New Media, Old News: Journalism and Democracy in the Digital Age

Have new communications technologies revitalized the public sphere, or become the commercial tool for an increasingly un-public, undemocratic news media?.
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Well, the big thing is that the internet is killing newspapers. Circulation of national dailies peaked in - many years before the first web browser. Even when reading on-line people tend to rely on information from established news outlets, and these tend to be the ones historically associated with their town or city of residence. Some 55 per cent of people agreed that much of the news on TV was not relevant to them, up from 34 per cent in In fact, the vast majority of internet users have never posted anything anywhere.

There has been a blogging revolution — and we do get told over and over that the Arab Spring showed the power of the internet and social media. Not all mirrors are one-way. It is also interesting that very few of the journalists here said they ever really got very much information worth having from blogs. The problem being that the information contained in blogs is often produced by some random person who may know next to nothing about the topic they are getting insanely worked up about.

Gossip and vitriol are all great reads, but reprinting stuff like that in a national daily, for example, would probably only get the newspaper and journalist in trouble, rather than the blogger. Rule one — sue the guy with the money. And talking about money, that really is the problem.

As one person says here, they exchange dollars for pennies with each reader that shifts. This has much to do with both the economics of internet advertising as it does from downturns in the economy. Both of which are hard to separate out from each other so as to be able to tell which one is the most important current factor. While the whole world is telling you the internet is killing advertising revenue for news sites, it might actually be that the GFC did the killing and that once there is a recovery then advertising might spring back again, as it has done in the past.

Journalism: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO)

As a cow how that works next time you are in the local butcher. And then newspapers and other media recycled some of this money back into content to retain their audiences to sell them anew next time. But while everyone complains that the public isn't prepared to pay for content, when was the last time you heard someone complain that Google doesn't provide any? There is a lot more cannibalism going on with journalists for want of a better word repackaging material and then putting their byline on it. The problem is that most real news — that is, new content — comes the way it always did — through connections with real people.

But journalists are increasingly tied to their desk. Why would you need to go see someone to get a report when they can email it to you? Why would you go have coffee with someone if you can text them? And companies and governments have their own media units that provide copy — normally produced by trained journalists — that is infinitely easier to reformat into your house style than starting from scratch.

And then there is the problem of having to produce lots and lots of copy for news media organisations that have lots and lots of space to fill with fewer and fewer people. There is virtually no time to check the accuracy of any of this copy that will have your name on it.

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And here is the next paradox — the internet provides infinite space for new copy, and yet what we get is all the same. There are benefits to being able to control what populations think and cannibalism only works while there is still flesh to eat. Economics has much to recommend it — but never underestimate the power of politics. View all 15 comments. Jun 18, lita rated it it was ok Shelves: This book explores how technological, economic, and social changes have reconfigured news journalism and the consequences of these transformations for a vibrant democracy.

May 30, Muhammad Ihsan added it. Jonathan McIntosh rated it liked it Oct 22, Lyubomir rated it really liked it Apr 02, Christopher Mackenzie rated it really liked it May 11, Cat rated it liked it Sep 01, Jonathan rated it really liked it Jan 11, John rated it really liked it Jan 15, Nicole Breckau rated it liked it Jan 31, Sabine Berzina rated it really liked it Feb 04, Rob is currently reading it Jan 03, Mohamed Salem marked it as to-read Sep 07, Sandy marked it as to-read Oct 07, Siddartha added it Jan 19, Meredith Metzler added it Mar 05, Lucy marked it as to-read Mar 18, Anastasia added it May 29, Technology Foretold Chapter 2: New Media and News in Practice Chapter 4: New Bottles Chapter 6: Politics, Journalism and New Media: News from Everywhere Part V: A New News Order?

Online News Content Examined Chapter Futures of the News: International Considerations and Further Reflections. View Copyright Page [Page iv]. French Representations of an American Presidential Election.

New Media, Old News: Journalism & Democracy in the Digital Age

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