Seven Media Group chair Ryan Stokes calls to protect Aussie journalism from being stolen without compensation

Seven Media Group chair Ryan Stokes has called on the Federal Government to clamp down hard on social media platforms and protect Australian journalism from being stolen without compensation by AI giants.

Mr Stokes, in an address to shareholders at the company’s annual general meeting in Sydney on Thursday, said global tech giants did not contribute to the economy in the same way as traditional media.

“Global digital platforms have built their businesses on algorithms designed to capture attention and engagement for their own commercial ends, with little accountability to the communities where they operate,” he told shareholders.

“That has included profiting from scam advertising that uses AI-generated likenesses of well-known Australians to defraud the community.

“They use algorithms to capture Australian audiences and Australian content without a comparable contribution through tax, employment or investment in local journalism.”

Mr Stokes said the country needed a regulatory framework “built for the way Australians now consume media”.

“It means protecting Australian content from being used by AI platforms without permission or payment,” he said. “It means addressing competition failure in advertising technology markets and it means reforming the regulation of our own sector, much of which was designed for a different era, so that locally-owned media companies can invest and compete on fair terms.”

He said the company would continue to work constructively with the Federal Government and Parliament on those reforms.

The company is also asking shareholders on Thursday to vote to change its name from Southern Cross Media Group to Seven Media Group, encompassing Channel Seven, The West Australian, the Triple M and Hit radio networks and digital assets including The Nightly, PerthNow, LiSTNR and The Game.

Chief executive Rohan Lund emphasised the company was seeking to earn more of Australians’ time and trust, giving advertisers large audiences and more valuable ways to connect with them.

The group reaches more than 20 million Australians each month, Mr Lund said, with each experience having value in its own right.

Total TV audiences have grown year-on-year by 9.5 per cent across broadcast and streaming.

“You should judge our progress by delivery: the savings we achieve, the revenue share we generate from our audience strengths and the improvement in earnings and cash generation over time,” Mr Lund said.

Mr Stokes emphasised it was important to level the playing field given technology was re-shaping how media was being consumed.

“Australian media is being reshaped by technology, by changing audience behaviour and by global competition,” he said. “Those forces will not slow down.

“They will reward companies with trusted brands, national scale, direct relationships with their audiences and the discipline to invest where it counts.

“That is exactly the company we are building.”

Mr Stokes acknowledged to investors that financial performance had not met expectations, but also said it did not match the business’ potential.

Mr Lund conceded that the economy “isn’t great” and while advertising markets were “short and volatile”, the business was being managed with that uncertainty in mind.

“We have been more aggressive in setting the cost base on the assumption the broader economy deteriorates in the second half,” he said.

“We cannot control the advertising market. We can control the quality of our content, how well we serve customers, where we invest and how efficiently we operate.”