Andrew Jaspan

Notable work and positions

360info - Founding Director and Editor-in-Chief
The Conversation - Founder (2011)
The Age and The Sunday Age (Melbourne) - Editor-in-Chief (2004-2008)
The Observer (London), The Scotsman, Scotland on Sunday, Sunday Herald (Glasgow) - Editor (various years)

Biography

Andrew Jaspan AM is a British-Australian journalist who founded The Conversation and now serves as founding director and editor-in-chief of 360info. Born in Manchester on April 20, 1952, and raised partly in Australia, he earned a Bachelor of Arts in Politics, Modern History and Philosophy from the University of Manchester. After graduating, he launched The New Manchester Review and later edited The Big Issue in London, The Observer, The Scotsman, Scotland on Sunday and the Sunday Herald in Glasgow, winning Scottish Newspaper of the Year and UK Sunday Newspaper of the Year under his editorship of the Sunday Herald. In 2004 he became editor-in-chief of Melbourne's The Age and The Sunday Age, where the paper won the Pacific region's Newspaper of the Year award in 2007; he left the role in 2008 amid restructuring at Fairfax Media. In 2009 he began developing the concept for The Conversation with University of Melbourne vice-chancellor Glyn Davis, envisioning universities as a source of expert-driven journalism; the site launched in Australia in March 2011 with co-founder Jack Rejtman and expanded to the United Kingdom (2013), the United States (2014), Africa and France (2015), Canada and Indonesia (2017), and Spain (2018). He left The Conversation in 2018 and went on to found 360info, a nonprofit wire service that supplies newsrooms with free, research-driven content addressing global challenges; it launched in November 2021 and is hosted by the Australian National University. Jaspan is a Member of the Order of Australia for his contributions to media and higher education.

Career highlights

• Founding of The Conversation 2011 · Built the academic-journalist collaboration model into a global network spanning eight countries.
• Founding of 360info 2021 · Launched a nonprofit wire service providing free, research-driven content to newsrooms worldwide.
• Member of the Order of Australia · Recognized for contributions to media and higher education.