More information
Description
For many years now, we have been witnessing a crisis of printed press in Poland. In 2019 one of the biggest Polish distributors, RUCH SA, was on the verge of bankruptcy, causing a lot of damage to small and middle-sized publishers. Garmond SA, another major distributor, found itself in similar circumstances in 2020. The pandemic, rising inflation, and war in Ukraine caused hikes in prices of paper and many of the press salons closed their doors. As a result, it is difficult for small and medium sized publishers to stay afloat. It is particularly acute for those media organizations without the government’s support, which can eventually become a threat to the Polish democracy. A development of paid, digital access to content is a chance for a survival of small and medium publishers and an actual defense of the free media in Poland. Meanwhile, IT services that would make that possible are often too expensive for the newsrooms in questions. We would like to create a unique tool called “rE-medium” (rE-medy), which will make the work of newsrooms interested in such solutions easier. We will organize meetings with publishers to narrow down the needs and expectations for the tool. We will test different functionalities of this new system to meet the demands of news teams, make workflow and copy editing easier, as well as communication with the readers more seamless. We will improve its marketing functions, subscription tools and will be able to better utilize user databases. We will organize workshops presenting the product to interested institutions, with representatives of at least five newsrooms and publishers. We will share our experiences and best practices for the implementation of the system. Lastly, we will propose creating a network, which will allow us to stay in touch and continue exchanging experiences and support each other.
Summary of project results
For several years now, small and medium-sized independent press publishers in Poland have been facing a serious threat to their continued existence from the crisis in the market for the distribution of the printed press. This particularly threatens media that are deprived of state patronage and are independent of or hostile to the authorities, which consequently poses a serious threat to democracy in Poland.
Our goal was to create a comprehensive tool to streamline the work of editors and enable more effective monetization of content, which ultimately increases their chances of diversifying their sources of revenue.
As part of the project, we created an integrated IT tool for publishers of electronic and/or print media, which provides the ability to create a database of user accounts along with integration with analytical and marketing tools. Thanks to the registration of users in the system, each beneficiary of the project, being able to get to know their audience better, obtains the possibility of profiling the content they publish. The creation of the tool was possible thanks to meetings, workshops, presentations and a meeting with representatives of five press publishing houses during the project, which showed us exactly what needs our software must meet.
We also organized a conference on free media and contemporary challenges for independent publishers, which was attended by 40 people.
The tangible result of our project is a tool that is available to publishers.
The project was focused on developing and providing rE-medium beneficiaries with additional in-depth, accessible information materials. As a result, two products were created - “E-medium guidebook” and a demo environment of the rE-medium tool.