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< Back Welcome to the Metrics Jungle: Organizational Stakeholder Perspectives on Evaluation of News Recommender Systems in Industry Vandenbroucke, H., Michiels, L., & Smets, A. (2025). Welcome to the Metrics Jungle: Organizational Stakeholder Perspectives on evaluation of news recommender systems in industry. ACM Transactions on Recommender Systems, Highlights of RecSys ’24. https://doi.org/10.1145/3778173 News recommender systems (NRS) are increasingly implemented in news industry to enhance digital distribution, yet their development and evaluation are shaped by a complex interplay of organizational stakeholders with diverse objectives. This study investigates the real-world complexities of NRS implementation, considering the multitude of objectives on the NRS provider side by exploring how different stakeholder groups —from journalistic, commercial and tech logic— conceptualize NRS goals and assess their performance. Through 22 semi-structured expert interviews across four news organizations in Europe, we uncover a `jungle of metrics' where an overabundance of data insights does not necessarily lead to better decision-making. While traditional accuracy-based metrics like click-through rate (CTR) remain widely used, they fail to capture the broader strategic objectives that guide NRS adoption in industry. This paper identifies a critical gap between current academic evaluations of NRS and the business key performance indicators (KPIs) used in practice. Rather than evaluating NRS in isolation, stakeholders assess their contribution to overarching organizational goals, including reach, engagement, conversion, and retention. Our findings highlight the need for a more nuanced, multi-stakeholder approach to NRS evaluation that aligns with both business imperatives and journalistic values. Newsmedia, Recommender Systems, Stakeholders Previous Read the article Next

< Back Close Contact for Context: Qualitative Methodological Considerations for Assessing Prominence and Discoverability Iordache, C., Leiva, M. T. G., & Raats, T. (2025). Close Contact for Context: Qualitative Methodological Considerations for Assessing Prominence and Discoverability. Media Industries, 12(1), 111-132. https://journals.publishing.umich.edu/mij/article/id/7625/ This article advocates for a “close contact for context” approach as a crucial step before, or in combination with, automated data collection and comparative analyses to assess the prominence and discoverability of European works in video-on-demand (VoD) catalogs. Grounded in media industries research, the method emphasizes the importance of close observation within the dynamic interface environments of VoD services. To this end, we present a set of reflections based on an exploratory study conducted on four US-based subscription VoD services in Spain and Belgium and propose three key sets of methodological considerations to be integrated in future assessments of prominence and discoverability tools and practices. First, a broader analysis of market characteristics and their interrelations is essential for conducting comparative research and understanding the strategies of transnational players within each market. Second, VoD services must be treated as individual cases shaped by specific industry practices and business models. Third, we recommend “getting personal” with the object of study through detailed analyses of interface architectures and consumption affordances, and propose the concept of a title’s discovery arc to analyze its spatiotemporal placement. This approach underscores the value of contextual, qualitative insights to complement quantitative evaluations. Previous Read the article Next

< Back People, personalisation, prominence: A framework for analysing the PSM shift to digital portals and interrogating universality across contexts Iordache, C. et al. (2024). People, personalisation, prominence: A framework for analysing the PSM shift to digital portals and interrogating universality across contexts. International Journal of Cultural Studies. https://doi.org/10.1177/13678779241296556 In the context of enhanced platformisation, Public Service Media (PSM) are once again forced to rethink the ways in which they achieve core public values. To this end, PSM have been prioritising the development of their own video-on-demand portals. To contribute to ongoing research, we propose a theoretical framework that can be applied by future PSM work, based on the operationalisation of platformisation in PSM policy documents and strategy. We identify the shared priorities across ten media organisations in seven media markets: Belgium—Flanders and Wallonia-Brussels, Canada, Denmark, Italy, Poland, and the UK. The study is based on the qualitative analysis of 61 documents, outlining the PSM remit and how they report and present themselves to governments, collaborators, and audiences, contextualised by ongoing national and regional debates. Findings confirm that the framework of people, personalisation, and prominence can serve as a useful theoretical basis for understanding and interrogating universality across contexts. Public Service Media Previous Read the article Next

< Back Not One News Recommender To Fit Them All: How Different Recommender Strategies Serve Various User Segments Vandenbroucke, H., Maes, U., Michiels, L., & Smets, A. (2025). Not One News Recommender To Fit Them All: How Different Recommender Strategies Serve Various User Segments. In 19th ACM Conference on Recommender Systems Proceedings . ACM. Many news recommender systems (NRS) adopt a one-recommender-for-all approach, overlooking that users engage with news in fundamentally different ways. In this work, we identify user clusters based on various engagement metrics that go beyond clicks by employing cluster analysis on two real-world datasets: EB-NeRD and Adressa. Next to that, we evaluate the performance of common rec-ommender strategies: popularity, collaborative filtering (EASE and ItemKNN), and a content-based model across these user clusters, which exhibit varying reading behaviors and information needs. Our findings show that different recommender strategies are effective to varying degrees depending on the user cluster. This study contributes to NRS research by providing a grounded clustering of users derived from real-world datasets and emphasizes the importance of user-centered evaluations for understanding how NRS strategies serve audiences with varying levels of news engagement. Recommender Systems Previous Read the article Next

< Back Noëmie Forest Researcher noemie.janine.forest@vub.be Eager to investigate the role of platforms and streamers in constantly evolving media ecosystems, Noëmie joined SMIT as a researcher in the Media Economics and Policy unit in 2023. She will research personalization and recommender systems, and their value in media markets. Noëmie studied Communication Sciences at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, between 2018 and 2022, with a specialisation in media, strategic communication, and marketing. Her specialisation gave her the chance to immerse herself in this subject through her thesis, “Does one size fit all? – How do five Belgian food brands position themselves on the international market?”. Noëmie dived into the world of different brands, and earned herself a great distinction in 2022. Before starting at SMIT, she worked at Think BBDO as strategic executive, to assist organizations in their branding and communication. Visit my research profile

< Back Catching the waves: The case of VRT's digital-first audio strategy Van der Elst, P., Iordache, C., & Raats, T. (2025). Catching the waves: The case of VRT’s digital-first audio strategy. European Journal of Communication . https://doi.org/10.1177/02673231251370877 European public service media (PSM) are increasingly embracing strategies that balance digital platform tactics and meeting the public remit. This article addresses how a small market PSM is repositioning itself in a media landscape dominated by global platforms, streaming services and legacy media adopting platformisation strategies. We examine platformisation at the Flemish broadcaster VRT through the lens of its digital audio strategy. The study combines document analysis and expert interviews. Results show a strategic shift towards more focus on user needs and habits; a branding strategy revolving around the VRT parent brand; a necessary yet precarious presence on third-party platforms; a legacy-driven content offering complemented by online-only commissioning; and a firm editorial grip on content curation. VRT's take on these strategic innovations highlights a series of key dilemmas for PSM to reconcile public remit delivery and competitiveness in a platformised media landscape. Public Service Media Previous Read the article Next

< Back Ashley Amerson Product Manager This is placeholder text. To change this content, double-click on the element and click Change Content. Want to view and manage all your collections? Click on the Content Manager button in the Add panel on the left. Here, you can make changes to your content, add new fields, create dynamic pages and more. Your collection is already set up for you with fields and content. Add your own content or import it from a CSV file. Add fields for any type of content you want to display, such as rich text, images, and videos. Be sure to click Sync after making changes in a collection, so visitors can see your newest content on your live site. info@mysite.com 123-456-7890

< Back Brad Grecco Marketing Associate This is placeholder text. To change this content, double-click on the element and click Change Content. Want to view and manage all your collections? Click on the Content Manager button in the Add panel on the left. Here, you can make changes to your content, add new fields, create dynamic pages and more. Your collection is already set up for you with fields and content. Add your own content or import it from a CSV file. Add fields for any type of content you want to display, such as rich text, images, and videos. Be sure to click Sync after making changes in a collection, so visitors can see your newest content on your live site. info@mysite.com 123-456-7890

< Back Camilla Jones Content Manager This is placeholder text. To change this content, double-click on the element and click Change Content. Want to view and manage all your collections? Click on the Content Manager button in the Add panel on the left. Here, you can make changes to your content, add new fields, create dynamic pages and more. Your collection is already set up for you with fields and content. Add your own content or import it from a CSV file. Add fields for any type of content you want to display, such as rich text, images, and videos. Be sure to click Sync after making changes in a collection, so visitors can see your newest content on your live site. info@mysite.com 123-456-7890

< Back Brian Chung VP Product This is placeholder text. To change this content, double-click on the element and click Change Content. Want to view and manage all your collections? Click on the Content Manager button in the Add panel on the left. Here, you can make changes to your content, add new fields, create dynamic pages and more. Your collection is already set up for you with fields and content. Add your own content or import it from a CSV file. Add fields for any type of content you want to display, such as rich text, images, and videos. Be sure to click Sync after making changes in a collection, so visitors can see your newest content on your live site. info@mysite.com 123-456-7890

< Back Kelly Parker HR Representative This is placeholder text. To change this content, double-click on the element and click Change Content. Want to view and manage all your collections? Click on the Content Manager button in the Add panel on the left. Here, you can make changes to your content, add new fields, create dynamic pages and more. Your collection is already set up for you with fields and content. Add your own content or import it from a CSV file. Add fields for any type of content you want to display, such as rich text, images, and videos. Be sure to click Sync after making changes in a collection, so visitors can see your newest content on your live site. info@mysite.com 123-456-7890

< Back Marcus Harris Account Director This is placeholder text. To change this content, double-click on the element and click Change Content. Want to view and manage all your collections? Click on the Content Manager button in the Add panel on the left. Here, you can make changes to your content, add new fields, create dynamic pages and more. Your collection is already set up for you with fields and content. Add your own content or import it from a CSV file. Add fields for any type of content you want to display, such as rich text, images, and videos. Be sure to click Sync after making changes in a collection, so visitors can see your newest content on your live site. info@mysite.com 123-456-7890