I had a nightmare.
There was no print. News was spread through Facebook posts, “You’ll never believe what the mayor did yesterday! Click here to find out!” and “If this post gets 1,000 likes, we’ll tell you the verdict on that criminal case!” Buzzfeed took over, and every update hidden among a million gifs and categorized into lists: 21 things you need to know about the newest tax hike, 44 reasons rapid transit failed, 67 ways you can be a better citizen of Winnipeg. Everyone was a news reporter, everyone had a camera. No facts were checked, no privacy honoured, and there were spelling errors and comma splices everywhere.
Okay, so it sounds ridiculous, but really—how far off is it?
It’s not out of the realm of possibility that within the next 10 years, print might be gone. I hope I’m wrong, I hope the morning newspaper will always be available to flip through, that the cold Metro guy at my bus stop will always be there to hand me a crisp, new copy of the daily news. I hope the Saturday paper will always be in our household, favourite sections pulled out and scattered. Then again, I hoped printing photos would always be necessary, because I couldn’t fathom living without hard copies of my memories. The fact remains that things change, and things are going digital.
So how does a paper stay afloat in a digital world, providing actual breaking news, thoughtful and well-educated columns, and maintain the integrity of journalism when everything is available free of charge and advertisements make far less revenue?
The Winnipeg Free Press has been hinting there might be changes coming to combat this. First, Paul Samyn’s New Year’s article hinting of a big year ahead, then accounts needing to be created in order to access the site, then most recently, this article that says the Winnipeg Free Press will be limiting free content on it’s digital stream in 2015.
Of course, people flipped. It’s a bad move, I’m not paying for stuff I can get free elsewhere, why should I have to pay for news, what a rip off, etc etc blah blah blah.
I’m definitely biased. I get frustrated with these responses because that’s my future. My dream job is to get paid to write articles that hopefully
people want to read. When people say they don’t want to pay, I feel like that’s one more little obstacle in front of me, one less job position open, one more seed of doubt in my head that I’ve set myself up for failure with this.
The thing is, even if I wasn’t pursuing this for a living, I would still hate those inaccurate Facebook posts, and still I hate the ignorant comments attached to them even more. I hate not being able to trust what I’m reading on the internet, and I hate falling for those stupid advertisements written like an actual news story. Damn you, garcinia cambogia!
Having free content is great, but let’s be realistic. The best news sources are businesses, the Winnipeg Free Press, to the Globe and Mail, to the New York Times. These businesses need to make money in order to continue to run. Refusing to pay for quality news will have consequences eventually. I just hope it’s not a scenario of not knowing what you have until it’s gone.
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“Refusing to pay for quality news will have consequences eventually.”
Well, the consequences already have been massive in terms of people laid off, long-running media outlets closing etc.
The decision made by who knows who many years ago to simply give journalism away online for free should go down as one of the biggest blunders of modern times.
But now we deal with reality.
There are tons of jobs for journalists these days — but they’re for journalists with the heart and stomach to work damn hard day in and day out and do reliable, accurate and interesting reporting.
They’re for journalists with incredibly varied skill sets — they can take photos, manage social media accounts, think in terms of multimedia, video and data visualization AND write really well to boot.
It’s a tall order but not impossible. A generous sprinkling of entrepreneurial spirit often helps as well. See how Jesse Brown has thrived with Canadaland.
The future is bright for journalism. But it gets considerably dimmer for those who think they’re going to go work at “Media Outlet X” and they’ll take care of you for the rest of your life.
That’s old-school thinking.
Embrace this, and be free.
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The Freep going to a paywall system has created six new jobs in the newsroom. It’s going to create better journalism and the way readers engage with it and that can’t be a bad thing.
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Very insightful- you made the issue relevant and provided both sides to the story! I have no doubt I’ll be reading your articles (in print) for years to come
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