Northwestern Medill Local News Initiative 2025 State of Local News Report: Two Decades of Data, Deserts and Dynamic Change. “Twenty years of data, one overarching headline: transformation. With this State of Local News Report, Medill has two decades of data on local news outlets across America. And over the span of that time, the historic reshaping of local news has come into clearer focus. News deserts are widening. Newspaper closures continue unabated. Independent publishers are calling it quits at an alarming rate. Yet local digital-only news sites are multiplying. Many are even thriving. Our Medill Local News Initiative researchers updated and expanded a database of local newspap…
Northwestern Medill Local News Initiative 2025 State of Local News Report: Two Decades of Data, Deserts and Dynamic Change. “Twenty years of data, one overarching headline: transformation. With this State of Local News Report, Medill has two decades of data on local news outlets across America. And over the span of that time, the historic reshaping of local news has come into clearer focus. News deserts are widening. Newspaper closures continue unabated. Independent publishers are calling it quits at an alarming rate. Yet local digital-only news sites are multiplying. Many are even thriving. Our Medill Local News Initiative researchers updated and expanded a database of local newspapers, digital-only news sites, networks, ethnic media outlets and public radio broadcasters. The team also utilized a predictive model to identify counties at high risk of losing local news. And a team of editors and reporters were deployed to highlight innovators in local news and to canvass the country to report on vital issues in the industry. The result of all that months-long work is simultaneously sobering and inspiring. The steady, unrelenting decline of local newspapers — still the primary news source in most areas – is leading to an ever-rising number of news deserts, now 213 counties. This has huge implications for communities and our society. At the same time, digital-only local news sources are growing, providing pathways for new journalism entrepreneurs and giving consumers even more information choices. The festering, 20-year-old problem? Those digital news sites don’t come close to replacing the number of newspapers and journalism jobs being lost. And the digital news providers are almost entirely concentrated in metro areas, leaving vast swaths of the country with little to no access to local news.To summarize: This scrupulously researched report tells a story of wrenching retraction, inspirational creation and unceasing transformation…”
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