Final (Reading)

Question 1

When will newspapers disappear completely? How about other news media like television news and radio journalism?

Answer 1

It’s unlikely newspapers will entirely vanish.
Same for a variety of other news media – they’re destined to last for a long time in one form or another → many are repurposed.
It is possible, but history says not to assume b/c they often find ways to accommodate each other

Question 2

What will “the new social roles” of these old media be?

Answer 2

Text journalism will increasingly provide context for breaking news events
Visual journalism will focus more on discrete occurrences
Auditory news will focus on combination of context & storytelling
We’ll probably see blurring of the lines with the different formats
Visual & video media to remain that of bringing readers dramatic or explanatory info – some submitted by ordinary ppl
Social context of print will shift toward narrative & explanation

Question 3

Is there a magic bullet that is going to solve all of journalism’s future revenue problems? Can “paywalls” save the news?

Answer 3

No
Paywalls won’t save the news – they’ll grow in importance and increasingly become less controversial, but NO magic bullet → it’s a very complex future for journalists revenues.
They’ll provide some revenue, but not nearly enough to maintain business operations & staffing

Question 4

You said that hundreds of newspapers and magazines have instituted metered models for access to news content. Is that pretty much all of journalism, then?

Answer 4

No, it’s far from all of journalism
Many online-only publications, new journalistic startups, and many print-digital hybrids still offer content for free
Almost no broadcast news found online operates behind a paywall

Question 5

Why? - why doesn’t all of journalism use paywalls

Answer 5

Economic: despite growth in “direct payment models” for news, some outlets have continued to try to find other ways to subsidize the journalism they produce.
Also might be likely some companies have cultural aversion to charging consumers for news – think it’s impossible or morally wrong

Question 6

So what are these other models? What other options for future revenue growth are there?

Answer 6

1 The Direct Payment Model
2 The Native Advertising Model
3 The Venture Capital Model
4 The Traditional Advertising Mode

Question 7

(other models for journalism revenue)

1 The Direct Payment Model

Answer 7

Readers will start to pay for the news they want directly. They can subsidize new orgs by purchasing content through subscriptions/newsstand sales. It eliminates the intermediary orgs that stand between consumers & producers (aka advertisers)

Question 8

(other models for journalism revenue)

2 The Native Advertising Model

Answer 8

Making better ads and blurring lines between news & ads in the first place. It continues to rely more heavily on ads, but the ads are designed internally by creative teams at news orgs and made into publications so they blend in with actual news content. Has been controversial, but also successful

Question 9

(other models for journalism revenue)

3 The Venture Capital Model

Answer 9

Venture capitalists that invest large sums of money into news outlets. They may be impressed with plans to create & market content-management systems and build native ads, but investments are usually based off predicted future growth…that may not be accurate

Question 10

(other models for journalism revenue)

4 The Traditional Advertising Model

Answer 10

Online advertising with ads popping up or appearing on webpages. The shift to the “mobile web” and direct partnerships between online platforms like FB and news publishers like NYT may make traditional ads worth it again

Question 11

How about public funding for news? Could that somehow solve the journalism revenue crisis?

Answer 11

No, not in the US – funding will probably decline
But, the US gov’t faces media regulatory decisions (ex. net neutrality) that can impact future finances of journalism orgs that are beyond direct funding levels

Question 12

Will nonprofit news outlets become key players in the journalism landscape of the future?

Answer 12

They’ll only produce a small % of the journalism in the US, but it’s likely they’ll have an above avg. impact on audiences & the public
Will make only a portion of news b/c: the dominant media structures have been for-profit, and non-profits are more niche-focused which has relatively small audiences

Question 13

How are the distinctions among nonprofit, for-profit, and public media becoming harder to draw?

Answer 13

The public media system is turning to advertising and a variety of Silicon Valley-inspired organizational innovations to make up for shrinking gov’t financial support
This shows the blurring line btw public/non-profit & commercial journalism

Question 14

What about public media organizations in other countries, like the BBC? What will their future be like?

Answer 14

Even the most powerful public service broadcasters are vulnerable to larger changes in journalism
Even though British households subsidize BBC, it’s subject to political pressures – some don’t like the service fee/tax, others think its power is an unfair advantage over emerging digital news

Question 15

What about streaming video in general? Will that become an increasingly popular way to get news?

Answer 15

Almost certainly it will – news videos can command premium ad prices in a way text can’t. The ability to stream high-quality video will grow; emergence of new visual formats like raw footage from citizens etc.

Question 16

So it seems like you’ve been avoiding a straight answer to this: What’s the business model for the new/old journalism hybrid?

Answer 16

There won’t be just one model (single source of revenue is over) → subscriptions, metered walls, native ads, tech services, Silicon Valley investments, and gov’t & foundation funding
They’ll need to diversify their funding streams

Question 17

What does the “rise of mobile” mean for the future of journalism?

Answer 17

News publishers haven’t settled on appropriate strategy to deal w the changes through which journalism is consumed → most news isn’t “optimized” for mobile devices
More than half of all Internet use is through mobile devices tho
The way publishers get money in mobile marketplaces changes – customers more willing to pay for mobile news but mobile ads are hard

Question 18

Is there a big difference between local and national news coverage when it comes to the future of news?

Answer 18

National news orgs will probably be more economically successful than local/regional news
B/c: local gets very little traffic (load slowly, hard to navigate etc.), small advertising opp., less broad readership, & ppl care more about national news

Question 19

It sounds like news coverage based on geographic location might be less important in years to come. Is that right? And if that’s the case, what coverage options are there other than geographical ones?

Answer 19

That’s probably right – the future is likely to bring more & more non-location-specific news services
Instead, probably more digital news arranged around overlapping interests of small groups of ppl as well as niche elites → they could cater coverage to specific subjects not bound by geographical location ex. Videogames or rugby
Buzzfeed isn’t tied to a location, but has high readership

Question 20

What about ethnic and other non-English language media in the US, particularly Spanish language journalism?

Answer 20

Their importance and power is likely to grow in the future as the bilingual pop of US increases
Spanish language journalism isn’t the only ethnic media, but it’s the most central to the daily life of this group
Yet, they’re not immune to general decline of newspaper business

Question 21

So does this mean we see news continue to fragment?

Answer 21

Maybe – 2 ideas:
Yes: news outlets will rely on smaller audience with well-defined interests & reasons for consuming the journalistic content
No: there are globalizing trends that draw audiences together – new digital intermediates like FB and Google became widely used mass audience platforms
Future will see both increased fragmentation and integration at the same time

Question 22

So is this fragmentation a bad thing?

Answer 22

Many future-of-news commentators think it’s universally bad
But it also creates new communities and new freedoms to learn about the issues that concern you directly – these less powerful communities can engage

Question 23

Will the kinds of news collaborations discussed in Chapter 2 continue? How might they change in the future?

Answer 23

Collaborations will continue & become more common – but for certain kinds of journalism over others
It’s still a minority practice cause newspapers compete, but will be more important
The technological ability and economic incentive will increase
Most common will involve investigative reporting on institutional practices of gov’t’s & corporations and some breaking news events but never investigative journalism on exposing individuals

Question 24

Facebook and news companies are increasingly working together to host some news stories. Is this another example of news industry partnership and collaboration?

Answer 24

Yes, but more so a “platformization of news” – FB hosts the content rather than publishing it themselves
News orgs will increasingly depend on platforms for traffic b/c they’re more powerful and play an active role in the business of journalism

Question 25

It has been said “journalists will start having to build their own personal brands.” What does this mean?

Answer 25

Old corporate brands are now less powerful than the brands of individual journalists themselves. Journalists with strong social media presence and unique voice are in position of power – news institutions want a collection of powerful individual voices

Question 26

What is “entrepreneurial journalism”? Is this a Silicon Valley thing?

Answer 26

Its goal is to create a sustainable future for quality journalism by entrepreneurs who develop new business models and innovative projects by working on their own, with startups, or in traditional media companies
No, from a NY school of journalism

They have traditional journalistic roles but also 1 learn how the news business works 2 being tech savvy and 3 keeping an open mind & not being wedded to old ways of doing things
They’ll help chart the future of news business

Question 27

But isn’t entrepreneurialism bad in a lot of ways? Doesn’t it just accept, without protest, the fact that journalism is now a risky way to earn a living?

Answer 27

There’s nothing wrong with it as long as it remains open to the possibility that entrepreneurialism alone might not be enough – journalism is collapsing and students should attempt to innovate to push the industry in new directions
It is risky b/c it involves a lot of things, but just be realistic

Question 28

Will journalists have to know more about specific topic areas as opposed to just being generalists?

Answer 28

Probably – subject matter expertise is hard to obtain and retains significant value. Being an expert is one way reporters can distinguish themselves. It’s important to cater to the specific interests of readers
To rise in professional ranks, it’s likely subject matter expertise is a condition for employment

Question 29

How else will journalism schools change in order to train these new journalists?

Answer 29

They need to do a better job at teaching their students quantitative reporting skills partially b/c of the explosion of digital data
Also, students will increasingly need to think visually – how it relates to other social sciences, to info visualization and design, and to larger discipline of “data journalism”

Question 30

Tell me more about this “data journalism.” Does that mean that every journalist should learn to write computer code?

Answer 30

It’s the application of statistical techniques to the analysis of diverse evidentiary sources such as databases, opinion surveys, gov’t records and crafting of narratives that stem from them
It treats data as a kind of journalistic “source”
Many data journalists are comp. programmers – the skill sets needed are greatly aided by knowing software languages & comp. programming

Question 31

So is the future of data journalism really just an extension of this earlier, social scientifically oriented journalism?

Answer 31

In some ways, yes
BUT there’s a newer form of quantitative journalism - computational/structured - that focuses less on the analysis of data sets and more on actually generating data (like location of newsworthy incidents) than can be aggregated and processed by algorithms

Question 32

Does that mean that the storytelling function of journalism is just going to disappear?

Answer 32

NO! – it’s always interested in telling good stories

Even if they use data, conveying info through narratives is one of the few things that make journalism journalism

Question 33

But—is it true that robots will really write news stories?

Answer 33

Yes, and they’re already doing it now
Companies and news orgs use computer algorithms and simple natural-language processing techniques to take data reports and turn them into stories – they’ll become more common, but can only write particular kinds of stories

Question 34

Are changes in the news media system feeding political polarization in American society or just exploiting it? And will political polarization grow in the future?

Answer 34

There’s mixed evidence of a causal link – more media choices lowered the share of less interested/partisan voters which made elections more partisan, but it’s more of a vicious cycle
Journalism may not even be the main reason for polarization