Nieman Lab

The Nieman Journalism Lab is dedicated to guiding journalism as it navigates the challenges of the digital age. The rise of the Internet has led to an explosion of news and information, but it has also disrupted the traditional business models that have supported quality journalism for many years. Journalists nationwide are facing job losses or adapting to a dramatically different online landscape. Our goal is to showcase innovative approaches and understand what leads to their success or failure. We aim to uncover valuable ideas that others can adopt. We want to assist reporters and editors as they embrace their online roles, help established news organizations find ways to thrive, and support the new startups that may either enhance or replace them. We maintain a positive outlook. While we don't claim to have all the solutions, we are connected to many insightful individuals. Our readers play a crucial role in this exchange, and we encourage your input to make the Lab a space for collaborative idea-sharing. We invite you to share what’s happening in your area or what you believe should be happening. We hope you find value in our work and join us in this ongoing conversation.

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“Fake news detection” AI is more likely to fail in the Global South, new study shows

1 week ago | niemanlab.org | Andrew Deck

LINK: journals.sagepub.com ➚ | Posted by: Andrew Deck | April 16, 2025Last May, as India conducted the largest democratic election in history, I spoke to reporters and fact-checkers in the country about the challenges they faced identifying political deepfakes. Many of them spoke to shortcomings in existing AI detection tools, and the biases baked into them.
“Multi-local” newsrooms aim to get more news to more people

1 week ago | niemanlab.org | Sophie Culpepper

Newsrooms in Colorado that once employed hundreds could now “fit around a large dinner table,” Larry Ryckman, publisher and co-founder of The Colorado Sun, told me in December. Leaders at newsrooms like the Sun, seeing the rapid collapse of local news around them, are thinking about how they can do more to compensate for what’s being lost in their own backyards. One model they are betting on: Regional hubs.
The Houston Landing raised $20 million pre-launch. Less than two years later, it’s shutting down.

1 week ago | niemanlab.org | Sophie Culpepper

Houston, with a population of more than 2.3 million people, is the largest city in Texas — and the Houston Landing had funding to match. The nonprofit news startup raised $20 million well before it began publishing, from the American Journalism Project and the Knight Foundation along with local philanthropies the Houston Endowment, Kinder Foundation, and Arnold Ventures. But less than two years after the Landing officially launched, its board has voted to shut the news outlet down.
Reuters is the latest media company to drop “diversity” language in response to Trump executive order

1 week ago | niemanlab.org | Sarah Scire

LINK: bsky.app ➚ | Posted by: Sarah Scire | April 15, 2025Last week, Nieman Lab reported that Gannett, the country’s largest newspaper chain, had removed references to “diversity” from its corporate site and would stop publishing diversity information for its newsrooms.
The unreality of reality TV: How competition shows influence U.S. politics and shape views about economic inequality

1 week ago | niemanlab.org | Joshua Benton

It was about five years ago that I first started noticing the name Eunji Kim on some interesting research. Best dissertation, best paper, best article — she seemed to be winning them all.
Gannett will stop publishing diversity information, citing Trump’s executive order

2 weeks ago | niemanlab.org | Hanaa' Tameez |Hanaa' Tameez

America’s largest newspaper chain, Gannett, will no longer publish demographic and diversity data about its workforce, and has revamped its corporate site to remove mentions of diversity. The announcement was made in a company town hall meeting on Wednesday afternoon.
The origins of Patch’s big AI newsletter experiment

2 weeks ago | niemanlab.org | Andrew Deck

Last month, Patch announced it was publishing AI-generated newsletters in 30,000 communities across the U.S. These newsletters scrape from local news sites, social media groups, and official town websites, then use large language models (LLMs) to select the most relevant headlines and draft story summaries. The final product is a daily or twice-weekly email round up, with link outs to five articles and a list of upcoming events.
The Trump White House is now sitting on any reporters’ pool reports it finds unflattering

2 weeks ago | niemanlab.org | Joshua Benton

LINK: www.status.news ➚ | Posted by: Joshua Benton | April 10, 2025Perhaps it’s surprising, perhaps not, but one thing has become clear about Donald Trump’s bizarre war with the Associated Press: The White House cares about it. It’s not just a symbolic gesture, red meat to throw MAGA’s way — it’s a conscious attempt to rewrite the rules of how the presidency interacts with the press. And the administration keeps pushing to see how far it can go.
Americans are really not into news chatbots, a study finds

2 weeks ago | niemanlab.org | Hanaa' Tameez

LINK: www.poynter.org ➚ | Posted by: Hanaa' Tameez | April 9, 2025If you’re working out your newsroom’s AI budget for the rest of the year, maybe scrap the chatbot idea.
Which types of people aren’t big fans of “impartial” news? People who don’t have power

2 weeks ago | niemanlab.org | Joshua Benton

Who actually wants impartial news? Your first thought might be: everybody! After all, if news is meant to be a reflection of reality, wouldn’t you want the least biased version of that reality — the one that matches up most with the world around you? Even an outlet as partisan as Fox News understands the appeal of impartiality, branding itself “Fair and Balanced” for two decades.