ORF gets new management, settles new newsroom and hopes for digital news. Media funding could be reorganized. And: The “Wiener Zeitung” gets a new business model.
The media year 2022 promises many innovations and shows the potential for even bigger ones. It is certain that Roland Weißmann and his team will take over the management of the ORF and that the editorial offices will move to the multimedia newsroom on the Küniglberg. The “Wiener Zeitung” will also receive a new business model. It is unclear whether the media funding will be put on a new footing after the advertising cause and a digital amendment of the ORF law will be decided.
A potential reorganization of the placement of advertisements and media funding would affect the entire industry. For years, experts have complained that the government’s advertising budget is too high in relation to the various legally anchored media subsidies. The investigations of the Economic and Corruption Public Prosecutor’s Office (WKStA) into the advertisement affair made the calls – also from the opposition – for a reorganization more urgent.
Whether the demands become reality is largely in the hands of the ÖVP and, more recently, especially in those of Susanne Raab (ÖVP). She has received the media agendas that were previously with the Federal Chancellor. In the media chapter of the government program, the further development of the media funding system and the review of the current award and funding criteria are in any case intended.
A new media subsidy – the digitization subsidy – will most likely be paid out for the first time in the summer of 2022. A few days ago the EU Commission gave the green light for this. It still has to go through parliament, whereupon it ends up with the regulatory authority RTR, which is responsible for the distribution. It is regularly endowed with 20 million euros per year. In the first year of disbursement, however, it is paid out retrospectively for three years and thus adds up to over 50 million euros. The digitization funding benefits print media and radio stations for their digitization efforts and is intended to ensure an “independent and pluralistic media landscape”.
Raab is between the two fronts with regard to the ORF digital amendment announced by the Federal Chancellery for the coming year. Because what should be included in this divides the spirits of the local media industry. The ORF would like to see the digital space unleashed, as it believes that it brings up the rear in the pan-European field of public media companies. Specifically, the media company intends to abolish the 7-day access regulation and approve “online first” and “online only” content. The planned ORF player should also be made possible with the amendment. In return, the ORF emphasizes its willingness to cooperate with domestic private individuals, because the real “opponent” are international platforms.
The private media houses and associations are open to closer cooperation. But nobody wants to be an “appendage” – for example with the ORF player. Cooperation at eye level is required. Eugen A. Russ, Vice President of the Association of Austrian Newspapers (VÖZ) and kronehit managing directors Mario Frühauf and Philipp König have already stated in “Horizon” interviews that a fair balance of interests is needed on the part of private individuals. In any case, the Ministerial Council lecture, which was once published with the timetable for the ORF digital amendment, states that domestic competition should not be “disproportionately distorted” by the amendment, but that the ORF must also be able to develop technological and programming innovations in the interests of the Austrian public. There should be more intensive negotiations around the amendment in the first quarter of 2022.
Roland Weißmann will play a key role in the negotiations for ORF. As of January 1st, he will take over the post of ORF general director, replacing Alexander Wrabetz, who ran the country’s largest media company for 15 years. Weißmann’s central team of directors also begins their five-year term of office at the beginning of the year. It consists of program director Stefanie Groiss-Horowitz, technology director Harald Kräuter, finance director Eva Schindlauer and radio director Ingrid Thurnher. The team was still largely cautious about concrete plans for the coming years.
There is also a lot going on in the ORF regional offices. At the beginning of the year there were five new people at the top: Edgar Weinzettl in Vienna, Robert Ziegler in Lower Austria, Klaus Obereder in Upper Austria, Esther Mitterstieler in Tyrol and Waltraud Langer in Salzburg. Werner Herics in Burgenland, Gerhard Koch in Styria, Karin Bernhard in Carinthia and Markus Klement in Vorarlberg take their places again in an ORF country chair.
Away from the director’s post, the ORF staff carousel continues unchecked. Doroteja Gradištanac, formerly known as Dodo Rošcic, succeeds Monika Eigensperger as FM4 broadcaster. Kathrin Zierhut-Kunz becomes commercial director of ORF III. And most recently, on Wednesday, the previous “ZiB 2” presenter Lou Lorenz-Dittlbacher was officially named as the successor to Ingrid Thurnher as editor-in-chief of ORF III. It is still open who will follow Waltraud Langer as editor-in-chief for the main TV department for magazines and service programs. Promising applicants include ORF 1 channel manager Lisa Totzauer and TV Time.news boss Claudia Lahnsteiner.
In addition to all of this, there are other important positions that ORF will have to fill in 2022 when the multimedia newsroom on Küniglberg goes into operation. The construction of the 303 million euro project has been in progress for over three years. When it is finished, ORF employees who work for the radio will also move to the ORF center. Together with TV and Text, there is to be a multimedia management structure in the future, with strong broadcast teams to maintain independence and diversity. Weißmann announced the implementation of the new multimedia structure for around the summer. Viewers will recognize the commissioning of the newsroom, among other things, by a new “ZiB” studio in autumn.
Originally the outgoing ORF General Director Wrabetz wanted to decide on the central executives in the new newsroom. It was later said that this was done in agreement with Weissmann. Multimedia department heads or the new news desk, where the areas “Monitoring”, “Verification”, “Current News”, “Live Teams” and “Social Media” will be located, are to be occupied.
As if there weren’t enough (personnel) decisions to be made at ORF, the public council and foundation council will be newly appointed in the coming year, although individual members can of course and probably will be extended. The term of office for the two ORF bodies is four years. At its constituent meeting, the public council will, among other things, appoint six members from its own ranks for the board of trustees.
The constituent meeting of the ORF Board of Trustees will take place on May 19th. At the moment, the bourgeois “Freundeskreis” with a couple of independent councilors close to it has a majority on the board of trustees. Great shifts are not to be expected here. Only the “Freundeskreis”, which is close to the Greens, is likely to grow, provided that the three FPÖ-affiliated councils sent from the Public Council in 2018 are replaced with people close to them at the request of the Greens.
The Board of Trustees will probably not have to make one important decision in the coming period: who will be the next ORF General Director. After all, its term of office is five years and thus exceeds that of the councils.
2022 will also bring higher ORF fees for Austrian households. This was decided by the Board of Trustees in 2021 and will come into force as soon as the media authority KommAustria gives its okay. That is expected to happen in the first few months of the new year. The monthly amounts vary depending on the federal state, as the federal and state governments charge fees in addition to the program fee. In any case, the program fee increases from the current 17.21 euros to around 18.60 euros and makes up roughly two thirds of the GIS fees.
KommAustria is also busy outside of the program fee. For example, she deals with a presentation of facts by the Concordia press club against the weekly commentary “Der Wegscheider” on Servus TV. It will also be decided whether the head of KommAustria, Michael Ogris, will enjoy the trust of the federal government for another six years. He was last reappointed in October 2016. A personnel decision is also pending at RTR – a KommAustria branch. Oliver Stribl, Managing Director for the media sector, will switch to the management of the city’s own Wien Holding in March 2022. His contract would have expired in mid-August.
2022 will also be a decisive year for the future of the “Wiener Zeitung”. She will be given a new business model. Because, as is well known, the oldest daily newspaper in the world is on the brink after the announcement of the abolition of compulsory publications in printed form in the official gazette. The then Federal Chancellor Sebastian Kurz (ÖVP) saw their future as the digital bulletin board of the republic, which owns the daily newspaper. It remains to be seen whether the new media minister, Raab, sees the situation as Kurz once did. You could also opt for a concept developed by the Cognion Research Association together with the “Wiener Zeitung” editor-in-chief. This provides for comprehensive digital publications of data and their non-profit processing as well as a “hardcore quality daily newspaper editorial office”, as editor-in-chief Walter Hämmerle explained.
The APA – Austria Press Agency, which is developing a log-in alliance together with Austria’s media, is also working on future projects, which should make it possible to use content across all media with a user ID. Completion is planned for 2022.
The ProSiebenSat.1Puls4 Group also has freedom of choice in the new year and can then decide whether ATV will continue as an independent Austrian broadcaster with its own editorial team. Because in 2017 the station was taken over. The Federal Competition Authority (BWB) submitted conditions for at least five years, which stipulated, among other things, that ATV “decides independently on the basis of its own budget on the programming in the area of ’news and information'” and that the station name is retained.
And last but not least, the media industry will continue to deal with the continuation of various processes relating to media maker Wolfgang Fellner in 2022. Several women face sexual harassment before him. Fellner vehemently denies the allegations. A lawsuit is being continued around his former employee Raphaela Scharf, who is suing against her dismissal without notice. In this case, the media maker was also not legally convicted of defamation against Katia Wagner – another former employee. On the other hand, he appealed, which means that a continuation is pending here as well.