How publishers are now approaching curation with a calculated embrace

Publishers are learning to work the curation game without buying into it, making peace with a system they don’t trust but can’t afford to ignore.

Mar 24, 2025 - 05:02

How publishers are now approaching curation with a calculated embrace

By now, publishers’ skepticism toward curation is less a hot take, more a hard truth. The same old story of middlemen, murky margins and the nagging sense that someone else is getting rich off their inventory. But justified cynicism doesn’t pay the bills.

So rather than rehash familiar frustrations, what follows is about something more pragmatic: how publishers are learning to work the curation game without buying into it, making peace with a system they don’t trust but can’t afford to ignore.

Because at this stage, sitting it out isn’t a statement, it’s a financial risk. Programmatic dollars keep slipping away and the evidence is piling up that, when done right, curation isn’t just a necessary evil — it might actually be smart business.

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