Rebuilding Journalism's Lost Culture of Sharing and Collaboration

The Changing Paradigm in Journalism: From Collaboration to Competition

The journalism profession historically progressed with a culture shaped around a common purpose, open to method sharing and collective learning. Experienced journalists mentoring trainees in newsrooms, temporary collaborations between different organizations on important public interest issues, and even sharing research techniques and code were among the most important dynamics in the profession's development. However, the speed brought by the digital age, platform dependency, and ruthless competitive environment have deeply shaken this open-source professional culture.

What is an Information Silos and Why is it Dangerous?

Information silos refer to data piles trapped within an organization or platform, not shared externally and not open to interaction. In the journalism context, this means news organizations hiding insights, methods, and even successful research processes developed in their algorithmic systems, private data pools, and proprietary tools from competing institutions. While this approach may seem to provide short-term competitive advantage, in the long term it hinders the development of the profession as a whole and can lead to declining standards.

Digital Platforms and Dependency Relationship

The dissolution of traditional media's financial models has made news organizations more dependent on major digital platforms (meta, google, tiktok, etc.). These platforms' closed algorithms and internal content priorities force journalists to adapt to specific formats and even content types. The transformation created by digital streaming services like Joyn in the publishing world similarly centralizes content access and distribution channels. This centralization makes it harder for independent and diverse voices to be heard, increasing the risk of information being trapped within specific 'silo' platforms.

The study titled "Rules of Content Management in the Digital Age" published in e-Journal of New Media highlights this transformation, emphasizing that areas like entertainment, news, and education are turning into a giant spectacle and independent editorial processes are eroding. In this environment, as journalists focus on producing content compliant with platform rules, professional solidarity and methodological sharing are pushed to the background.

The Role of Artificial Intelligence and Automation

The increasing use of artificial intelligence (AI) and automation tools in journalism makes this trend even more complex. Major media groups protect their proprietary AI models developed for news writing, data analysis, and personalized content distribution as trade secrets. This situation restricts small and independent news organizations' access to these technologies and deepens the technological divide. However, accessible, transparent, and shareable artificial intelligence tools could contribute to raising professional standards and strengthening verification mechanisms.

What is Lost? Not Just Code, But Public Interest

The cost of the disappearance of sharing culture is not just technical regression. Journalism serves the function of accountability, ensuring transparency, and nourishing public debate in democratic societies. This function can only be fulfilled within a reliable, diverse, and methodologically sound information ecosystem. Information silos weaken collective defense against misinformation, increase the cost of investigative journalism, and ultimately risk public interest-oriented reporting.

• Slowing Innovation: Without idea and technique sharing, innovation speed declines across the sector.
• Inequality: Large companies' resources block small ones' access, damaging media pluralism.
• Trust Erosion: Content and algorithms produced behind closed doors foster suspicion and distrust among the public.
• Erosion of Professional Standards: Common ethical discussions and methodological