"2026 will be the year when journalists finally realize that being in the room is not where news happens. Sure, à la Hamilton the musical, lots of back-room deals happen in quiet, private spaces of power - but journalists generally aren't in those rooms. Instead, journalists go to press conferences and public meetings - and for more than a century, this has been the bread and butter way for beat journalists to report out a story."
"At first glance, the state of journalism and democracy in America looks pretty dour. The Trump administration's old flex is back: denying journalists press credentials. At the local level, we're deeply worried about communities that no longer have reporters at school board and city council meetings, and what that might mean for public accountability. Journalists' ability to depend on these reliable reporting routines has become increasingly precarious, thanks to the sorry state of our political culture and the news industry's bottom line"
Being present in official rooms and public meetings is no longer sufficient to find where news emerges. Press conferences and council hearings have been outpaced by private power dynamics, credential denials, and the disappearance of local beat reporters. Reliance on routinized reporting has become precarious due to political hostility and industry decline. Some of the best reporting does not depend on access to sanctioned facts or stenographic coverage of staged meetings. Newsrooms have adapted practices for new technological, economic, and political realities, but the conception of place as the primary locus of news remains mistaken.
Read at Nieman Lab
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