ISOJ wraps up second virtual-only conference with more than 7,300 registrants from 154 countries

• By Knight Center
• May 18, 2021

More than 7,300 people from 154 countries and territories registered for the 22nd annual International Symposium on Online Journalism (ISOJ) as the global journalism conference went completely online for the second year in a row.

This year’s ISOJ brought together journalists, academics and media executives from around the world for five days of discussion on some of the most pressing issues of digital journalism.

From April 26 to 30, a diverse group of 87 speakers from 13 countries shared successes and failures, as well as insights gleaned along the way.

More than 5,000 people joined ISOJ via Zoom in English and Spanish, and nearly 12,000 followed the sessions on YouTube in the two languages. Recordings of each individual session are available via our language-specific playlists. You can access the playlists of all sessions in English and in Spanish.

Keynote speakers for the symposium included A.G. Sulzberger, chairman and publisher of The New York Times; Katharine Viner, editor-in-chief of The Guardian; Anna Palmer and Jake Sherman, founders of Punchbowl News; Lauren Williams and Akoto Ofori-Atta, founders of Capital B; and Marty Baron, former executive editor of The Washington Post.

Additionally, 10 panels covered online journalism topics ranging from collaborative investigative networks, to online violence against women journalists, to race and equity in the news.

Two of the panels featured peer-reviewed research from the #ISOJ Journal, now in its 11th volume and focused on the evolution of online journalism.

There were also five workshops on innovation from the Global South, developing secure communications with sources, Google tools for journalists beyond search, covering climate change and separating news from opinion.

We’d like to thank Knight Foundation and Google News Initiative (GNI) for sponsoring ISOJ. We’d also like to thank Univision Noticias for supporting the simultaneous interpretation of all ISOJ sessions to Spanish for the eighth consecutive year. And thank you to the John S. Knight Journalism Fellowships at Stanford University for sponsoring an excellent welcome virtual party and to the Moody College of Communication for hosting a great farewell happy hour.

A huge thank you to Veritas Group for helping with production and distribution, yet again making ISOJ run smoothly and more professionally. We are also grateful to the Moody College tech team for helping to stream and record the event.

And we extend thanks to Steven Mines and his team of interpreters for making sure that Spanish-speaking ISOJ attendees were able to watch in their preferred language.

Remember that isoj.org will soon house all videos from the 22nd ISOJ, as well as transcripts of all sessions. For now, you can view other videos, transcripts, and news stories from past symposia dating back to 1999 on our site.

Below is a list of articles covering each panel from this year, composed by the Veritas Group and the Knight Center’s LatAm Journalism Review teams:

Keynotes

• New York Times chairman and publisher A.G. Sulzberger opens ISOJ with discussion on trust, diversity and the business of journalism
• ‘High quality matters,’ says editor-in-chief of The Guardian, who shared editorial and business strategies, as well as pandemic challenges, during ISOJ
• New media outlet focused on Washington politics, Punchbowl news achieves more than US$ 1 million in subscriptions in only four months
• With a national newsroom and several local bureaus, Capital B wants to get closer to Black communities and regain their trust in media
• Baron on Bezos ownership of the Washington Post: ‘I don’t think that we would have been a success without his involvement’

Panels

• Collaboration in investigative reporting presents its challenges, but the reward is truthful and well-reported stories for the global community
• Engaging with communities is non-negotiable for the survival of journalism, according to directors and strategists
• Fighting disinformation, especially surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, is one of biggest challenges of our lifetimes
• Research on bots, credibility and zombie sites capture the evolution of online journalism at ISOJ
• Global Issues require global solutions: addressing online violence against women journalists
• Photogrammetry, VR and AR are adding new dimensions to storytelling where readers have the opportunity to act upon their curiosity
• Traditional opinion sections are evolving and adapting to the digital media ecosystem
• Invaluable relationships for the success of local news: Networking and collaboration are key
• How Black and Brown-owned media companies are working to change the diversity landscape in newsrooms
• Diving deep into journalism engagement with peer-reviewed research for the ISOJ Journal

Workshops

• Journalists from the Global South share how innovation helped their newsrooms to reach new readers, find new stories and combat disinformation
• How journalists can develop secure communication with sources in the Age of the Internet
• Harnessing the power of Google to produce better and bigger journalism
• Finding unique angles to cover climate change and get readers’ attention
• Opinion journalists show how publications and platforms can work to distinguish news from opinion

If you joined us for ISOJ thank you. If not, we hope you’ll read these stories and watch the YouTube recordings of each session, available in English and in Spanish.