Promoting democracy, pluralism and vitality in society

Contributor to a sustainable society

Alma Media’s media brands are committed to defending freedom of speech and a pluralistic and democratic society. They engage in ethical, objective and transparent journalism and help citizens improve their media skills.

Other Alma Media services also strive to enhance the vitality of their communities and support the balanced development of society, often in cooperation with other organisations, educational institutes or other companies.

While the methods vary, the goal is the same: providing people with tools for sustainable growth in both professional and private life.

Media literacy for schoolchildren

People today consume more content on the internet and social media than ever before. The ability to differentiate between different types of content and having a basic understanding of data protection and data have become important civic skills.

At the beginning of 2018, Alma Media launched a three-year media education project in Finland aimed at having Alma Media employees conduct at least 50 media education visits to schools each year. More than a hundred visits were made in the first year.

“The goal of our visits is to provide schoolchildren with tools for evaluating content and help them operate more safely online,” says Elina Kukkonen, SVP, Communications and Brand at Alma Media. She adds:

“The feedback we have received about the visits has been very positive for the most part. Both the Alma employees who have participated in the visits and the classes they have visited have liked the concept and provided us with good ideas for developing it further. Many upper comprehensive school teachers have requested visits for several of their classes.

An opposing force to fake news and hate speech

Responsible media companies must internalise how they can best support democracy and open dialogue between citizens.

One way to achieve this is to develop the ways editorial teams work and to open up this information to public scrutiny. Alma Media’s editorial teams have set quality goals for the content they publish. The key indicators used in monitoring their achievement include the number of condemnatory decisions by the Council for Mass Media as well as the results of reader surveys.

If the results decline, the editorial teams take action to respond.

Alma Media’s editorial offices also cooperate with schools in many ways. One of the focuses of this cooperation is media education. We consider it important for schools to produce children who have the capacity to act sensibly both as consumers and producers of content.

Interesting but not irresponsible

Headlines can be bold but they must not upset or insult anyone. Facts must be checked and false rumours exposed, states Iltalehti’s Editor-in-Chief Erja Yläjärvi.