LCA ACCELERATORS: “Did Content Kill the Media Star?”

The media landscape is different today than it was yesterday, with the pace of change getting ever quicker.

With more media outlets than ever, public access is at an all-time high – whether that be access to celebrities, politicians, celebrity politicians, business leaders or any public figure, intentional or not. Meanwhile, it is happening at a time when reputation has never been more important, seen in many ways as the most valuable commodity to any organisation in 2025.

Whether it’s the algorithms or Trump himself ripping up the rule book, these seismic shifts in media are a global phenomenon that are playing out on our doorstep in London.  

CityAM has dropped its Monday and Friday editions; The Evening Standard is no-longer daily, replaced by the weekly London Standard; and TimeOut is now purely online. 

But while The New Yorker has suggested London is now a local news desert, change is perhaps signalling local journalism is evolving but by no means dead. The arrival of London Centric, The Londoner and Lines to Take are just two examples of new London online news outlets from national journalists setting up on their own. The Times has launched a dedicated London edition, that far from avoiding London stories for ‘being too London’, instead aims to celebrate the London stories of interest to both Londoners and its visitors. A paper to reflect the international gateway city London has long been. 

Beyond London, Tortoise Media’s buy-out of The Observer continues to make headlines with news of redundancies and long standing Observer commentators walking away (an insider at Tortoise tells me slow and steady wins the race!). And the recent united campaign across all UK national newspapers – Make IT FAIR–  was an attempt to tackle the government’s plans to water down the copyright laws as the intellectual property of journalists is increasingly tested by the rise of AI.

In broadcast we have seen the BBC introduce BBC Verify in an attempt to authenticate its content as a point of difference to its competitors – placing trust at the heart of what they do against growing scepticism around what is true and what is not in an age of ‘fake news’. Sky News, meanwhile, is championing quality as the future announcing plans to overhaul its programming and newsroom to create a model of premium paid content that it says will “safeguard its future from an existential threat to traditional TV brought about by the rise of YouTube and TikTok”.  This is a marked step-change against dwindling advertising revenues that puts faith in the idea users are willing to pay for quality. 

In our very own trade press we’ve seen EG go under, nearly, only to resurrect (thankfully!) as Estates Gazette.  The news EG was closing was the moment many in the property industry took notice of how much change was going on in the news outlets that celebrate the sector and, crucially, hold it to account.  The rallying cry to support Estates Gazette demonstrated how we value the role of sector commentators. 

As well as the need for new commercial measures to allow Estates Gazette to continue for another 200 years, the opportunity for Estates Gazette 2.0 is to harness the dynamism in the sector today that is a very different audience make-up to what it had when it was founded in 1858. We should be asking how we reflect this with relevant content to engage. Inspiration can be drawn from the growing consumer interest for the sector and titles such as Wallpaper* and Monocle increasingly focusing on the makeup of towns and cities, and a rise in property social media influencers. As well as producing highly engaging and visual content, these writers and content creators are responding to a rising consciousness around how buildings and developments impact the freedoms, community and health and safety of daily lives. While these outlets by no means compete with the role of Trade publications that play a very different role, they should encourage us all to think audience first – how do you get your news and what grabs your attention? Holding someone’s attention is a tall ask in 2025.

Changes in the media landscape was the focus for our first LCA Accelerators, where we interrogated consumption trends, platform evolution, audience segmentation and the impact of AI and all-time high public access on trust and reputation. With relentless change the need for businesses to adapt is critical if they are to avoid being left behind. The opportunity for real estate is to harness more channels to engage growing audiences and inform thinking.  While change can present risk, we should celebrate the fact reporting on property and the built environment is going beyond the trade and business news where it once belonged. In doing so we’re unlocking greater potential to reach new audiences and untapped talent that can join the sector and bring new thinking.