Journalism is undergoing a momentous transformation not seen since the printing press, but newspapers in particular have been slow to adapt. Journalism is becoming a smaller part of people’s information mix.
Old-style journalists are no longer the gatekeepers for the flow of information. The people journalists are supposed to watch–politicians, corporations, activists–have taken to the new media (like blogging) ahead of journalists. “Politicians, interest groups and corporate public relations people have bloggers now on secret retainer, and they are delighted with the results.”
Fighting to retain audiences, news outlets are creating “brands” or “franchises,” packaging the news around the brand of Anderson Cooper, for instance, or opinionated anchors like Keith Olbermann or Lou Dobbs.
Those are among the findings of the fourth annual survey of the state of the news media released Monday by the Project for Excellence in Journalism, a research group affiliated with the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
Clearly, the health of newspapers, television and cable declined in the past year; the only sector showing growth is the ethnic press.
The bad news keeps getting worse: Serious journalists (ie. newspapers) haven’t figured out how to use the web yet. “Sites have done more, for instance, to exploit immediacy, but they have done less to exploit the potential for depth.”
Network newscasts underwent huge changes this year, but audiences didn’t notice. “Despite new anchors, millions in promotion, press attention and more, network evening news lost another million viewers, roughly the same number it has lost in each of the last 25 years.”
Morning network news also fell for the second year running, by 500,000 viewers (to 13.6 million viewers), the smallest audience in a decade.
The book-length study at is divided into chapters covering online, cable, network TV, local TV, cable, newspapers, radio and more. The observations are grim for all categories except the ethnic (notably Hispanic) press.
Increasingly private owners seem a better fit for the goals of serious journalism than public corporations, the authors conclude. “Private markets now appear to value media properties more highly than Wall Street does.” Pressures of the bottom line, quarterly earnings and stock prices don’t offer media companies the freedom and tolerance for risk-taking that they need to make the transition to the new media age.
As for newspapers partnering with former online rivals like Monster and HotJobs, the study suggests the web is both a threat and an opportunity for newspapers.
“As of now,” the authors note, “we find it too soon to side with either the optimists or the alarmists.”
