Here are 4 visions of what journalism might look like in 2025

The future of journalism will come down in one of four ways. At least, that’s what a new report What’s New(s): Scenarios for the Future of Journalism, released by the Dutch Journalism Fund purports. And while the study looks specifically at the future of media in the Netherlands, the visions they describe are easily transferable to wherever you live. The report, which will be presented to the Dutch parliament, identifies four possible futures for 2025.

"The Wisdom of the Crowd": a world where journalistic startups have crushed traditional industry and the sharing economy prevails. Journalistic enterprises are bootstrapped and rely on crowdfunding, while a healthy skepticism by the public of major media interlopers like Apple and Facebook is maintained.

"A Handful of Apples": Giant technology companies -- see the aforementioned Apple and Facebook -- have set the agenda. News is highly personalized, but that’s due to the fact that all the chains and distribution platforms have been tightly contracted into the webs of these huge new powers. In this dystopian future, the traditional news industry has not survived and is now ruled by tech.

"The Shire": Though traditional institutions have still not survived in this scenario, they’ve been replaced by local and regional publications that are civically inclined. On thematically driven community sites, both citizen journalists and professional reporters find an audience.

"Darwin's Game": media organizations must adapt or perish. The narrowing mechanism is, rather unexpectedly, transparency. In “Darwin’s Game,” the news-consuming public has come to have exacting standards for the quality of their journalism, and wants journalists to show their work. To survive in this world, traditional media should expect to evolve in how they see their audience. Those that don’t should not expect to survive.