The impact of technological change on newspapers
The impact of technological change on newspapers
Technological change has seen newspaper readership decline, as audiences move towards reading news and current affairs via the internet. Rising printing and paper costs have pushed traditional news journalism to adapt. A newspaper titles offer a news product using the internet platform. These online newspapers mean less revenue because people do not need to pay to read information. To cope with this many titles have introduced a paywall (a way of charging audiences to read their content).
1. Look at all of the UK news titles and research how the paywall is being used in an attempt to protect revenue and profits for these companies.
2. How do newspapers prompt readers to interact with their online news? Consider how they use social media to encourage reader participation.
2. How do newspapers prompt readers to interact with their online news? Consider how they use social media to encourage reader participation.
3. Consider how you could apply Shirky's End of Audience Theories to online news products.
End of Audience Theories: Shirky
In the ‘old’ media, centralised producers addressed atomised consumers; in the ‘new’ media, every consumer is now a producer. Traditional media producers would ‘filter then publish’; as many ‘new’ media producers are not employees, they ‘publish then filter’.
These amateur producers have different motivations to those of professionals – they value autonomy, competence, membership and generosity. User-generated content creates emotional connection between people who care about something. This can generate a cognitive surplus – for example, Wikipedia can aggregate people’s free time and talent to produce value that no traditional medium could match.
‘The Audience’ as a mass of people with predictable behaviour is gone. Now, behaviour is variable across different sites, with some of the audience creating content, some synthesising content and some consuming content. The ‘old’ media created a mass audience. The ‘new’ media provide a platform for people to provide value for each other.
The theory of 'every consumer is now a producer' applies to the
End of Audience Theories: Shirky
In the ‘old’ media, centralised producers addressed atomised consumers; in the ‘new’ media, every consumer is now a producer. Traditional media producers would ‘filter then publish’; as many ‘new’ media producers are not employees, they ‘publish then filter’.
These amateur producers have different motivations to those of professionals – they value autonomy, competence, membership and generosity. User-generated content creates emotional connection between people who care about something. This can generate a cognitive surplus – for example, Wikipedia can aggregate people’s free time and talent to produce value that no traditional medium could match.
‘The Audience’ as a mass of people with predictable behaviour is gone. Now, behaviour is variable across different sites, with some of the audience creating content, some synthesising content and some consuming content. The ‘old’ media created a mass audience. The ‘new’ media provide a platform for people to provide value for each other.
The theory of 'every consumer is now a producer' applies to the
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