Daniel Harrison at the The Global Perspective takes issue with my post about media companies no longer being about content and all about the medium. He makes a fair point, and it’s a good thoughtful post (I’ll forgive him getting my name wrong), concluding that “it is misleading to get side-tracked into a debate on medium, when content is what it’s about”:
The medium is changing, but this is nothing new. One hundred years ago most newspapers did not have pictures; now they do. So what? The act of news reporting and delivery is what the economics of journalism is about.
I don’t think, sadly, this is true.The economics of journalism is to make money through advertising, and to a lesser extent, through subscription. The content — how many reporters can be hired, how far they can travel — is largely determined by this. Some publications manage to ignore this with the help of wealthy patrons, but eventually they all fall into the same equation. Newspapers have been economic for so long because they represented a viable logistical operation for delivering content (and advertising). But if the technology of logistics changed, so would be the business model. That is what is happening now. The delivery mechanism has changed so radically that it’s also changing the content mechanism. If bloggers on the streets of Bangkok can get pictures and news of a coup before the wires and TV crews, why not make that part of your content?
His commentary is in the context of the broader tug of war between bloggers and journalists — one he is right to say has a tendency to get too personal, too vitriolic. This is one of those weird artefacts of this period of change, and we’re going to look back and wonder what all the fuss was about. There will always be room for professional journalists — reporters, editors, commentators and columnists — and Daniel is right to say that content, in that sense, is still going to be a priority for many media companies. But it will be in a much changed environment, where the walls between creator and consumer are broken down, where delivery, creation and sharing are part of the logistical machinery, and where a well-known, respected blogger is as credible as a well-known, respected journalist.
Well Andrew, I haven’t seen anything so far that disagrees with your observation that advertising and subscriptions are the bread and butter of media.
🙂
Can’t see how professional journalists will die out either as you point out. Blogs don’t work the same as newspapers/sites and bloggers aren’t supported by large media organisations.
I’m sure news stories will continue to break in the blogosphere, and this will give some bloggers swollen heads, but that won’t lead to the demise of traditional media (which is now busy adapting to Internet-delivered content anyway.)
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