As per the
Wikipedia definition the term citizens media refers to forms of content
produced by private citizens who are otherwise not professional
journalists.
Citizens’ media is
causing a few fundamental changes in the media landscape that will impact how
we produce and consume information in the decades to come. The changes are:
- This is about democratized media and wide participation because it is open to many people
- A fairly fundamental change is that consumers are now producers and vice versa
- Also, we now have a read-write Web that allows people to write easily on the Web
- Journalism has traditionally been a lecture – journalists tell you what the news is, you either buy it or you don't. Now it's moving into something like a conversation and the first rule of a conversation is to listen.
- And Journalists have not been listening, many a times readers know more than journalists. This isn't a bad thing, it is just an opportunity to do better journalism
- The democratization of access to media means that the audience now has many choices and most of them are free
- Media organizations are asking the public what they know about things and also about what they want reported in media
Shirky, in his
blog[1]
explains why the newspapers are in trouble. He says the most salient reason is
the fact that Printing presses are terrifically expensive to set up and to run.
This bit of economics, normal since Gutenberg, limits competition while
creating positive returns to scale for the press owner, a happy pair of
economic effects that feed on each other. In a notional town with two perfectly
balanced newspapers, one paper would eventually generate some small advantage —
a breaking story, a key interview — at which point both advertisers and readers
would come to prefer it, however slightly. That paper would in turn find it
easier to capture the next dollar of advertising, at lower expense, than the
competition. This would increase its dominance, which would further deepen
those preferences, repeat chorus. The end result is either geographic or
demographic segmentation among papers, or one paper holding a monopoly on the
local mainstream audience.
The expense of
printing created an environment where advertisers were willing to subsidize the
Print media. This wasn’t because of any deep link between advertising and
reporting, nor was it about any real desire on the part of advertisers for
quality journalism. Advertisers had little choice other than to have their
money used that way, since they didn’t really have any other vehicle for
display ads.
The high entry
barrier effect of printing cost got destroyed by the internet, where everyone
pays for the internet, and then everyone gets to use it. And when the
advertisers and everyone else, were all able to use the internet to get out of
their old relationship with the publisher, they did!
However before we
sound the death knell of the Print media (used to mean largely newspapers) we
need to consider the fact that Print media does much of society’s heavy
journalistic lifting, from flooding the zone — covering every angle of a huge
story — to the daily grind of attending the Government meeting, Court hearings
etc. This coverage creates benefits even for people who aren’t newspaper
readers, because the work of print journalists is used by everyone from
politicians to district attorneys to talk radio hosts to bloggers. The newspaper
people often note that newspapers benefit society as a whole. So the question
looms
“Who will
gather all the news, cover all the events and uncover all the scoops if the
Print media dies?”
Well the answer
is, we don’t know yet! But one thing is for sure that newspapers/print media as
we knew it will NOT survive. Another clear distinction is that what we should
be worried about is NOT how print media or newspapers will survive but how
journalism will survive as it revenues are eroded by the advent of the internet
and who will play the watchdog role that the print media largely played in
society.
While the debate
rages some adaptations are being experimented with in the print media. For
instance, Dan Gillmor who is
the founder and director of the Center for
Citizen Media and author of We
the Media: Grassroots Journalism by the People, for the People at a
recent public forum on Citizens media cited the example of Le Monde
which offers its readers blogs and actually puts better ones up on the Web site
and even paying some bloggers. The Northwest Voice in Bakersfield,
California is including hyperlocal content that is proving to be quite
successful. The threat that journalists should be thinking most about is not a
journalistic threat – it's about money – it's the advertising revenues that are
being taken away rapidly by craigslist and eBay. The online Oh My News
in Seoul, South Korea is also fascinating. They have 40,000 citizen journalists
around Korea who have agreed to post things there. They have professional
editors who edit things that get posted, so it's a hybrid. It's a wonderful
experiment and they just opened an Oh My News in Japan and will launch
an ambitious project in the US. (Source: http://web.mit.edu/comm-forum/forums/citizens_media.html)
A thing to
remember though is that newspapers still hold the edge in generating original
and credible content. Credibility of information is going to be newspapers'
competitive advantage.
Another aspect of
newspapers that we should not overlook is the fact that newspapers play a role
in organizing our lives and providing us a summary at global, national or local
levels which the blogosphere or citizens media is unable to do currently.
Secondly the newspapers play a crucial role in setting the agenda which stems
from their credibility. Citizens’ media being themselves consumers of print
media is still some distance away from being able to lead public opinion and
set agendas.
To sum up what all
I have presented above in one sentence, “We are in the middle of a journalistic
revolution and we don't know what will happen next?"
There is much similarity to the revolutionary effects of the printing press itself. Post this revolution what will print media look like, what will journalism look like? We all have to wait and watch as the revolution unfolds.
The Web 2.0 notion of mashing together things from various sites and sources including print and online media is creating interesting things like the micro-publishing model. Mashup Web sites and videos are something younger generations find very natural BUT will credibility and original content still hold the key for print media? Will technology like the internet, that was the harbinger of this revolution by drastically reducing publishing and distribution costs, similarly reduce sourcing/reporting and content creation costs too? Will Bots write the regular news of tomorrow and change the face of Print media and reporting as we know it today? Well, I don't know but I surely know that there are interesting times ahead…[i]
There is much similarity to the revolutionary effects of the printing press itself. Post this revolution what will print media look like, what will journalism look like? We all have to wait and watch as the revolution unfolds.
The Web 2.0 notion of mashing together things from various sites and sources including print and online media is creating interesting things like the micro-publishing model. Mashup Web sites and videos are something younger generations find very natural BUT will credibility and original content still hold the key for print media? Will technology like the internet, that was the harbinger of this revolution by drastically reducing publishing and distribution costs, similarly reduce sourcing/reporting and content creation costs too? Will Bots write the regular news of tomorrow and change the face of Print media and reporting as we know it today? Well, I don't know but I surely know that there are interesting times ahead…[i]
Comments
Post a Comment