Riverside-Talk: «The free internet no longer exists»

Anyone looking out of the window in the conference room of the 25hours Hotel on Zurich's Langstrasse would see an old Aqui sign. A relic from the days when mineral water still came out of the depths in Zurich. Today it bubbles differently. Not from Zurich's springs, but from the development centers of tech companies. Visibility, reach, data, attention: the city's new streams are digital. And they no longer flow freely.

This is exactly where the first Riverside Talk on April 15 came in. The setting was deliberately kept intimate, but the topic was all the more important: «The power of digital media: do algorithms and AI control our reputation?» A question that almost took on an added irony in this location. After all, just a few steps away is Google Land in Zurich, where YouTube, Maps and other global products are being co-developed. Inside, people were talking that evening about the consequences of precisely those platform logics that help set the pace of the digital present outside.

The Internet as monopoly and graveyard

Martin Andree, media expert and bestselling author, kicked things off. And he did so without a run-up. His diagnosis was drastic, his language deliberately pointed. Anyone who still sees the internet as an open space in which content can assert itself freely was served a harsh rebuttal. Andree showed a distribution curve of digital attention which, in his interpretation, hardly knows any competition. A dozen providers bundle practically the entire usage time, the rest, according to his exaggerated formula, «lie in a huge graveyard».

It was the tone of a wake-up call, not an academic footnote. Andree spoke of monopolies, regulatory failure and platforms that keep users trapped in their own systems. His image of the department store, which you can enter deeper but are no longer allowed to leave, was simple but effective. In his view, the free Internet has not disappeared, but it has been emptied: there is still content outside the platforms, but it lacks traffic. Attention no longer circulates openly, but is siphoned off and redirected within a few systems.

Andree became particularly pointed when he linked the logic of visibility with the logic of the transaction. Anyone who wants to sell in the digital world moves through a funnel in which the decisive gates have long been occupied by monopolists: Google for search, YouTube for free moving images, Meta in the social sector, Amazon for the transaction itself. His question to companies was therefore less moral than economic: how will you get any attention, data and transactions in the future if access is controlled by just a few players?

From media problem to management issue

This was precisely the strength of his presentation. Andree not only spoke about media and democracy, but also shifted the problem directly to the boardroom. Anyone who believes that platform power is primarily a journalistic issue is falling short. It has long been a business model issue. Content marketing is becoming ever more expensive, organic visibility ever scarcer and dependencies on the major gatekeepers ever greater. Even companies that are not interested in media policy issues have to ask themselves how they still want to operate independently under these conditions.

It was only logical that he also turned his attention to generative AI and ChatGPT. If, in future, an AI plays out the product recommendation, the point of power will only shift even further. Then it will no longer just be a search engine that decides on visibility, but a system that selects exactly one option from a multitude of possibilities. Andree called this a kind of feudalistic road toll in his typically pointed way. Either you are recommended - or you don't exist.

You don't have to share every one of his formulations to take the core of his message seriously. The first Riverside Talk therefore began not as a cozy after-work event, but as an alarm call. And that is exactly what gave the evening its pulse.

Trust in a world of plausible fakes

After this powerful diagnosis, the discussion did not tip over into resignation, but into a second, almost even more delicate level for companies: If digital spaces are characterized by platform logic, AI and synthetic content, how can reputation be shaped at all?

Tanja Hollenstein, strategy and communications expert, shifted the focus away from criticism of the system to the question of leadership. Trust, according to the central line of her input, is becoming the scarcest currency. She referred to studies according to which three quarters of the population already use AI assistance, but trust in these systems remains significantly lower - and at the same time many hardly check their results. The sentence she put into the room hit home: we actually trust people, but ask machines.

Hollenstein was describing a dilemma that affects companies very directly. Today, information circulates in fragmented public spheres, topics are pushed up in networks and mistakes are no longer forgiven. At the same time, organizations are under pressure to take a stand, provide transparency, react quickly and still remain credible. For Hollenstein, the basis of trust therefore lies not just in reactive communication, but in the interplay between self-image, strategy and communication. If these three levels are not coordinated with each other, reputation quickly collapses in a crisis.

It was remarkable that she did not describe communication as a cosmetic discipline. Quite the opposite. Communication should not patch up what was previously left strategically unresolved. It can only be effective if there is a basis for decision-making in the company - before the shitstorm, deepfake or misperception occurs.

When plausibility becomes stronger than verification

In the subsequent discussion with Diana Ingenhoff, communication scientist and media researcher, the evening gained further depth. Moderated by Hans Peter Riegel, who used AI-generated Trump memes to demonstrate the proximity of satire, manipulation and visual perfection, the discussion focused on the socio-cultural shift behind the problem of trust.

Ingenhoff formulated a sentence that sticks: It's less and less about whether something is verified - but whether it fits into your own interpretative framework. This is precisely where the actual shift lies. In a media world characterized by synthetic visual communication, plausibility often becomes more important than truth. Images, memes and AI-generated content are not effective because they are correct, but because they are connectable.

This is an unpleasant realization for companies. After all, a sober correction is often too late or too weak to counter a viral, emotionally powerful but false narrative. Ingenhoff did not make any false promises. You can no longer manage everything. Anyone who wants to manage reputation today must first accept that complete control has become an illusion.

This is precisely why preparation is gaining in importance. Social listening, a precise understanding of the relevant stakeholders, a clear value framework, functioning processes and practiced response patterns: these are no longer optional extras, but prerequisites. In this logic, reputation is not only created in a crisis, but long before.

People remain the eye of the needle

It was exciting that, despite all the technology debate, the evening kept coming back to people. Hollenstein spoke about leadership, enabling and strategic agility. Ingenhoff emphasized media competence, further training and the declining ability to classify content at all. And Riegel put his finger on a sore point in many organizations: Managements also often lack a deep understanding of digital mechanisms, even though their economic consequences have long been real.

This was perhaps the most productive insight of the evening. It is not the technology alone that is the problem, but how society and organizations deal with it. Anyone who only understands algorithms, platforms and AI technically does not understand them enough. Those who only use them communicatively also do not understand them well enough. We need a broader understanding of how visibility, belief, emotion and power interact today.

Or to put it more bluntly: reputation is no longer just the result of good work and clever communication. It is increasingly also the result of systems in which perception is distributed, amplified and distorted.

A start with friction

The first Riverside Talk thus had exactly what a new format needs: friction, focus and enough open flanks for contradiction. Martin Andree delivered the shock. Tanja Hollenstein translated it into leadership and communication issues. Diana Ingenhoff showed that the real challenge lies even deeper - in our patterns of interpretation, in our media competence and in a public sphere that is increasingly splitting into partial realities.

The old Aqui logo was emblazoned outside. Inside, it was no longer about water, but about the streams of attention. Whoever directs them does not direct everything. But a lot. And that is precisely why this evening was more than just another talk about digitalization. It was an indication that reputation today is no longer just something to be cultivated. In an increasingly confusing system, it has to be defended, explained and constantly re-established.