Good Luck Media Wants To Tell A Different Kind Of Climate Change Story

In early June, for a couple of days, New York City had the worst air quality in the entire world with smoke drifting in from Canadian wildfires. Though many expressed shock, there was something impersonal about the doomsday photographs of towering skyscrapers enveloped in haze that I encountered all across social media. It felt more like a sci-fi film than something that was happening to everyday people commuting to work, picking up their kids, or like me, rushing to the Whitney Museum before it closed. As the effects of climate change become clearer and more apparent, these types of freaky, unsettling events will become more common. Media outlets will have to find new ways to cover such events without erasing the people most impacted. 

Striking a balance between the universal and personal experiences of climate events is what Alessandra Ram and Samantha Oltman are aiming for with their new production company,  Good Luck Media, which will tell the stories of climate change from “the human angle.”  

With backgrounds in social media, video, and longform journalism, Oltman and Ram are well-seasoned and prepared to bring a fresh perspective into climate coverage. The two initially met when they were working in “producer-type roles” at WIRED. Ram left the magazine in 2016 and worked as a field producer for AJ+, traveling across the world to cover social justice movements.  

Good Luck Media, which launched in mid-June, will produce audio content in the “thriller vein” that’s aimed at younger audiences who are deeply invested in the future of the planet, says Ram. Eventually, she hopes to  expand to producing video content.  In our conversation, the co-founder discussed the strength of podcasting as a narrative format and what it’s like to start a new media venture in a precarious landscape. 

This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity. 

Study Hall: What’s the benefit of telling a story through a podcast vs video content or a written article? 

Alessandra Ram: Longform journalism can take many forms. I think that the interest in audio has really peaked over the last few years because it’s a really intimate platform. People have this sense of loyalty to who they’re listening to, that’s why people have these big podcast brands now, and everybody is trying to get into it. With podcasts, it’s an intimate activity, you’re sort of like walking the dog, or you’re doing the dishes, and you’re learning a lot or you’re relaxing. We don’t want to just give people information. We want them to enjoy themselves when they’re listening to our stories or feel like they are connecting with somebody and have an emotional reaction. 

SH: What type of stories or creators are you looking to spotlight with Good Luck Media?

AR: A big focus of ours will be on underrepresented narratives. That’s a huge area in the climate space in particular because it’s basically something that everybody is affected by. But, I certainly don’t see that reflected in the media coverage. We are a global journalism studio so we aren’t just focusing on Western countries. We’re going to be focusing on people and communities all over the world. And then we’re also going to be looking at stories that haven’t really been told yet. I want to provide our audience with something really interesting and engaging, and hopefully relatable. 

SH: Climate change coverage tends to invoke the apocalypse. How do you strike this balance between raising awareness of how dire the situation is, but also allowing for hope and providing possible solutions? 

AR: That’s something that Sam and I are talking about all the time. It’s going to be a bit experimental. I come from a news background so I tend to lean into the apocalyptic and I feel that documentary formats tend to do that. We all have the same experience when we watch a documentary, where we sort of know where it’s going especially if you’re aware of the issue around it. So I think having an element of surprise is something that we are going to lean into with our storytelling regardless of format, and also providing people with relatable experiences and figures. There aren’t too many examples of climate studios or production companies like this one, which is shocking to me.

SH: Do you have any advice for anyone starting their own media venture right now? 

AR: I would love to give people advice. I feel like I’m still asking people for advice all the time. So that’s one thing that I will say is that you’re constantly asking people for advice when you start your own company. I don’t know if that will ever stop and if it needs to. I’ve just been really inspired and encouraged by everyone that has been so supportive since we launched. There’s a lot of chatter in media and tech circles about the current state of the economy, the landscape, and that it’s not a good time. But it’s never a good time.

I’m a woman, I’m a woman of color and a journalist [from a] non-technical background launching a startup. So sort of, like, all the red flags are there, but you have to just decide that you’re going to do it and just take a leap. Since the company is focusing on climate, it provides a sort of a sense of purpose and urgency so I know that it actually is the time to do it. 

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