In recent months, journalists and newsrooms have debated their presence on X in light of its owner's misconduct. Should they leave or stay? Some have already set sail for other horizons while others are hesitant, torn between their audience's needs and the failings of a social network that no longer respects them. On the substance, however, the press's assessment is unanimous: major platforms are neither allies nor reliable partners, with X being just one example among many. The era when Facebook and Twitter courted the press with traffic and partnerships is over. Now, trust between these two sectors, which have long fed off each other, is more than fragile.
A breaking point that manifests itself, for example, through Meta's refusal to pay news organizations in Canada, even going so far as to ban news content from its platforms. Recently, Mark Zuckerberg has put to rest any doubts about the importance he places on quality information on his platforms by ending partnerships aimed at combating misinformation and by relaxing its moderation rules to the detriment of women and the LGBTQIA+ community. At the same time, Google is redefining its algorithms to the detriment of news outlets, leading to drops in traffic and troubling tests of content removal. Finally, the emergence of generative AI such as ChatGPT, Perplexity, and Gemini is disrupting the flow of information. Despite lawsuits and protests from part of the press against OpenAI and the way the company exploited their content, some news organizations ultimately opted for partnerships negotiated individually and on sometimes opaque terms.
Faced with these changes, some newsrooms are worried: how can they maintain engaged communities without social media? How can they guarantee traffic without Google? How can they protect their content from AIs that aggregate and regurgitate information? And above all, how can independent media resist against digital giants with unlimited resources?
Migrate to decentralized alternatives
Unlike X or Meta, some platforms are taking a different approach, seemingly welcoming the press with open arms. Bluesky, which aims to win over those disillusioned with Musk's platform, has pulled out all the stops with features and kind words aimed at the press. LinkedIn has done the same in recent months by working with hundreds of newsrooms around the world and rolling out new tools for publishing newsletters and vertical videos. Yet these methods are nothing new. Meta, X, Google and others had already used them before reversing course a few years later. Even Substack, once seen as a haven for journalists seeking independence, ultimately disappointed through its laxness toward neo-Nazi content. Are media outlets forced to bow to platforms to distribute their content there, while crossing their fingers that they won't be abandoned too quickly?
History seems to be repeating itself, and the press finds itself trapped on social networks whose values and methods it no longer approves of but on which it has built a community it's difficult to leave. A problem that decentralized platforms like Mastodon or Bluesky could address. Unlike social networks such as X or Facebook, they would give users more control over their data, their content, and their communities. Like email, decentralized social networks would allow internet users to exchange with each other from the platform of their choice.
The concept is also attracting interest from many newsrooms, such as The Verge and 404 Media, which are considering federating their sites, allowing their articles to be accessed from multiple decentralized platforms. In practice, a Mastodon user could, for example, comment on an article, and their message would be visible not only on the media outlet's site, but also on other platforms, like Threads. Such an approach would unite audiences that have so far been scattered across different social networks into a single community. It would also reduce dependence on traditional platforms and limit the risk of losing part of your audience due to algorithm changes or the sudden closure of a social network.
Even with decentralized alternatives, leaving major platforms remains a challenge for now. "A large part of our community is on X, we're there for now. I can't cut off a branch in the middle of a fundraising campaign to keep the site going" explained StreetPress's cofounder, Johan Weisz-Myara, to Arrêt sur images. The success of this transition therefore depends on public engagement, called upon to follow media on new platforms, subscribe to their newsletters, and support them financially.
Strengthen direct connections with your community (newsletters, RSS feeds, thoughtful paywalls)
Facing the crisis of intermediaries, some media outlets are strengthening their direct connection with audiences by returning to tools that social networks had intended to make obsolete. Among now common solutions is the newsletter, which allows them to bypass algorithms and reach readers with fewer filters. Others are bypassing the traditional distribution process by setting up an RSS feed like 404 Media, allowing their subscribers to read all their content from their aggregator of choice, such as Feedly or Netvibes.
The RSS feed is just one of the tools explored by 404 Media, which also introduced a paywall requiring an email address to access its content. A method that allows it to maintain direct contact with its readers but also to protect itself from voracious AI. An approach recently adopted by several newsrooms whose content was previously freely accessible. While these paywalls provide revenue and distribution independent of platforms, their proliferation raises questions about access to quality information for everyone. A dilemma that The Verge addressed when announcing the implementation of a partial paywall on its site.
Return to the tangible: paper, local rootedness and physical distribution
For now, technical solutions are not all fully functional. The decentralization of social networks is still in its infancy, and some platforms have no viable alternative. « We're in pretty deep shit, to be honest », acknowledged for example Jeannie Paterson, researcher in digital ethics at the University of Melbourne, regarding the lack of options to replace Meta. Faced with these limitations, some media outlets are reinvesting in physical space to distribute their content. During the winter of 2023, The City (New York) sent postcards informing residents of their right to heating. Last year, the local media outlet The Texas Tribune distributed flyers and posters about air quality in the neighborhoods covered by its investigations.
In Marseille, Marsactu is testing free local distribution: with Marsactu Illimité its articles can be read free of charge in cafés and community centers via Wi-Fi connection. Beyond bypassing the Internet for distributing its work, this method allows Marsactu to geographically target its audience, some of whom lack the financial and technical means to access paid news online.
Other online media are betting on a return to print. Splann! prints some of its investigations while some newsrooms are going further by launching their own magazines, books or publications. The Verge for example launched "Content Goblins", a magazine that specifically critiques how journalism and culture are shared in an ultra-optimized way on the Internet to be consumed in quick succession. Print is not a magic formula, however. While some newsrooms have bet on reviving their offerings on glossy paper, some publications struggle to keep up with paper price increases, or even cease publication entirely.
Develop your own platforms
Rather than waiting for new alternatives, why not create them? This is precisely what several media outlets set out to do in 2016 when they launched La Presse Libre, a bundled subscription platform featuring publications like Arrêt sur images, Les Jours and Alternatives Économiques. In 2022, however, the platform ceased operations; a setback for the media organizations that participated as ASI attested to. The concept of a shared platform, however, is far from dead. It features, for instance, among the solutions proposed by Coop-médias, a cooperative committed to supporting press independence, and the outlet Basta! has been offering for several years a Free Media Portal that brings together articles from various outlets on a single platform. Basta! now wants to launch a new platform with similar ambitions. Some newsrooms are also betting on investing more resources in their own websites rather than relying on external platforms they don't control. To retain their readership, accustomed to getting news on TikTok or X, these outlets readily draw inspiration from popular social media features – such as dynamic news feeds or vertical video formats – by integrating them directly into their sites. By adopting this approach, these newsrooms are no longer merely content providers for social media, but assert themselves as standalone products offering a complete and autonomous experience, while freeing themselves from algorithms. This is the logic behind Urbania's launch of its "micro-mag", a 100% digital format blending traditional magazine conventions with typical web formats: vertical videos, polls, etc. Distributed and hosted on its site, they embody the outlet's ambition to reclaim its audience outside the ecosystems dominated by the GAFAM.
Admittedly, it's tough for independent newsrooms that are already struggling to balance their budgets to embark on costly development of features and services that could rival Silicon Valley. Newsrooms have every incentive to pool their resources — financial, technical and human — to produce tools that serve them. In Canada for example, a coalition of around twenty media outlets came together to launch a shared platform, Unrigged.ca, in the wake of Meta's decision to ban news from its platforms. The site brings together articles, videos, newsletters and podcasts published by its members with the ambition of creating a new meeting place between readers and their media.
Archive the Internet to protect information
As acquisitions and closures occur, news sites disappear abruptly, taking years of work with them. This recently happened to MTV News and Game Informer, raising in turn the question of digital memory preservation. According to a Pew Research Center study, 38% of web pages accessible in 2013 have vanished, undermining online journalism that often relies on hyperlinks as sources. Rethinking the future of the internet thus requires developing robust systems for content preservation.
Archiving is certainly costly and requires solid infrastructure that some newsrooms lack, whether due to financial constraints or lack of will. In the absence of internal solutions, journalists themselves often have to take on this task. Yet newsrooms can rely on certain initiatives to ensure the preservation of their work. In France, the Bibliothèque nationale de France manages legal deposit of the web, while Internet Archive, active since 1996, works to preserve hundreds of billions of web pages. But given the scale of the mission and the threats – particularly cyberattacks that could compromise these archives – collective action is essential, as Internet Archive itself emphasizes in its latest report. Want to contribute to the effort? This page compiles numerous guides and tools.
Stop just enduring the Internet, document it instead
A healthier Internet rests on collective commitment. While tools and infrastructure exist, the public must still understand the stakes and identify levers for action. Yet, the press has long underestimated Internet as a major political and cultural subject. Nevertheless, recent events illustrate its profound influence and the consequences of overlooking it. The last American election was a reminder: Internet shapes the politicization of a generation moving away from traditional media and turning to influencers. Treating it as merely a distribution channel would be a mistake, and leaving it as a journalistic blind spot would give free rein to disinformation actors and platforms, without regulation or counterbalance. The press must document these digital transformations to create collective awareness, especially as many talented journalists are already working on this and are simply waiting for newsrooms to call upon their services.
Leveling the Playing Field: The Role of Government
Freedom of the press and the right to information are being challenged by the capitalist ambitions of digital giants, whose monopoly has considerably strengthened in recent years. Despite all the initiatives mentioned previously, it seems unrealistic to consider that independent press and its allies are capable of reversing this trend on their own.
Faced with an imbalanced power dynamic, regulation appears to be an essential lever. In recent years, several legal tools have already contributed to this. With the GDPR, internet users benefit from better oversight of how their data is used. With the Digital Markets Act (DMA) and the Digital Services Act (DSA), major companies like TikTok, Google and Meta are subject to obligations regarding content moderation and freedom. But these protections must be strengthened against the threats and pressures exerted by players in part of American tech as well as Donald Trump. The General States of Information has formulated a number of recommendations on this point, such as "effective algorithmic pluralism", defended in this column, allowing for example social media users to freely choose a recommendation system. The press can engage more with this issue and unite, as it has done in the past through initiatives like the General States of Independent Press, in order to push public authorities and political representatives with one voice to act. While major AI companies attempt for example to impose individual negotiations, unity is undoubtedly a key lever in reclaiming the internet.
To go further:
- How Marsactu distributes its digital offering in physical spaces
- Our guide to better understanding the decentralized internet and why part of the media is interested in it
- Where democratic freedoms are threatened by the rise of far-right extremism and where media concentration undermines the diversity of information, pooling resources becomes essential for independent outlets.
