At UBC’s Future of Journalism conference, journalists said creators are not replacing journalism outright but highlighting how much newsrooms must change to stay relevant.
Newsrooms trying to reach young audiences are no longer competing only with rival outlets. They are competing with creators who build trust one post, video and personal connection at a time.
That shift drove a University of British Columbia discussion on creators, influencers and local journalism, where panellists wrestled with a question facing the industry. Moderator Professor Alfred Hermida set the scene by asking whether creator journalism is an existential threat to legacy media, or simply evidence that the news landscape has already changed.
Bob Kronbauer, known online as BC Bob and the founder of Vancouver Is Awesome, said news organizations cannot afford to ignore the shift. Audiences increasingly encounter news and information through social platforms, independent personalities and direct relationships rather than scheduled broadcasts or institutional brands.
“Will we wake up? Yeah. I think so. I think we have to,” Kronbauer said. “I used to watch it all the time, and I don’t watch it anymore.”
Anita Li, publisher and CEO of The Green Line, pushed back against the most dramatic framing. She said creator culture should not be treated only as a threat to journalism. Newsrooms, she argued, can borrow creator techniques without abandoning reporting standards.
“I think it’s just a tool, like in the toolkit,” Li said.
Tanya Talaga, journalist, author, filmmaker and The Globe and Mail columnist, said legacy media will survive, but as one part of a more crowded media landscape.
“We’re going to have a pie with lots of pieces cut out of it,” Talaga said. “It’s like smaller and smaller and smaller. And I think that’s just going to be the way of the future.”
The line between journalist and creator
The panellists did not treat “journalist” and “creator” as mutually exclusive identities. But they were clear that journalism depends on more than audience reach.
Kronbauer said he does not see himself primarily as a breaking-news reporter. His work focuses on British Columbia stories, local history and culture, often through short videos and social posts that rely on personality as much as subject matter.
“I consider myself a storyteller,” he said. “What I do isn’t breaking news. It’s not hard news. It’s rarely news at all.”
Still, he said his experience working with trained journalists at Glacier Media shaped how he approaches stories and helped keep his work grounded in newsroom standards.
Talaga drew a firmer line around professional identity. She said journalism training, verification and accountability still matter, particularly in an environment where opinion can travel as quickly as reporting.
“I’m a journalist, I’m a storyteller as well,” she said.
The danger, Talaga said, is not that independent voices are entering the field. It is that audiences may read partial information, commentary or unverified claims as news.
“There is something about truth, and we don’t talk a lot about where is the truth coming from and who’s telling the story,” she said.
Li said many younger journalists still see themselves as journalists, but not necessarily as future employees of legacy newsrooms. At The Green Line, she said, staff are drawn to a more collaborative model that asks communities what information they need and uses social video to reach audiences where they already are.
The Green Line focuses on young Torontonians trying to make city life work, from housing and grocery costs to loneliness, public services and community connection. Li said the outlet presents itself not only as a journalism operation but as a community and information services organization.
That language is deliberate. For some audiences, “journalism” itself has become contested or politicized. The work, Li suggested, still rests on reporting, but the relationship with the audience has to feel more useful, transparent and direct.
Trust, harm and transparency
Trust became the panel’s central question. For Kronbauer, credibility as an independent media figure comes from consistency. He said journalists and creators build trust by telling the truth repeatedly over time.
But he also warned that some online personalities borrow the visual cues of journalism without doing the reporting behind them. Kronbauer said a creator can stand in front of a camera, use the language of news and appear authoritative while offering little more than opinion based on a thin set of facts.
Li said personality-driven trust is not new. Local television reporters and anchors were familiar figures long before the word influencer became part of media vocabulary. The difference now is the platform, the format and the expectations audiences bring to the exchange.
“So to me it’s not like influencers or creators are reinventing the wheel,” Li said. “It’s something that journalists have historically done.”
For Li, the harder question is how to meet younger audiences’ expectations without compromising journalistic independence. Traditional newsrooms often define credibility through fairness, public service and holding power to account. Younger audiences on platforms such as TikTok may also judge coverage by whether it reflects lived experience, avoids harm and treats communities with care.
She described a recent discussion inside The Green Line over a social video about a Toronto neighbourhood denied an emergency flood plan. The reported article included both the city’s position and the concerns of community organizers. The social version leaned more strongly toward the community’s perspective. Li said she understood why the hook worked, but worried it could make officials less likely to take the outlet seriously.
“I don’t have an answer to that,” she said. “I’m still kind of trying to figure it out.” She explained that she reminded her team of the need to be fair and impartial in their work.
For Talaga, questions of trust and authenticity are inseparable from online abuse and denialism about Indigenous history and identity. Indigenous journalists, she said, face attacks not only on their work but on the legitimacy of the stories they tell.
She said comments on some of her work have been turned off at her request because of the abuse readers from her community would otherwise see.
“They’re so hurtful. They’re so racist. It’s unbelievable,” Talaga said.
That is why media literacy, she argued, cannot be treated as optional. Audiences need better tools to distinguish reporting from opinion, truth from falsehood and accountability from performance.
“I think that we need to be teaching media literacy in our schools because we are leaving it out to the audience to figure it out who’s telling the truth, who’s not telling the truth,” Talaga said.
What young journalists need next
The panellists also warned that the changing media economy requires skills many journalists were never taught.
Talaga said running Makwa Creative means doing far more than reporting. Her work now spans books, documentary film, podcasts, web series, YouTube distribution, fundraising and hiring. Independence brings freedom, but it also brings the pressure of sustaining a business.
“It’s hard. It’s not easy to be independent,” she said.
Kronbauer said journalism schools need to take that reality seriously. Independent journalists and media founders are not only producing stories. They are also building audiences, managing revenue, understanding platforms and making business decisions.
“They’re entrepreneurs,” he said. “They’re straight up storytellers.”
Li said young journalists need business fundamentals, whether they become freelancers, newsletter writers, newsroom employees or founders of small outlets. She also said journalism education must help students understand artificial intelligence and set rules before big tech sets them for journalism.
When asked what advice they would give students entering the field, the panellists rejected the idea of one correct path.
Kronbauer urged students to begin publishing while they are still in school.
“Start it now while you’re in school,” he said. “Just start making videos.”
Talaga said students should pursue formal training and newsroom experience where they can, but also build their own projects on the side. Journalism careers, she suggested, are no longer linear.
“There’s no one clear path,” she said.
Li said her own path began in traditional newsrooms before moving through digital media, audience engagement and independent publishing. That training still matters, she said, even as the industry changes.
“It’s so important to have a solid foundation as a journalist,” Li said.
The panel, “The New Vanguard: Creators, Influencers, and the Local Ecosystem,” was part of the Future of Journalism summit at the University of British Columbia on May 13, 2026. The session examined how local news reaches younger audiences as more information moves through creators, platforms and independent media brands.
The summit was presented by Global Journalism Innovation Lab, the UBC School of Journalism, Writing, and Media and Canadian Journalism Foundation, and supported in part by funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
Photos: Reilly Brady