Lantrn.ai is an artificial intelligence platform founded by media and technology veterans (from left) Reggie Ellis, Paul Myers, and Ryan Clark. The company is building AI-driven solutions that can power sustainable and profitable revenue models, especially for local and regional news organizations. Composite photo illustration by Cecilia Lopez
A Visalia-based startup believes technology can help the local journalism industry grapple with declining advertising revenues, dwindling newsroom resources and difficult choices between economic survival and impactful reporting.
Lantrn.ai is an artificial intelligence platform founded by media and technology veterans Paul Myers, Reggie Ellis, and Ryan Clark. The company is building AI-driven solutions that can power sustainable and profitable revenue models, especially for local and regional news organizations.
The founder’s premise is simple and straightforward. Journalism’s core product is information, but news organizations have long struggled to monetize that product in a digital economy dominated by clicks and scale.
“That’s when people don’t know who their city council member is, but you can name the entire Kardashian family,” Clark said, adding that the three founders of lantrn.ai noticed a disconnect in the way news organizations communicate with their readers, viewers or listeners.
The bet behind lantrn.ai is that better business infrastructure will help news publishers regain their footing, giving local reporting the stability it needs to endure and succeed in keeping people informed.
lantrn.ai teaching experience
The idea to use AI breakthroughs to help news organizations came from a conversation between Myers, Ellis, and Clark, just as AI solutions like ChatGPT gained popularity after they relaunched their podcast, “The Paper Trail,” in 2023.
Myers is president and CEO of lantrn.ai, Ellis is chief financial officer and Clark is vice president and chief technology officer.
Myers and Ellis built and expanded local news assets through Mineral King Publishing at a time when many independent news organizations were under contract. Although he has roots in the Central Valley, Clark spent decades working in early Internet and information-based companies during the rise of Silicon Valley’s digital economy.
This contrast sharpened the founder’s thinking. They concluded that journalism still operates on business assumptions that no longer align with how information moves, is consumed, and creates value.
They believe that journalism’s revenue is highly tied to digital reach. For local news, its reach is limited to the community the publication serves.
For example, Myers said Visalia City Council activities are important to cover, but the news doesn’t generate enough advertising revenue to cover the resources needed to cover it effectively.
“The rules of the internet are far-reaching, and even if you want to stay in the local news field, that’s never going to work,” Myers said. “If something changes, we’ll take advantage of it. But we just had to keep trying and rely on revenue streams as much as we could.”
So how can you make your local news reach more effective?
A new approach to AI in journalism
While large-scale AI tools and chat-based generative AI platforms continue to expose journalists to opportunities (and risks) in content generation and reporting automation, lantrn.ai’s approach is different.
The company works behind the scenes to help publishers better understand audience behavior, identify high-value information, and develop revenue and editorial strategies that go beyond traditional digital advertising.
Clark said that targeting news more effectively to the people who need it most in the way they consume information could increase trust and increase the number of viewers for influential stories.
This could look like a single article, reported and written the same way journalists do it today. This is then parsed or reformatted by AI into different forms of content, preserving the facts and integrity of the original reporting, so you know where and how your readers consume the information.
Myers said improving the way information is packaged and monetized could help publishers stabilize their operations and reinvest in reporting, especially in local markets where reporters often cover multiple stories across large geographic areas.
Addressing regional coverage gaps
Over the past two decades, California has experienced a significant decline in local news, especially in mid-sized and rural communities such as the Central Valley.
Since 2005, four out of 10 newspapers in the state have closed, according to the 2025 State of Local News Report by Northwestern Medill School of Journalism.
Nonprofit, philanthropy-supported journalism is emerging as one response, with publications like Fresno Land and Merced Focus allowing journalists to focus on stories rather than clicks.
Corporate-backed businesses are also stepping in to fill the gap, like GV Wire, founded in 2016 by Fresno developer Granville Homes.
The founders of lantrn.ai hope their AI-based model can help new and existing news publishers at scale while addressing long-term sustainability challenges.
Looking to the future, the company is focused on improving its platform, expanding its partnerships with publishers, and demonstrating that journalism can be both mission-driven and economically viable.
Although the company is still in the early stages of its rollout, the founders plan to begin testing their product this year using Mineral King Publishing’s news media assets, which have recently expanded to include the Sun Gazette, Mid Valley Times, Carman News, Firebaugh Mendota Journal and West Side Advance.
