NL Conversation: Gautam Mishra on creating the Spotify for news, regulating big tech, and paywalls

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In the latest episode of NL Conversations, Newslaundry’s Chitranshu Tewari speaks to Gautam Mishra, joining in from Melbourne. Gautam is the founder and chief executive officer of Inkl, a bundle news subscription platform that unlocks coverage from premium publishers like the New York Times and the Economist with a monthly subscription of just Rs 250.

Talking about the upsurge in demand for bundle news subscriptions, Gautam speaks at length about the longevity and breadth of news in 2020. “Twenty years ago if you were from Delhi, it was fine for you to mostly concentrate on news from Delhi, but today you cannot do that,” he points out.

He adds: “If you want to know what’s happening with Brexit, you would want to know it from the Brits. If you want to understand what’s happening in Hong Kong, you actually need to get it from the South China Morning Post.”

Defending Facebook and Twitter on being unable to police “fake news”, Gautam says, “Facebook and Twitter are open networks and anytime you have an open network, that, by definition...means anybody can publish anything.” He says the Australian Competition Commission’s decision to make big tech pay directly to the publishers is “completely ridiculous and nonsense”. “When somebody has cancer, you can’t just cure it by giving a band-aid,” he says.

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