#audience-trust

#audience-trust

In 2026, journalism will lean even more toward independent publishing, with small outlets like The Preamble and individual, seasoned journalists using platforms such as Substack and social media to set the agenda rather than react to it. This shift will not replace legacy media, but meaningfully erode its gatekeeping power and push the industry toward more independent thought leadership and community-funded reporting.

This year, as legacy news outlets slashed diversity teams, eliminated community beats, and gutted cultural coverage, they undermined the very asset that determines relevance in today's fragmented media environment: cultural fluency. These cuts were framed as cost-saving measures, but in reality, they stripped away the expertise that allows media institutions to build trust, resonance, and meaningful connection with the audiences they claim to serve.

It's an efficient way to get information, and it lives in a space that combines many information sources. Social feeds are places where audiences can get updates about the many facets of their life - community events, road closures, upcoming local issues, updates from friends and family, advice for working more efficiently - in one place, making it especially ripe to soak in new information.

Hello and welcome to Modern CEO! I'm Stephanie Mehta, CEO and chief content officer of Mansueto Ventures. Each week this newsletter explores inclusive approaches to leadership drawn from conversations with executives and entrepreneurs, and from the pages of Inc. and Fast Company. If you received this newsletter from a friend, you can sign up to get it yourself every Monday morning.

I've been in that room a hundred times. The lights are dimmed and the "big idea" is revealed to a round of applause. It's bold, beautiful and expensive. And just before lunch, someone says: "Okay, let's bring in comms to get a press release out and prep for any negative feedback." In that moment, the comms team isn't a creative partner. They're the airbag. The risk-mitigation function brought in to protect an idea they had no hand in shaping.

In fact, a recent report on the use of AI in news media from the Reuters Institute showed a pretty clear pattern of audiences' trust declining the more AI was used in the journalistic process. Only 12% of people were comfortable with fully AI-generated content, increasing to 21% for mostly AI, 43% for mostly human, and a respectable (but, notably, not amazing) 62% for fully human content.