What if local news needs more than a new business model?

We often hear about the “broken business model” when it comes to local news.

Advertising revenue has declined. Digital platforms have disrupted traditional publishers, with most of the money now flowing to Google, META and other forms of “Big Tech”. Since the Covid 19 pandemic, hundreds of local news outlets have closed, while others have been consolidated or been stretched across increasingly large geographic areas. The question that follows is usually: how do we fix the revenue model?

What if, instead of continuing to search for one magical formula that makes every local news outlet commercially viable, we took a different approach; one focused on the outcome we all want: quality, sustainable local news that communities can rely on?

That was one of the ideas that stayed with us after the Rural Press Club of Victoria attended the launch of the final report from the Australian Local News Resilience Project (ALNR) at Deakin Downtown in Melbourne’s CBD this week.

The three-year project, led by Deakin University in partnership with the ABC and Griffith University, has taken an important step towards understanding where Australians can actually access reliable local news, as well as mapping the locations, where sadly, they cannot.

Measuring what really counts

One of the report’s most significant contributions is the development of the Australian Local News Proximity Index.

This is much more than a map of where news outlets happen to exist. The Index is designed to assess how well communities are actually served by local news, including the proximity and relevance of journalism to the places it claims to cover. Its potential uses include identifying vulnerable areas, informing targeted funding and policy interventions, helping new entrants identify under-served markets and encouraging collaboration between news providers.

The research found that the news desert problem may be more severe than existing mapping suggests because some communities appear to have local news when, in reality, they are served by so-called “ghost” or “zombie” publications (outlets that are local in name only). These publications can rely heavily on syndicated content produced far from the communities they supposedly serve, while some of their newest local content may be months old.

Angela Ross (pictured) authored the report with Kristy Hess, Alison McAdam, Susan Forde, Matthew Ricketson and Angela Blakston.

A different way forward: collaboration

Perhaps the most interesting proposition in the ALNR report is that the solution may not lie solely in asking individual local news businesses to somehow solve their own sustainability problems.

The researchers instead propose an Australian Local News Resilience Program: an evidence-based national approach built around collaboration between the ABC, local news providers, universities and communities. Its goal would be to improve access and quality, strengthen professional capacity and encourage innovation, particularly across regional, rural and remote Australia.

The proposed model includes six interconnected areas: resilience reporting, in-depth reporting, a digital resilience portal, careers and networks, public emergencies and an innovation incubator.
This doesn’t mean abandoning commercial local news. Quite the opposite. It recognises the extraordinary local knowledge, relationships and commitment that independent and regional publishers already bring to their communities.

But it does suggest that sustainability might sometimes come from shared infrastructure, specialist support, stronger professional networks and collaboration, rather than expecting every small newsroom to build every capability on its own.

The report, for example, found that local journalists often lack the time and resources to undertake in-depth and investigative work, while a hybrid model combining hyperlocal knowledge with external specialist expertise, particularly in areas such as data journalism, could strengthen public-interest reporting.

Congratulations to all involved in the project for reaching this publication milestone. We look forward to seeing what action comes from the report.

The Australian Local News Resilience Project is part of an Australian Research Council Linkage Project.

You can read the full report at: localnewsfutures.com

Kirsten is a Committee Member of the Rural Press Club of Victoria and a PhD Candidate at Deakin University. Her current research is aligned with the overall ALNR project.