Naver and Kakao will conduct the 'portal news admission and exit' reviews separately. This change comes two years after the suspension of the activities of the 'News Partnership Evaluation Committee' operated by the two companies.
Naver noted on the 23rd, "We will launch the 'Naver News Partnership Committee' in June, which will propose and operate a media partnership model." Previously, Kakao established and implemented evaluation criteria for the admission and exit of news on the Daum portal in November last year.
The two companies established the News Partnership Evaluation Committee as an independent organization in September 2015 to conduct reviews of news organizations' portal admissions and exits. However, in May 2023, they suspended operations on the grounds of "searching for a partnership model suitable for the media environment." With the creation of the 'Naver News Partnership Committee' following Kakao, the admission and exit of news organizations on the portal will now be conducted completely separately.
The Naver News Partnership Committee will consist of a Policy Committee responsible for establishing and amending review regulations, a Partnership Review Committee in charge of evaluating new partnership admissions, and an Operational Evaluation Committee that assesses compliance of existing partners. Additionally, a separate 'Appeals Handling Committee' will be established to review the admission and evaluation processes.
The Policy Committee will have a total of 11 members, composed of scholars, legal professionals, former journalists, and nominees from political parties, all recruited directly by Naver. The Partnership Review Committee and Operational Evaluation Committee will recommend personnel from professional organizations that conduct media-related evaluations, such as the Media Diversity Commission, the Public Opinion Concentration Investigation Commission, the Internet Newspaper Ethics Committee, and the Korea Newspaper Ethics Committee. Furthermore, members will also be appointed from a 'pool of expert committee candidates' consisting of former members of readership and viewership committees operated by news organizations.
To operate the Partnership Review Committee and Operational Evaluation Committee, Naver will form a pool of experts consisting of 300 to 500 members. Members of the two committees will be selected randomly from the candidate pool during each review cycle. Naver stated, "With newly appointed members participating in each review, the fairness of the evaluation process will be further strengthened."
The evaluation for new partnership admissions will primarily focus on quantitative evaluations, which account for more than 50%. Qualitative evaluations will also be assessed by each reviewer based solely on specific fields. All evaluation items will be subject to review by academics and experts.
Unlike Naver, Kakao determines the admission of news organizations to Daum based on 100% quantitative evaluation. Media organizations applying for admission must be affiliated with at least one relevant press or journalist organization to receive a quantitative evaluation. The quantitative evaluation process includes verifying 'original articles' produced through independent reporting and 'expert articles' from the categories for which they applied for admission. The structure allows for admission if the ratio of original and expert article production meets certain criteria. Among the 78 news organizations that applied for admission last March, 49 met the criteria.