Center for Innovation & Sustainability in Local Media
UNC Hussman School of Journalism and Media
This can be a scary time to be in local news, as the economic effects of COVID-19 are exacerbating the challenging circumstances that are already stripping newsrooms of employees and resources around the country. However, it’s those very challenges that…
CBS This Morning featured UNC Knight Chair in Journalism and Digital Media Economics Penny Abernathy in a segment focused on Wyoming’s Casper Star-Tribune, which has cut the number of days it prints the newspaper from seven to five weekly, making…
As legacy news models continue to struggle, digital startups appear promising. However, while barriers to publication are few — no printing press or delivery trucks needed —digital startups face challenges as they build brands from scratch. This Medill Local News…
UNC Knight Chair in Journalism and Digital Media Economics Penny Abernathy recently appeared on the “Axios Today” podcast — featured in a conversation about the future of local news and its vital role in democracy. Abernathy recently published “News Deserts…
An article by Tom Stites in Poynter examined findings from the recently released “News Deserts and Ghost Newspapers: Will Local News Survive?” — the fourth in a series of reports by Knight Chair in Journalism and Digital Media Economics Penny…
This Better News piece profiles an innovative town hall-style event hosted by EducationNC, a 2018-19 participant of the UNC-Knight Foundation Table Stakes Newsroom Initiative. The February 2020 EducationNC event allowed high school students in a rural North Carolina county to…
This Editor & Publisher piece details Project Oasis, a partnership between the UNC Center for Innovation and Sustainability in Local Media, Google News Initiative and LION Publishers created to identify, share and implement the best practices that help local digital…
COVID-19 has shuttered more than 30 local newsrooms across America, says Kristen Hare in this article for Poynter. The pandemic’s far-reaching economic effects continue to exacerbate pre-existing industry conditions creating not only closures but mergers, and the newspapers disappearing —…
This Los Angeles Times editorial looks at key causes of declining newspaper numbers across the nation: including changing reader habits; the migration of classified advertising to Craigslist and other internet services; the dominance Google and Facebook built over online advertising; and the slowness of legacy…
A new exhibit celebrating two centuries of North Carolina’s local news publications kicked off at the UNC Wilson Special Projects Library Feb. 27 with a talk by Knight Chair in Journalism and Digital Media Economics Penny Abernathy, who shared her…