Happy Friday! Today's Media Roundup is brought to you by Chris.

Why is Insider still thriving? "Because we didn't try to be Disney" — www.pressgazette.co.uk

Insider has been quietly powering away in the background of the media industry, solidly performing while its contemporaries have flamed out. It's been responding quickly to new editorial opportunities and making small but decisive investments in new products. That, according to its chief executive Henry Blodget, is what ultimately sets Insider apart from its rivals:

"Buzzfeed was modelling itself as an entertainment company with a news division. Whereas we want to be a journalism company. We’re not trying to build the Disney piece. That’s a big difference and that focus has helped us a lot. And again, it forced us to build a model that was sustainable for journalism – not something that is news funded by another part of the organisation."

What's interesting here is that Insider seems to be deliberately steering into mushy middle which we've often argued is a death sentence for media organisations. It could be argued that Insider's subject matter is niche enough to avoid that, but more than anything we think it speaks to the inherent dangers of unchecked VC funding and unreachable expectations.

We must address the war on women journalists, online and offline — digitalcontentnext.org

Excellent article from Kiran Nazish here that we're not even going to attempt to paraphrase: "Threats and violations against women journalists have become more than a job hazard. This is a threat to their lives. And it poses a threat to journalism itself... A lack of institutional support can be especially difficult for the many women who are freelance journalists."

Diversity hit between the eyes as old media pockets about 90% of big tech cash — www.crikey.com.au

Congratulations to the people and organisations who argued that the Australia-Google deal was good for journalism for their historically wrong takes. We discussed it on this week's podcast, but any direct payment from platforms is only likely to benefit the biggest (and baddest) players. That's exactly what's happened here. Slow claps all round.

The Arizona Republic considers killing “zombies” a staple of its digital subscription strategy — betternews.org

We love an extended metaphor here at Media Voices. This explanation of how the Arizona Republic created its rules for surviving the zombie apocalypse of inactive 'undead' subscribers is worth a read for the practical approach to reducing churn alone. The Zombieland comparisons are a bonus.

This week's podcast:

The Bureau Local director Megan Lucero on the collaborative future of news — voices.media

This week Megan Lucero, director of the Bureau Local at the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, provides us with a hopeful look at the present and future of local journalism and how regional media is changing.

Sharing is caring — www.getrevue.co

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