm like, I'm not sure she's gonna be able to get away. When do they start? So um yeah, uh our other station just down the block here is in the midst of theirs right now.

Zoe Clark 13:00

So give to your local public radio station.

Craig Fahle 13:03

Uh you know, like I said, support journalism in general, but let's talk about Axios and your model there. It's a little bit different, obviously, than this. I mean, there's still an advertising vein there, but um it's getting really, really hard. Uh and I I as I'm working with clients and they're looking to get things placed or talking about buying ads and things along those lines. It's hard for people to see the value in that sometimes. Talk a little bit about some of the challenges that you deal with there. And and I don't know whether or not there's any pressure from on high at Axios for you to deliver certain numbers of uh dollars to the program.

Annalise Frank 13:39

To be completely transparent, Craig, I am not involved at all with that side of the business. Awesome. So which we yeah, which I'm grateful for. I could focus on the journalism. But I I will say, you know, um from the the perspective of a national company that's trying to be ethically in the local journalism space, um, you know, I think it is so Axios has 34 cities that it's in, and you know, it hires people in those cities to produce newsletters there. And so I think there's a little bit of a like, how do you coordinate advertising across so many cities? You know, are you going city by city? Are you trying to get a big company to buy across all these cities? I mean, I think there's a lot of options there. I don't have insight into how that's done, but um, I know that you know we are a for-profit corporation and they have you know an events business. They had sort of a you know an arm uh called Axios HQ where they would sort of build out you know tech things that maybe I don't understand that they spun off. And so there, you know, I think there's d you kind of have to diversify the income. And again, this is not something that I'm part of, but I I just you know I know that it's it's something that they're always thinking about.

Craig Fahle 14:48

Well, I mean, what's what's interesting to me though, too, is that, you know, uh again, listener support, reader support, um, you give people that option, but obviously, you know, uh similar to getting sponsors, underwriters, uh, and and corporate support, um, philanthropic support is really, really important to your guys' mission. Uh but what is sort of the value proposition that you are telling people as you sit down in meetings to get them to consider uh like a corporate contribution to Bridge, for instance?

Katy Locker 15:19

Well, corporate contributions is uh probably this one of the smallest parts for us, although there are some folks, and but really philanthropy has been a big part of uh what's uh started Bridge, what particularly started Bridge Detroit, and what keeps us going. It's about a third to 40 percent of our overall revenue every year. And that conversation is really part of what you started with is this is about democracy, this is about information for communities. There is less and less of it. The model is breaking, uh, has broken. Um we're deeply concerned about the quality of reporting for us in particular. It's about public policy, civic information, the things most important to Michiganders. And we can assure that we are gonna be mission-driven, that people outside in corporate headquarters outside of Michigan are not gonna decide this, that we and our board are gonna decide it. And that matters a lot. And unfortunately, in today's world and a landscape we're experiencing here in Michigan, where some corporate partners are deciding major things about the future of our newspapers and our television stations when it's a commercial environment.

News Deserts And Statewide Coverage

Craig Fahle 16:24

Yeah, we'll talk a little bit about consolidation in the media in just a little bit, but I want to talk about something that's a little bit more pressing on a local level, and that is the loss of smaller local publications. Hometowns, every town in Michigan, you know, had its own newspaper for a while, and and there are still some that are hanging on, C and G newspapers, God bless them, still get delivered directly to people's homes for free every single week, and they cover a bunch of communities, suburban communities. But out in rural parts of the state, um they're losing very, very valuable information. They're not hearing what's happening at their city council, what's happening at their county township meetings, etc. Um, because there's nobody there to do this work now. Uh is there a responsibility on the part of everybody else, even if you because you guys have statewide audiences, right, that you're catering to. Bridge Detroit obviously is a little bit more, and Axios has got Detroit right in the name, but is there a gap that you guys feel a responsibility to fill as we see some of these things sort of go away? And how can he possibly do it?

Zoe Clark 17:21

One bite at a time. I mean, i you know, if you if you look at it as a way of like, how do I fix the magic wand, or you know, with the magic wand of the the news deserts throughout the state, you you can't. I mean, you can't do it at one foul suit. But what you can do is figure out the communities where we can have impact and the communities where we can be. I'll say we do have a reporter who's based in Flint, we have a couple of reporters based in Grand Rapids, we have our Lansing Bureau. Um, but it's not enough. I will say one, and I'd love to hear, you know, Katie and Annalise on this, because I think one of the things that's really changed is a conversation, let's say 10 years ago was about the news deserts in Detroit. And now I look at Detroit from 10, 15 years ago and just the robustness of Axios, of Bridge Detroit, Outlier, Planet Detroit, on top of uh the Detroit News and the Detroit Free Press. I mean, it's amazing to see the difference. And so I'd like to think that, and I think some of the work that Bridge is doing up north too. And it's it's one of the mechanisms that I do think with the decrease in federal funding, you know, we've got public radio stations throughout the state that are covering areas. We've got public radio stations in Interlochen up north and uh Mount Pleasant. We got, you know, they got towers in Alpina and all over the place, Marquette. So, you know, what I'm hoping, if I'm gonna be an optimist here for a minute in all of this, is that it's going to push us all to work a little bit closer in this network.

Partnerships That Stretch Resources

Craig Fahle 18:46

Um It seems one of the challenges, though, is that, you know, as you mentioned, all those different organizations, and I try to keep up with all of them every day, but it's it's really difficult to do. And that's my job. Yeah, yeah. Um, you know, but there's still a ton of different things that are going on. Um that seems to me that like, you know, partnerships are going to become an important part of this ecosystem. One, because it's hard to sustain a small reporting outfit, obviously.

Zoe Clark 19:08

But let me give you like a great example of something that Katie's team and our team are doing right now, which is Katie's team is doing some fact-checking work, right? And so they're able to distribute it via their newsletters and emails um and on the website. And again, as I was talking about, one of the things that we're really lucky to be able to do is like pot up for free. I mean, there's the infrastructure of running a radio station, but you know, we're not paying by the minute to pot up and tell a story. And so we're combining our resources this year for something called the Fact Squad. It's FAQ Squad, if you're interested in checking it out. But what it is, is it's it's Katie's team who's doing some deep dive fact checking and candidates and campaigns issues facing the 2026 election. And then they're coming on uh our program and we're debriefing, and then we're doing short form video out of it. So I think those are the ways that we can combine resources and say, okay, what's the content? So we're not all creating the same content, but again, having that conversation about just mass distribution so that you know you can just say, okay, like I feel like I better know this issue now with one click or you know, one quick listen.

Katy Locker 20:15

You know, the pessimism is that they're not coming back. The local newsrooms at the scale that they were at, which were really driven by advertising and and classified and those kinds of things, not coming back. And people are turning to Facebook more than anything in their communities to get local local news. And it's not there's not journalists behind that. That trust you have in journalists is really can be very scary in a in a Facebook environment or other environment. And so I we are getting creative and we're getting much more open, I think, across certainly across the nonprofit field, but even in the for-profit field, there's no way around it. Um and so we find ways to partner, um, we find ways to share information. One of the things we did just in the last year, there were lots of business reasons, nonprofit business reasons, and for us to have uh limitations on the ability to republish our reporting. We took the all the limitations off. And so uh my mom lives in Midland, and I get a shot of bridges reporting on the front page of Midland Daily News because they're republishing. We're working not just with Zoe and Michigan Public with but with Interlock and Public Radio to really reach up north. And we work with small newsrooms. The difference for us, uh I think the difference that we see in in Detroit too, where there still is a robust journalistic community, is up north, part of what they want is our team that has in-depth knowledge of reporting and editing, the landscape in Lansing. Uh I mean, the Lansing Press Corps has reduced so dramatically from the early days that Zoe was there so long ago.

Zoe Clark 21:48

It is so long ago. Back in my day. Um but I will say actually the the Lansing core right now is larger than it was 10 years ago, which is really Lucky. And part of that is because of the bridge team. I mean, you guys are really doing amazing, amazing work along with, you know, again, the news and the free press and the Michigan um public radio network. I mean, folks are really doing hard, hard work at Lance I think.

Losing Institutional Knowledge In Newsrooms

Craig Fahle 22:13

Proud Michigan Public Radio Network alum here, by the way. Yeah, ninety four to ninety-six, I believe. The Engler administration. So fun walking into the Capitol every day. Here's something I just this is sort of off track a little bit, but I mean, you know, you mentioned that the coverage of Lansing is really important. I mean, our seat of government is hugely important. Having people that understand the legislative process is key. And knowing the people who are there and all that sort of stuff. And I have found it, you know, I'll have reporters doing stories and I'll say, well, you've got to check this. I'm telling them where to find the information that they need about where these bills are, whose committee it is, who's the sponsor, et cetera. Um and I feel like we're losing something there. Uh City Hall, pretty, pretty well covered. It's easier to cover that than it is the legislature. But I mean, this is a skill set that takes time to develop and a knowledge base that, you know, if you lose somebody that's been there for a long time, you put a rookie in there and nothing against young reporters, because they're exactly who we need to keep doing this work. But you know, the institutional knowledge that we're losing as we see people cycling out of journalism is a problem, Annalise.

Annalise Frank 23:25

Well, I I think that uh something I think a lot about is, you know, when you have these very small newsrooms, you do have less of that institutional knowledge of who, you know, you know, think about your first journalism job and kind of who you looked up to there and who you learned from. I think a lot of young reporters are going into places, especially remote work environments where you just don't have the same like person-to-person resources, archives, like brain archives where you're going to people. And I think it just is harder to have that kind of knowledge passed down. And I think um it's it can be really hard for young reporters to to deal with that. And you know, I think we have a lot of amazing um young reporters in Lansing and Detroit, but like it's just yeah, I I I think that that can be really hard, especially I think the remote piece. And yeah, I mean, my publication is two people, um Joe and I, and like um we both know a lot of things, but we don't know everything. And so I I think that uh maybe more people are having to be generalists or to kind of pivot where they're at, become a new kind of reporter and you know, doing their best. But it's just when you have less people and they're very spread apart in their houses, in an office of a co-working space, an office of three people. I mean, it's just it's just very different.

Zoe Clark 24:40

Yeah, and I'm gonna I'm gonna just push back on that, Craig, because I, you know, that may be, and I that's very nice of you for for you know, if there's a reporter who needs some help finding something, but I'm blown away. I am blown away all the time on a daily basis by what some of these young reporters are doing in Lansing. I think it's amazing. And I think um what is really awesome to see is some of the work they're doing after only a couple of years there. And I know that in five years and ten years, what they're gonna continue to do is just gonna blow us all the way. I feel really, really lucky to have the the capital reporters that are there right now covering Lansing.

Craig Fahle 25:17

Trevor Burrus, Jr. As long as the B encounters don't decide to go after the higher salaries.

Zoe Clark 25:21

It's look, this is the economics that we're talking about. Right?

Katy Locker 25:25

But I also think it's really important. Uh I'm not a reporter. I've never been a reporter, I've never worked as a journalist or an editor. Um I just am the employer of uh 25 of them. Um and it's a really hard industry. It was it was tough a long time ago. Uh and the folks that I have that are at the senior stage of their career talk about that era. But it's even harder now. It's harder to have a trajectory that you can you can live in Michigan and say, oh, all these different places I can work at, less and less places to work at. And it doesn't pay well. I don't know if anybody's noticed, but it doesn't pay very well. And there's not an easy trajectory of you climb up.

Authenticity Trust And Fighting Misinformation

Zoe Clark 26:05

Sorry, I was just gonna say and being a journalist means a thousand more things than it did even 10 years ago, right? Being a print journalist really isn't a thing anymore. Being a radio journalist isn't really a thing anymore. When you're a reporter, um, you know, you've got your phone and you've probably got like a nice camera, um, and you've got like your recording equipment depending on you know what you're doing. And so, I mean, you're doing so, so much with fewer and fewer resources. Yeah.

Craig Fahle 26:35

I well, I do want to talk a little bit about that because technology is changing what you have to offer, how you have to present it. Uh it's also creating all sorts of challenges with misinformation and things along those lines. Um so let's talk about that because it seems as every time you adapt, you start something new, like you're mentioning being on TikTok and and you have to be in there and you have to push your stories out, you have to have video now, and you have to do all these sorts of things. Uh talk a bit about that challenge because it certainly seems as if, you know, whatever the the public is doing is out in front of what news organizations are doing in terms of utilizing that technology. So are you always behind the curve a little bit? Or is it just like, you know, there are certain things we're just not going to be able to do? Does that make any sense?

Zoe Clark 27:21

I think it depends on the journalists. I've got some newer journalists that I work with who are super hungry to try a bunch of different things, right? Who and and for them, that's how they've grown up. They've grown up with this thing. And so for them, just taking video, you know, vertical video on the scene of the story, totally vertical. That's a what? Uh totally makes complete sense to them. That's just the norm of how they're gonna tell a story because that's how they're telling their story to their friends and their, you know. But then there's reporters that again, that's totally new. And I think it's figuring out where that sweet spot is. And the one word I don't think we've used at all around this table yet, talking about journalism and trust in journalism today is authenticity. And that is a word that I think so, so much about today. And I think that's what our audience craves. And so if it's authentic to hold up and tell the story like this, then go do that thing, you know? And if it's authentic for you to actually sound more like Joe Newscaster and do it this way, then but tell the authentic story. That's what audiences want. You know, that's the trustworthiness.

Craig Fahle 28:27

The problem is, though, that you can well, I mean the one of the problems that I see is that we are becoming so splintered in terms of what our media offerings are that organizations like the three of yours that actually value, like, you know, real journalistic ethics, follow paths, do fact-checking, you know, and and all these sorts of things, and and take time to tell a story correctly and as honestly as you can, you're competing with organizations that are constantly playing on the way people's emotions are. And they will just feed them what it is they want to hear to reinforce whatever pre-existing view they had. That seems to be something that really threatens why that whole freedom of the press thing matters to begin with.

Zoe Clark 29:09

Yeah.

Craig Fahle 29:10

And so how do you combat that? How do you convince people that there is still value to having ethics in journalism?

Zoe Clark 29:19

I think that's a good thing.

Craig Fahle 29:23

You're all sort of thinking about this at the same time. That's okay. A little a little healthy pause is just fine.

Zoe Clark 29:30

I I look at it less as organizations, and I think it's more individuals and influencers, right? Um, and so I think that's problematic into itself, but I think one of the things that we can do as organizations is show the work. Show our work, right? I mean, like influencers don't have necessarily that background and that ability and the ethics component that all of us I mean, I can show you right now if you know you wanted me to pull it up and read the the numerous amounts of ethic documents that we put on our website that show here's our process. Here's how we think about sourcing, here's how we think about anonymous sources, here's how if someone gets in touch with us and wants us to take their name down after giving us a quote, this is what we will or won't do. Here's our minor release forms of what it means to talk to someone over 18. Like we can show our work. And I think that's one of the things that we have to continually do. And I think that goes back to being authentic, right? Authentically, here's how we do what we do. Is that going to be the promised land come five or ten years? I don't know. But I know it's one of the ways that we're gonna continue to show our North Star.

Annalise Frank 30:35

And I I think that part of how Axios tries to do that is through um predictability. I mean, it's five days a week, you know when it's coming. And then also um I think I think right now authenticity comes from personality as well. And like you're saying, like individuals. And so, you know, you know it's Anna and Joe every morning, and you know, there are some guest stars because you know, Axios is a large company with other reporters who who help each other, but um it's it's about kind of building that relationship with the audience where they kind of know who you are and and what you're about and have some level of trust. And of course we have people who challenge that or or send in an email or something, but I think you really have to like put it out there and hope that there's trust and um really just like build that through consistency and and and prove it and and also by being transparent, of course.

Katy Locker 31:27

Yeah. Yeah. I think that I mean I'm one I'm one of the non-journalists and one of the bean counters, right? And and and so it is about thinking about how do you invest in the in something that's gonna last, that's successful, that serves serves the mission. And we invest in quality journalists, for one thing, and and that is a distinction. Um we also worry about the technology use and the policies that we use, and we s and we put resources into thinking about what is needed to um to deliver quality journalism. That some of that is I s there's every member of my staff has a professional development budget because we want them to still be able to go learn new things. Uh we focus a lot, we have offices for our journalists because we think they can learn from each other. And I absolutely agree with Anne. At least there's something about these are people, and same is true at Michigan Public. You get to know who is reporting your news. You know that they could be your neighbor, you could see them at the grocery store, all those things. Um, and it matters. Um, and so we focus on that too. Like, what's the identity of the people? And I've started to lift up and see if you want to talk about AI, but I've started to lift up for folks. If you see a byline that says newsroom staff, read to the bottom and see if there's a disclosure that says that this was produced by AI. Doesn't necessarily mean it's bad news or not quality news, but we're making sure bylines reflect a human being wrote this. Uh a human being did the reporting, a human being provided their insight and their experience.

Craig Fahle 33:04

Well, I I do want to get to AI in just a second because I think there's, you know, I th that could be another certain hour. But we we don't have that much time. But I do want to talk about the fact, though, that, you know, the media is is at a time right now. We're suffering from pretty bad reputation. A lot of people seem to have lost faith in the work that we do, and and so a few bad actors can make the whole quote unquote mainstream media look really, really bad. Um and those things get highlighted, and you have a whole ecosystem out there of people that do not want you guys to be good at your jobs because they can operate a little bit better when people aren't paying attention. And so, how do you fight through that cynicism that that a lot of people who would otherwise read your stuff um, you know, are dealing with right now when it comes to how to trust you?

Zoe Clark 33:49

Yeah, yeah, it's something we think so much about. I my husband happens to be a journalist also, and we also talk about it.

Craig Fahle 33:56

One of my mentors, by the way, in my early time in Lansing.

Zoe Clark 33:58

So Pluto We love you, Pluto, uh, most of the time. Um but one of the things that we talk about is never has it felt like more important what we do and less important at the same time. Like we are in these moments where journalism is so important, and yet it can feel like it can just sort of pass right through into the ether. And what does it really mean? And what does it really matter? Um, I think one of the things that we're really trying to facilitate is being out in the community. We do these things called the issues and ale, which I just love. I eat them up with a spoon or eat them up with an ale glass, I should say. And uh, like we just had one last week, and it was like, I don't know, 170 people at a pub, which you could think about like people drinking and talking politics. Like, is that the smartest thing to be doing right now? But it works, it does. And then there's a couple hundred people who are at home watching virtually, and I think more and more people want that. I think they want community and they want a place where like you're not just standing up and listening to someone yell at somebody else or be really hyperbolic. And like people come and they ask questions of our panelists, and it's a give and take, and people share their thoughts and they do it with um uh some level of decorum. I mean, it depends again on how many ales, but it's I think you could build trust if you can be out in community and just be a real person and say, here's who I am, here's the person who's delivering your news, here's the person who's that byline on that story.

Katy Locker 35:26

And the and the research really says that when you dig into it, people have a lot more doubt in the national news than they do in their state and local news. And part of that is because that's somebody I know. That's somebody that my aunt went to school with. That's you know, that connection to reality versus the the national news has has become uh much more orchestrated and a show. Yeah. It's the same with politicians.

Zoe Clark 35:55

Yeah, it's the same with politicians. Like much, you know, you're likely to see in polling. You know, I don't agree with the national in DC, but when you talk about my congressperson, my local rap. That's right. Yeah.

Annalise Frank 36:07

Yeah. Very different.

AI Disrupts Search Email And Reporting

Craig Fahle 36:09

Well, let's let's talk AI for just a second. Um just because again, I think I think one of the dangers here is that, you know, with AI, there's a lot of ways that people can just sort of go around the media, you know, put their message out there, um, say, write me a story, and then I'll just publish it on my Facebook page or on my you know, LinkedIn or whatever. Uh but there are there have got to be good uses for it in journalism. Um But how are you looking at this and how are you approaching the use of AI and also how it's impacting the work that you do, especially from like outside sources? Who wants to sort of take that one on?

Katy Locker 36:46

Aaron Powell Well, there's a business part and there's a journalism part. Sure. Maybe these ladies should talk about the journalism part, and I could talk about it. You could talk about the business part.

Craig Fahle 36:52

All right, Katie, start us off.

Katy Locker 36:54

And and that is really one of the challenges is that whether we realize it or not, AI is influencing the what we get, how we get it, when we get it, and and how all these news organizations work. Uh one of our models for people to find us, really model for anybody to find anyone on the internet, is you go to Google, you put in your search, and then before AI really became a dominant force, then you would click through to what Google gave you answering your question. Well, now Google creates a summary, so there's no reason for you to ever click through. Well, we we want you on our website. That's that's that's what serves our business model. Um that's a a problem. Uh at our model is also very newsletter driven, along with Axios. And our strategist who thinks for us about the next thing in technology says, the time is coming. It's actually really already here, just most of us don't use it, where you can get a summary. You, Craig Foley, get a whole bunch of news sources in your email box first thing in the morning. You don't have to open those emails. AI can tell you what was in there and highlight the things that you are likely to want to look at and never have you even open that email. And that fr the the business model is you open the email, maybe you'll click and donate, maybe you'll you know click and subscribe. But AI's disruption that will continue no matter what we do is why on the business side we always have to be looking at what's next. And we have other tools for delivering besides our newsletter. Because of that, I'm sure that the business strategists at Axios are far ahead of us on what's next. That's kind of scary if you think about it though.

Craig Fahle 38:33

Because I mean, how do you compete with with the you know uh the Googles of the world?

Katy Locker 38:38

Aaron Ross Powell Authenticity. I mean, I I you know I I I just do have to agree at some point we want to know a human being, you know, showed up. Uh you know, yesterday was a a terrible tragedy uh uh at um uh at the Temple Temple Israel. And and it's you know, if a drone goes there and and takes the pictures, and if you just are are relying on raw feed, that's that's not the story. You know, the the story comes from people going there and talking. One of our we had several reporters get on scene pretty quickly, but one of our reporters was nearby seeing where food was being prepared for folks in the area. It's a connection. Yeah. AI can't do that. Um so um, you know, on the business side, it is about smart strategy and seeing what's next. But I think the journalists have the bigger challenge of thinking about how to distinguish from AI content and then how to value. There are some places where it can serve us well.

unknown 39:38

Yeah.

Annalise Frank 39:39

Yeah. I I think that you know, inherently in our industry, like we have to believe that people still want that human created. I mean, it's crazy that I'm even like saying talking this way, but I mean like that human-created content with emotion and a dissection of of what's going on. I mean, you know, like what you're talking about, viewing, I mean, we just have to believe that people will continue wanting that, I think. And if we didn't believe that, then what what will we do? Um, you know, I think Axios has a public relationship with OpenAI, and I think that it's something that's discussed as part of workflows and production and back-end things and research, and I think there's a lot of applications to it where you know, I think you know, you can't ignore it and you can't pretend it's not happening, but it is it feels very threatening to a lot of people. And so um how, you know, how does one use something ethically? And and I mean, uh a lot of these decisions are above me, obviously, but um it's something that all of us are are thinking about. And I think as journalists, I think we have like lines we don't want to cross, right? And so um, how do you add value with a a new kind of product to sort of back up, you know, things like how the content management system works, or I don't know, like whatever you might be able to do that's um research-based, collecting data. Um, but you know, there's also data journalists. And so I'm kind of getting out of my depth here because I think it is stressful to people, right? And so um, but you have to deal with it. You have to use it, you can't be behind, like you have to keep moving forward. So I don't know where I was going with that.

Zoe Clark 41:17

But I think you did, I think you just did fine. I think you absolutely, I think you totally hit it. I mean, I think what I would just say on top of what Annalisa Katie both said is I I think A, I'm gonna also remain optimistic that I think people can deep down tell and and know the difference and want the human voice and want authenticity. The other thing that I'm really just sitting with is I was um hosting a panel actually just yesterday about trust in media and and just sort of the changing landscape of trust. Um and and I asked folks, it was probably a group of, I don't know, two or three hundred people, did they want the news to slow down a little bit? And I didn't mean like necessarily like the breaking news, because I think everybody wants that to slow down a little bit. Um but I meant more just like the need to constantly be checking this thing, right? And just the inundation and how quick everything is coming at them. And not again the news so much, but all of the ways to get it. And and I don't think a single hand didn't shoot up and say, Yeah, like I would love it to come at me a little slower. So I'm really sitting in that too about what does it mean to make sure that we're on top of all of the stories when they're happening, but also to go like, how are we serving this where it's not, you know, a meal of 15 different courses, and then you just sort of lose the taste of that two or three really good dishes. So now I'm the one that's kind of making them all these different things, but but it's it's something that just happened and I'm I'm really sitting in and thinking a little bit about, and again, and going back to this kind of younger generation of, you know, we've talked about constantly them growing up being online, but now this younger generation of being sort of like interested in the 90s and this analog era, and and what is that gonna mean? Are we gonna start seeing sort of an inverse where suddenly it's like, you know what, I am gonna check out a little bit. And then what does that mean for us? And how do we still uh remain attractive when people are ready to tune back in or do want at some different cadence what's happening in their world or their community?

Consolidation Transparency And Independence

Craig Fahle 43:24

Aaron Powell All right, we've only got a couple of minutes left, and I do want to get to this one real quick. We have seen um some very high-profile mergers in recent uh recent months. Um, you know, you've got CBS News and CNN potentially being owned by the same company, company with a decidedly political lean uh at the top. And there are a lot of concerns right now about what's going to happen to the editorial independence. We've seen it with Jeff Bezos and the Washington Post. We've seen it with Barry Weiss and CBS News. We don't know what's going to happen with CNN at this point. Will that just be folded into something else, or is the brand too valuable to lose? But what's that gonna look like? Um Are the arguments for editorial independence being weakened right now? Are people not understanding why that's still something that is critical?

Zoe Clark 44:13

I think there's a difference between nationally and what you're talking about, and I can only speak, you know, personally.

Craig Fahle 44:18

We're seeing it here locally too, with with the, you know, same company owning both the Detroit News and the Free Press.

Zoe Clark 44:23

And what I can tell you, and again, you know, fun drive coming up. So so watch me if this is what this starts sounding like. But I mean, part of being a not-for-profit newsroom, part of having 30,000 folks who we depend on means that we depend on those 30,000. We don't depend on one or two people who can write a check and dictate coverage, or one or two mergers that can suddenly change what our newsroom looks like. What we depend on is the thousands of people who like the idea that that's who we're beholden to.

Katy Locker 44:55

And I would I would add to that the more the cautionary side of it. When you are going to a news source, I don't care if it's a newspaper or a website or a Facebook page, you need to think about where is this coming from? Who is this person speaking to me? What is their interest? And with nonprofit news in particular, and certainly the the um members of public media, the members of trade associations for nonprofit news, there's a level of transparency required. Who is paying for this? Who is making those decisions? And I think it's um as for the people that care about it, and not everybody does reach that distinction of needing to think or wanting to think through editorial independence. I always encourage people, I do it myself when I start reading a new news source or finding a new resource. You go look, where's the money? Where is that money coming from? Who is in charge? We work really hard at transparency, I think everybody does of how are we making decisions? And we are editors, it is a skill to be an editor or a producer, and that's part of what slows down the news is what are you delivering, why are you delivering it, what what principles are being applied, and that is shared. Uh strong newsrooms, particularly nonprofit newsrooms, will share that process, will share their AI policies, will share other decisions, reveal whether they do sponsored content or not. That's really important for people who care about it. I think it is a question that there's people that don't at this point understand how influenced some of their news is. And that's what we're all working on, is just elevating, giving that perspective of check on the trustworthiness of your source.

Craig Fahle 46:36

Well, and at least I think one of the things that you see is if somebody doesn't like a story that you wrote, or they, you know, because it might be tired, they're like, well, you're biased. I mean, that's not never happened to me.

Annalise Frank 46:44

Ever, never.

Craig Fahle 46:46

And they just assume that, you know, well, you don't like my person, so therefore you went after somebody and and therefore you're you're bad. But that's not the case, is it?

Annalise Frank 46:54

No, no. I think that yeah, I I think it it really is about like how do we establish um the transparency and show what we believe in from an unbiased perspective, right? Believing in, you know, truth and you know, the anonymous sourcing policies and all of this. And and um, you know, I I think it I mean I think Axios discloses a lot of I obviously not the same way a nonprofit does. I I believe they have some pages up. I please don't fact check me or do fact check me. But um I do think that that um you know a a journalism organization has these sort of firewalls in place for a reason. And and and you know, if if you're just clicking through something on on Facebook, like how how do you sort of let people how how can people come to understand that like they could be reading something entirely false? They could be watching a video that's not a real video. Like I have gotten fooled by AI videos before. Like it's you know, it's it's so common now, and it's just like it's scary that people could just be ingesting any sort of inaccurate information at any time. And and um so I think it go does go back to that issue of bias and authenticity. And I don't know the solution like how how we solve that, but it it's something that's a reality.

Local Stories That Show Impact

Craig Fahle 48:12

Well, okay, we we've got time for one last question because we've been going a little bit longer than I anticipated, but that's because I'm enjoying the conversation. So and and I'm not gonna ask you this question, and we sort of laughed about this at the beginning before we started, like, you know, don't ask me what's gonna be here five years from now, ten years from now, uh, because you know, nobody can see that far in the future with technology emerging the way that it is. But I do want you to give me an example, if you can think of one, of a story that one of your organizations has run recently that you think exemplifies why local journalism still matters. Something that you've been proud of that your team put out there that you're like, you know, this this is why we're here. Trevor Burrus, Jr.

Zoe Clark 48:50

Can I do uh well it doesn't have to be a Ford promo. We're we really listened to the people. No, what I what I will say is um our stateside team, which is our daily news magazine, uh they just started a new podcast called On Hand. And it was after some like real looking at our audience and saying, what do you need? And what people needed was a break. What people needed was a break from the news and then some sort of amount of pride, because we know like Michiganders, if there's one thing that we all agree on, right, it's we love our state. Like we do. It's the hand and it's the you know, litten and the kitten and all this kind of like stuff. And so we listened to Michiganders about what they wanted, and we started this new series where we talk about OPE and we talk about the best Coney dog. I mean, like all the things that we love about Michigan, and it has gone through the roof, it's gone bonkers, the amount that like interested people have, and it's it's not just doing it on the radio, it's digital first, it's a podcast, it's video, um, it's all of these different ways to connect with each other about our state, and I think also creating that, again, local community, and then it's from people that you know and that you see. And so it's something that I'm really, really proud of. And I think the team has just done such a lovely job with.

Craig Fahle 50:07

You know, Katie, I'm gonna prompt you a little bit here because um you can. Well, I don't know, but but the key is that you guys are very intentional about getting out and meeting your readers uh and your supporters and and talking to them. Um and that informs a lot of the work that you end up doing, a lot of the stories that you end up telling. Uh that seems like that's something that isn't necessarily gonna happen from some corporate monolith.

Katy Locker 50:33

It does depend on what your priorities are, and that is what we celebrate often is everybody who works for the Center for Michigan or any of our publications, we're mission-driven, serving Michigan, serving Detroiters. So the every editor, every reporter knows that's the mission, not make more money, get more clicks, uh make a difference, have impact. And we do focus a lot. It, you know, you ask the question, and I read our stories, but I don't edit or write them. But I I was like, we did reporting on this expenditure of opioid funds, and it influenced the legislature looking at that and and the questions of how is that money being spent, and it changed how it's being spent. Uh we had uh reporting recently by one of our reporters who grew up on a farm, who still spends a lot of time in rural Michigan, who recognized how difficult it is to be a farmer in Michigan today, and there are farmer suicide rates that are really alarming, and there had been a cut by the State of Michigan to the funds for mental health counseling for farmers. And after our reporting, huh, the legislature is looking again at that cut to the funds. That that's where we really see a difference. People get information to use that uh addresses something of concern in their community, or we are influencing policymakers to take a look again. In this year, in this election year, that's what we're doing. That's what we're doing in partnership with Zoe and her team is lifting up those issues because candidates are responsible to respond.

unknown 52:01

Yeah.

Zoe Clark 52:01

Beautifully put.

Craig Fahle 52:02

Annalise, I want to give you an opportunity to talk a little bit about some of the work that you've been proud of as well.

Annalise Frank 52:07

Yeah, um, I think that a strength I'd like to highlight is this um theme of collaboration that um my fellow podcast guests have also been discussing. Um so I think that journalism is best when it's done together. And whether that's, you know, across the state, whether that's partnering with more rural areas with like an urban publication or um connecting the dots between local markets. Um I think that's something that um the Axios local cities can do as a strength is sort of you know meet cities across the Midwest, meet and talk about what are themes going on, what are people talking about, what are are some of the things, the challenges we're dealing with that are happening across cities. And um, a couple examples of those would be like data centers. So there was, I actually didn't contribute to this, but there's a project that some Midwest cities around did around data centers and uh kind of doing some high-level reporting and resource sharing around just like what are these, what are the challenges, what are these through lines that we can um use because we don't have a lot of resources in each city, but we can combine them and share information and then look digging down like what are the issues that we can expand on in each state. And so we did that with data centers, and then um we I I did this a couple years ago uh in collaboration with some other cities around um uh lesbian and queer women-owned bars and how those are disappearing across the U.S. We do not have one in Michigan currently, and so I think that's something that uh we we can really do as local news outlets is kind of collaborate and resource share. And of course, this is all within one company, but I think it applies as well across publications. So I love seeing that kind of work.

Closing Thanks And YouTube Video

Craig Fahle 53:48

All right. Well, I uh like I said, I wanted to end on something optimistic, right? So so I appreciate it, and I want to thank my guests uh again today, Katie Locker, of course, of Bridge Michigan, Zoe Clark of Michigan Public, and Annalise Frank of Axios Detroit. Thank you all for being here. Um I could go on for a lot longer, but frankly, I'm sure you all want to get out of here. I appreciate it.

Annalise Frank 54:07

It is 313 Day. I guess it won't be when this air is so irrelevant.

Craig Fahle 54:11

People can know when this is recorded because you know it's a podcast, so they may see this six months from now. You never know, but we appreciate it. And a reminder, this has been the VVK Podcast. I'm Craig Fawley. Thank you very much for being with us. And a reminder, this podcast is brought to you by the team at VVK. Our producer is Alan Helimski. Our video team includes Tommy Binkley, Michelle Oliver, and Justin Sketarczyk. And that's right, we do have video now. Check us out on YouTube. Audio production editing by your host, Craig Fawley. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time.