Zetland (company)

Zetland

Type of site

| News
Available in| Danish
Created by|

* Jakob Moll
* Silke Bock
* Hakon Mosbech
* Lea Korsgaard

Editor| Lea Korsgaard
URL| www.zetland.dk
Registration| Yes
Users| 18,000
Launched| 23 March 2012; 13 years ago (2012-03-23)
Current status| Online

Zetland is a Danish media company founded in 2012. Headquartered in Copenhagen, it publishes three to four news articles daily, focusing on long-form stories and in-depth articles.[1][2] A subscription-based organization, it had more than 18,000 subscribers as of November 2020.[1] The editor-in-chief is Lea Korsgaard [da], formerly of Berlingske and Politiken,[3] who co-founded Zetland along with Jakob Moll, Silke Bock, and Hakon Mosbech.[4]

Founded in 2012, Zetland originally created single long-form stories, called e-singles, delivered monthly to subscribers. Journalists would also read their works at public events, similar to Pop-Up Magazine in the U.S.,[5] which have become central to Zetland's business model.[1][4] The company name derives from a hybrid between a zebra and Shetland pony.[1]

## History

[edit]

In 2015, Zetland initiated a relaunch with a crowd-funding campaign which raised over 530,000 kroner (kr.), and additional investments of 8 million kr. The relaunch occurred in March 2016, with Zetland offering daily news articles.[4][6] In 2016, revenue was 6.2 million kr.[1] In 2018 Zetland is to receive 1.8 million kr. for editorial production services from the Danish cultural board Slots- og Kulturstyrelsen [da].[7]

Since the relaunch, notable pieces have included conversations with Justice Minister Søren Pind and British sociologist Anthony Giddens.[8] In 2017 Zetland won a trio of awards from the Society for News Design Scandinavias, including gold and "Best of Show" in the digital news category for front page, and silver in the website category.[9][10]

Zetland has been offering its stories in audio format as well as text, and that has rapidly become the most popular aspect of the site, with 60% of members now consuming their content in audio.[11] In 2021, it switched from MP3 to Opus for its articles' audio recordings, which attained a 35 percent reduction in bandwidth and reduced climate footprint.[12][13] Korsgaard attributes the growth of the title to its focus on a membership model as a community, and a constrained number of stories per day, making the site "finish-able" each day.[14]

Zetland achieved financial stability in 2020, with the help of a member-get-member campaign in 2019 that contributed to a 25 percent growth in the span of a month. The campaign was later awarded several awards, including Best Idea to Grow Digital Readership or Engagement from INMA Global Media Awards and Best Digital Marketing Campaign for a News Brand from WAN-IFRA European Digital Media Awards.[15][16]

In May 2020, former Head of Product Tav Klitgaard replaced co-founder Jakob Moll as CEO, with the latter pursuing academic studies abroad. In 2023 Zetland launched Good Tape, a speech-to-text transcription tool initially created for internal use that was later spun off as a separate entity.[17]

## References

[edit]

1. ^ a b c d e Lichterman, Joseph (July 25, 2017). "Start your meetings with a folk song — and other ideas from the community-driven, crowdfunded Danish news site Zetland". Nieman Lab.
2. ^ Ciobanu, Mădălina (13 April 2017). "How live journalism brings people together to build trust and excitement around stories". journalism.co.uk.
3. ^ Hansen, Kartin L. (31 August 2016). "Journalism startup Zetland will be at SNDS16". snds.org.
4. ^ a b c Pontes, Angela (23 February 2017). "Danish startup Zetland spreading the love with its membership model". blog.wan-ifra.org. World News Publishing Focus by WAN-IFRA.
5. ^ Sillesen, Lene Bech (March–April 2015). "The power of Pop-Up Magazine's live journalism". Columbia Journalism Review.
6. ^ Cobben, Ingrid (23 August 2016). "Innovation in Denmark: building a community willing to pay for quality journalism". blog.wan-ifra.org. World News Publishing Focus by WAN-IFRA.
7. ^ Andreassen, Andreas Marckmann (12 December 2017). "Tre nye medier får støtte – Zetland får 1,8 mio. kr". Journalisten.dk (in Danish).
8. ^ Holm, Adam (18 March 2016). "Anmeldelse: Turen går til Zetland". Politiken (in Danish).
9. ^ Hedegaard, Anne-Laura (28 September 2017). "Zetland vandt guld for hjemmeside. Nu laver de en ny" [Zetland won gold for website. Now they are doing a new one]. Journalisten.dk (in Danish).
10. ^ Hansen, Kartin L. (27 September 2017). "Finnish and Danish media houses top Scandinavian news design". snds.org. Society for News Design Scandinavias.
11. ^ "Zetland's members asked for an audio version — and now it's more popular than their written stories". Nieman Lab. Retrieved 2018-05-10.
12. ^ "Audio formats and their climate footprint". Sustainable Web. 2 February 2022.
13. ^ "How a tip from a member made our audio files 35 percent greener". Zetland (in Danish). 25 November 2021.
14. ^ "Zetland: journalism as (profitable) community service". One Man & His Blog. 2017-04-24. Retrieved 2018-05-10.
15. ^ "INMA unveils Global Media Awards winners, COVID campaigns get top nod".
16. ^ "Strong Nordic performance as WAN-IFRA European Digital Media Awards announced". 23 April 2020.
17. ^ "Toolbox #3: Zetland". The Fix. 2024-02-22. Retrieved 2024-03-29.

## External links

[edit]

* Official website (in Danish)
* About Zetland (in English)