In September 2023, E&P reported on the Arizona Newspapers Association and the Arizona Broadcasters Association merger.

In the past year, there have been several legacy newspaper and public media mergers, such as Chicago Public Media's acquisition of the Chicago Sun-Times, The Steinman's "gifting" of their 150+-year-old Lancaster, PA newspaper to the local public broadcasting outlet and the Denton (TX) Record-Chronicle becoming part of Dallas-Fort Worth's KERA Public Broadcasting operations.

Many news media pundits predict that, in the very near future, we will see more broadcasting and newspaper newsrooms working as one to compete for larger audiences and achieve new economies of scale to achieve sustainable business models.

For this reason, E&P sought insights from the Radio Television Digital News Association's CEO & President Dan Shelley on how the RTDNA is helping journalism survive in today's complex local news media ecosystem. Topics discussed in this episode of "E&P Reports" include the fight for cameras (and microphones) in courtrooms. Should the news media industry police itself in defining who is a journalist? We also explore the growth of citizen journalism, its impact on local news media outlets and more.

Dan Shelley is president and CEO of the Radio Television Digital News Association (RTDNA) and president of the RTDNA Foundation. Previously, Dan was senior vice president of digital content strategy for iHeartMedia, senior vice president at Interactive One (part of Radio One), director of digital media at WCBS-TV, New York and an executive producer for WCBS-TV News.