media lab | Podcast Season: 1 - Episode: 7 / Release date: 15-11-2022

1:1 with Thomas Noppen
New Media Denmark

Episode Highlights

00:00 Intro

01:28 Q1 - What does (protecting) media freedom mean to you?

03:40 Q2 - What should the EU legislators do or do better to protect media freedom?

06:59 Q3 - What are the pitfalls that EU legislators should avoid when trying to protect the media and its freedom?

10:46 You have 2 minutes to deliver a message to the powers that be in the EU: make your case.

12:05 Outro

Key Quotes

"Media freedom (...) should be about ensuring that we don't put systems in place that favour and institutionalise certain ways of being a publisher."

1 / 10

"There's a tendency to define media freedom (...) like financial freedom where legislation favours old legacy publishers, and (...) they forget the new ideas and the new needs of journalism."

2 / 10

"[EU legislators] shouldn't let the old guard define what media freedom is, and there's a plurality of people who should be heard."

3 / 10

"Legacy publishers (...) dominate the debate because they are ‘the news’, but they also have the financial powers to actually put in the lobbying efforts, which a lot of small publishers don't."

4 / 10

"Legislators shouldn't get too blindsided by the discourse about the tech platforms being the main problem. (...) Media legislation is only 10% [about] tech platforms, there's a lot of other stuff."

5 / 10

"Focus on journalism and not the medium. (...) Journalism can take many shapes (...) Don't make legislation that purely focuses on one type."

6 / 10

"Don't make laws that protect, but make laws that empower. (...) Create a path or opportunity for media publishers to do something new."

7 / 10

"Support ideas and not business models. (...) [Otherwise,] you're protecting the business, not the journalism."

8 / 10

"Support ideas and not business models. (...) Because that's actually what allows us to have a proper and good public debate across the entire EU and beyond."

9 / 10

"There isn't (...) one type of media publisher out there, but (...) many perspectives. And the most important task for a legislator in Europe is to ensure that there is a breadth of multiple options in the media landscape."

10 / 10

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About Our Guest

Thomas Noppen | Board Member - New Media Denmark

Thomas Noppen is a board member and previous chair of New Media Denmark. An organisation which he founded to create a unified political voice for small and medium sized digital and innovative media publications in Denmark. His journalistic experience ranges from hosting a weekend show on Danish national radio to founding and managing an online newspaper before editing a printed design magazine. At a European level, he's part of the steering committee at the European Innovative Media Publishers.

Relevant Resources

European Media Freedom Act EIMP Position Paper: “Boost media pluralism through a level playing field online”

European Innovative Media Publishers

New Media Denmark

1:1 with Thomas NoppenNew Media Denmark