Media Execs: The New Playbook for Creators and Brands in 2026

Going independent is the biggest move in media right now. During San Francisco’s Tech Week 2026, we co-hosted our first NEW MEDIA Summit with Yahoo, bringing together media’s biggest names for candid conversations on where the industry goes next. This panel brought together Joanna Stern, founder of New Things, Sona Iliffe-Moon, Chief Communications Officer at Yahoo, and Lillian Xu, VP of Podcast Business at Vox Media. They discussed why Joanna left The Wall Street Journal after 12 years, how her NBC News partnership works, what the NPR and How I Built This deals mean for creators, how to keep audience trust while running ads, and what the internet will look like in five years. ------------------------------ Timestamps (0:00) Welcome to the New Media Summit (3:05) Meet Joanna Stern: Why she left The Wall Street Journal (7:28) How media companies are partnering with creators (11:09) What changes when a journalist goes independent (12:33) Do the NPR deals make sense? (17:58) How to keep your audience's trust (19:21) How creators partner with brands 27:00) Does the audience care about paid ads? (30:50) Quick-fire round ------------------------------ How to connect with us Follow Ollie on LinkedIn:   / ollieforsyth   Follow Jim on LinkedIn:   / jlouderb   Follow Sona on LinkedIn:   / sonamoon   Follow Joanna on LinkedIn:   / joannastern   ------------------------------ Our Partners Harmonic: Your go-to startup database - https://harmonic.ai/ VCX: The public ticker for private tech. Head over to GetVCX.com to learn more. Prelint: Keeps every decision reviewed, recorded, and traceable. Head over to Prelint to learn more.