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The documentary Part Three: What’s Happening to the News? displays the growing
concern that newspaper companies are continuing to fail. The U.S. is looking
for entertainment, like they would in other forms of media and losing interest
in watching fact based news. They are also moving deeper into the internet
world causing the traditional news media and the economics of it to need to
adapt or eventually fail.2
With news sources on the internet
like Yahoo! And Google being the top two sources for the public it is important
to recognize that people are demanding news when they want it. The internet
allows stories to be put up and developed over time and allows people to follow
stories.3 The top news
sources also rely on newspapers, so if they were to fail there would no longer
be a good source of information especially for Google, who supplies consumers
with links to newspaper websites with the stories they want to see. These news
sources know that people “info-snack” meaning that they look at stories or pieces
of stories that interest them and then click on links leading them to other
similar stories. They also know that people are more interested in
entertainment news and stories like investigative pieces are more popular and
stories that people have not heard before are the most successful.2 People have
short attention spans and so it is important to show short clips in order to
get the point across quickly and keep people interested and coming back for
more information like this short clip from CNN.2,3
People are able to get national news
all over the internet with sources like Yahoo! and Google. However, they are
not able to get local news and investigative stories, such as high school
sports and problems or developments in their city or town. This is why many
papers are beginning to “hyperlocalize” because they are able to maintain
themselves and get more advertisements to support themselves.2 The big
national newspapers are losing their advertisements to Yahoo! and Google, but
more and more are able to get online advertisements on their sites to maintain
themselves. Because news media has become very profit driven over the years
through advertisements and the realization that this information can be
profitable it has become more and more competitive. Big companies began buying
newspaper companies until the dramatic decline in sales and then they began to
break up into smaller companies once again. They competitive nature for profit
has caused the industry to need to adapt fast and maintain a profit through
online “paywalls” because advertising is not enough for large national
newspapers to profit.3
To get more interest and viewers
newspaper industries on the internet are competing with free blogs that are put
together by citizen journalists. These are regular, untrained people who blog
about issues going on in the world. These blogs are becoming more and more
popular and are being recognized as the top sources of information. A popular
one is the dailykos.com.3,4 The newspaper
industries need to find a way to keep up with these information sources.
Although, this type of journalism might seem good to the public, are they
really getting what they need to be hearing about the world or are they just
getting what they want to hear? Is the U.S. just being entertained by the news
or are they being informed? Many newspaper companies prided themselves in
giving news that gave neutral, factual information to the public, but today the
news media has become more and more about entertainment to keep up with that
form of media.2,3
The news industry is very important
for the public not just in the United States, but everywhere. If the newspaper
industry was not able to stay in business then how would the public stay
informed about many issues including politics? People need to be informed about
the decisions that are being made for them and their country. Without newspaper
companies the information we need to maintain our democratic government will
become lost and more difficult to find. Even today, I feel that information is
being mixed with entertainment as well as confused with it. Newspapers need to
find a way to keep support and maintain their status through support from
places like colleges or big companies.3 With this
continuous decline in newspaper companies, where will these companies be in the
future if something is not done?
Works Cited
1. McIlroy T. Future Of Publishing. Available at:
http://thefutureofpublishing.com/industries/the-future-of-newspapers/. Accessed
May 25, 2013.
2. News War.
Frontline Available at: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/newswar/view/.
Accessed May 25, 2013.
3. Campbell R, Martin
CR, Fabos B. Media & Culture: Mass Communication in a Digital Age.
9th ed. Boston, MA: Bedford/ St. Martin’s Available at: https://reader.cafescribe.com/reader/Reader.html.
Accessed May 22, 2013.
4. Daily Kos. Dly.
Kos. Available at: http://www.dailykos.com/#. Accessed May 25, 2013.
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