Reflections on Self-Publishing [2023]: Year Four, Geneva Health Files

Newsletter Special Edition

Dear Readers,

As this tough year comes to a close, we spent some moments distilling our learnings in 2023.

From a self-publishing perspective, it has been a great year, reporting on a diverse range of issues on global health in Geneva. We also took a number of steps to nurture this initiative to the next phase of growth.

We consolidated our coverage of on-going global health negotiations, building on every single week and month, with our eye on the ball across the parallel discussions towards a new Pandemic Agreement and the amendments to the International Health Regulations, as WHO member states volleyed back and forth between these tracks.

Our reporting this year was made possible by a previous grant from the Open Society Foundations. This was also supported by our other sources of revenue including from subscriptions and research projects that cross-subsidize our journalism work.

Apart from these negotiations, we continued to report on global health financing, on TRIPS related discussions at the WTO and other unfolding issues in Geneva. (Here are all our stories through the first, second and third parts of 2023.)

I am deeply grateful to our team comprising part-time reporters, who are mostly lawyers with a deep interest in global health. My podcast team brought you a fleet of episodes this year adding a wonderful layer of story-telling to these technical matters.

I have also had the pleasure to work with and learn from our Fellows who have been a part of the Geneva Health Files Fellowship program this year.

We consolidated on our operations in 2023, taking some strategic decisions on the future direction of this initiative. From setting up an editorial board; making efforts to put in place a board of directors to oversee governance and fund raising; from working on a new website, to formalising our legal structure; we have started taking some steps towards making a transition into a more mature media company. You will hear from us on these various aspects as they come to fruition in 2024.

Some of these directions have been catalysed by an intensive nine-month long entrepreneurship program this year, that Geneva Health Files has been proud to be a part of. We have made steady progress through much of 2023 as a part of International Center for Journalists ICFJ’s Elevate program working on the multidimensional, operational aspects of running a media initiative beyond the editorial.

This year, we also exchanged notes and swapped lessons on media entrepreneurship with mentors and fellow media founders at journalism conferences including at the Global Investigative Journalism Conference in Sweden, and presented our work in Italy, helping us benchmark our work with the best in the field.

I have also had the wonderful opportunity to find a sounding board from a reader who has volunteered to be our business development advisor and has played a crucial role in mapping and brainstorming about opportunities.

It has been one challenging year, as we continued to report and stay on top of the game, even as we worked furiously to hold this organization together and do everything we can, so that it stands the vicissitudes of grant funding and related uncertainties. We hope that enough readers will pay to support our journalism, so we will continue to have the privilege to serve this readership in the best way we can.

We see 2024 as a make or break year, as we work to test pilot strategies on generating new revenue streams, ramp up existing revenue flows, and pursue grant funding to ensure overall financial viability.

Consider supporting us by becoming paying subscribers, this will protect our editorial independence. There are several ways you can support us.

Finally, as a publisher, for me personally, 2023 will go down as the year of threats. These ranged from implicit ones, to some that have been fairly explicit, taking crucial time away from the journalism that we love doing. We tried our best to take these in our stride even as we hold on to the tenets of robust journalism practice and associated editorial judgement. These threats have been in response to our reporting and related editorial decision-making. They emerged from various quarters including from a government, an activist and even a global health academic.

As I have said before, self-publishing is a radical act. Even after close to four years in operations, there is much to learn to walk this tightrope. My gratitude to all those who supported me during this period: family, friends and loved ones.

As always, thank you for your engagement, dear readers, sources and critics!

Wishing you a Happy New Year and best wishes for 2024.

Cheers,

Priti

Feel free to write to us: patnaik.reporting@gmail.com; Follow us on Twitter: @filesgeneva

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Image Credit: Photo by Mohammad Danish, Pexels

Here are some reflections in brief:

(In no particular order of importance)

Write better headlines

Meet more people

Trust strangers, sometimes

Trust intuition when it comes working with new suppliers

Do better recruitment

Be tougher on asking questions

Mean business, bills have to be paid

Be comfortable with influence

Be brutal in guarding your time for business development

Give away time for serendipitous conversations (They sometimes yield stories, ledes and insights)

Read non-global health stuff

Read more

Write less

Write shorter

Ask folks to back off, politely, not so politely, whatever it takes to get the message across

Seek collaborators

Chase sources, it pays off mostly

Speak your mind

Go to more journalism conferences

Our home is journalism, the community we serve is global health

Strategy, strategy, strategy

Execution is key but only when it follows great strategy

Don’t be afraid of drafting contracts

Your accountant is your friend

Go for a walk, it is good for the business

Be humble, put your head down and write

Read fiction, read poetry

Exercise

Meditate

Spend more time with son

Never give up on work-life balance, no matter how miserably you maybe failing at it!

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