The way we consume news has changed. During the recent INMA Africa Audience Development Summit, Researcher-in-Residence Greg Piechota looked at two forces driving this transformation: Artificial Intelligence and the creator economy. 

As they reshape how news is produced, distributed, and consumed, Piechota analysed what that means for Africa — and how it can lead the world as media is redefined.

Evidence of the collapse of traditional models is plentiful, and Piechota began by sharing an example from London: “Last year, the last daily local newspaper in London was closed and they switched from a daily to a weekly. For the first time, 9 million people of London have no daily newspaper in print anymore.”

That’s when creators stepped in to fill the void. One example is Michael MacLeod, who runs The Minute, a one-person newsletter operation. By skimming hundreds of sources each morning and curating stories for his 25,000 subscribers, MacLeod earns around £150,000 annually — five times the average salary of a local journalist in the U.K.

This example illustrates the disruptive power of creators, who can build audiences quickly, monetise through small contributions, and thrive outside traditional newsroom structures. However, the rapidly changing world of AI could threaten their success, as audiences could just as easily turn to AI-powered browsers to automatically generate personalised news digests.

“Many news publishers across the world feel they’re squeezed between creators on one side and AI on the other. In western countries, most consumers are already getting news from social and video platforms,” Piechota said, adding that today there are more creators globally than people employed by professional media companies.

Africa’s distinctive position

This rapidly changing environment puts Africa in a unique position, as it already depends on mobile, video-ready devices. With nearly 200 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa using these devices, Piechota maintained the continent is primed for social-first, mobile-first news consumption. 

Data from Reuters Institute indicate that in Nigeria, Kenya, and South Africa, social media is the dominant gateway to news. And adoption of AI tools like ChatGPT is higher in South Africa than in the United States, with African consumers expressing more excitement about AI than concern.

“So maybe it’s not like the Africa is becoming like the rest of the world; the rest of the world becoming more like Africa,” he said.

Part of this enthusiasm can be attributed to Africa’s demographics. With an average age of 19, Africa is the world’s youngest continent — and younger audiences are more likely to get news from influencers and creators than from traditional outlets. 

In the United States, about one-fifth of consumers get their news from influencers, but in Africa, that number jumps to nearly 40% of young people rely on influencers for news: “You already live in the future in many ways,” Piechota explained.

Creators as news sources 

Creators are rapidly replacing traditional news outlets, Piechota said. In the United States, Joe Rogan’s podcast rivals CNN and Fox in weekly reach. 

Although “not a news person,” Rogan now influences political discourse, interviewing figures like President Donald Trump and shaping electoral narratives. He is perhaps the highest-profile example of the creator movement which combines entertainment, commentary, and news — and has found a massive audience.

This is particularly relevant to Africa, where a youthful population and reliance on social platforms offers the ideal environment for creators who can explain, entertain, and engage. 

Piechota shared the example of a history teacher in Slovakia who became an Instagram sensation when she started created videos about history: “A newspaper invited her to become a news explainer. They don’t want a creator to be a journalist because she doesn’t know how to do journalism… but she knows how to talk to young people. So she’s a perfect addition to the newsroom because she can explain the most important news in a way that young people appreciate.”

African publishers could adopt similar strategies, Piechota suggested, inviting popular creators to collaborate without expecting them to become traditional journalists.

Journalism versus content

However, as publishers consider how creators and AI fit into the newsroom of tomorrow, Piechota underscored one crucial distinction: Journalism is not content. 

Content can be produced by anyone — or anything. Journalism, by contrast, is a process: witnessing events, investigating facts, verifying information, and making sense of reality. He compared the difference to raw eggs versus an omelette: AI and creators may serve raw eggs, but “nobody knows whether it’s good or not.” Journalism, on the other hand, cooks those eggs into something nourishing and reliable.

Of course, many audiences won’t recognise this difference.

“Some people do, and these are the people usually who pay for journalism,” he said. But, he added, news companies need to do a better job of communicating the distinction.

“We need to educate people at schools. We need to advertise the difference between journalism and everything else that is content that is available out there,” Piechota said, adding it should go so far as to change the titles being used.

“You shouldn’t have a title director of content. You should have the title director of journalism because we need to explain to everybody that there is a substantial difference between what we do and what others do.”

While creators attract attention — which in turn attracts advertisers — monetisation is uneven.

Platforms like Spotify and YouTube pay billions to creators, but the vast majority earn little. On Spotify, only 10,000 creators make more than US$130,000 annually, while most earn under US$6,000. The same dynamics apply across platforms: A few winners thrive, while most struggle.

As a result, successful creators often rely on selling products outside the platform — books, events, or even chocolate, as in the case of MrBeast. Content becomes a marketing tool rather than a product in itself.

“What it all means is that basically the creator economy is a marketing content marketing economy. They use the content only to sell other things rather than sell content itself,” he clarified.

For newsrooms, this suggests a future where news publishers act like record labels, managing creator talent and providing an infrastructure to sustain them. Since most creators burn out in three to five years, the stability of an established news organisation could help make the creator model more sustainable.   

Where AI fits in

Piechota envisions future newsrooms as hybrid spaces where journalists, creators, and AI agents work side by side. He cited the example of Ippen Media, which already is using AI agents in the newsroom: “They produce content about culture — for example, articles about 10 new movies on Netflix that you should watch.”

The content requires editors who will think about what type of content the AI should produce and then check it before publishing. Humans also will be needed to determine how to divide the work between human journalists, creators, and AI agents.

This model could be particularly powerful in Africa, Piechota said. By combining the continent’s youthful creator culture with professional journalism and AI efficiency, African newsrooms could move faster than other countries, avoiding the mistakes being made in the west: “We need change.”

Banner art: Adobe Stock Delmaine Donson/peopleimages.com.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .