November 18, 2025
The California News Hub
Launched in partnership with KQED, built on Distributed Media Lab’s technology platform and with initial financial support from the Google News Initiative, the California News Hub is a state-wide content sharing network currently including more than 30 local publishers throughout California in the distribution network and growing. The California News Hub carries stories from local and other news organizations to an expanding network of local media websites spread across the state offering a broader audience for stories of statewide interest.
Growing new revenue for local media
From the beginning, the project was focused on growing both audience and revenue for local news organizations.
After working through 2024 to build a scaled distribution network with a baseline reach of more than 1.5 million monthly impressions, in January 2025, KQED engaged with the Monterey Bay Aquarium to sponsor the California News Hub and launched a free sponsorship focused on gathering initial performance data.
Based on strong performance, in June 2025, the Monterey Bay Aquarium made the decision to pay for a 4 month campaign. They then renewed through the end of the year and now have made the decision to continue the paid sponsorship through the 2026 calendar year. The revenue from the sponsorship is shared with the publishers hosting the feed on their websites, serving as the starting point for a new revenue stream.
Monitoring the performance of the campaign and comparing that performance to their programmatic advertising budget was key to the decision by the Aquarium to continue the sponsorship through 2026. They found that engagement through the California News Hub network was outperforming their programmatic performance by a factor of 4:1!
A true collaboration from content to commercial operations
The network is built on DML’s technology platform while KQED took the lead engaging with contributing publishers and reaching out to publishers across the state to add the feed to their websites, growing the distribution network.
Once the network had achieved scale- reaching a broad California audience, KQED Sales staff engaged the Monterey Bay Aquarium to develop the details for a sponsorship campaign. With the campaign’s initial success through 2025, KQED is now reaching out to more commercial partners to sponsor the California News Hub as the distribution network grows.
Other publishers participating in the collaboration are now activating their sales teams as well and reaching out to prospective sponsors interested in engaging a statewide audience through the California News Hub program. Sales pipeline growth from multiple publishers selling in their markets drives audience growth by providing more revenue to share across an expanding network of participating local news publishers.
Publications contributing stories through the California News Hub:
Publishers with the California News Hub on their websites:
Get involved
If you’re interested in contributing to the California News Hub or hosting the collection on your site, contact CEO Dave Gehring at dave@distributedmedialab.com
