From AI to press freedom: iMEdD’s highlights from the 20th International Journalism Festival in Perugia

It was a conference with many overarching themes. Our editorial team attended in person and watched most of this year’s sessions online, and offers here a selection of highlights. These are the moments we kept in our notebooks and bookmarks, to revisit as part of our ongoing professional reflection and growth. 

Newsrooms and AI: Efficiency gains, editorial risks 

During the four days of the Perugia festival, a large number of sessions focused on artificial intelligence, how journalists can investigate it, the companies that manage it, its future, and whether newsrooms should hand over editorial control to it.

Editorial control on AI tools: The panel, “How to edit a liquid: a survival guide for the AI age”, moderated by Olle Zachrison, the head of the News AI team at BBC News, discussed the issue of controlling a “fluid” element such as AI, and the applications of this technology on websites, offering the public a different, interactive, way to interact with journalistic content, as well as the difficulties involved in controlling the quality of the output from these tools.

“You can’t be a control freak when it comes to managing these tools,” said the editor-in-chief of Helsingin Sanomat, Erja Ylajarvi, responding to a question about how newsrooms should approach these new applications, given that editors could face criminal prosecution if they write something incorrect. “It’s maybe less like driving a car and more like riding an elephant,” replied Mukul Devichand, editor-in-chief of AI Initiatives for The New York Times, on the same issue.

At the same time, though, artificial intelligence tools have been deployed to streamline journalists’ workflows within news organizations. At the Helsingin Sanomat, the newsroom uses a tool that “scans” the internet for press releases and alerts editors to any newsworthy stories, on a scale from 1 to 5. However, such a tool can present problems, Ylarjavi noted.

It’s maybe less like driving a car and more like riding an elephant.

Mukul Devichand, editor-in-chief of AI Initiatives for The New York Times, on how newsrooms should approach these new AI applications.

Covering AI: AI is never as good as it is marketed to be and it is the journalists’ responsibility to scrutinize tech companies’ claims, highlighted Abeba Birhane, a cognitive scientist researching AI accountability at Trinity College Dublin, in a ““Beyond the hype: covering AI across beats”” panel, which discussed the coverage of AI. She added that this is especially important at a time when Big Tech companies are trying to shape the narrative around AI. Speakers also urged journalists pursuing investigations into artificial intelligence not to be intimidated by its technical complexity. Garance Burke, a global investigative journalist at The Associated Press,, noted that “the notion that covering AI requires an advanced computer science degree” needs to be debunked.

At the panel “Uncovering Big Tech’s Sphere of Influence,” investigative journalists examined how technology companies shape regulation, public debate and the flow of information. “We know these companies influence almost everything we see and do,” said Carole Cadwalladr, co-founder of the Nerve, who moderated the discussion, adding that much of that power, operates in ways that are often invisible to the public. Bram Vranken, researcher and campaigner at Corporate Europe Observatory, pointed to the lack of transparency around the environmental impact of data centers. Information on emissions remains limited, he said, partly because an amendment drafted with the involvement of Digital Europe was incorporated into European Union legislation. “There is no major think tank in Brussels that does not receive funding from big tech and often from multiple big tech companies […] TheyF don’t give this money to think tanks because they’re philanthropic. They give this money to think tanks, because they want to shape the narrative,” he added, urging for more investigative stories in the field.

*Further discussions on investigating Big Tech happened at the session “How to investigate Big Tech and overcome platform capture”, a series of candid discussions on how journalists can cover Big Tech more effectively and with greater urgency. This side event brought together reporters from around the world for and collaborative brainstorming.

There is no major think tank in Brussels that does not receive funding from big tech […] They don’t give this money to think tanks because they’re philanthropic. They give this money to think tanks, because they want to shape the narrative.

Bram Vranken, researcher and campaigner at Corporate Europe Observatory.

The future of journalism and AI: In the panel discussion, “What future for journalism in the era of AI?”, David Caswell, founder of StoryFlow Ltd., argued that news organizations have not yet fully leveraged the opportunities offered by artificial intelligence. Many outlets are using AI to make “their existing conception of journalism more efficient,” an approach he compared to improving the efficiency of managing horses as a response to automobiles. Such efforts will be irrelevant in the long-term, he added, as AI’s advancements are leading towards “a completely new, completely different information ecosystem where societal information flows in completely different ways.” To navigate this shift, he advised journalists to “increase the scope of your ambition by a factor of a thousand in what you can use these tools to serve society.”

Gender reporting: new forms of harm and old ethical questions

AI-assisted gender-based violence, along with the aftermath of coverage of the Epstein files, dominated panels on gender. Julie Posetti pointed to a stark statistic, underscoring the scale of the threat: 75% of women journalists have experienced online violence, and nearly a quarter of these were “generated or amplified by AI tools”, according to the Tipping Point Project, a UN Women survey. She moderated a panel focusing on AI-assisted violence against women in the public sphere. During the same discussion, Maria Ressa, Rappler’s CEO and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, recounted her personal online harassment experiences, including receiving 90 hate messages per hour in 2016, and, more recently, the circulation of Ressa’s deepfakes instructing diabetics to discard their insulin.

When we’re reporting on survivors, we have to remember that at the core of this issue is consent

Lucia Osborne-Crowley, award-winning investigative journalist and author.

At the panel “The Epstein Files: Where Did the Media Get It Wrong?”, journalist Lucia Osborne-Crowley urged reporters to keep survivors’ consent at the center of their work. “When we’re reporting on survivors, we have to remember that at the core of this issue is consent,” she said. Crossing boundaries set by survivors, she added, risks retraumatizing them.

The yearning for belonging, and new forms of funding 

The creators’ wave: Authenticity and relatability, speakers said, are central to building trust with audiences. At the panel “How Are Publishers Responding to the ‘Creator Wave’?,” moderated by Nic Newman, speakers examined how both legacy outlets, including CNN, and more social media-driven newsrooms are adapting to shifting audience expectations, alongside journalists’ own reflections on the change.

Newman presented figures from the latest Reuters Institute survey, which found that 76% of media executives say the response to the “creator wave” is to encourage in-house journalists to act more like content creators. At the same time, 50% also point to collaboration with external creators to amplify news organizations’ content.

“Social media gives you the ability to have a relationship with the people that are watching your content, to go a bit beyond that three-minute TV piece,” said Bijan Hosseini, senior producer in CNN’s International Productions department. He noted that CNN has also opened a creator studio in Doha aimed at younger audiences, with a more transparent production process and cameras throughout, to show how news is made. The panel also featured Liesbeth Nizet, who presented Spilnews, a platform designed with “news poverty” of young people in mind. They actively involve their audience through WhatsApp and Snapchat, where users could send direct messages to creators, she said, adding that the approach has produced results.

Alternative funding: At the conference, news organizations shared campaigns designed to actively engage their audiences to grow their subscriber base. During the panel “Campaign-led approach to reader revenue growth” moderated by Zakhar Protsiuk, speakers discussed various strategies used by both long-established outlets, such as The Guardian, which first published in 1821, and newer ones like Uusi Juttu, launched in January 2025.

Tomáš Bella said that media outlets must move beyond “buy for the content” toward “buy for the idea, for the cause.” The Finnish Uusi Juttu, described a more direct form of audience engagement, referring to its subscribers not as readers but as “members.”

The Guardian appeals directly to readers’ sense of mission and their willingness to support the outlet’s journalism, said Liz Wynn. For the Slovak outlet Denník N, which has a goal of getting about 70 percent of its revenue from subscriptions, the approach is different. Tomáš Bella said editorial and business teams work closely together, arguing that media outlets must move beyond “buy for the content” toward “buy for the idea, for the cause.” As an example, he pointed to a campaign linking participation in the European elections, in a country with high abstention rates, to a discounted subscription offer. The newest outlet on the panel, the Finnish Uusi Juttu, described a more direct form of audience engagement, referring to its subscribers not as readers but as “members.” “Everything we do that has to do with growth or marketing, we involve our members,” said Antti Pikkanen.

A useful case study: As traditional media funding sources decline, with cuts to USAID among the latest pressures, news organizations are increasingly turning to alternatives. Correctiv.Europe offers a community-driven model, with roughly 65 to 70 percent of its budget coming from small individual donations. In the session, “Where did the money go? A conversation about the funding crisis and rebuilding journalism”, its director Joanna Krawczyk said the approach relies on active audience involvement, from crowdsourced reporting to post-publication engagement through live journalism events. “It’s a whole civic cycle,” she said. The organization’s latest experiment is a community café in the German city of Gelsenkirchen, designed as both a meeting point for local journalism and a modest revenue stream through coffee sales.

Low-cost tools reshaping investigative reporting

Global crises and press freedom 

Reporting at a personal cost: “Many stories are not missing because they are unimportant, but because the cost of reporting them is too high”, highlighted Mustafa Nasr. The Yemeni journalist and Chairman of the Studies and Economic Media Center, discussed the experiences of journalists reporting from war zones among other colleagues at the “Bearing witness in conflict zones (Gaza, Yemen, Sudan)” panel. That cost, journalists noted, has been stark in Gaza. Wael Al-Dahdouh, bureau chief in Gaza for Al Jazeera said, “We have over 262 fellow journalists who were killed in Gaza, and not one single investigation has been opened by the Israeli government.” Al-Dahdouh’s personal cost was immense. Having lost his entire family during the war he recalls the moment he found his deceased wife: “When I found her, she was in pieces, I couldn’t even look at her face because there was nothing to look at. And for this they deprived us not only the chance to stay alive on this planet but also the goodbye moment.” In Sudan, “almost all voices are missing,” said Raghdan Orsud, co-founder of BeamReports, noting that media is being used as a tool of war by both local parties and foreign actors, creating a “huge gap” in accountability and verified reporting. “Sudan is not a forgotten story to us,” she said, urging journalists to think cross-border: “Journalism by nature is cross border […] Be cross-border.” In Yemen, Mustafa Nasr said more than 2,600 violations against journalists have been documented since 2015, including killings, detention and forced exile, with 71 reporters killed and more than 30 percent of journalists displaced.

We have over 262 fellow journalists who were killed in Gaza, and not one single investigation has been opened by the Israeli government.

Wael Al-Dahdouh, bureau chief in Gaza for Al Jazeera.

On bypassing censorship: How do journalists in exile from Iran, Russia, and China continue reporting under intense surveillance and censorship? In the panel “Authoritarian convergence: how Russia, Iran and China reshape information ecosystems”, moderated by Filip Noubel, reporters described a mix of technical workarounds and trust-based sourcing strategies. For Tehran Bureau, co-director Marketa Hulpachova said reporters retained limited access during Iran’s internet shutdown through roughly 60,000 Starlink routers operating inside the country. For coverage of Russia, Important Stories’ editor-in-chief Alesya Marokhovskaya said the outlet uses Russian SIM cards to maintain trust with sources, along with encrypted channels for whistleblowers. To reach audiences inside China, , Dasheng Media’s founder Vivian Wu said content is accessed via VPNs and sometimes re-uploaded in disguised formats, including screen-recorded videos shared on censored platforms.

Fighting Russian propaganda: At the session “Reporting on Russia’s authoritarian narratives,” the discussion focused on the spread of Russian disinformation around the war in Ukraine. Peter Pomerantsev said Russia had been shaping and normalizing false narratives well before the invasion. Journalists Yaroslav Trofimov, Olga Rudenko and Oleksiy Sorokin discussed the difficulty of reporters in maintaining objectivity in a context where misinformation is used as a weapon. Trofimov said Russian propaganda had been particularly effective in “hijacking” the notion of peace, reframing language even as the war continues as an act of aggression against Ukraine.