For more than 30 years, I’ve watched the news industry repeat the same mistake over and over again.
Every time a new technology comes along, traditional media declares it the enemy. They ridicule it. They dismiss it. They tell everyone it’s a fad that will never replace “real journalism.” Then, a few years later, they quietly adopt the very thing they once condemned—only after they’ve surrendered market share, readers and relevance to those who embraced change first.
The news industry was scared to death of the internet. They felt it would allow any Joe off the street to start a blog and trump them. That’s exactly what it did, and it not only empowered the people, but put companies like Gannett on notice to up their game and deliver what people wanted. They were no longer the only players in town.
I’ve seen it happen with the internet. I watched it happen with free online news. I watched it happen with social media.
Now it’s happening all over again with artificial intelligence.
When I began working in digital media during the earliest days of the commercial internet, I was part of a team at InJersey—owned by the Asbury Park Press—and later at ePresence, one of the pioneering companies that helped bring newspapers, television stations and Fortune 500 companies online during the dot-com boom.
At the time, many newsroom veterans looked at the internet as little more than a novelty. When Gannett took over the Asbury Park Press, they told all of us internet gurus to hit the road and start looking for new jobs.
“The internet is a fad,” Publisher Robert Collins Declares, then told he is pulling the plug on IN Jersey and all that we built as a team. It was the future. It was Patch 20 years before Patch.
- Shore News Network says AI is the next evolution of digital journalism.
- Editor Phil Stilton says traditional media has repeatedly resisted technological change before ultimately adopting it.
- AI is used to assist with story components including FAQs, summaries, SEO, source attribution and visual content.
- The publication argues AI will become a standard newsroom tool within the next decade.
“We transformed the entire industry,” I often tell people. “We helped kick off the online news industry.”
That isn’t arrogance. It’s simply history. It wasn’t just me, people like Ken Kruse, Stanton Fisque, Diane Burley, John Lott, Neptune Interactive Design, Paul Lamhutt and of course, Jules Plangere, III. Without Plangere’s vision, none of it would have happened.
Back then, many newspaper executives insisted readers would never abandon printed newspapers. Editors argued that journalism couldn’t exist online. Publishers believed giving away news on the internet would destroy the business.
“You can’t read a computer on the toilet,” they told us. Guess what? That’s exactly how it’s done today.
The internet proved them wrong.
Social media changed everything—and newspapers fought that too
When Shore News Network launched in 2013, we encountered the same resistance all over again.
The prevailing wisdom inside traditional newsrooms was that publishing news directly to Facebook was reckless. It was blasphemy and amateurish.
Giving away stories for free on social media, many argued, would destroy newspapers forever.
We ignored the critics.
Instead of treating social media as a marketing tool, we treated it as a publishing platform. We went directly to readers rather than waiting for them to come to us.
Today, virtually every major newspaper, television station and digital publication distributes its content across Facebook, Instagram, X, TikTok and other platforms.
They eventually copied the model.
The problem is they never truly adapted their business.
Most traditional news organizations remain structured around operational models developed during the 19th century, when newspapers controlled printing presses, delivery routes and advertising monopolies.
Those advantages no longer exist. Nobody controls the printing press in 2026, and they can’t get over it. If they want to survive, they have to.
“We have always been on the cutting edge of what’s next in the media industry,” I said recently. “They hate us because they know we can pivot quickly, but they’re too bloated and set in their ways. The newspaper industry is still modeled after 1800s business models. They can’t adapt, and that’s why they’re failing.”
They will hate on AI tools that can modernize their newsroom because they don’t know how to do anything else but fear technology in the newsroom.
AI is another tool—not a replacement for journalists
Today’s debate centers on artificial intelligence.
Once again, many legacy media organizations portray emerging technology as an existential threat to journalism itself.
That misunderstands how responsible newsrooms are actually using AI.
At Shore News Network, AI doesn’t decide what is newsworthy. It doesn’t conduct interviews. It doesn’t verify facts. It doesn’t replace editorial judgment.
Journalists still determine what to report, verify information, interview sources, review documents and make final publishing decisions.
AI assists with repetitive production tasks that once consumed valuable newsroom time.
Why should you read a 200 page legal brief when AI can parse it into humanly-manageable chunks? Why sift through thousands of pages of data when an AI report can pull the data you want in seconds? Why spend time with formatting layout when it can do that for you?
It gives us more time to focus on actual stories.
We use it to help generate reader-friendly FAQs, summarize complex information into key points, improve search optimization, organize source attribution and assist with visual concepts and image generation where appropriate.
Those tools allow reporters and editors to spend more time doing journalism and less time formatting articles.
That’s evolution—not replacement.
Journalism has always evolved with technology
Every generation of journalists has seen new technology reshape the profession. Imagine early colonial newspapers being horrified at printing presses that can print, collate, and package newspapers instead of having a manual operator place the page, print the page, and move the page after each pass of the press.
Those who didn’t move to automated presses, claiming traditionalism over technology, were the first stubborn publishers to vanish.
The telegraph accelerated reporting.
Photography transformed newspapers.
Radio challenged print.
Television changed news consumption.
Cable news created a 24-hour cycle.
The internet democratized publishing.
Social media decentralized distribution.
Artificial intelligence is simply the next step.
Refusing to acknowledge that reality won’t stop the technology from advancing.
It will simply leave those who refuse to adapt even further behind.
The industry will eventually catch up
If history is any guide, today’s AI skeptics will eventually embrace many of the same tools they criticize today.
Within five to ten years, AI-assisted workflows will likely become standard across much of the media industry, just as websites and social media eventually did.
By then, however, another disruptive technology will almost certainly be emerging.
That’s the cycle.
Traditional media resists.
Independent innovators experiment.
Readers embrace change.
Legacy organizations reluctantly follow.
Then the cycle begins again.
The future of journalism won’t be determined by whether AI exists.
It will be determined by which news organizations learn how to use it responsibly while continuing to uphold the principles that matter most: accuracy, verification, accountability and public trust.
Technology changes.
Good journalism doesn’t.
FAQ
- How does Shore News Network use AI?
AI assists with production tasks such as FAQs, key points, source organization, search optimization and certain visual elements, while editorial decisions remain with journalists. This FAQ box you’re looking at right now is AI-generated, but proofread and checked by an editor before publishing. - Does AI replace reporters?
No. Reporting, interviewing, verification and editorial judgment continue to be performed by journalists. It only replaces lazy reporters. - Why does Shore News Network support AI?
The publication views AI as the next stage in newsroom evolution, similar to the internet and social media before it.
Source: Opinion by Shore News Network Editor Phil Stilton.
