To what extent has print media been affected by modern day technology – has the growing use of digital media moved journalism online and is print media suffering because of this?
‘The media industry stands at the dawn of a new golden age’ (Peter Chernin president and chief operating officer of News Corporation) One that is ‘fueled on the demand side by ever-more discerning consumers and on the side by fresh thinking, new products and oceans of new content’. The UK's 11 major national daily newspapers have seen their circulation shrink an average 5.75% in the last year. Is print coming to an extinction, or moving online?
By the 21st Century, the internet changed everything. Technological change created a new role of journalism. For mainstream journalism this has meant vastly increased distribution. It used to be that people had to purchase print media from newsagents around their city. Now, newspapers and magazines are accessible to read on the internet, wherever and whenever necessary. Digital publishing has compressed the timescale for journalists and newspaper production staff. The internet also means increasing competition for newspapers. Not just for known conglomerate companies like the BBC but from independent companies, too. The emergence of self publishing platforms like Wordpress, has reduced the barrier and cost of publishing to virtually nothing. Journalism in the digital age with undoubtedly continue. From chronicle to broadside, from broadsheet to iPhone app, the format and delivery of news has always changed as a result of technological change and innovation, but the basic human behaviour of wanting to uncover, tell, and share stories of common interest always remains.
Manovich states four advantages digital technology bring. One being, variability. A large amount of what we experience in digital media is ‘unique’, in the sense that it has been created specifically for individual users in the sense of personalisation and customisation, but not ‘original’, in the sense that these unique creations are not composed of bespoke human-created material. The uniqueness of digital media objects not only emerged from this ability to personalise, but from the fact that most digital media objects change over time. Because digital media tends to be networked and interactive it often gets altered by efforts, needs and wants of the user. Digital media is often hypertextual or hypermediated and thus composed of a variety of linkages where the order of execution of those linkages can be determined by the user. These links usually change over time as they often either become out of date, epand in number. Finally, Websites configure and customise sites on the basis of the user’s IP address or by altering presentation to the type of computer and web browser being used. Automated periodic updates change software and keep it up date, as well as reconfigure social media profiles.
Manovich views technological change as a panacea; a digital revolution. However, there is a resistance to this theory. The situation explored is a microcosmic representation of the whole industry. Journalism stands at a cross road, one that it is ready to jump wholesale onto the digital band wagon. Perhaps, the only things that is holding the move back is the print native audience themselves. It is the need for commercial survival that might drive these changes faster.To further my research, I created an alternative lifestyle magazine with the audience demographic of ABC1, between the age ranges of 16-19 and 19-25 and conducted primary research. In order to ensure the digital natives and digital immigrants are satisfied with the move of print journalism to digital journalism, the stylistics of pages need adapting. The readability of Ezines is different to print magazines. For example, Oh Comely magazine uses typography which is small and compact - this would be hard to read on digital technology. Therefore, the font size is enlarged in order to enhance the usability and readability of the online magazine for the consumers. In Oh Comely, content wise, online journalism and print journalism are similar. Again, this convention will be used to satisfy the readability needed for the consumer; both use the inverted pyramid of interest, ensuring the important information is at the start to draw the audience in. The image to text ratio was larger in both Company and Oh Comely magazine, than online. Thus suggesting that print journalism need more images to make it more attractive to consume. Similarly, both use images to reinforce the narrative articles by displaying what is being written about. If stylistics were not adapted to suit audience’s needs, perhaps online magazines would not be so successful. Company magazine post articles about what will be featured in each edition, however they also have digital editions to download which are identical. Company are ceasing print publication after 36 years, and are going online-only. This clearly supports the fact that the print industry is not ‘dying’ but moving online. Company already has a strong social presence across Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and YouTube and this focus will ensure this audience remains a key part of Hearst’s product portfolio. So why do print versions exist given the expense of such objects? The results of this dramatic change may impact on how other magazines decide to publish in the future due to continuous technological change.
“Journalism exists to connect masses of people with compelling content” (Peter Chernin). Technological change allows consumers to personalise their news to suit their own taste, true one-to-one distribution. Consumers are able to get news updates delivered directly to their mobile telephone handsets. News, by this logic, is a form of content that needs to be repurposed, so as to comply with the demands of time-shifting consumer, who interacts and engages with the possibilities created by explosion of choices otherwise constrained by ‘the old analog world. the ‘mass digital conversion’ puts consumers at the very heart of the media.
Most newspapers seem to have chosen one of two approaches to the Internet. The first - and most common - approach is to have selected articles from the newspaper on the internet. The second approach is the same, but with more focus on adding content exclusive to the web pages. The latter approach also offers a better integration with news and user interaction. Even though "Interactivity does not come automatically with two-way technology" (Morris, 2001), people's attitude towards the media seems to have changed. As such, the profession of a journalist has changed. The main challenge is that people's needs have changed. A large part of the audience does not settle for the information given by the journalist anymore - Information must include hyperlinks to related news stories, allowing the readers to continue research on their own.
Arrival of tablets was a game-changing moment, not because of the technical attributes of the device, but because of the overall message sent by the hardware and software. Easy and non frightening to use, screen’s optical quality became as attractive as paper. Switchover to digital reading was accelerating. Publishers must embrace that they have three core markets for their packaged journalism. Digital natives will rarely use print, perhaps on weekends. They might want digital-only solutions from publishers and their smartphone is central to them. Such people will be of any race/ethnicity, different interests depending on their preferred genre, and will be split into the age ranges of under 16, 16-19 and 19-25. Digital natives will fall under the family life cycles of singles, newly married couples and full nest 1, who are in the income status if C2, C1 and B, and are emulators, emulator-achievers and societally conscious achievers. Print natives and digital immigrants are in a similar market. Print natives will rarely embrace digital unless for specific reasons like connecting with old friends and grandchildren. “Digital immigrants prefer print but know the world is going digital” (Earl J. Wilkinson, INMA). They take digital technology one step at a time, adopting permeations of the digital native’s lifestyle; the tablet is perfect for them. Print natives and digital immigrants will be in the age ranges of 30-45, 45-60 and over 60. They fall under full nest 3 and empty nest 2, in the income status’ of C2 - B, and are belongers or need directed.
In 2010, people spent 9% less time reading newspapers and magazines as compared to 2009 (Emarketer). Through digital technology, people can communicate without face to face interaction. News can be broken the minute someone can write and publish it. This makes newspapers come across perpetually slow to the punch, nothing more than a recap of what has already been said. For that reason, some deem newspapers to no longer be a practical way to receive information. Print media also costs money. As the old adage goes, why pay for something that is free? This is the very ideology that devastates the print industry. Secondly, the entire printing and distribution operation is expensive and cumbersome, considering that readers can just as easily download the same content in seconds online. Journalism is threatened because people aren’t paying for it when they should. Physical print may not officially be niche, but if newspapers abandon the relentless reporting that makes them special, then their future won't be worth protecting, in any form.
From the beginning, newspapers have prospered for one reason: the trust that comes from representing their readers' interests and giving them the news that's important to them. That means covering the communities where they live, exposing government or business corruption, and standing up to the rich and powerful. Technology now allows us to do this on a much greater scale. That means we have the means to reach billions of people who until now have had no honest or independent sources of the information they need to rise in society, hold their governments accountable, and pursue their needs and dreams. Some newspapers and news organisations will not adapt to the digital realities of our day—and they will fail. Technology should not be blamed for these failures. The future of journalism belongs to the bold, and the companies that prosper will be those that find new and better ways to meet the needs of their viewers, listeners, and readers.
Despite the dramatic change in print media over the years, the reports of the “death of print” have been greatly exaggerated. A survey by Deloitte found that 88% of magazine readers in the UK still prefer to consume articles via print. With the adoption of tablet services on the rise, this figure could well be out of date already - particularly given the rapid improvement in the quality of digital publications, and the demand for them to do more than merely replicate print titles online. But, regardless of some high-profile print closures in recent years, the stories of doom and gloom in the publishing industry have been tempered by a mini renaissance in independent titles. And old-fashioned paper and ink has an unlikely saviour. Some of the biggest conglomerate companies on the internet such as Style, Asos, Net A Porter and even Google itself, are now publishing print magazines; using traditional media to refresh the parts of their business models that other solutions can’t reach. "For online brands, print is a neat way of gaining extra marketing attention and boosting their community, even if there's no money in it," (David Rowan, editor of UK Wired).
“Traditional media is not dead” (Peter Chernin). Internet editions are widening relationships and not ‘cannibalising’ print readerships. Reality is that new technology, far from being a threat, offers media companies the chance to solve an age-old problem. Businesses were built on the ability to enlighten, entertain and educate - whether through the pages of an article, the images on a screen or the facts in a news broadcast. They exist to connect masses of people with compelling content. Yet throughout history the power to achieve the mass connection has been limited by distribution constraints - prohibitive costs, hard to reach locations, sluggish technology etc. ‘on-demand technology’ brings with it the promises of allowing consumers to order new programmes ‘for immediate viewing with the click of a button, freeing the viewer from the hassle of schedules’.
However, the colossal increase in the quantity of available information raises a possibility - and a strategic dilemma for publishers - never previously encountered in journalism: overproduction. Far more reporting is copied from other media than journalists generally admit and this was the case long before internet made it easy. Publishers trying to cope with internet disruption faced with dilemma much more complex than many cyber-utopians thought. When a business model begins to disintegrate, it can do so quite slowly and uneven speed.This might be called the technology cycle of deception and acceleration.
Furthermore, every year the amount of digital information grows even more readily than the year before. Internet addiction, information fatigue syndrome, and information overload are among the terms being thrown around to describe the new psychological diseases of the digital age. The constant use of digital technology can place a strain on families, friendships and classrooms. Some news accounts stretch the truth to suggest the extreme form - internet addiction - is a major health hazard for most digital natives. The increasing power and attractiveness of the internet for purposes like escapism and self-expression is part of the problem for some young people. The internet’s interactive quality leads some digital natives to prefer their “second life” to their first. Is the convenience of Ezines really enough to overrule these possible problems?
Journalism’s platform is moving, in a literal sense. The age of mass media will leave an imprint on the coming era of social, dispersed media. But the last century, when journalists were part of industrial oligopolies, may have well been historically unusual. Journalism cannot survive without adapting again. The determinants of success or failure are the quantity and quality of the experiment. Journalism’s recent history has shown that existing institutions have been slow and cautious to experiment radically and disruptively enough inside their own organisations. Overall, actual extinction of print media, taken as a whole across developed societies, still remains rare. Printed newspapers and magazines may be lower and less important layers of journalism in many countries, but it is not likely that they will vanish entirely.
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