This shouldn’t surprise anyone. According to a research report blog and online journalists are more optimistic about the future than the print and broadcast brethern.
The Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism
released a study today that claims bloggers and journalists have an “uneasy” optimism about the future of news media on the web. But, the study says, their optimism definitely trumps that of broadcast and print employees in traditional media industries.
According to the study, most journalists who work in the online news industry believe that the internet is having a negative impact on fundamental journalistic values, including a loosening of standards (45% of respondents felt this way), increased emphasis on speed (25%), and the addition of voices from outside the traditional media institutions (31%). While there’s no doubt that the internet is changing the way journalism is conducted and delivered, I’m hesitant to think that speed and increased diversity of viewpoints from outside the industry is detrimental to journalistic integrity.
Online journalists are cautiously optimistic that their publications have viable business models compared to traditional forms of media. Over 60 percent of respondents reported that their online news units were making a profit. But only four out of every ten online journalists are “very confident” that online news can find a profitable business model for journalism, and are worried about the money-making prospects of internet advertising. Roughly two-thirds of journalists surveyed predicted advertising would be the most important form of revenue for news websites in three years. That in itself might be an overly optimistic projection for online advertising revenues, which today only accounts for less than 10 percent of overall newspaper advertising dollars in the U.S., and actually showed a slight decline last year. Print advertising, however, is diving faster than anyone expected.
Internet certainly is changing the face of all the media industries. Change brings fear and uncertainity. Whie the old media is getting disrupted, the new media is struggling to find proftable revenue models. Purely advertisement based model doesn’t seem to be the answer, at least right now. Economic recession is not helping thigs either. So these are difficult times, but things should improve as media adapts to the web, mobile and other digital media technologies.
While on this topic, one of my blog readers Leo Dirr, forwarded me this interesting blog post on the blog utah stories titled ‘will newspapers survive?‘. Thanks Leo.