The president and co-founder of The Intercept Brasil opened the keynote block on the first day of Media Party Buenos Aires 2026 with a talk on how an independent, member-powered newsroom can change history.
In the age of agents, journalists are no longer the only ones telling stories and spreading news: machines narrate too. Even so, Fishman warned that this does not mean laying off staff and replacing their work with AI. “You don’t need to play their game. You can play your own game to build a people-powered newsroom that has the power to do what we all wanted to do when we got into journalism, which is to try to shape history,” he said.
This is not Fishman’s first time on the Media Party stage. In 2018 he presented The Intercept Brasil at the Media Fair, and in 2019 he returned as a keynote speaker to tell the story of Vaza Jato, the investigation that shook Brazil. That journey is covered in the article published ahead of his keynote.
A newsroom funded by its readers
Fishman leads a nonprofit investigative news outlet funded mostly by reader donations. Its best-known work is the Vaza Jato series, which exposed the conduct of the influential Operation Car Wash (Lava Jato) prosecution task force, then-judge Sergio Moro and their allies.
The 2024 crisis: 90% less reach
In 2024, The Intercept Brasil was in crisis: the reach of its main stories fell by 90%, and recurring member revenue dropped by 30%. To turn things around, the newsroom began to “think bigger and smarter,” which meant new ways of doing journalism and of reaching its readers.
From newsletters to Meta Ads: more donations with fewer staff
According to Fishman, the outlet decided to bet on larger-scale strategies, technical capacity, modern marketing and new workflows. The model shifted from relying on traditional email newsletters to paid advertising on Meta (Meta Ads), which allowed it to scale massively and efficiently.
“We are able to raise more than we used to raise with more than 50 organic pieces, which are much more complex and sometimes legally risky. We have many more donations with fewer staff,” he explained. The search for sustainable models for journalism is one of the themes Media Party keeps coming back to, as in Ester Borges’s talk on who pays for the news.
A team that goes beyond journalists
The priority, said the president of the Brazilian outlet, was to invest in technical capacity. The Intercept Brasil did not only hire journalists for its investigations: it also added a chief operating officer, social media strategists, CRM specialists and frontend developers, among other roles.
Once the newsroom put these changes in place, with the help of agents, the improvements came quickly. “We care about the moment our work hits the street. The public took care of distribution; these are issues people care about,” he noted. Technology thus becomes a tool to boost reach without losing sight of the investigation.
Mass movements, not just a prosecutor or a senator
His motivation is simple: “We want big impact driven by people, not by institutions. To change the world you need mass movements of people, not just a prosecutor or a senator.”
“Report like a journalist, communicate like a marketer”
Asked the question guiding this edition, how to tell stories in the age of agents, Fishman answered: “Produce what agents can’t, and that means learning to embrace your human quirks. Communicate like a digital native, not like a journalist. Report like a journalist, think like a journalist, but when you’re communicating with the public, you have to think like a marketer. Use agents for the things you can’t or don’t want to do.”
His approach speaks to this edition’s central theme, cognitive sovereignty: the ability to think, editorialize and decide without delegating judgment to a machine. It also connects with other voices who have come through Media Party, such as Natalia Suniga and her analysis of the TikTokization of social media, and with the defense of independent journalism that Sevgil Musaieva of Ukrainska Pravda brings to this same edition. To keep exploring the topic, read more articles on business models and audiences.
The conversation continues at Konex
If you want to be part of the conversation, debate the role of news media in the face of AI agents and get a close look at the tools transforming newsrooms around the world, Media Party continues on Friday, October 30, at Ciudad Cultural Konex with the sandboxes, lightning talks and workshops. On Saturday, October 31, the hackathon turns ideas into prototypes.
Friday 30 and Saturday 31 at Konex (Sarmiento 3131), free admission: register here and don’t miss a single activity.
