Christophe Leclercq

we are not safe, but it's too easy to take obvious solutions which can turn wrong. My summary of our report takes just one sentence in three elements. Avoid censorship, dilute fake news, promote quality content. Avoiding censorship has not completely been done. In my own country, France, there is a fake news law which is good on most points, but it does give the judge some powers to take away some articles or even to disconnect some TV channels, which the media people find excessive. Diluting fake news, this is what the platforms should be doing. that, they need help in indexing the quality of sources, and that can be done by people outside the platforms, especially in the media sector itse…

Yes.

First, I agree that this is a big issue and I would draw a parallel between the rise of the social media, the rise of disinformation, also called fake news, and the rise of populism, which risks undermining not only the EU but any kind of fact-based policy making. So it is worth spending time and energy in these policy circles. I would say from my viewpoint, there are two things to be done. One is to continue providing good media coverage in an innovative way. And that is a task of EURA ACTIV. It does it in combination with its national media partners, which typically are bigger than itself. So EURA ACTIV is a kind of bridge between national public spheres. I should probably not be much lon…

First, I agree that this is a big issue and I would draw a parallel between the rise of the social media, the rise of disinformation, also called fake news, and the rise of populism, which risks undermining not only the EU but any kind of fact-based policy making. So it is worth spending time and energy in these policy circles. I would say from my viewpoint, there are two things to be done. One is to continue providing good media coverage in an innovative way. And that is a task of EURA ACTIV. It does it in combination with its national media partners, which typically are bigger than itself. So EURA ACTIV is a kind of bridge between national public spheres. I should probably not be much lon…

First, I agree that this is a big issue and I would draw a parallel between the rise of the social media, the rise of disinformation, also called fake news, and the rise of populism, which risks undermining not only the EU but any kind of fact-based policy making. So it is worth spending time and energy in these policy circles. I would say from my viewpoint, there are two things to be done. One is to continue providing good media coverage in an innovative way. And that is a task of EURA ACTIV. It does it in combination with its national media partners, which typically are bigger than itself. So EURA ACTIV is a kind of bridge between national public spheres. I should probably not be much lon…

there are analogies between all these sectors that you have mentioned, music, film and journalism. it's the same challenge, which is that we have fixed costs. It takes a lot of money to create content, whatever the nature of the content. And there is a tendency for other platforms, which are different to some extent for music, film and news. There is a tendency for the platforms to capture the client or the reader's relationship and the data, and therefore also the advertising and sometimes the subscription money. There are a number of initiatives on the policy front in order to redress this balance. Commissioner Maria Gabriel mentions in her speeches lately that the media sector has lost 9…

Right. Most people answering your question would talk about press freedom, journalists being attacked, etc. are issues, but they are well known, they are not central issues in the majority of countries. Of course, I do feel for the journalists that were attacked or that are under pressure, even in the countries where we are present. I think there are two main issues. One is the revenue, very simply. The number of journalists in Europe has been reduced by about half, and the other half could disappear in the next 10 to 15 years if we don't act more forcefully within the media sector itself, but also facilitated by EU and national regulation. And the second big challenge, in my view, is innov…

First of all, most of the media landscape in Europe is national or even regional. And it's okay to some extent because it fits the requirement of citizens to have information in the right language, but also customized to their own thinking. So, here at your active, we are talking about a very small media segment, which is a specialized media regarding EU policies. So, we are different because we are not a national media. We connect with national media. are also different from other specialized media, I would say in two ways. of all, because we are very decentralized. We have this network, which is not just translating, it's feeding news from the countries. So, we are not focusing just on th…

is, apart from minor subscription schemes, there is no talk about making access to such information on the platforms paying. This is a kind of misleading rumor which has been spread by the other side, basically. And you say the traffic comes from the platforms. I disagree. It comes from the users. It's the users that are spending their time and that are in the end the target for the advertising. And the question is how to distribute in a fair way the money that is made between the users and the advertisers. And both have a role to play. The media companies creating the content and the platforms which provide part of the visibility between the users and the media companies.

First of all, I don't think that the media has necessarily to be neutral. I think it's good to be balanced, which is a different notion from neutral. Secondly, have nothing against owners of media companies. I am one. I have a sense of solidarity with this kind of big brother in Washington. But more seriously, I think that the balance and the editorial quality of the media is not determined mainly by the owner. Of course, there are owners that are not acceptable. It's determined mainly by the ethics that people follow, the codes of practices, etc., and the quality of journalists. And this has been good at the Washington Post for a long time. They were the ones triggering the Watergate scand…

not only did I hear about the news, but in the meantime, I attended some presentations by the editors of Washington Post. Basically, Jeff Bezos contributed two things, money, but also a technology orientation, which is very important. The concern was whether he would respect the editor independence of the Washington Post, or transform it into a pure commercial venture. And he has been smart enough to respect the editors, and they have even increased the number of journalists. now, have many more technology-oriented people at the Washington Post, and they are not, like in the past, second-class or third-class citizens. So, I think it's a very good move.

They were taken over, to be fair. Ah, they were taken over.

That's correct. European Voice, like other specialized media, was focusing primarily on Brussels' EU circles. They tried to branch out and to reach other capitals, but apart from a bit in London, it was difficult. Why? A, because they had only one language. That's kind of obvious, but it's still only one language in most publications. And secondly, because paper does not circulate as fast and as well as the internet. And I understood from the beginning that the internet would allow us to branch out and to have affiliates and different language versions in different countries, which we did very fast. We were present in Central Europe before enlargement, before 2004.

Mainly, plus a website which was never as good as a newspaper.

I was at the commission between 1995 and 1998. 1998 was the opening of the telecoms market. big prerequisite for Internet growth was to liberalize the telecom market. So I was part of that team dealing personally with Internet matters, which were a tiny topic at the beginning. the more I was understanding about it, the more I felt that something could be done with this technology. This was a time of the dot coms. You are too young to remember, but many Internet companies were developed with no business plan to speak of, with tons of money from the Silicon Valley. didn't have much money. I had mainly an address book and therefore we did not spend too much and therefore we survived. So that's…

I started the project at the end of 1998, but we were really fully operational only in year 2000 in English and then adding languages, etc. I would say initially we had a website and then we had a proper portal and then we could really claim to call it media. It was media in the concept from the outset. But of course, at the beginning we had to learn a lot. To answer your question on technology, I was driven not by some kind of Internet ideology. I'm not a technologue by background. I was driven by transparency I understood that Internet would make access to information much cheaper. That volume would not be an issue. And at the time Brussels, the EU circles were very much of a black box. A…

been there for five and a half years. I learned about strategy, of course, also about organization within multinational companies. And I worked, I learned the skills to talk with corporate people, which was very useful in two further stages of my career. And I can move to that. First, after McKinsey, I decided to come back to my first love and to work within the European Commission. So I took the concur. I became an EU official. I decided to work at Digi Competition because I was not a lawyer. So I would have more to learn there. And I decided to focus on the Internet and the information society, because at the time it was a brand new topic. And what I brought there from my McKinsey knowled…

been there for five and a half years. I learned about strategy, of course, also about organization within multinational companies. And I worked, I learned the skills to talk with corporate people, which was very useful in two further stages of my career. And I can move to that. First, after McKinsey, I decided to come back to my first love and to work within the European Commission. So I took the concur. I became an EU official. I decided to work at Digi Competition because I was not a lawyer. So I would have more to learn there. And I decided to focus on the Internet and the information society, because at the time it was a brand new topic. And what I brought there from my McKinsey knowled…

J'ai travaillé deux ans dans la car industrie pour Renault en Allemagne. en de vendre en France à l'Allemagne. C'était un challenge et en parallèle nous avons développé cette organisation et après j'ai l'internité à l'Université de de 'Université de de de 'Université de de l'Université de 'Université de l'Université C'était

un mois après. en parallèle de mon stage en la Commission 'Université de 'Université de en partie de l'Université de 'Université de 'Université C'était un excuré de 'Université pour pouvoir développer d'université et qu y des aspects 'autres People would look for cross-border careers and there should be a place where students with international experience would meet big national companies wanting to recruit outside their borders. This has worked very well. It was then taken over by some colleagues of mine and transformed into a recruitment company. And again, was faced with different options and I decided to go for the more serious one, which was to join McKinsey, the strategy consultancy.

sûr, c'est un must. J'ai même essayé de lire un PhD thesis en allemand, mais c'était trop difficile. Je n'ai réussi. On le même en en allemand, avec 'autres personnes, nous développions une association qui s EG Europe. nous étions la principale organisation qui s de l'Erasmus. Je me rappelle un très famous lunch avec François Mitterrand, à l'Élysée. Et les gens de la Commission de étaient flabbergasted que nous étions à ce niveau de ce qui s'expressent les needs de notre génération. Et c'était un petit projet qui s'est créé par le Parlement à l'époque. Et c'est devenu un grand programme qu'on tous connaît.

tant jeune, j'avais beaucoup de idées. En tant jeune, j'ai vraiment voulu créer une cross-border, car je suis de la génération qui ont vu l'éducation de l'éducation interne markete, et aussi l'éducation de programmes comme Erasmus. Nous pouvons revenir à ça. Et j'ai pensé que ces types de gens voulaient travailler dans des entreprises qui ne pas nécessairement des multinationales, mais qui sont plusieurs locations. C'est plus ou moins ce que nous avons fait avec Your Active Media Network. Et en termes de topics, j'ai considéré un post-graduate study dans le journalisme. J'ai été offert aussi en sociologie, en business administration, et j'ai décidé de business administration, parce que ça a…