Small Press, Big Ideas

Sophie Culpepper covers local news for Nieman Lab, the Harvard based publication tracking how journalism is evolving in a digital age. She joins the show to map what is actually working in local media right now, from a...

Brian Kennett is the founder of Built Revenue. He argues that local publishers are sitting on the most valuable asset in their market, a trusted audience, and monetizing almost none of what it is worth. In this...

Uriah Kiser has spent more than three decades in local media, from interviewing President Clinton as a teenage TV reporter to launching Potomac Local two years before the Virginia newspaper he grew up delivering shut...

Brandon Mercer is the Vice President of Ad Product Integrated Solutions at Hearst, where he builds the programs that sit between editorial and advertising across the company's local newspaper properties. Brandon argues...

Justin Rushing has spent more than fifteen years on the revenue side of local news. Today he is cofounder of the HBCU Digital Media Collaborative, which partners with historically Black colleges and universities to help...

David Arkin returns to the podcast to talk about the format reshaping local media right now: vertical video. He breaks down why reels are no longer a young person's medium, why dropping a two and a half minute TV...

Donnell Suggs is editor in chief of the Atlanta Voice, Atlanta's only Black newspaper, which marked its 60th anniversary in May without ever missing an issue. He joins the show to talk about two decades of reporting in...

Peter Stuart spent 20 years in journalism before quitting his editorial role at in late 2025 to build an AI-powered publishing platform called Velora. In this conversation, he walks through what that platform actually...

Lorne London has been publishing in Toronto since 1989, starting with an eight page community newspaper in his unheated basement. Today his company reaches 200,000 print readers a month and 1.4 million social media...

T.J. Ortenzi is the Deputy Managing Editor of Audience and Digital at the Baltimore Banner. T.J. spent 11 years at the Washington Post before joining the Banner specifically because it would let him cover the city where...

Melissa Barragán Taboada spent nearly three decades in legacy journalism, including more than 20 years covering Austin and a stint at the Boston Globe, before making the leap into nonprofit local news. She's now editor...

Eli Wohlenhaus, Director of Digital and AI News Strategy at Adams Multimedia, started out skeptical of AI in the newsroom. Now he leads training sessions across a network of local newspapers in 20 states, helping...

Sara Hebel is the co-founder and editor in chief of Open Campus, a nonprofit news organization built on the idea that higher education is fundamentally a local story. In this conversation, she walks through how Open...

Aron Pilhofer has spent three decades at some of the most recognizable names in journalism, from the New York Times to the Guardian, and now serves as Chief Product and Membership Officer at Chicago Public Media, home...

Rebecca Klein, publisher at New York Focus, traces an unlikely path from national education reporter to leader of one of New York's most impactful nonprofit newsrooms. In five years, the outlet grew from a scrappy...