Pittsburgh has ~40 newsrooms and little shared infrastructure. I'm going to talk about it at TEDx Pittsburgh May 29, 2026
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette — a 240-year-old institution — nearly died this spring. It was rescued at the last minute by a nonprofit called the Venetoulis Institute, which promptly cut roughly 40 percent of staff, with union members bearing the brunt.
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette — a 240-year-old institution — nearly died this spring. It was rescued at the last minute by a nonprofit called the Venetoulis Institute, which promptly cut roughly 40 percent of staff, with union members bearing the brunt. A separate group of former employees is now trying to build something new from scratch, calling themselves PAPER. Meanwhile, the rest of Pittsburgh's journalism ecosystem — roughly 40 newsrooms by some counts — operates in near-total isolation from one another.
This is not a Pittsburgh problem. It's an American problem. And on May 29, I'm going to talk about it.
I'll be speaking at TEDx Point Park University, making the case that Pittsburgh's fragmented media landscape isn't just a tragedy — it's a solvable design problem. My talk gets at something journalism insiders have debated for years: why do foundations keep funding intermediary organizations that talk about local news instead of the newsrooms actually doing the work? The consequences are real. Newsrooms close, communities lose watchdogs, and cities like Pittsburgh end up with dozens of outlets competing for scraps rather than sharing the infrastructure — legal support, technology, audience development, revenue strategies — that could keep all of them alive.
I'm not theorizing. I've spent years operating inside this broken system — writing for Bloomberg and the Associated Press, building Amphibian Media, and now working with Suncoast Searchlight on Florida's Gulf Coast. I've seen what works and what doesn't, and I have some ideas about what has to change.
My talk is one of six at TEDx Point Park University: AFTER, a morning built around what comes after collapse, reinvention, and the things we thought we knew.
The details: 📍 University Center, 414 Wood Street, Pittsburgh 🗓 May 29, 2026 | 9:00 am – 12:00 pm 🎟 100 seats: grab your ticket here
If you care about what's happening to local journalism — not just in Pittsburgh, but everywhere — I'd love to see you there.
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