On Friday morning around 10 a.m. Central, I found myself in the middle of a photo that captured the absolute joy that only happens when a group of people come together with shared purpose and spirit.

We’d met in real life for the first time less than 48 hours earlier, but by the time the picture below was snapped, so many crucial conversations, kindnesses, and a-ha moments had already happened that I knew I was witnessing the bonding of a group that will go on to build a big part of the future of news and information together.

This is significant not just because these 10 people – all part of the 2025 Project C ONA Creator Cohort – found each other and did that magic thing that happens when people connect in real life and go through something together. It’s bigger than that.

The cohort was the most visible part of what turned into a massive wave 🌊 of creator energy at ONA25. And that, y’all, is an amazing signal about where journalism is headed and our industry’s ability to adapt and support a future where audiences are increasingly looking beyond institutional brands to individuals as trusted messengers.

My ONA25 takeaways:

• Curiosity abounds. Legacy newsrooms want to know how to partner with independent creators. This came through loud in clear in all of the questions during sessions about how newsrooms find and work with creators – and in a Friday afternoon workshop from API’s Samantha Ragland and Trusting News’ Mollie Muchna about building respectful creator-newsroom partnerships.

• Creators want (and need) business help. Not because it’s impossible to turn on reader revenue or ad dollars, but because most journalists didn’t come up learning how to monetize. If we do one thing different in 2026 it will be to add more programming about the business side of creator journalism. That’s why it was awesome to see Who Sponsors Stuff’s Ryan Sager and Jesse Watkins wandering the halls and popping into sessions. Next year we need to get them on the program.

• Engagement is everything. Erstwhile Washington Post TikTok guy and now LNI Media founder Dave Jorgenson shared how his commenters actively shape LNI’s video strategy. The audience-creator symbiosis was a recurring theme when it came to understanding why fans are so fiercely loyal and willing to support their work with 💰️.

• Building a lifestyle vs. an empire. On our Wednesday panel, Links I Would GChat You If We Were Friends writer Caitlin Dewey talked about building a business big enough to support her logging off at 5 p.m. every day to spend time with her kid. For Caitlin, and many other journalists choosing this path, it’s not not about chasing endless growth, but about approximating a fair salary they might have earned for similar work within a news organization.

• Video made simple. The amazing Adriana Lacy stopped by the Project C lounge to talk to the cohort and reminded us that vertical video shouldn’t be slick, so don’t feel overwhelmed if you’re just starting to wade into TikTok — in fact, polish can hurt more than it helps. It also pays to spend time on the platforms before you dive in. Get a sense of the platform’s norms and pay attention to what pops, then emulate.

• Connection changes everything. In news, we’re constantly flooded with new ideas for innovation, collaboration, and strategy. But when you get people in a room together – face to face – something shifts. The conversations slow down, the ideas get real, and a level of understanding emerges that just doesn’t happen over email or Zoom. I saw that over and over again at ONA.

Huge thanks to the Online News Association for giving us that space to have real conversations and to The Lenfest Institute for Journalism for funding the cohort’s trip to New Orleans.

🔥 the latest things

📌 Mapping trusted messengers (aka creators) at the local level is vital work if we want to understand where our communities are getting news and information and support and/or partner with those messengers. Public Source did just that in Pittsburgh – mapping the creator landscape to make more newsroom-creator partnerships possible.

📌 Dave Jorgenson is building a media business, but he has a mission: media literacy. “I think using comedy as the way in to teach media literacy has been really effective,” says Jorgenson in a great piece from NiemanLab’s Neel Dhanesha.

📌 The Washington Post is following other legacy publishers to Substack. In a LinkedIn post a week ago (SORRY! I WAS AT ONA!), The Post’s Claire Wallace announced the launch of Post Runway, a fashion-focused newsletter.

📌 On the flip side, fashion mag Marie Claire added several Substackers to their contributing editor lineup. Writes Emily Sundberg on LinkedIn of Marie Claire EIC Nikki Ogunnaike, “It feels like she’s walking the walk: treating Substack writers less as competition and more as a talent pool.”

📌 Publishers have realized the “primacy of personality is here,” writes Chris Sutcliffe in a piece about personality-led newsletters at The Economist and Financial Times.

📌 Guess what, y’all? Polygon is back – kinda, sorta. After mass layoffs that killed the gaming site, a group of Polygon alums just launched Rogue, a worker-owned independent site covering much of the same awesome stuff.

📌 Watch this space: Longtime gaming reporter Grant Stoner just launched Access Granted, a newsletter about accessibility and the disabled perspective in the gaming industry. And congrats to Going Solo Spring ‘25 cohort member Julie Holstein on the launch of her lovely new newsletter, Ward 6 Brooklyn. 👏 

🛠️ the useful things

📌 ICYMI, Gmail just made it way easier to unsubscribe from newsletters. Is anyone feeling the impact yet? Let me know.

📌 Every creator-journalist who transparently shares their business health report is a friggin’ champ. Thank you, Alicia Kennedy, for being the latest. Steal this idea: “I’ve also gotten over the feeling that to care about making money means I’m a disgusting capitalist pig.”

📌 A LinkedIn program is expanding to allow publishers and creators to make more money by placing pre-roll ads before their video content and earning a share of the revenue.

💅 cool things to do

📌 Registration is open for Going Solo, the 8-week creator journalism course that takes you from the nugget of an idea to launch ready. Spots are limited, so I’d recommend securing your spot now!

📌 In our first 201 level workshop, Blair Hickman and I are teaching a 4-week virtual course for UT Austin all about revenue. If you’re already up and running but looking to improve those margins, sign up for Revenue 201: From Surviving to Thriving as a Creator Journalist.