Today’s seminar presentation covered all aspects of the readings. Jayne did a very good job in explaining the term journalism and the relationship between consumers and a journalist’s pay. Son provided an interactive presentation especially when he brought up the topic of Osama Bin Laden’s death and how majority of us heard the news through online media first rather than print media. This causes one to ponder on the survival of print media and of course, the influence of social and online media impacting print media.
As stated in the reading, there has been a decline in readership among people with regards to print media such as local newspapers. Using United States as an example, its newspaper market has dropped by 30percent and this is also caused due to the print newspaper readership by age cohort (Este, et al, 2010). It can be noted that the Gen Y contributes most to the decrease in print newspaper readership and this is particularly because of the evolution of media in the form of technology. Gen Y are the most exposed to online Medias and social Medias that they always turn to these platforms for their daily dosage of news. In fact, this was even proved in our class when all of us raised our hands to say we found out the death of Osama through online media.
Moving on to Singapore, according to the 2008 Nielsen Media Index, internet usage to access news increased by 5percent while newspaper and television showed a downtrend (Tan, 2008). This also shows that more and more Singaporeans prefer reading e-news rather than reading from the traditional media. Some reasons that people mentioned for preferring online news than buying newspaper is because it is free, ease of access and it is much more efficient as news will be updated on the go. So than how will traditional media such as newspaper survive and who will pay for journalism if everything is available for free? What will happen to journalists and how credible are sources online?
Despite the fact that anyone is able to publish anything online, people still consider online news more credible than print or television (Cassidy, 2007). This is because people tend to believe that traditional media is heavily influenced by the government and thus they are somewhat controlled in what they publish. As for the problem of who will pay for journalism, there are always the advertisers who are willing to pay for their advertisement to be published in newspapers. Citing Mr Jimmy, he mentioned how the New York Times announced paid subscription and they are able to argue that people who buy their papers are from the higher income groups or companies. Thus, they will be interested in the advertisements as well. Thus, consumers and journalists are interrelated as only when consumers pay for their news, journalists will get paid. Thus, as long as there are people who are willing to pay for traditional media, journalists would get paid, although their salaries could fluctuate from time to time.
Finally, in my own opinion, I feel that traditional media will not die. It will decrease but somehow, it was the one that created an epitome of news and there are still people who turn to traditional media for news. Even though internet news is on the rise, we have to remember that popularity does not mean that it pays for journalism as most internet news is free.
References
1) Cassidy, W. P. (2007). Online news credibility: An examination of the perceptions of newspaper journalists. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 12(2), article 7.Este, J., et al, 2010. Life in the clickstream: The future of Journalism. Media Entertainment & Arts Alliance.
2) Tan, L., 2008. Newspapers and television decline while internet use goes up [Online]. Singapore: Red Sports. Available from: http://redsports.sg/2008/10/19/newspapers-circulation-decline/ (Accessed 21st May 2011).
Heya Nivi,
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that Gen Y (referring to our age group) contributes more to the decline in the readership of newspapers. Also, the reason for this may be because we are more exposed to new media and social media and we like to have more interactive platforms to gain our source of news.
But, I think we have to consider what will happen to journalists if we keep reading from online news sources? What if one day, more and more journalists lose their jobs because there is no circulation of newspapers? This is indeed a worrying issue, especially for us who are studying this journalism module.
So, personally, I feel that news companies as well as journalists should try to be more innovative and think of interesting and creative way to post news and to engage the audience in how they present the news. This will ensure that traditional news sources gain profits in the long run.
Well, in the Case of Rupert Murdoch in Australia, then I would say that he has manipulated the true meaning of print journalism in newspapers, as information has been tampered with to make certain facts inaccurate and falsified. In Singapore though, it is true that it is so-called 'ruled' by the government, as certain pieces of information are masked so as to not give the Singapore government a bad name. In this way, information is not entirely true because what is in the newspaper does not show full transparency especially with what is happening politically.
ReplyDeleteSince the popularity of the reading news off the internet is on the rise and it does not pay for journalism, journalism can be on the decline which can be the reason as to why the wages of journalists are constantly pushed lower. This trend can continue over the next few years until media companies are able to find a way to make people pay for the news that they receive off the internet. Perhaps, subscription fees can be collected by large media companies since people will be more willing to pay for the credibility of the news received, but smaller firms have to source for alternatives to maintain their foothold in the competitive media industry.
ReplyDeletexoxo, calcy
@Shasi: Yes, it is a worrying thing that we might be out of job. But nonetheless, i still think traditional media will survive because they were the epitome of journalism. But that's just my opinion. Let's wait and see. =)
ReplyDelete@Gwen: It is true that transparency is a problem in singapore as well. But we need to ask ourselves, how much transparency are singaporeans willing to accept. It might cause chaos for certain issue and disrupt the stability of the country. So we are indeed studying a sensitive and dangerous subject.
@Calcy: Certain companies do offer paid subscription online. If i am not wrong, strait times online only allows you to access the full article if you pay for it. so maybe more companies should do that. but than again, people would not want to access it because they have to pay for it. so even when big firms face this kind of problem, small firms will face even worse than this.
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