LINA thanks attendees and sponsors of our 2024 LINA Summit.

30 April to 2 May, Port Douglas, Queensland.

With local co-host and valued LINA member:

Photo gallery

Summit Resources

See the summit resources for session slides, key takeaways and next steps for LINA members

Summit Resources

Session snapshot:

Conference kick-off

Summit co-hosts – Newsport, Kubirriwarra Yalanji Aboriginal Corporation – John Hartley.

Our summit co-hosts Newsport kicked off the summit along with the LINA team and a Welcome to Country from Chair of the Kubirriwarra Yalanji Aboriginal Corporation John Hartley.

Keynote presentation

The Digital Guide – Tracy Sheen

Author of The Digital Guide, Tracy Sheen helps empower small businesses with AI and digital tools. She shared insight into useful integrations of AI in small newsrooms and a little about what is coming down the pipeline, as we move into the next phase of “AI beginning to underpin new technology”.

Conference kick-off

Summit co-hosts – Newsport, Kubirriwarra Yalanji Aboriginal Corporation – John Hartley.

Our summit co-hosts Newsport kicked off the summit along with the LINA team and a Welcome to Country from Chair of the Kubirriwarra Yalanji Aboriginal Corporation John Hartley.

AI in Action

The Digital Guide – Tracy Sheen

Tracy Sheen demonstrated how magic AI functions in Canva can be used to efficiently create well-designed social media tiles, and how to work between ChatGPT and Canva. Then, best practice for using LinkedIn as a business.

Smart Connections: Using tech to reach new audiences

Community Broadcasting Association of Australia – Andrew Morris

CBAA Manager of Online Products and Services Andrew Morris shared his knowledge of connecting story posts to smart technology audience platforms, as well as a couple of tips and tricks for publishers branching into video and podcast content.

Bring the Trust

ABC – Stuart Watt, Edelman – Tom Robinson, AAP FactCheck – Ben James

LINA Executive Director Claire Stuchbery hosted a panel discussion on building and maintaining audience trust within communities.

Hon Michelle Rowland MP

Minister for Communications

Minister Rowland shared a video presentation praising the work of LINA and its members and re-iterating support for “media diversity and the sustainability of local, independent journalism”.

Read the full speech

LINA Update

LINA – Claire Stuchbery

Claire Stuchbery provided an update on LINA’s progress and member services, reporting value of almost $20k per annum for LINA membership.

ACMA Update

ACMA – Katherine Anstee

ACMA provided a short update on its progress on the Media Diversity Measurement Framework and what the framework means for digital publishers.

Know your value

LINA – Zahra Khalid, Impact Architects – Rosemary D’Amour, In the Cove, Jacky Barker, Fleurieu App, Susie Williams

LINA’s Data & Insights Analyst Zahra Khalid led a panel discussion on measuring impact for newsrooms. Impact Architects’ Senior Manager of Media Impact Strategy and Engagement Rosemary D’Amour shared insights on how to implement an impact tracking system and the benefits for newsrooms of showcasing qualitative impact.

Debate: Publishers must paywall news content to ensure sustainability

A debate between six LINA members

A lighthearted debate between publishers on the merits and/or evils of paywalling content.

Revenue Growth Pilot Program

Bastion Transform – Jenni Ryall and pilot program members

LINA members participating in the Revenue Growth Pilot Program joined Bastion Transform Group Director of Content and Media Jenni Ryall for a discussion about the income-based experiments they’re developing as part of the program.

SEO Workshop

ABC – Jane Mower

Jane shared advice on how to shape news coverage around audience demands based on common search results.

SEO has moved on considerably since “keyword” search optimisation. It is now much more than retrofitting SEO to stories.

Prepare for 3rd-Party Cookie Deprecation

Google – Chris Burgess

This session taught us about the impact cookie deprecation will have on our websites, and how to make the necessary changes before the change comes into place in 2025.

Skills refresh: Interviews and writing tips

Community Media Training Organisation – Martin Corben

A brush-up on reporting skills in this workshop run by the Community Media Training Organisation. Covering how to get the most from your interviews, how to approach tricky topics in reporting and a refresher on best practice writing techniques.

Grow your audience

Daily Motion – Jean-Baptiste Alary, Community Media Training Organisation – Dante St James

News avoidance is a rising concern, particularly among young audiences and women. This session looked at ways to reach audience groups you might not be engaging currently through multimedia content channels.

Newsletter strategies

Unmade Media – Tim Burrowes, Hills to Hawkesbury – Diana Paton

Rather than relying on social media algorithms to engage audiences, publishers can be pro-active about building direct newsletter lists to grow audience, revenue and engagement.

Solutions journalism

ABC – Suzanne Dredge, Missing Perspectives – Phoebe Saintilan

A panel discussion on our roles as journalists and publishers to produce solutions journalism, what exactly is solutions journalism, and the outcomes, benefits and challenges of this type of reporting.

Workshops and discussions:

Our News, Your Voice: Collective fundraising

This workshop session prepared newsrooms to run a digital campaign, including how to use the digital toolkit developed specifically for local newsrooms and how to set up a payment portal to get matched funding for the campaign.

Collective advertising working group discussion

This session was an opportunity to work together on a collective advertising representation: the model, the implementation, the tech, and how to start.

HR Challenges

This session was for people managing small teams, or preparing to take on staff, exploring potential solutions to issues like staff retention and sharing common challenges across all areas of personnel management.