While some of you know us well—or even very well—more and more of you have discovered us in recent months. Who are we? Médianes, a project that combines entrepreneurship and nonprofit work, supporting media outlets, their founders, and the people who create them. Let us tell you more.
Behind *Médianes au quotidien* are Christelle Perrin, Baptiste Thevelein, Marine Slavitch, and me, Marine Doux. I’m delighted to be writing to you today. Graphic designer, journalist, project managers, media enthusiasts—the four of us combined are 100 years old—and, above all, friends. Just one year ago, along with my partner Baptiste, we were seeing the end of a project we’d helped build, and we were taking advantage of the long Breton summer evenings to dream up a new one. Our goal? To bring new voices to the fore—for the long term.
And so, in the midst of that unforgettable summer, Médianes was born. A free resource center, a mutual-aid network, and a studio specializing in strategy, marketing, and creative work for the media. Where does our name come from, anyway? Well, when you launch a project, there are many paths to success. So with Médianes, we help you create your own. For fans of geometry and Cédric Klapisch, you’ll also find a reference to the movie *Chinese Puzzle*.
Over the past year, we’ve laid the groundwork for the project, developed our support studio, and are now working toward the launch of our resource center by the end of the year. We’re also looking forward to expanding the team this fall! Since last fall, we’ve supported more than thirty media outlets in their growth, from RFI to La Déferlante, including Live Magazine, Les Autres, StreetPress, Génération XX, Mediatico, Books, Novethic, FishEye, and Climatico—as well as in the launches of La Disparition, *Fondamental*, *mūsae*, as well as *La revue écossaise*, *Specto*, *Horizon(s)*, and the *Collectif Antidotes*.
For the past year, Médianes has also been (sort of) a media outlet: Baptiste and Christelle are co-founders, alongside Manon Boquen and Benoît Michaëly, of *Pays*, a magazine that focuses on a specific region every six months. We like to get our hands dirty and try new things, so we often put them into practice with *Pays*.
For these dedicated media founders, we devise and implement marketing strategies, create websites and newsletters, design visual identities—both online and in print—and develop subscription offerings and pre-sale campaigns. We always strive to find a viable and sustainable business model that is focused on their audiences.
Committed media? Yes. Feminism, diversity, an inclusive and sustainable society: we are proud to support projects whose vision and values we share. This shared commitment extends beyond an editorial stance to encompass a development model: respect for the people who shape these projects, organic growth, a virtuous model, and a better distribution of wealth and power: by creating Médianes, we modestly seek to have a positive ecological and social impact, step by step.
Whether at the Public School of Journalism in Tours or at the European Institute of Journalism in Paris, working with aspiring journalists, and soon through our free online resource center accessible to everyone, we’re committed to passing on and sharing what we learn alongside you: how to actually create a media outlet. That’s why, for the past six months, Médianes has also been this newsletter that more than 600 of you have come to read every two weeks. A newsletter written in collaboration with the talented Marine Slavitch. In it, we share the best of our industry monitoring, great ideas, and strategies we’ve spotted in the media—some closer to home, others farther away—but all adaptable to your projects.
We’re not going to lie to you—we didn’t think any of this would work out. It’s true we didn’t get much sleep, but we learned a lot, had a really good time, and most of all, we feel like we were able to help you. And that’s undoubtedly the most precious thing of all. So thank you, from the bottom of our hearts. Thank you for your trust, for listening to us, for your advice, and for your kindness.
Médianes exists thanks to you.
