Although you have, in the course of the semester, made known your somewhat dismal opinion of the news media, I am still willing to admit that I am a print journalism major. That being said, after a long summer of lifeguarding and wedding plans I came back to school worried that my overexposure to chlorine, sun and love-sickness may have weakened my journalistic abilites. I'm not saying this is the best article I've ever written, but I am pretty pleased with it and considering the premise of the article is that journalism is dying, you might actually be happy to read it :).
NOT PAPER OR PLASTIC, BUT PAPER OR WIRELESS?
BY MARIA KERSHISNIK WALTON
It’s been said that “the pen is mightier than the sword”, but apparently the printed word is no match for the World Wide Web.
In an age where knowledge can be accessed instantly allowing the answer to almost any question about politics, local news, weather, sports, the definition of words, or even what the rest of the lyrics are to that annoying song you’ve had stuck in your head for three days, to pop-up on screen within seconds of your query, traditional newspapers are struggling to compete.
Although journalism is known as a fast-paced, deadline-conscious industry, the number of people willing to wait 24-hours to get information are becoming as rare as size eight jeans at an after-Christmas sale.
Despite efforts to add color, fact boxes, and concise, blurb-like stories, it seems that journalism, as the veritable watchdog, has just about barked itself hoarse trying to get people to pay attention.
Although newspaper circulation has been somewhat weakened since the 1980s, the downward spiral it currently faces has been picking up steam since 2003. This journalistic nosedive culminated in the Audit Bureau of Circulations’ April 2008 report, which announced a 3.6 percent drop in U.S. newspaper circulation over a six-month period from October 2007 to March 2008.
But even with the decay of daily paper sales over the last few decades, Sunday circulation remained removed, to some extent, from the accelerating demise of its daily counterpart: not anymore. In the six-month reporting period ending on March 31, 2008, that same report found that Sunday circulation fell 4.2 percent, nearly a full point higher than daily circulation.
While some of the “physical” newspaper’s demise has been self-inflicted – some publishers cut costs by halting delivery to remote locations and bad press about the press (plagiarism, strong liberal bias) weakened credibility – much of this tailspin in circulation can be attributed to the readers’ mass exodus from traditional news sources to online versions. Not only has this decreased circulation, but in addition, ad revenues have plummeted.
“Ad revenues of newspapers are way down, especially in classifieds,” said Ed Carter, an assistant professor of communications at BYU. “The print side is taking a big hit because the ad side is not keeping pace.”
Dennis Romboy, an assistant city editor at The Deseret News and part-time instructor at BYU explained, “We laid off 34 people this year - mostly reporters, editors, and artists - because classified ad revenue was down, something like a 3 million dollar shortfall, because people prefer to use KSL.com or craigslist.org to advertise.”
As a result of the lack of ad revenue, The New York Sun was forced to close its doors on Tuesday and the Tribune Company in Chicago “is trying to sell assets like the Cubs baseball team, Wrigley Field and the Tribune building,” Ed Carter said.
The Sun Times in Chicago recently sold their real estate to Donald Trump and now they are leasing space in order to keep their paper going.
“Major newspapers in major cities are renting space.” Carter said. “It’s hard to trust in this industry’s staying power when even their location is temporary.”
Soon the image of everyday Americans shuffling out to get the morning paper in their bathrobes and slippers will be replaced by a few quick scans of the computer screen whenever the mood should strike them.
The mile-a-minute world of yesterday has been left in the dust by the continent-a-nanosecond technological abilities of today. While it can be said that these advances make the journalists’ task of keeping the public informed a million times more doable, it is becoming apparent that they have also shaken the entire foundation of an American industry that dates back to before the Declaration of Independence.
Inherent in our society is an indescribable trust between the public and the paper; trust that what they put out is true. In the past, papers sustained that trust and, consequently, their own credibility, by editing and fact checking their stories and by printing corrections for errors the following day. This recipe for integrity doesn’t translate well in the online news format.
“We don’t have time anymore to copy edit or edit for substance,” Carter said. “We just want reporters to write the story and get it posted immediately, so there are errors due to haste.”
When the World Wide Web enters into the journalism equation, speed, rather than accuracy becomes the number one priority for reporters. The race to be the first to post a breaking news story allows for the presence of errors in reporting due to unknown information or “facts” proved to be false upon further investigation.
Although it is still possible to make corrections to online news stories, Carter believes that no amount of effort can remedy the harm done by erroneous Internet reporting.
“Even if it’s only been up for a few hours, it’s could still be out there somewhere on the Web,” Carter said. “Someone could have copy and pasted it onto their blog or uploaded it onto a Web site - you can’t undo that damage.”
Another blow to the journalists’ collective psyche is the immergence of bloggers as ‘reliable” sources of news.
“It seems like now everybody is a reporter,” said Dennis Romboy of The Deseret News. “People can put things on blogs or a web site and it’s not necessarily good writing, it’s just information.”
Michael Bragonje, an English major at BYU, went so far as to say that he trusts bloggers more than journalists. Believing that the current news media are so biased in their reporting, they are not unlike bloggers, Bragonje thinks that at least the latter of the two have the decency to admit when they are pushing their own agendas.
“I find that traditional news sources present current events with a slant – I can’t get news out of that,” Bragonje said. “I’d like them to say, ‘This is our opinion’ rather than present it as news.”
Anne Blake, a BYU graduate in English language, also spoke in favor of blogs.
“With a blog there’s dialogue,” Blake said, “A lot of people are very biased, but it’s a discussion, people can answer back and correct things.”
Looking to the future, Bragonje was nonchalant about proclaiming that print journalism is dying, “Things are changing, no one wants to buy it anymore” he said.
Blake added, “Of course [papers] will all be online soon, I mean we’re not still using candles.”
Citing the discomfort of reading off a computer screen as the only downside to online papers, Michael Bragonje was confident that soon, with the aid of technological advances, that would no longer be a problem.
And with new applications like the Amazon Kindle, a wireless reading device, technology is well on it’s way to fulfilling his prophesy.
According to Amazon.com, the Kindle utilizes a “revolutionary electronic-paper display” which provides a sharp high-resolution screen that looks and reads like paper.
Top U.S. papers including The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, and Washington Post can be auto-delivered wirelessly to your Kindle every morning for between 14 and 10 dollars a month.
As new developments in technology that cultivate the ideal of easy access with minimal effort emerge as the norm in society, the significance of Ed Carter’s idea that “the print side of journalism won’t be around in some places any longer,” could be more than that of a passing thought; It could be the ghostly peal of traditional journalism’s death knell echoing off of idle printing presses across the United States.
No comments:
Post a Comment