Retooling Local News May Not Be What You Think.

Now that election money is no longer pouring into local TV stations, it's time to face the reality of what local news will be like in 2025 and beyond.?

If you cruise LinkedIn and industry trades for state-of-the-business insights, you see some common themes: AI, changing staffing, and consolidating smaller market newsrooms. There is a common theme in these seemingly very different ideas: money is beyond tight in local newsrooms. Drastic changes need to happen.

What if we instead ask this question: How should we, as an industry, retool newsrooms? I use the term retool literally. We need to look harder at the mechanics of how we turn content. How do you get the information? How do you shoot and edit the video? How many steps does it take to add a story to a rundown? How often must a producer go into a script to add everything needed to turn that story?

The issue with newscast repetition isn’t so much the writing burden as the mechanics of creating the actual rundown. If you sit with a producer and watch their daily routine, you quickly learn that writing the content takes less than half of their time turning a newscast. It's finding content, loading it into the rundown, creating graphics, deciding what to tease, and tracking down visual elements that easily take up most of their shifts.?

Turning packages the way they look now but with newer technology or a different type of “reporter” is not the answer. Research shows that traditional packaging is a turnoff. The growing distrust in traditional media is driving the need to present information in a less stylized way.? Viewers want information that they can easily understand and from people who authentically explain it. This requires looking more closely at how you source information and select content and what technologies can help make that process easier. A large roadblock is how we traditionally source and edit video. Current processes work against the reporter's ability to turn efficiently.?

Prioritizing how to gather information and fact-check it quickly and how to gather and edit video more effectively is a game changer. The newsroom of the future models I keep hearing about largely neglects these elements. Many pilot projects ultimately fail because not enough attention is paid when time-consuming technical issues come up. Usually, the response is that the journalist is wasting time or not working hard enough. Often, the reality is that the technologies are cumbersome, and information is lacking.?

We are looking at what to do in the wrong order. Increasing the ability to find and source information has to come first. Emerging technologies can help retool information gathering right now. Technology must make it easier for journalists to use a more authentic approach when storytelling. The better the stories, the more attractive the viewers.?