Our 41st Annual Conference will be held on 22nd and 23rd May 2025
in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain
The annual forum of our organisation is hosted by our member 3Cat, the regional broadcaster in Catalonia, Spain. We will focus on three main topcs:
Artificial Intelligence - From automated content creation to audience personalization, AI is redefining how we produce, distribute, and consume information. But where do we draw the line? How can we ensure that technology enhances good journalism without compromising ethics and quality? We will tackle these challenges with experts, broadcasters, and industry leaders.
Audiences and Strategies - In a world of ever-changing consumption habits, regional broadcasters must rethink their strategies to engage, retain, and grow their audiences. What content formats are resonating today? How can public media compete in the digital landscape while staying true to their mission? We will explore innovative strategies to reach audiences effectively, share best practices, and discuss the future of public service media in Europe.
Promoting and Protecting Good Journalism - With misinformation on the rise and audience trust at stake, the role of regional public media has never been more critical. How can we uphold journalistic integrity while adapting to new digital trends? What strategies are working to keep public interest journalism strong and relevant? We will discuss the challenges and opportunities of promoting good journalism in today’s fast-changing media landscape.
We will talk about the challenges that regional public media services across Europe face, trends in content production and the role of media in society, and celebrate the best productions in regional media services across Europe in the Prix CIRCOM Gala event.
During the Conference, participants will have an opportunity to watch all programmes entered into the Prix CIRCOM 2025 - check the details HERE.
Conference Programme
Check the programme regularly for updates!
May 21st
- 20:30 Welcome Cocktail at El Born Centre de Cultura i Memòria
May 22nd, 2025 Conference day 1
Venue: Disseny Hub Barcelona
- 9:30 Opening Ceremony
Day One Morning Session: Artificial Intelligence in the Newsrooms
- 09:45 - AI for Regional Media: Overview, Opportunities & Outlook
This talk will review the recent developments in AI and its application to media, and will examine some of the new opportunities and potential threats that AI may pose for regional media in particular. It will conclude with a look at possible scenarios for AI’s future role in media, how media organisations might adapt to those scenarios and the potential for a new AI-mediated information ecosystem to emerge.
Speaker: David Caswell, Application Architect for AI in News Products & Workflows, StoryFlow Ltd.
David is an innovation consultant focused on applying AI to journalism. He was previously the Executive Product Manager of BBC News Labs and has held senior roles leading AI initiatives at Yahoo!, Tribune Publishing and The Los Angeles Times. Caswell also publishes peer-reviewed research on computational and automated forms of journalism
- 10:30 - Implementing AI-driven Workflows During a Year Full of News
In a year marked by elections and sports events, VRT revolutionized its news workflows with AI optimizations. Our new PAM system, featuring AI-powered transcription, has reshaped content search and editing processes. Through pilot projects and extensive training, we ensured a smooth transition while maintaining operations.
Speakers:
Isaac Meers, engineer in the Media Management team, VRT, Belgium
Isaac played a key role in the recent overhaul of the VRT’s newsroom PAM system, focusing on AI-driven workflow optimisation.
Jan Gerits, journalist, VRT, Belgium
For the past 25 years, Jan has been working as a journalist for VRT, starting in radio and later moving to the main TV news show. He played a key role in the transition to the new PAM system and the introduction of AI, operating as the bridge between the technology team and the newsroom.
- 11:00 - Smart Support: How AI Enhances the Modern Newsroom
Presentation on how AI supports the newsroom workflows in Omroep Brabant, focusing on practical applications such as automatically gathering and analyzing news sources and improving workflows through speech-to-text, transcriptions and organizing archives. The emphasis is on collaboration between humans and machines, while maintaining editorial control.
- Speaker: Sander Van Barneveld, News Manager, Omroep Brabant, The Netherlands
Sander is responsible for all the news on web, app and tv and directly in charge of the newsroom.
11:30 - Coffee break
- 11:50 - AI and Journalism: Towards a Model for Responsible Adoption
Artificial intelligence is transforming journalism by facilitating the analysis of large data volumes and streamlining processes such as transcription and trend detection. However, it also presents ethical risks, including biases, the creation of information bubbles, and the spread of unverified content. Journalists have a responsibility to ensure that technology upholds truthfulness and information quality. In this conference, we will explore the ethical principles that journalism is adopting to ensure the responsible integration of AI.
Speaker: Patricia Ventura, researcher and trainer in AI ethics
Patrícia Ventura Pocino holds a PhD in Communication from the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, where her dissertation on artificial intelligence, ethics, and communication received the extraordinary doctoral award. Her experience includes research, outreach, and training in AI ethics, with notable collaborations in institutions such as RTVE, Prisa Media, and CCMA - where she is a member of the Responsible AI Committee - as well as universities like Columbia and Amsterdam.
- 12:15 - AI and Minor Languages
This presentation will explore the challenges and opportunities of AI in supporting non-major and minority languages. Based on the European Language Equality Book, it will highlight the persistent technological gap that limits digital accessibility and inclusion. With the rise of large language models (LLMs), new initiatives are emerging to bridge this divide, fostering language diversity through open datasets, specialized AI models, and policy efforts. The presentation will discuss key findings and solutions aimed at ensuring linguistic equity in the AI-driven future.
Speaker: Arantza Del Pozo, Director of Speech and Language Technologies, Vicomtech
Arantza is Director of Speech and Language Technologies at Vicomtech, where she leads a team of 20 people dedicated to the research, development and transfer of speech and language technologies to industry. In the audiovisual field, she coordinated two of the first European projects exploring how speech recognition and machine translation can help optimize intralingual subtitling and subtitle translation. Since then, her team has continued to work on the development of automatic subtitling technology.
12:40 - Lunch
Day One Afternoon Session: Audiences and Strategies
- 14:00 - How SVT's Local Newsrooms Work to Reach a Younger Audience
The talk will focus on SVT Nyheter's transformation journey and the strategies and methods used to meet the evolving needs of a new audience. From in-depth analyses that identified five clear audience needs, to creating relevant journalism for a younger demographic. In October, SVT launched its transformation journey, where the goal is to produce content that meets the needs of a new generation. With 50 local newsrooms, cultural news and minority news SVT is exploring various approaches to reach a younger, more diverse audience. During the lecture, participants will gain insight into how the newsrooms have experimented with different methods, such as focus groups, data analysis, innovative work processes, and projects such as the creation of a dedicated target audience newsroom. We will also look at how new routines during morning meetings and new approaches to investigative and constructive journalism help tailor content to attract a younger audience in the news app and on the streaming platform.
Speaker: Jessica Wennberg, programme manager, SVT, Sweden
Jessica is the program manager of SVT Nyheter Local News, Cultural News and Minority News since October 2024. She has a long history in leading digital transformation in local journalism, from VK Media where she was editor in chief for several years. VK Media has been recognized for its work with innovation and developing content for new audiences.
- 14:30 - The Enigma of Alpha ADN: Decoding Next Gen Engagement Drivers
Young people are the future, but how are Alpha's today? Born since 2010, the older ones are already immersed in adolescence. Technology is not aspirational for them, immediacy is a must, they are creators of communities and they need to express themselves freely. Discover how 3Cat's Innovation & Knowledge team uses real-world research on Alpha's motivations and needs to enhance consumer engagement and create meaningful content in a hyper fragmented media landscape full of challenges and opportunities.
Speakers: Matias Ramos and Regina Arenas, Innovation & Knowledge team, 3Cat, Catalonia, Spain
Speakers’ details to be announced soon
- 15:00 - Understanding News Avoidance: Why is it Happening and What Can We Do About It?
Stressful, depressing, relentless - words increasingly used by our audiences to describe The News. Research is suggesting that as many as 39% of people across 47 countries take steps to actively avoid the news. There are striking and clear implications for our newsrooms and for our democratic systems - so who are the News Avoiders, why are they turning away from our journalism and what can we do to reach and connect with them?
Speaker: Joanna Spencer, Senior Planner at Audiences division, BBC, UK
Joanna has been a Senior Planner at the BBC for the last five years, contributing to the Audiences division - a team dedicated to helping content creators and product designers better understand what UK audiences want and need from the BBC.
- 15:30 - The ENACT Project: Easy News For New Audiences
How many people don't understand the content of news programmes? It is estimated that at least 20 percent of the population has reading comprehension problems. These figures range from people with intellectual disabilities to elderly people, and also new speakers of a language. Easy news can be considered an opportunity to reach new audiences, but real-life implementations are still limited. The ENACT project aims to foster collaboration across borders to explore how easy news could be developed on the web, radio and television in order to achieve a more diverse and pluralistic media environment. This presentation will clarify some key concepts around easy-to-understand language. It will also offer an overview of the ENACT project in terms of participants, objectives, stages and expected results.
Speaker: Anna Matamala, professor at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain
TransMedia Catalonia main researcher, AccessCat Network director. Anna specialises in audiovisual translation, media accessibility and accessible communication. She is involved in research and educational projects, as well as on standardisation and knowledge transfer activities.
- 16:00 - Presentation of CIRCOM Regional Annual Conference 2026
Yle, Finnish national public broadcasting company, will be hosting the 42nd Annual Conference of our association. The conference will be held in May 2026 in Tampere, Finland.
Speaker: Aki Karjalainen, Managing Editor, Local News, Yle, Finland
16:10 End of Conference Day 1
Day One Evening: 19:30 - Prix CIRCOM Regional 2025 Awards Ceremony
Venue: Maritime Museum of Barcelona
The ceremony celebrates the best productions in regional television broadcasting across Europe.
May 23rd, 2025 Conference day 2
Venue: Disseny Hub Barcelona
Day Two Session 1: Meet Prix CIRCOM Regional Winners
- 09:00 - An opportunity to get to know the creators of the award-winning programmes.
10:30 - Coffee break
Day Two Session 2: Promoting and Protecting Good Journalism
- 11:00 - How to Make Multi-award Winning Short Documentaries
In just one year, an independently produced series for TV3 3Cat Catalonia broke through the international media noise — winning top global awards including the prestigious International Emmy. This talk explores how bold editorial autonomy, cinematic storytelling, and global relevance can empower even small public broadcasters to compete with industry giants. Through the journey of Point of No Return, Raul will share practical insights on narrative strategy, access, and mindset — proving that size is no barrier when the vision is uncompromising.
Speaker: Raül Gallego Abellán, journalist and documentary filmmaker
Raül is an Emmy-winning journalist and documentary filmmaker whose work has been recognized as well with the Edward R. Murrow award, the Webby Awards, The Royal Television Society or the POY awards. He has directed and produced for global outlets including The Associated Press, Al Jazeera English, Channel 4 UK, TVE, and TV3 Catalonia, with a focus on conflict, social and human rights issues, and the human stories behind global events.
- 11:30 - Journalism Under Pressure
Politicians and advertisers. Economic, security and environmental crises, protests, wars and humanitarian catastrophes. Journalists and the media are under enormous pressure. The new century brought unprecedented challenges for journalists: kids are less and less interested in a career in journalism, and many users think that AI and social networks can replace us. The European Union believes that EMFA is a good answer for journalism, but will it be enough? Journalism is most important precisely in times of major crises, when it is most difficult to be a journalist.
Speaker: Domagoj Novokmet, journalist, Al Jazeera
Domagoj is a journalist with 30 years of experience. He started at the Croatian public broadcaster HRT where, among other positions, he was the host of the central political talk show, editor-in-chief of the news program and interim general director. His team launched two new TV channels, HRT (culture and education) and HRT4 (news channel). 7 years ago Domagoj moved to N1, a 24/7 news channel, regional CNN affiliate. In 2025 he joined the Croatian team of the international news channel Al Jazeera Balkans, which covers 6 countries in Southeast Europe and is part of the global Al Jazeera network.
- 12:00 - TBA
Session description to be announced soon
Speaker: Carlos Aguilar Paredes, Chair, European Board for Media Services (EBMS) and Board Member, National Authority for Competence and Markets (CNMC), Spain
Speaker’s details to be announced soon
- 12:30 - The Norwegian Model
Norway is first on the global Press Freedom Index, with several unique features to its media system. What can we learn from the Norwegian model?
Speaker: Solveig Husøy, Deputy Secretary General, Association of Norwegian Editors, Norway
Solveig has more than 20 years of experience as a journalist and editor for the Norwegian public broadcaster, NRK.
13:00 End of Conference Day 2
Conference Venues
The Welcome reception (May 21st) will be held at El Born Culture and Memory Center, the Conference (May 22nd and 23rd) at Disseny Hub Barcelona and the Prix CIRCOM Gala (May 22nd) at Maritime Museum of Barcelona.
Read more about the venues >>
About Catalonia and 3Cat
