Editor’s note: We are republishing an announcement of the Media Blend Hackathon from The Fix’s partners International Press Institute and Media Development Foundation. Apply by the 17th of March to join the three-day offline event in Vienna in late May. 

The European media hackathon Media Blend is pleased to announce that applications are now open for its main event which will take place in Vienna, Austria, and starts on the 22nd of May. It is a three-day competition for media managers, journalists, and technologists from newsrooms and media startups around Europe to explore tech-powered solutions to improve and enhance journalism operations, sustainability, production, and storytelling.

Participants will have the opportunity to delve further into developing their project ideas with industry-leading mentors, and, eventually, pitch them to the jury, media investors, philanthropists and experts in the field and compete for a chance to win kick-off grants of €5,000. The deadline for applications is the 17th of March.

The program is primarily co-funded by the Creative Europe Program and is a part of a bigger project, which is coordinated and administered by the International Press Institute and implemented by a consortium of media organisations including BIRN, and Thomson Foundation. Media Blend Hackathons are designed and implemented by a Ukrainian media development organisation, Media Development Foundation.

“At the Media Innovation Europe consortium, our goal is to unlock innovation to help newsrooms in Europe, both young and old, achieve sustainability. The Media Blend Hackathons are a critical step toward rethinking how media can become more resilient to the fast-changing realities around them, from building closer relationships with audiences to ensuring the financial viability of their news products”, said Ryan Powell, Product and Innovation Manager at the International Press Institute. 

Graphic created by Media Development Foundation and International Press Institute

Anyone interested can apply within a team of up to four people or alone (Media Blend will help individual applicants find the team with matching or similar ideas). The organisers expect the applicants to have rough ideas of projects related to the following workstreams:

  • Analytics and Monetisation: this year the key focus for many publishers will be looking to hang on to new subscribers gained during Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and COVID-19. That’s why the organisers encourage the participants to tackle this challenge and use technologies for improving subscriber retention.
  • Media research and data analytics: there is a negative trend of dropping trust in the media, accelerated by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the pandemic. The main reason for that might be the spread of fake news and messages from the sources of information. Therefore the organisers identify countering fake news and verifying the information as the second challenge.
  • Content production and distribution: growing news avoidance among audiences seemingly keeps many newsrooms up at night. During this hackathon, the organisers would like to focus on people under 25, who due to their news consumption behaviour are less interested in traditional news subjects and don’t have a strong affiliation with specific media brands. So the last objective is to find a way to make Gen Z users engaged and instantly aware of the information that matters most to them.

The main challenges are identified in each category to help potential participants focus their efforts, but the Media Blend team also encourages applicants to bring in other innovative ideas solving different challenges in the media sector.

Applicants can participate in an ideation session curated by media and tech experts in order to refine their project ideas. Although participation in the ideation sessions is not mandatory – it will give those taking part an upper hand in the selection process. To apply for the participation in the ideation session, applicants have to submit their details here.

The selection of the participants for the hackathon will be administered by the project team and led by an independent jury consisting of European media market leaders. The selection will be based on the following criteria:

  • Team participants come from at least 2 different countries and 2 different companies;
  • Suggested idea provides a viable and innovative solution to a challenge related to the 3 main hackathon’s work streams (mentioned above).

During the event, all participants will be supported by experts to develop their products, create a business, promo- and action plan, and prepare for the pitching session.

Applicants must be based in one of the following countries: Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Republic of Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Kosovo, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Moldova, Montenegro, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, and Ukraine.

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