A Digital Ecosystem of Trust

About the symposium

This English-language international policy workshop and symposium is not a conventional conference of successive academic papers. On Thursday, invited researchers, media professionals and policy practitioners will compare experience from several European countries in structured discussions across three themes. Friday’s public half-day will bring those issues to a wider audience through a keynote by Manuel Puppis, a roundtable and a summary of the workshop’s findings.

The discussion looks beyond any single institution to the infrastructure, financing and shared knowledge resources of the wider media ecosystem. Budapest offers a particularly relevant setting: shifts driven by platforms and AI coincide with the possibility of rebuilding a highly concentrated media system shaped by political capture. At the end of the workshop, participants will also consider whether to develop a longer-term European collaboration.

Confirmed contributors

Additional European and Hungarian specialists are being invited. The final speaker line-up and individual session roles will be published when confirmed.

Balázs Bodó

University of Amsterdam, IViR

Professor of Information Law and Policy, specialising in technology governance, digital infrastructures and trust.

Krisztina Rozgonyi

Austrian Academy of Sciences, CMC

Senior scientist working on media and platform governance, AI policy and the public interest.

Attila Mong

Committee to Protect Journalists

Journalist and CPJ’s Europe representative, with long experience in investigative reporting and press freedom.

Manuel Puppis

University of Fribourg

Professor of Media Structures and Governance; researches media policy, comparative media systems and the public-service remit.

Marius Dragomir

Media and Journalism Research Center

Founding director whose comparative research examines media ownership, public funding and political capture.

Michał Głowacki

University of Warsaw

Professor and vice-dean researching public-service media, media management and institutional change.

Ágnes Gulyás

Canterbury Christ Church University

Professor of media and communication whose work centres on local journalism and community media.

Bernd Holznagel

University of Münster

Emeritus professor of media and telecommunications law, with a particular focus on platform regulation.

Olaf Steenfadt

Global Media Registry

Founder and managing director; works on media ownership transparency, pluralism and journalism standards.

Ákos Maróy

AlvraLabs

Computer scientist working across digital systems, AI and media technology.

Ferenc Hammer

ELTE Department of Media and Communication

Media scholar whose research includes media and politics, disinformation and the social history of everyday life.

Dávid Kitzinger

Tilos Rádió

Media sociologist, collective rights management expert and community radio organiser.

Organisation and support

The symposium is being prepared by the Institute for Information Law (IViR) at the University of Amsterdam and ELTE’s Department of Media and Communication.

Balázs Bodó and Krisztina Rozgonyi are responsible for Infrastructure; Attila Mong and Angéla Szabó for Funding and governance; and Dávid Kitzinger and Ferenc Hammer for Shared knowledge and memory.

Colleagues from the Austrian Academy of Sciences’ Institute for Comparative Media and Communication Studies (CMC) and the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) are also involved in the preparations.

Hungarian media professionals, as well as representatives involved in media policy, its implementation and regulation, are also being invited.

The event is supported by the Goethe-Institut. Lead organiser: Angéla Szabó, with Mariann Bencze supporting the organisation.