What is the future of local news?

By 2027, I don't think people will trust the internet. That belief is why in-person events sit on my roadmap as a real line item, not a nice-to-have.

Is there still demand for local news?

Yes. The old business model was the problem, not that people stopped caring. It can be reinvented digitally and with AI, and that's exactly what I'm building my business and career on. See why local newspapers failed.

A consultant I met put it well. Everybody thinks media is dying, and it is being harmed, but there's still a lot of money in it, and he's glad nobody's paying attention because it keeps his competition low. You wouldn't get into local media VC-backed, expecting billions. Could you make good, solid money? I think 100% you can.

Will every town have its own local media company again?

I think so. Thirty years ago every town had a newspaper. They went away because the model was too expensive. My estimate is that AI has dropped the cost and the difficulty by about 95%.

"It's now viable again for every town to have a local newspaper. It just so happens that newspaper comes in email and it's on a website."

The second change is who publishes. When a local business owner runs the brand instead of a traditional journalism company, there are two revenue streams instead of one: the ads and the owner's own business. And most of the playbook (surveys, segmentation, partnerships, lead generation) already exists in B2B marketing. Local media is just so far down the list that nobody has connected the dots yet.

It may go further. As AI writes more of each issue, nearby cities could each get their own edition, and eventually individual readers could. Beehiiv's CEO is already talking about per-person newsletters. My guess: possible but hard today, possible in 6 to 12 months, and something you probably need to do to compete in about 24 months.

Who will run local news?

People with a stake in the town. Legacy outlets, if they have writers at all, pay them a salary to do the minimum. An owner-operator who truly cares goes to chamber events, meets business owners and films short-form content locally. Nobody at a legacy outlet is invested enough to do that.

Right now local media sits in two silos. Legacy newspapers have good journalists and real value, but they're stuck in news, on paper, with not many readers. Local influencers, a lot of them moms, film content at places and get real engagement. But they have no brand outside themselves, they're bad at sales, and they live on one channel they don't control. Putting what each is good at together is a huge opportunity.

Non-journalists are already moving in. A lot of realtors are starting to do local news in an engaging format, and they're getting way more traction than the outlets doing the reporting. Local content is getting bigger, and real estate agents are figuring it out first.

Laid-off and independent journalists will go out on their own too, the way national political writers did on Substack. Local has too few voices now, but it could swing to too many quickly. That's why I tell operators to build the brand and become the face of it now, before people come in behind you.

What do readers actually want?

Community information, more than deep journalism. My guess is 90% of people want what I offer and 10% want what a journalist offers. Journalism is good and shouldn't go away. But most people don't care about a deep dive on one politician. They care about community stuff, creators and social media.

They also want it quick and with personality. Most local newspapers are gone, and the survivors read like the Wall Street Journal. A modern local newsletter says "I love this place, I went here last weekend." You don't see that from a normal journalist.

Why will in-person matter more?

The value of in-person events, even from a pure business perspective, is sky high. We've had 20-plus years of social media and disconnection, COVID made it extreme, and AI is going to make it even worse.

You won't know what's real on the internet. Not text, not audio, not a five-minute video clip of a politician saying something. The only way to know is to go do things physically. Ask the biggest nine-figure companies where things are heading, and I hear the same words constantly: local, events, in-person, human connection.

"Everybody doing local media needs to be thinking about how to bring people together in person."

Local media owners are well positioned to host those gatherings, and a national brand can't match it. People already want it now, and I think they'll want it much more by 2027. AI helps from the other side too, because it makes producing the newsletter and content easier. It's a win-win.

Will AI newsletters and remote networks take over?

I don't think they'll last. One operator runs about 300 AI-generated newsletters in towns of 5,000 to 25,000 people that have nothing. I subscribed to one, and it's terrible.

The market will split. Some people will be fine with all-AI content, and others will reject it even if the AI is a little better, because they want a human touch. Being there, being seen and talking like a local is the difference. A remote network with a salaried writer and nobody on the hook as the face of the brand can't do that. Scott Brodbeck, who has run local publications in the DC area since 2010, agreed with me on my podcast that the brands that last will be truly local.

Build things AI can't do. AI is not going to have a person go give away money in town and film it.

Will legacy local media survive?

Some of it, for longer than people expect. Local media has moral capital: people with money fund it because they believe in it, independent of ROI. And the slowest operators will be the last to feel tech disruption, which buys them years.

The industry around them is old and fragmented. At a local media conference I found software vendors with legacy products and old WordPress builds still claiming hundreds of clients at $200 to $1,000 a month. That tells me there's plenty of room for better tools.

What should a local operator do about it?

• Be human and in the community, giving people what they want in a way nobody who isn't there can.
• Build a full brand around the newsletter: social video, events, maybe a podcast or a local show. A newsletter alone is too easy to replace.
• Put in-person events on the roadmap as a real line item.
• Become the face of the brand now, before the newcomers arrive.
• Think long term. Know-like-trust takes time, and if you have it, you're golden. If you see this as cheap Facebook subscribers and quick money, it won't work.