Is Journalism Really Dying? A Seoul Conference Offers Reality Check

Last Updated:April 01, 2026, 14:21 IST

From shrinking attention spans to the rise of AI, global journalists debate what’s changing and what isn’t.

In a room full of journalists in Seoul, I asked a question many in the industry have been quietly wrestling with, is traditional media like television and newspapers slowly dying?

The response was immediate and perhaps unexpected.

“Let’s not call it dying," said Lee Joo-hee, Managing Editor at The Korea Herald, gently pushing back. What we are witnessing, she argued, is not a collapse, but a shift, a “recomposition of formats."

The idea that journalism is not disappearing but reshaping itself ran through conversations at the 2026 World Journalists Conference (WJC), hosted by the Journalists Association of Korea (JAK), which kicked off on April 30 at the Korea Press Centre, in Seoul.

The gathering brought together journalists from across the world, including India, South Korea, Belarus, France Croatia, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Hungary, Indonesia, Bulgaria, Spain, the Czech Republic, and Slovenia, to debate “Democracy and Journalism: The Role of the Media in an Era of Crisis," with a strong emphasis on generative AI, at a time of technological disruption and declining trust.

A SHIFT IN HOW WE CONSUME NEWS

The concern I raised wasn’t abstract. It’s something visible across newsrooms and audiences alike, particularly among younger consumers.

Attention spans are shrinking, platforms are multiplying, and the way news is consumed has changed dramatically.

The same video that might be ignored on television could easily rack up views on social media or an OTT platform.

Lee acknowledged the shift.

Fewer people are watching traditional television broadcasts or flipping through newspapers, she said, but that does not mean journalism itself is in decline.

Instead, audiences are becoming more selective, curating what they watch and read rather than consuming it passively.

“It’s been 20 years since I watched real TV," Daniel Bastard, Asia-Pacific Director at Courrier International, admitted, pointing to a broader trend.

Viewers today choose segments, clips and formats that suit them, rather than sitting through scheduled programming.

The pattern, he suggested, is not new. Radio did not disappear when television arrived. Newspapers survived both. The internet, in that sense, is not an executioner but another layer in the evolution of media.

The real story, then, is not the death of journalism, but a redistribution of attention.

AI ANXIETY AND THE PUSHBACK

If the first half of the conversation was about changing formats, the second was about something far more unsettling: artificial intelligence.

In another session, I raised a question that has been increasingly difficult to ignore: what happens if AI begins to replace journalists altogether?

Across industries, automation has already led to job losses.

In media, AI-generated scripts, automated translations, synthetic visuals and even virtual anchors are no longer theoretical.

The concern is not just technological, but economic.

If AI can produce content faster and cheaper, what stops organisations from replacing reporters, editors or anchors altogether?

Renata Ewa Kim, a journalist with Poland’s Newsweek Polska, acknowledged the anxiety but offered a grounded response.

The threat, she suggested, is often overstated.

In her newsroom, AI tools are already in use.

For instance, translating content from international editions. But an experiment revealed their limitations. Articles published without human editing, she said, failed to engage readers.

“People recognise it was produced by a machine," she noted.

The difference, she argued, lies in something far less tangible than speed or efficiency: human presence.

Journalism, at its core, is not just about assembling information. It is about reporting, observing, and telling stories with context and emotion. An algorithm may be able to process data, but it cannot replicate lived experience.

“Artificial intelligence won’t go to the border," she pointed out, referring to conflict reporting. It won’t speak to refugees, navigate uncertainty on the ground, or capture the nuance of human suffering.

For now, at least, that remains firmly within the domain of journalists.

BETWEEN DISRUPTION AND CONTINUITY

What emerged from the discussions in Seoul was not denial.

No one suggested that journalism is untouched by the forces reshaping it.

Traditional formats are under pressure. Newsrooms are adapting to digital-first audiences. AI is rapidly becoming part of everyday workflows.

But there was also a quiet resistance to the idea that journalism itself is under existential threat.

Instead, the consensus leaned towards adaptation.

Digital platforms may be overtaking print and broadcast in reach, but they are still vehicles for the same core function: informing the public.

AI may streamline processes, but it still depends on human judgment to verify, to contextualise, and to tell stories that resonate.

For countries like India, where the media landscape is vast, diverse and increasingly digital, these questions carry particular weight.

Younger audiences are moving away from legacy formats, but their demand for credible, timely information has not disappeared. If anything, it has intensified in an age of misinformation and rapid news cycles.

THE ROAD AHEAD

The conversations in Seoul did not offer easy answers, nor did they attempt to. What they did offer was perspective.

Journalism, it seems, is not at an endpoint. It is in transition.

Formats will continue to evolve. Technologies will continue to disrupt. Business models will be tested. But the fundamental role of journalism, which is to report, to question, and to tell stories grounded in reality, remains difficult to automate.

As one discussion after another made clear, the real challenge is not whether journalism will survive, but how it will adapt.

And if the voices in that room are anything to go by, it is far from ready to disappear.

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