Future of Media Awards shortlist | Nolan and Kuenssberg are top-paid BBC journalists

Good morning from the team at Press Gazette on Wednesday, 15 July.

🫡 This morning Team Press Gazette salutes some of the heroes of online news publishing over the last year.

Like King Leonidas and his 300 Spartans at the Battle of Thermopylae, they are holding the line against the giant tech platforms who would swamp our civilisation with addictive, misleading, AI-generated drivel.

Our Future of Media Awards celebrate the best news-based websites, newsletters, podcasts, apps, storytelling and video content.

There are also categories for the best reader revenue strategies, commercial innovations, news industry partners, innovators and publishers.

The AI category offers a fascinating insight into six innovative uses of technology to support quality journalism being deployed around the world.

If you are on one of the shortlists, well done - I look forward to toasting your success at the awards dinner on 10 September at the Hilton Bankside in London.

For everyone else this list of finalists is well worth your time as a handy guide to digital innovation in news publishing in the UK and around the world.

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💡 Our latest Masterclass feature looks at the topic of first-party data collection – how publishers can best make money from readers by getting them to share personal information.

Sharing his insights is Gustaf Eriksson from Norway’s Schibsted Media, which boasts some 1.25 million digital-only subscribers across the Nordics - an incredible achievement when you think Sweden and Norway only have an adult online population of around 14 million.

Click on the Masterclass tag here to enjoy other features looking at video monetisation, newsletter mastery, managing newsroom change and more.

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💷💷💷 The BBC’s list of top paid on-air talent is out with Stephen Nolan topping the list for his mainly Northern Ireland-based output – which earns him £425,000 to £429,000 per year (just a few grand less than the CEO of news and current affairs).

Today we list all 62 journalists and other news division staff earning more than the UK Prime Minister (the BBC disclosure threshold is £178,000, and the PM earns £179,000).

The BBC claims that “top talent” paid more than £500,000 has fallen by 50% over the last seven years.

But is worth noting that the BBC is not that transparent when it comes to the earnings of its star journalists.

Any work journalists do for the BBC’s commercial arm, such as Clive Myrie’s Mastermind hosting duties, are not included in today’s disclosure.

And neither are the many payments made to journalists for corporate gigs, which require a certain amount of rooting around among PDFs posted to the “external events register page” to find.

In January alone, Today host Amol Rajan made over £10,000 hosting Virgin Media O2’s strategy day for senior leaders and more than £10,000 working at an education technology event run by $300m turnover events business Hyve.

Absent from the list is former £1m+ earning Match of the Day host Gary Lineker, who has rather proved the point about the market for talent by earning lots more than he ever did at the BBC hosting a World Cup coverage show for Netflix.

It’s probably also worth noting that the BBC’s World Cup coverage has really missed having a star anchor this time around (the Lineker and Des Lynham role).