On our fourth day we spent two hours at Pew Research Center and I’m convinced my IQ has doubled. I found our speaker, Tom Rosenstiel, to be full of absolutely fascinating information. Tom is the director of the center’s project for excellence in journalism so he laid out tons of his findings on the current state of the media industry and gave our eager minds a glimpse into what the future may hold.
Myth #1: Newspapers are dying
It’s a phrase we’ve heard a lot during our time in journalism school, but it’s not entirely true. As Tom informed us, newspapers are not dying. In fact, their audiences are growing. The problem is that their audiences are growing online, not in print, and this creates two intertwining issues. The first is that people are no longer paying for subscriptions to print newspapers, significantly reducing that source of revenue. The second issue is that because people are moving away from print, where advertising has proven to be effective, and toward online news, where pop-up ads have become an annoyance, the newspaper industry’s biggest advertisers (i.e. car dealerships) are foregoing advertising period. This is because their when consumers are online, they can search the “classifieds” on sites such as Craig’s List, without the dealership having to fork over any money for advertising.
The Solution:
Tom’s first prediction for the future of newspapers is that newspapers will become solely Sunday editions (or Thursday, Friday, Sunday) because those editions generate up to 80 percent of the revenue for some newspapers. This will maintain their print advertising while also significantly cutting costs. By eliminating the other four editions, printing and shipping costs (the biggest cost to a newspaper) decrease dramatically.
Myth #2: No one will ever pay to read the news online
Yes they will. Two new “inventions” that may shock the news industry back to life are Apple’s iPhone and iPad. There’s an app for this an app for that, and some of the most popular are news apps. Depending on where you get your news, some of the apps may be free. But that may change in the near future.
The Solution:
Rather than paying to read news online, you’ll be paying monthly, yearly, or metered fees (which charge by the amount of usage) for the convenience a news app provides. The Washington Post currently charges $1.99 for a year’s access to their app. They’ve already determined that’s not enough. Right now, they’re working to develop their iPad app and Tom said they’re currently thinking of charging $1.99 per month or $12.99 per year for that app. Many in the news industry are afraid to even try charging their readers/viewers out of fear they’ll bail. I don’t see this happening. It may be difficult for people to wrap their heads around at first, but the bottom line is, the news industry is valuable to so many people in the world for so many reasons. If this is the way to save it, it’s time for people to pay up.
“And that’s the way it is.” –Walter Cronkite
Myth #3: Network news is the most trusted and the most popular source of news
Not anymore. Studies are showing that credibility in a news source is still very important to the majority of news consumers. But with network viewership decreasing, the companies are depending more on advertising. When that happens, the desperation of the news companies gives more control to the advertisers. Often those companies start to make certain demands such as a trade of advertising for news coverage. It’s called “pay for play” and it’s jeopardizing the credibility of network news. As far as popularity goes, most viewers now prefer 24-hour cable news channels. People don’t consume their news only at the breakfast and dinner tables anymore. They want it at all times of the day. And even though television advertising is still proving to be very successful for companies, when viewership decreases for the networks (which only air in the mornings and evenings), the amount they can charge for advertising does too. Another issue is that a lot of people are foregoing television news altogether because they can get all they need at the speed of light on the Internet.
The Solution:
With television as it is right now, the quickest solution will be for a news charge to be incorporated into bundled television plans. We already don’t watch all 400 of our channels, but now we’re probably going to start paying more in order to produce some sort of revenue for television news companies. The long-term solution is that television will no longer really be television. It will be watched from a computer with Internet access. We have the iPhone and iPad right now, but soon there will probably be an iPad type of device that will hang on the wall and be able to stream video from anywhere online.
As you can see, the news industry is currently facing a lot of problems. And there isn’t just one solution. As Tom said, if there was one solution, someone would have thought of it already. Instead, there are going to be many solutions implemented to slowly improve each problem. Be prepared for a lot of changes in the news as you know it.
I can’t even name all of the questions I still have for Tom. So to wrap up, Bob Schieffer – thank you for everything you’ve done for us, especially introducing us to Tom. I think he’s educated us more than we could have ever imagined.
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