Journalism is going through a difficult period of transition thanks to the declining print market, the global economic difficulties and competition with the web. Print media outlets are beginning to face up to the fact that online publishers (and prosumers) can make content available for free which is of a good enough quality to take readers away from higher quality, paid-for channels like newspapers or paywalled websites.
It’s difficult to say where this leaves journalists. After all, they are not a free resource and their paymasters are struggling to find ways to compete and monetise online. This is the kernel of a huge discourse which spreads out into monetisation methods, quality of journalism, barriers to entry and changing business models.
Thanks to Guardian.co.uk‘s PDA blog this morning, I’ve spent a few minutes today reading The Internet Manifesto, and it’s as good a summing up of the ‘journalism question’ as I’ve seen in a while.
The Internet Manifesto came about when Sascha Lobo, Mario Sixtus and Thomas Knuewer started to think about the general angle of the discussion on journalism’s future. Lobo, again from PDA, explains:
“We were tired of the fact that the discussion about the future of journalism doesn’t take the reality of the internet into account, but revolves around the wishes of how the publishers think it should be.”
I’d recommend clicking through to PDA to read the Manifesto in full, because it neatly encapsulates all the big themes which are so important to this discussion. How can ‘journalism’ distinguish itself when publishing power has been made easily available? Is the internet working to improve journalism at financial cost to journalists and traditional media? Isn’t dialogue now crucial to successful journalism?
If you have any thoughts on the 17 declarations in The Internet Manifesto, please leave a comment. This is a topic which fascinates us here at PN Towers and we’d love to know what you think about this as a snapshot of the present and future of journalism.
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