FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Arlington, VA – Today the California Senate Judiciary Committee will hold an Informational Hearing on “The Importance of Journalism in the Digital Age.” Senator Tom Umberg is holding the Hearing to give California legislators the opportunity to learn more about the state of journalism in the state, the challenges local newsrooms face and potential solutions, and how the California Journalism Preservation Act (CJPA, AB 886) in particular can help support a vibrant free press.

The CJPA would require Big Tech platforms such as Meta (which owns Facebook and Instagram) and Google to pay news publishers a “journalism usage fee” to use the content of eligible digital journalism providers, as defined in the bill. Currently, creators of journalistic and creative content are not adequately compensated for the use of their work that takes a tremendous investment to produce.

The CJPA was introduced by Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) in March and passed out of the California State Assembly in June in a floor vote of 46-6 before it was held over to the next session. The Informational Hearing will provide legislators the opportunity to ask questions and provide input before the bill is brought up early in the next session in 2024.

“We applaud Assemblymember Wicks and Senator Umberg for their commitment to sustaining journalism and their dedication to the California Journalism & Preservation Act (CJPA),” said News/Media Alliance President & CEO Danielle Coffey. “By holding this informational hearing and having an open dialogue, they are showing their ardent commitment to preserving quality local journalism that supports a healthy democracy and providing their constituents with important information about their communities. Without meaningful action, news outlets will continue to disappear.”

News outlets, especially small, local ones, are shuttering at alarming rates as revenues decline and costs rise. California has lost more than 100 newspapers in the last decade.

A new report from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University last month raised the level of urgency surrounding the local news crisis, finding that one-third of the newspapers in the U.S. in 2005 will be gone by 2024. Previous reports had estimated the timeline to reach that milestone would occur in 2025, which indicates that the pace of closures has accelerated. Most of the communities that lose their local newspaper do not get a replacement or have a digital source for local news for their community.

When local newspapers shutter, there is a significant detrimental effect on communities whereby civic engagement goes down, corruption goes up, and the ability to combat disinformation grows increasingly difficult.

When newsrooms are full, the public reaps the rewards. The CJPA would also promote the hiring of more journalists, requiring news publishers to invest 70 percent of the profits from the usage fee into journalism jobs.

The News/Media Alliance has been vocally advocating for legislation at the federal level since 2018. The Journalism Competition & Preservation Act (JCPA), which was reintroduced by Antitrust Chairwoman Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Senator John N. Kennedy (R-LA) on March 31 (S. 1094), passed through Senate Judiciary Committee markup in June.

The dominant tech platforms have become de facto gatekeepers of journalism, setting rules for how news content is displayed, prioritized, and monetized. They reap the majority of the financial benefits of sharing publishers’ original content without incurring any of the costs of gathering and reporting news their users want and rely on. The CJPA and JCPA directly address these challenges and are a crucial part of the solution to preserving local journalism.

Coffey added, “With similar laws being passed around the world, we are seeing more and more support for getting this legislation passed countrywide. We must act now to protect and support publishers of high-quality journalism, who work tirelessly to keep our communities safe and informed through their reporting. We look forward to the CJPA moving to a Senate vote next year and working with policymakers in California to implement the CJPA and restore fairness and balance to the marketplace.”

For more information on the federal JCPA, visit www.JCPABill.com.

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Media contact:
Lindsey Loving
Director, Communications
lindsey@newsmediaalliance.org

The News/Media Alliance is a nonprofit organization representing more than 2,200 news and magazine media organizations and their multiplatform businesses in the United States and globally. Alliance members include print and digital publishers of original journalism. Headquartered just outside Washington, D.C., the association focuses on ensuring the future of journalism through communication, research, advocacy, and innovation. Information about the News/Media Alliance can be found at www.newsmediaalliance.org.

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News/Media Alliance President & CEO, Danielle Coffey stated, “We applaud Reps. Tenney and DelBene for introducing the Community News and Small Business Support Act and putting the needs of local communities first by supporting local news publishers, who provide critical journalism and information to Americans across the country. Without vital support such as tax credits for publishers and local businesses, publishers will not have the resources to continue investing in providing news and news deserts will continue to grow, making quality local journalism increasingly inaccessible to those who need it and allowing harmful mis- and disinformation to promulgate.”

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Arlington, VA – The California Journalism Preservation Act (CJPA, AB 886) passed out of the California State Assembly today in a floor vote of 55-6. The bill, which was introduced by Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) in March, would require Big Tech platforms such as Facebook and Google to pay news publishers a “journalism usage fee” to use the content of eligible digital journalism providers, as defined in the bill. Currently, creators of journalistic and creative content are not adequately compensated for the use of their work that takes a tremendous investment to produce.

The CJPA would also promote the hiring of more journalists, requiring news publishers to invest 70 percent of the profits from the usage fee into journalism jobs. The bill is expected to advance to the California Senate next month, and then head to Governor Newsom to become law.

News/Media Alliance President & CEO Danielle Coffey stated, “We applaud the California Assembly for taking decisive and direct action to save journalism through passing the California Journalism & Preservation Act (CJPA). We are extremely encouraged to see this progress at the state level, which shows that Americans understand the importance and value of journalism to keeping their communities safe and informed and holding those in power to account. We look forward to the CJPA moving on to the Senate and working with policymakers there to pass the CJPA and restore fairness and balance to the marketplace.”

The News/Media Alliance has been vocally advocating for such legislation at the federal level since 2018. The Journalism Competition & Preservation Act (JCPA), which was reintroduced in the 117th Congress (S. 673 and H.R. 1735), passed through Senate Judiciary Committee markup in September and nearly passed into law in December before the Congress ended. Senate Antitrust Chairwoman Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Senator John N. Kennedy (R-LA) reintroduced the JCPA, which has strong bipartisan support, in the Senate (S. 1094) on March 31.

Coffey added, “We are encouraged by the support we’ve had for addressing the severe marketplace imbalance between tech platforms and news and magazine publishers and look forward to legislation moving through both California legislature and Congress. Between similar laws being passed around the world, and the positive movement in the U.S. at the state and federal level, I believe we are at a turning point, and we are seeing more and more support for getting this legislation passed country wide.”

For more information on the federal JCPA, visit  www.JCPABill.com.

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Media contact:
Lindsey Loving
Director, Communications
lindsey@newsmediaalliance.org

The News/Media Alliance is a nonprofit organization representing more than 2,000 news and magazine media organizations and their multiplatform businesses in the United States and globally. Alliance members include print and digital publishers of original journalism. Headquartered just outside Washington, D.C., the association focuses on ensuring the future of journalism through communication, research, advocacy, and innovation. Information about the News/Media Alliance can be found at www.newsmediaalliance.org.

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“We are very pleased Senators Feinstein, Hirono and King have joined in support of the JCPA, and we applaud them for their commitment to sustaining high-quality journalism. Publishers must be compensated by the Big Tech platforms for use of their valuable content, and the JCPA will ensure they receive the compensation they need and deserve to be able to continue providing the important news and content that supports a strong and informed society. We look forward to working with all of the co-Sponsors to advance the JCPA toward becoming law.”

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Arlington, VA – Last night, at a hearing of the California State Assembly Committee on Privacy and Consumer Protection, members voted 9-0 in favor of the California Journalism Preservation Act (CJPA, AB 886).

The bill, which was introduced by Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) in March, would require Big Tech platforms such as Facebook and Google to pay news publishers a “journalism usage fee” to use local news content. Currently, creators of quality journalism are not adequately compensated for the use of their content that takes a tremendous investment to produce, and therefore, cannot reinvest enough in journalists and newsrooms.

The CJPA would also promote the hiring of more journalists, requiring news publishers to invest 70 percent of the profits from the usage fee into journalism jobs.

News/Media Alliance Executive Vice President & General Counsel, Danielle Coffey, testified at the hearing, alongside Assemblymember Wicks and Matt Pearce, representing labor unions.

Coffey stated, “We applaud Assemblymember Wicks and the Privacy and Consumer Protection Committee for recognizing the value of high-quality journalism and the need for journalism providers to be compensated fairly for the use of their content by the tech platforms. We are very happy with the outcome of the hearing in California, and we look forward to next steps as the bill moves forward.”

The Alliance has been vocally advocating for such legislation at the federal level since 2018. The Journalism Competition & Preservation Act (JCPA), which was reintroduced in the 117th Congress (S. 673 and H.R. 1735), passed through Senate Judiciary Committee markup in September and nearly passed into law in December before the Congress ended. Senate Antitrust Chairwoman Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Senator John N. Kennedy (R-LA) reintroduced the JCPA, which has strong bipartisan support, in the Senate (S. 1094) on March 31.

Coffey added, “The dominant tech platforms reap the vast majority of the online revenue at news publishers’ expense. If balance isn’t restored to the marketplace, we will continue to see local newspapers closing at the same alarming rate, leaving bigger and bigger news deserts that encourage misinformation, confusion and corruption to dominate, threatening democracy and our constitutional right to a free press.”

Watch a video of the hearing here. For more information on the federal JCPA, visit  www.JCPABill.com.

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Media contact:
Lindsey Loving
Director, Communications
lindsey@newsmediaalliance.org

The News/Media Alliance is a nonprofit organization representing more than 2,000 news and magazine media organizations and their multiplatform businesses in the United States and globally. Alliance members include print and digital publishers of original journalism. Headquartered just outside Washington, D.C., the association focuses on ensuring the future of journalism through communication, research, advocacy, and innovation. Information about the News/Media Alliance can be found at www.newsmediaalliance.org.

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Arlington, VA – The News/Media Alliance applauds Senate Antitrust Chairwoman Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Senator John N. Kennedy (R-LA) for today reintroducing the “Journalism Competition and Preservation Act” (JCPA). The bill would provide digital journalism providers the ability to collectively negotiate with Facebook and Google for fair compensation for the use of their valuable content. Currently, publishers do not have the ability to negotiate these deals on their own, as the dominant tech platforms capture the majority of U.S. digital ad revenue, leaving publishers with little to reinvest in the production of high-quality journalism. This follows in the wake of other countries’ successful compensation systems for publishers, with Australia’s Media Bargaining Code and European legislation leading the way and Canada and the UK expected to follow.

In response to the bill reintroduction in the Senate, News/Media Alliance Executive Vice President & General Counsel, Danielle Coffey said, “The time is now to pass this critical legislation that will protect and sustain local journalism, now more important than ever to ensuring an informed society. Emerging technologies such as AI are making it even more clear the need for compensation when content creators may soon see even less return than what they receive today. The cost of inaction is simply too great to ignore any longer. We must ensure that the digital ecosystem returns value back to the people who deliver high-quality journalism we all rely on around the world.”

Since 2018, the News/Media Alliance has been vocally advocating for such legislation in the U.S. “A compensation framework between news publishers and the tech platforms will help correct the current imbalance in the marketplace whereby Google and Meta have set the rules that everyone else must play by,” Coffey said.

Previously reintroduced in the 117th Congress (S. 673 and H.R. 1735), the Senate Judiciary Committee completed its bipartisan markup of the JCPA in September 2022. The bill received broad support, not only in Congress where it had 90 co-sponsors in the House and Senate (on both sides of the aisle), but also from over 300 consumer interest groups, unions, conservatives, advocacy groups and third-party organizations. In addition, nearly 24,000 individuals signed a Change.org petition for the bill and nearly 1,000 editorials in support of the JCPA have been published in newspapers in 48 states across the country. In a poll of 1,000 U.S. adults conducted in April 2022, 70 percent of Americans said they support Congress passing the JCPA.

The bill nearly passed into law in December when it was included in the NDAA legislation package. However, as it did in Australia just before the Media Bargaining Code passed there, Meta threatened to remove news from Facebook in the U.S. if the JCPA passed, further demonstrating their outsized power.

The JCPA has now been reintroduced in the 118th Congress to continue progressing forward.

Coffey added, “We are grateful to Chair Klobuchar and Senator Kennedy for their commitment to quality journalism, and we look forward to working with them to ensure small and local news publishers receive fair compensation from the platforms for the valuable journalism they work tirelessly to provide. News publishers need a lifeline, and the JCPA is that lifeline.”

More information on the bill can be found on the News/Media Alliance website at www.JCPABill.com.

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Media contact:
Lindsey Loving
Director, Communications
lindsey@newsmediaalliance.org

The News/Media Alliance is a nonprofit organization representing more than 2,000 news and magazine media organizations and their multiplatform businesses in the United States and globally. Alliance members include print and digital publishers of original journalism. Headquartered just outside Washington, D.C., the association focuses on ensuring the future of journalism through communication, research, advocacy, and innovation. Information about the News/Media Alliance can be found at www.newsmediaalliance.org.

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Arlington, VA – The News/Media Alliance applauds California State Assemblymember Buffy Wicks (D-Oakland) for today introducing the California Journalism Preservation Act (CJPA, AB 886), which would require Big Tech platforms such as Facebook and Google to pay news publishers a “journalism usage fee” to use local news content. Currently, creators of quality journalism are not adequately compensated for the use of their content that takes a tremendous investment to produce, and therefore, cannot reinvest enough in journalists and newsrooms.

“These dominant digital ad companies are enriching their own platforms with local news content without adequately compensating the originators,” Wicks said. “It’s time they start paying market value for the journalism they are aggregating at no cost from local media.”

In response to the bill’s introduction, News/Media Alliance Executive Vice President & General Counsel, Danielle Coffey said, “We applaud California Assemblymember Wicks for introducing this legislation and for recognizing the critical importance of high-quality journalism to ensuring informed and engaged communities. We hope Congress takes note and follows suit by reintroducing legislation at the federal level as well to give news publishers across the U.S. the same ability to be fairly compensated by the dominant tech platforms.”

The CJPA would also promote the hiring of more journalists, requiring news publishers to invest 70 percent of the profits from the usage fee into journalism jobs.

The Alliance has been vocally advocating for such legislation at the federal level since 2018. “The dominant tech platforms benefit tremendously from news publisher content, while not fairly compensating the creators of that content and reaping the vast majority of the revenue,” Coffey added. “Balance must be restored to the marketplace to allow for fair and equitable compensation. Otherwise, we will continue to see newspapers closing, creating larger news deserts around the country where misinformation quickly takes hold.”

Currently, Google takes up to 70 percent of every advertising dollar, leaving news publishers unable to reinvest in providing important investigative journalism and news to their communities.

A federal version of the JCPA, previously reintroduced in the 117th Congress (S. 673 and H.R. 1735), successfully passed out the Senate Judiciary Committee in September 2022. The bill nearly passed into law in December. At that time, Meta threatened to remove news from in the U.S. if the JCPA passed, further demonstrating their outsized power.

For more information on the federal JCPA, visit  www.JCPABill.com.

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Media contact:
Lindsey Loving
Director, Communications
lindsey@newsmediaalliance.org

The News/Media Alliance is a nonprofit organization representing more than 2,000 news and magazine media organizations and their multiplatform businesses in the United States and globally. Alliance members include print and digital publishers of original journalism. Headquartered just outside Washington, D.C., the association focuses on ensuring the future of journalism through communication, research, advocacy, and innovation. Information about the News/Media Alliance can be found at www.newsmediaalliance.org.

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Photo credit: rarrarorro / iStock/Getty Images Plus via Getty Images

Also published in America’s Newspapers’ e-newsletter here. 

Following the re-introduction of the Journalism Competition and Preservation Act (H.R. 1735 / S. 673) (JCPA) in 2021, the News/Media Alliance and its allies worked to advocate for the bill’s passage during the 117th Congress. The JCPA would allow small and local news publishers to come together to collectively negotiate with Google and Facebook for fair compensation for use of their content. News publishers, magazines and broadcasters currently do not have the ability to negotiate deals on their own, as the dominant tech platforms capture the majority of U.S. digital ad revenue, leaving little to reinvest in the production of high-quality journalism.

The Senate Judiciary Committee’s subcommittee on antitrust hosted a hearing for the JCPA in February of 2022, allowing for substantive conversation on the legislation, and garnering further interest from Congressional leaders. The Alliance and its allies followed up on this hearing by meeting with Congressional staffers and organizing grassroots outreach, resulting in over 2,000 touchpoints on Capitol Hill over the summer. These efforts led to a successful Senate Judiciary Committee markup on September 22, where the JCPA was reported favorably to the Senate floor with a committee vote of 15-7.

Policymakers are motivated to stand up for the vital public institution of journalism and push back against anticompetitive business practices. A thriving press performs a critical role in building and engaging local communities and holding government officials accountable. There is broad agreement in the U.S. – on both sides of the aisle, not only on the Hill but among members the public – that action is needed to protect local journalism. An April 2022 poll of 1,000 U.S. adults conducted by Schoen Cooperman Research for the News/Media Alliance found that 70 percent of Americans support Congress passing the JCPA.

In December, nine leading media and journalism organizations, including the Alliance, Americas Newspapers, National Newspaper Association, the American Economic Liberties Project, and others sent a joint letter to Congressional leaders calling on the Congress to pass the JCPA before the end of 2022. The groups underscored the importance of passing the JCPA as the best solution to ensuring news publishers are compensated fairly for use of their content by the dominant tech platforms.

Over the past few years, Australia and the European Union have witnessed the benefits of their recently enacted laws to protect journalism. The Australian model, which requires the dominant tech platforms to pay publishers for use of their original content, has prompted other countries including Canada, India and the UK to take steps towards adopting similar laws. The results in Australia have been transformative for journalism. As a result of its News Media Bargaining Code adopted in 2021, estimates suggest that the total compensation received by news publishers so far – $140 million, which translates to billions in the U.S. – would cover around 20% of the costs of Australian journalists’ salaries. In addition, Australian newspapers are recruiting more journalists, with journalism professors noting an oversupply of available positions for their students. This is despite the fact that no platform has yet been “designated” under the Code – an official determination requiring the designated platform to negotiate with eligible publishers. The mere threat of designation has resulted in successful negotiations between news publishers and the platforms and provides evidence of the value of an Australian-style model for other countries to follow.

The Alliance and its allies successfully advocated for inclusion of the JCPA in the NDAA in December, only to have it removed after Meta threatened to remove news from its platform and Republicans reversed support and demanded a “clean” bill. Threats like Meta made were attempted before the Australian government passed its Code – they were unsuccessful, and news publishers ultimately got paid. As the tech platforms compensate news publishers around the world, it demonstrates the demand and economic value for news.

In the 117th Congress, the JCPA garnered bipartisan support with 75 co-sponsors in the House and 15 in the Senate. The Alliance continues to hold conversations with the JCPA’s Congressional champions, who intend to reintroduce the bill in the 118th Congress. The congressional champions are eager to move the bill, mobilized after the momentum gained at the end of last year. The abuse of dominance by the tech platforms and threat to local journalism still exists, and leaders in Congress are still committed to fixing that problem. The Alliance remains dedicated to ensuring quality journalism prevails and intend to work alongside our allies to ensure a legislative solution moves forward in this Congress.

The post Big Tech Threat to Local Journalism Still Exists, Congress Committed to Fixing That Problem Through JCPA appeared first on News/Media Alliance.

Guests: Penny Muse Abernathy and Tim Franklin, the Medill Journalism School Local News Initiative at Northwestern University

“In this vast country, newspapers have historically been the prime, if not the sole source, for most small and mid-size independent communities. So, if you lose a newspaper, you’re losing the person who shows up to cover the school board meeting, the person who shows up to cover the county commissioner or even the zoning policy changes that can be quite controversial and affect the long-term quality of life of a community. The good news is I think there are a lot of things that are going on that can stem that, that range from policy solutions to new funding opportunities to new business development.“

– Penny Muse Abernathy, Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University

“What comes behind a news desert? We know that Facebook Groups emerge in these communities. … But as we know even as well-intentioned as those good people can be, that’s not the same as vetted, reported local news and local journalism. As so what happens is you have the, in some cases, unintentional spread of misinformation in those communities, and especially at a time when our democracy is already facing challenges, and at a time when we’re coming out of a pandemic, we know the need for accurate, credible, reliable news and information.”

– Tim Franklin, Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University

What is the state of local news today? What’s changed, where are there still concerns? What makes a community vulnerable to becoming a news desert? What does the future hold for the print newspaper? What are the most powerful opportunities for policy to help local news grow and thrive? What are some examples of positive outcomes and how can other news publishers emulate their success?

News/Media Alliance President & CEO David Chavern talks with the authors of now well-known research throughout the industry on the phenomenon known as news deserts, Penny Muse Abernathy and Tim Franklin of the Medill School of Journalism’s Local News Initiative at Northwestern University. In this thought-provoking conversation, Abernathy and Franklin share the findings from their latest update to The State of Local News report, released this summer. The previous edition of the report by Abernathy, released by the University of North Carolina Hussman School of Journalism and Media in 2020, revealed startling trends on the prevalence of news deserts, finding one-quarter of U.S. newspapers have closed since 2005. But there are reasons to be optimistic, and Abernathy and Franklin provide their thoughts on how the trend could yet be reversed. The two journalists-turned-academicians discuss innovations in digital publishing, as well as the introduction of non-advertising focused revenue models, including subscriptions and membership models, nonprofit organization structures, and other revenue models, that they say could offer a path for publishers who are living in areas that are vulnerable to becoming a news desert, as well as those who want to start a newspaper in a news desert.

Listen or download the audio file to listen offline:

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Speaker bios

Penny Muse Abernathy is a visiting professor at the Medill School. While at Medill, Abernathy is collaborating with the school’s Local News Initiative and Spiegel Research Center on local news-related projects, research and teaching. Abernathy is a former senior business executive with The New York Times, Harvard Business Review and Wall Street Journal, and was the Knight Chair in Journalism and Digital Media Economics at the University of North Carolina from 2008 to 2020. Her research focuses on the implications of the digital revolution for news organizations, the information needs of communities and the emergence of news deserts in the United States.

Tim Franklin is Senior Associate Dean, Professor and John M. Mutz Chair in Local News at the Medill School , where he is leading the Local News Initiative, a research-and-development project designed to bolster the sustainability of local news in America, and the Medill Metro Media Lab, a project funded by the Robert R. McCormick Foundation to strengthen the local news ecosystem and journalism education in the Chicago area. Franklin was appointed earlier this year by Governor J.B. Pritzker to serve on the Illinois Local Journalism Task Force, a bipartisan group studying the local news crisis in the state and recommending potential policy solutions. Before joining Medill in 2017, Franklin was President of The Poynter Institute, a leading international school for journalists and a media think tank.

Additional Resources

The State of Local News 2022 (Medill School of Journalism’s Local News Initiative, Northwestern University)

Watch the previous episode: The State of Advertising and Local News

Watch the next episode: Outsmarting Google and Facebook: Helping Publishers Grow Their Audience Outside the Dominant Platforms 

View all episodes

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Send your suggestions for future News Take guests to Alliance VP, Research & Insights Rebecca Frank at rebecca@newsmediaalliance.org.

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Schurz spent his entire career working in the newspaper industry, beginning after he graduated college in 1957 at the (Hagerstown, MD) Morning Herald and Daily Mail. He went on to work mainly in leadership positions at several newspaper and broadcast properties, including The Herald-Times (Bloomington, IN) and WSBT-TV, the (El Centro, CA) Imperial Valley Press and Brawley News, and the (Bloomington, IN) Hoosier-Times, Inc. He was remembered by his colleagues at The Herald-Times, who shared that during his career, he was publisher and editor-in-chief of The Herald-Times, The Times-Mail (Bedford, IN), The Reporter-Times (Martinsville, IN) and The Southside Times (Beech Grove, IN). He was most recently chairman emeritus of Schurz Communications, Inc., his family’s company, which owned the newspapers and broadcast stations at which he worked for many years.

News Media Alliance President & CEO, David Chavern, stated, “Scott Schurz, Sr. was one of the newspaper industry’s biggest supporters and an advocate for a free press around the world. His passing is a tremendous loss and the Alliance owes him a debt of gratitude for his passionate and tireless service to the industry and our association. He will truly be missed.”

Schurz was inducted into the Indiana Journalism Hall of Fame in 2003.

According to The Herald-Times, the Indiana newspapers where Schurz, Sr. worked are now part of The USA TODAY Network (Gannett).

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