Rich Gordon, an associate professor of journalism at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University, wrote an article published in 2005 titled "Online opportunities make journalism's future bright, despite gloomy feelings" in Online Journalism Review that argued the downturn in the media industry may be inevitable, but that doesn't mean that journalism as a profession will disappear.
Well I certainly hope it won't, I am about to finish my degree.
But more to the point, he suggests that the Internet has opened up tremendous other opportunities. In a telephone discussion with him today, I asked what has changed since the article was published. He responded that media outlets are finally seeing they must change their business model. Although it might seem as though the industry has experienced a rapid decline in readership and viewership recently, and it might be tempting to blame that on the Internet, he said newspaper circulation stayed stagnant while the population increased, meaning this has been a gradual loss. He suggested that with the overabundance of media offerings available now, more people are reading the news than ever, they simply aren't getting it all in the traditional print format.
"It's scary and uncomfortable and challenging and any other negative adjective you can come up with," he said. "Three or four years ago there were still an awful lot of people in the traditional media publishing community with their heads in the sand."
Gordon said those people are now beginning to understand that the industry needs to adapt and innovate in order to stay relevant. Although he admitted he is concerned with how much investigative reporting will be funded because the days of giving five reporters six months to work on a project are probably gone. Hopefully those types of groundbreaking stories aren't gone as well. I am hoping, myself, that those kinds of stories will be easier to do with the amount to technology available to us.
Gordon said there's no real set path for a journalist just out of school to follow. This job is one of constant learning, and to remain employable, journalists must learn to adapt. I think that's valid. I don't worry about finding an entry level position at a mid-size daily newspaper. I don't think that will be a problem, I just don't have as much confidence that I will be doing the same kind of journalism down the road. Actually, I'd like to write books someday, maybe after I pay off my student loans.
In 20 years.
Thursday, March 13, 2008
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3 comments:
My biggest concern is that people who paid a quarter of my undergraduate costs to attend two or three year technical institutes are better qualified to lead the online revolution. I love working with them--I just hope they value working with me. Given the lackadaisical broadcast and mainstream reporting that's going on in the U.S. right now, I wouldn't blame them if they wanted nothing to do with journalists.
I think the most encouraging sign is that the papers that had their collective heads in the sand, as Gordon said, are finally starting to adapt. It's a bit unsettling that journalists are learning these new techniques on the fly as they publish them, but at least they're trying.
By the way, I voted in the poll. I'll take a phone call any day.
I'm encouraged too, even if I don't want to see the actual print edition die. Even if I didn't enjoy the sensory experience of reading a print edition, I'm slightly perturbed that we're all spending so much time doing everything on screens these days. I'm afraid it's going to screw up my eyesight!
I voted in the poll, too. I'd much rather have the phone call. Those of us who work at the ODE are well aware of the kinds of comments that get left on stories. It's far too easy for anyone to just click "send" and leave a comment without any thought to the logic behind his or her comment (or to the grammatical content). The people who take the time to make a phone call are usually the ones who really care and generally they have better things to say. Even if they are yelling or are local crazies, at least they care more than someone who's never read the paper before and never will again but is mad about one story taken out of context of an entire year's worth of coverage.
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