By Jana Gous
Finding information used to be the difficult part of journalism. Now the difficulty is knowing what to trust. As newsrooms drown in AI-generated content and an endless churn of information, journalists are having to relearn the basics of how to verify and separate signal from noise.
Several journalists who started out at Die Matie went on to major South African newsrooms, and their early years show that finding the truth was never just about gathering facts. It also meant standing your ground when someone tried to stop you from publishing them.
André‑Pierre du Plessis, Editor of Die Matie in 2006, recounts a Stellenbosch restaurant that tried to sue Die Matie after an article recommended a competitor to the readers. “The baptism by fire taught me a necessary lesson: intimidation is often the first line of defense for those trying to push back against the press, regardless of whether they are actually in the wrong,” said Du Plessis.
That early test of nerve was part of what he calls the best job he’s ever held. “Being the editor of Die Matie is a unique opportunity to play with the mechanics of how stories are put together, how to curate a publication and how to motivate a team under pressure,” he said. In 2025, he founded Promenader, a printed community paper for Sea Point, carrying those same instincts for standing firm and holding a publication together into his own newsroom.
The fight for justice and truth continues, but the playing field has shifted over the decades. “It is an entirely different world. In the early days, everything required physical labour; you had to track down actual documents and report by going to court or to Parliament,” said Du Plessis.
“Journalism has become much easier to execute logistically, but in another sense much more difficult, because we are now drowning in an overabundance of information. The challenge has shifted from finding the information to separating the truth from the noise,” said Du Plessis.
That separation between truth and noise begins with reliable sources. “The biggest skill for journalists today is to double-check facts and information,” said Jóhann Thormählen, sports editor of Die Matie in 2007 and now senior sports journalist at Rapport. “It is now more important to be skilled at social media and AI, but you have to use those sources carefully. They are not always 100% correct,” he said.
Thormählen added that scepticism has to extend to people, not just platforms: “Don’t accept everything people tell you as fact. They can be, and often are, wrong – even your own sources.” That scepticism, he said, starts long before the interview does. Thorough preparation and unique questions remain essential, because the better the questions and research, the better the answers a journalist gets for the story.
George Claassen, former head of the Department of Journalism at Stellenbosch University and now public editor at News24, concurs. “To be accurate, truthful, and fair in reporting are the basics reflected in the SA Press Code’s Preamble.” Claassen was involved in drafting the code of conduct for Die Matie in 1994 and 1995. “I believe that journalists should, indeed must, apply the Carpenter’s Dictum, ‘Measure twice, cut once’. That is how you build trust,” said Claassen.
Thormählen builds on this by stating that trust is earned not only by ethics, but also by diligence and perseverance. “My years at Die Matie were the best preparation for a real newsroom, but you also quickly learn that you are not always going to be popular if you do your job as a journalist properly,” he said.
That perseverance, Du Plessis said, has to be paired with something that can’t be taught in a newsroom. “Curiosity remains the bedrock of this profession. If you do not possess an innate sense of curiosity, you have no business being a journalist,” he said.
It’s this instinct, more than any tool or platform, that he believes will decide who survives the industry’s next shift. “We are moving away from the era of the ‘broad’ journalist toward the era of the expert and the ‘micro-influencer’, thus following your specific niche. Audiences are increasingly seeking deep, authentic expertise rather than surface-level reporting,” said Du Plessis.
For the student journalists reporting for Die Matie this year, that shift is no longer a distant industry trend, it’s the landscape they’re already standing in.
