Print media is dying - Image:Stefano Corso
In response chairman Rupert Murdoch, infamous for his dumbed down tabloids and lightweight television “news” channels, has declared he will revolutionise online news by replacing traditional free services with pay to view content. He predicts that far from the major competition taking advantage of his move they will jump aboard the new model and thus transform the nature of online news delivery.
Murdoch, after years of pushing junk he laughingly describes as “news”, cynically points out that “quality” content doesn’t come cheap and free services harm the ongoing provision of quality journalism. What would this man know about quality journalism?
The lowbrow, celebrity and sex driven non-news we’ve come to expect from the News Corporation brands could be described in many ways but quality is a word that could never be applied. Revealingly Murdoch boasts of his network’s celebrity offerings being wildly popular and predicts people will be happy to pay to consume them.
Depressingly he could be right. So many of us aren’t in any way discerning about the type of “news” we read today. More often than not the most popular article of the day will be a chip shop wrapper piece on some publicity seeking Hollywood freak, skilfully tied in with a new book release or an upcoming movie clone.
But significant obstacles remain in Murdoch’s path, including Google and the BBC. And his early attempts at expanding his empire online have been encouragingly unimpressive, MySpace being a prime example.
Imagine a landscape on which news is really news, on which news actually contains un-spun, impartial fact, on which celebrities are rightfully consigned to the cartoon section and thinly disguised advertising pieces are clearly stamped, “a message from our sponsors.” If we are to be charged for “quality” this is the least we should demand.
Eventually the corporations will force their paid services onto the Internet. Whether we love or hate the idea, there are genuine costs attached to providing a large scale news service and if the print model is dying out revenues will have to be generated elsewhere.
Running a high circulation newspaper or national television news desk is a cash hungry enterprise, but the same is not true of the Internet where the playing field is levelled out and even a modest budget can command an impressive audience.
Today there are a few corporations controlling the traditional media and limiting our choice to a basket of mainstream approved issues, but we are not so constrained on the Internet. There we can find millions of sources covering thousands of topics, some reliable others dubious.
Rather than respond in a knee-jerk manner to Murdoch’s proposals, perhaps there is an opportunity to exert our influence as consumers in a marketplace with much wider choice and in the process punish purveyors of the type of rubbish being offered by Murdoch.
This could be an opportunity to strike an equitable contract with the mainstream media whereby the cost of paid services is determined by the quality of service. How about a return to proper investigative journalism for a start?
In the interests of choice, by all means retain the comic book style sensationalism and titillation for those that want it, but as an addition to rather than at the expense of real news.
That’s a fair deal. If the media corporations want to add a price tag then maybe they should start doing the job they claim to do, reporting the news.
As for Murdoch, his poisonous News Corporation will always be an impediment to detaching professional journalism from sleazy infotainment. A paid for, quality news service is mutually exclusive to anything Murdoch could offer.
Turning away from his slimy products and ensuring his initiative to grab and control Internet news is a resounding failure might be a route to resuscitating proper journalism. Whilst he is down we should kick hard and kick often by keeping our money in our wallets. Driving News Corporation into a deeper hole can only increase the chance of building a modern and open media that once again serves the public interest. That would be something worth paying for.
Of course Murdoch claims the media is already consumer driven and he’s giving people what they want. He overlooks the monopolistic progress of mainstream media but even so, I hope what he claims is not true. We have a chance to prove him wrong.
