The next 1,000 days: A hard look at future of media and journalism

Let me be direct. Planning for the next 1,000 days in the media is nearly impossible. The pace of change, unpredictability of platform shifts, and evolving nature of AI make any detailed forecast inherently fragile. But this is precisely why the exercise matters. Not as prediction, but as preparation. Not as certainty, but as a sense of direction.

 

This is a risky endeavour, perhaps audacious. But it is also critical. Media operators need frameworks, not just fragmented reactions. We need to understand the forces at play, even if we can’t predict every outcome. What follows is my attempt to give you that sense of what’s ahead- informed by two decades as an operator and the past year working with multiple global organisations as their capability partner.

 

The year 2025 marked an inflection point. AI and rapid platform changes have created what looks like chaos. But for those who understand the fundamentals, patterns emerge. Individual products will require constant experimentation, but the broader direction is visible.

 

First 100-300 days: Foundation reset

 

The immediate period will be about returning to fundamentals, what I call newspaper scale.

 

This isn’t the same as platform scale. Media companies must stop imitating big tech platforms or chasing one concurrent global audience. The focus- owned audiences, not borrowed platform traffic.

 

The benchmark that matters is ARPU (average revenue per user). Work backward from ARPU and everything comes into focus- content, product, technology, and monetisation. Revenue diversification becomes essential. Subscriptions matter not just for diversification, but for discipline. Even a small base of paying users forces you to stop building for algorithms and start building for audiences.

 

During this period, organisations must audit their true audience. Many SEO-driven sites of the last decade were fundamentally off-platform businesses. Often 80-90 per cent of traffic came from platforms, while real audience was one-tenth of that number. AI didn’t create this fragility, it simply exposed it. This period demands honest assessment and course correction.

 

Next 100-300 Days: The great unbundling

 

Linear television faces its reckoning. Expect many linear channels to scale down or shut down during this window. This doesn’t mean linear brands disappear. Many will successfully transition to CTV, OTT, FAST or become large YouTube-first entities. But linear TV is declining faster than newspapers, partly because large platform algorithms love video as a format.

 

Live sports, live events, and live news will continue performing on linear, but publisher pressure intensifies sharply. The opportunity- video is the super format. Linear companies that reimagine themselves as video companies during this window may find a powerful future. Those who hesitate will struggle.

 

Smart organisations will use this period to balance platform dependency with first-party channels (real audiences). AI must augment human talent, not replace them. Overuse or careless AI deployment risks audience trust and strategic drift.

 

We are entering a post-supermass media era. If you claim more than 100 million real audiences, you are either a rarest or rare global outlier or largely platform-dependent. This window is when that reality crystallises.

 

Verification economy emerges

 

By mid-to-late 2026, we reach a critical inflection- more AI-generated content online than human-generated content. This is when high-quality human content begins commanding a premium.

 

Content must be productised around a new value chain- verification. For media organisations, the differentiators become trust, verification, utility. This is when media organisations must position themselves as the verification layer for their audiences. Those who succeed here will have a bright future.

 

Local news, physical information ecosystems, and real-world events see strong revival during this period. The test is simple- even if the audience is small, are they willing to pay? That willingness defines a real audience.

 

Differentiation shifts decisively back to exclusive, high-value input. AI handles middling work, forcing significant talent changes. Investment shifts toward high-value input roles, while mass processing gets heavily assisted by compute. Editorial leadership evolves into context and insight provision, focusing on interpretation rather than packaging and curation.

 

Quality must decisively trump quantity. Clickbait and algorithm-serving churn, rewarded by platforms previously, has eroded trust. Those behaviours are likely to get punished in months and quarters to come.

 

Platform relationships restructure

 

The relationship between media and platforms will see a fundamental reset. Platforms remain valuable for discovery and brand exposure, but their limits for media companies become clearer- little control, capped revenue upside, constantly shifting terms.

 

Breaking news increasingly gives way to breaking verification. In the AI age, information is out before the media can react. Verification, context, and interpretation become the true value proposition.

 

Zero tolerance for AI slop separates serious organisations from opportunistic ones during this period. Highly engaged niches (hyperlocal, culturally specific, interest-driven) thrive.

 

Generic content becomes oversupplied by creators and AI alike. Platforms begin prioritizing differentiated partners. Product strategy crystallises- serving a single platform is not viable. Legacy products give way to audience- and brand-centric ones. AI gets applied from first principles, for personalisation and efficiency. Product teams split between experimentation pods and conviction-led deep product teams.

 

Newsrooms deploy AI assistants (agents) for most staff during this window, not to replace them, but to multiply capability. First 2x, then moving toward 5x.

 

New media architecture

 

As we move ahead, new architecture solidifies. Audiences increasingly pay for trust, insight, perspective, actionable information, and belonging to real communities with real-world connections. As platforms become more synthetic, credible media commands premiums.

 

ARPU growth defines real audiences and partially offsets mass decline. Media companies complete their shift from ad-network thinking to multi-revenue platforms.

 

Engaging local regulators for protection against big tech platforms and AI companies becomes an operating lever. Monetisation teams aggressively deploy AI, AR, VR in events, branded services and commerce integrations.

 

Brass tacks

 

Content is the product. Lifetime value guides strategy. Monetisation is embedded from day one. Audience ownership is the single most critical function.

 

By day 500 to 1,000, media is no longer flat. Mass media becomes an aggregation of niches and communities. Platforms offer discovery, not ownership. Your audience belongs to you.

 

Media organisations that treated content as platform fuel have either pivoted or become mere creators.

 

Media and publishing endure for those who navigate change wisely. Listen to audiences through real feedback, not dashboards. The next 1,000 days will separate fundamentals from trends.

 

Will this unfold exactly as outlined? No.

 

Surprises, disruptions, and unforeseen opportunities are certain. But the underlying forces (owned audiences, verification premiums, publishing scale) are directional truths, not speculation.

 

This is not about precision. It is about preparation. It is about having a framework when chaos demands decisions.

 

The path is visible. The question is execution.

(The writer is the CEO and Co-founder, The Media GCC)  (Disclaimer: These are the personal opinions of the writer. They do not reflect the views of www.business-standard.com or the Business Standard newspaper)