NDM - Baseline Assessment LR

1) Type up your feedback in full 

WWW: Good work on UGC & Citizen Journalism. Clear & Concise.
EBI: Greater coverage of institutions e.g. google, Pareto's law etc; cover this with more examples.   

2) Write a new, detailed paragraph to add to your essay that addresses one of the EBIs specified in your feedback. This may be the other side of the argument (the idea that audiences are not empowered) or perhaps a new or improved example from the wider media. Make sure this is an extremely well-developed paragraph of several hundred words, encompassing media issues, debates, examples and theories wherever possible.

Question - Developments in new and digital media mean that audiences now have access to a greater variety of views and values. To what extent are audiences empowered by these developments?

According to Briggs & Burke the internet is the most important medium of the 21st century and has helped stem some of the developments in New and Digital Media, which has allowed audiences greater access to a variety of views and values; empowering them to a great extent.The internet is a fast growing medium and therefore plays a huge part in NDM. For example, the internet has developed from search engines providing information to ordinary people like you and me making careers through the developments of the internet, such as YouTube vloggers and bloggers like Cameron Dallas and Lilly Singh who share their opinions and views about a wide multitude of things. The developments of the internet have also allowed the creation of newspaper conglomerates websites where we have access to views of opinion leaders such as politicians and other celebrities. An example, of this would be the ongoing twitter feuds between Lord Alan Sugar and TV presenter Piers Morgan who both have a very influential presence on the internet. The audience are empowered by their freedom of speech to share their views and values in the debate.

W/C: 26th September - Weekly New/Digital Media homework (6)

Rinstagram or Finstagram? The curious duality of the modern Instagram user

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/sep/26/rinstagram-finstagram-instagram-accounts

This article talks about the developments of Instagram and what it has given us from selfies to live blogging. It talks about the possibility of people having two separate Instagram accounts one which is public for anyone that wishes to follow them (Rinsta) and the other for those close friends (Finsta) that you can pull funny faces with and more. It discusses how most users many of whom are in their teens and live a double life in the world of social media. It discusses how the fake Instagram account is considered to be our real account while the other which is our fake account is considered to be our real one. A study found that a lot of us lie about ourselves on social media some of which have been successful such as the Cosmopolitan writer who faked an entire relationship with carefully constructed photographs. Which poses the question... Are we more comfortable blurring the lines of reality and fantasy online?

Statistical Information

•  A study conducted earlier this year (2016) found that 3/4 of British people admit to lying about themselves online
• Scope released research in 2014 revealing over 60% of people said social media makes them feel inadequate about their own lives.  

My opinion

I think that the world we live in surrounded by social media is fabricated big time, and therefore we do not really know anybodies true colours. Sadly, social media has sometimes led to people committing suicide etc because the idols or other people they follow on social media makes them feel so low and unimportant about themselves. In regards, to Instagram specifically, I think that two separate accounts will only contribute to this more.   

W/C: 26th September: New and Digital Media Homework (5)

The dizzying decline of Britain’s local newspapers: do you want the bad news, or the good news?

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/press/the-dizzying-decline-of-britain-s-local-newspapers-do-you-want-the-bad-news-or-the-good-news-9702684.html 

This article talks about something that we all know is happening if not already happened!!! The print medium is no longer... everything is now digital based. The print industry is in deep trouble so the vast majority of the newspaper conglomerates have gone digital while some remain to print newspapers... however from the newspaper conglomerates the newspapers that are still printed are not a paid newspaper they are given away for FREE! The most notable ones being The Evening Standard and The Metro. For printed papers the readership and sales figures have gone into a decline and are never going to rise unless those papers put everything online. However, there are also smaller regional newspapers for whom it is not as easy to just get up and put everything online as it can be very costly to set up and maintain thereafter.  Despite, the changes to go digital some newspapers particularly regional ones have continued to print as believe it or not some people do not trust what they read online and would prefer to have it in a newspaper coming from someone who knows what they are talking about. 

Statistical Information

• Sales are in freefall - down by an average of 13.5% on year in the first half of 2014
• The South Wales Argus, A regional newspaper had sales fall by 33.2%
• Doncaster Star, Another regional paper sold barely 1,000 copies per day
• Though, Scotland's Sunday Herald added 1% to circulation and has 10,000 online subscribers, thanks to a policy of charging for its website.
• London Evening Standard, freely distributed grew by a hefty 27.2% to 890,457 copies per day
• Trinity Mirror regional, though not officially audited claims a 17.3 million monthly audience

My Opinion

After reading this story, I think that the print industry does not have very long left in circulation however hard they try. The digital market is developing to fast for them to keep up and this is resulting in sales declining and therefore readership also declining. Even those who offer newspapers on the London Underground etc for free are soon going to find that they are not recognised because in some way, shape or form all types of news to suit everyone's tastes will be accessible online if not already. However, the only thing that I would like to see is that online newspaper websites are more friendly and welcoming to those who do not use the internet on a regular basis possibly those of the older generation. This is because at the moment I think that online sites are designed based solely on appearance and can be very confusing to someone who would not regularly visit the site.  

How has the news changed in the last 20 years?

1. How has the news changed in the last 20 years
2. Who has benefited most? Audiences? Institutions? 

Although, brief this mind map shows the changes in the news over the years in comparison to previous years when we only got the news in the form of printed newspapers or even at the cinema. The ways in which we receive, distribute and share news has increased so much that traditional means have been pushed out of circulation. We as the audience don't just get fed the news anymore we also produce and distribute it. Changes in technology have also changed the news because many traditional news paper conglomerates like The Independent have moved online ONLY. Some printed newspapers are even FREE!!!

Who has benefited most?
I think that institutions have lost out largely with the developments in technology and the way that they have changed the news industry. Institutions have lost out the most because a lot of journalists have lost their jobs as we are not taking any interest in printed newspapers anymore. We no longer need newspaper conglomerates to go and find the news and distribute it to us. Instead we are finding the news and distributing it to each other through UGC on social networking sites and blogs. With the decline in printed newspapers the newspaper conglomerates are suffering even more because they are loosing their audience not just to the digital production of news but also the printed as the older generations are looking elsewhere from people who do still produce printed papers. 

Then in terms of the audience I think that they have lost out just as much as the newspaper conglomerates but also benefited. I think that we have lost out because some people potentially of the older generations are more accustom to receiving the news from a printed paper and if newspapers are in decline then they have no means of receiving it.  With the  However, we have benefited because we can find and distribute the news ourselves and therefore we can get the real story out there as newspapers censor the truth heavily.    

Website references

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/press/the-dizzying-decline-of-britain-s-local-newspapers-do-you-want-the-bad-news-or-the-good-news-9702684.html

https://www.bloomberg.com/quicktake/the-fading-newspaper

   

New and Digital Media: News case study introduction

News institutions research

Major players in UK news:

• Murdoch
• BBC
• ITN

UK Newspapers ranked in terms of readership print + online

Murdoch

Murdoch has full control as CEO of his holding company News Corporation. It is the second largest media conglomerate.Therefore, he has a big influence on the changing news industry both in the UK and aboard (USA). 

Companies owned by Rupert Murdoch

- News Corporation

- 21st Century Fox

Assets of News Corp

UK

• The Sun 
• The Times 
• The Sunday Times
• Press Association (Part owned, News UK in one of 26 shareholders)

New South Wales

• The Daily Telegraph
• The Sunday Telegraph + insert Sunday Magazine

USA

• The Wall Street Journal
• Wall Street Journal Europe
• Wall Street Journal Asia
• Financial News

These are just some of the assets that News Corp holds they also have holds in Australia.

News Corp Statistics - GLOBAL REACH OF NEWS CORP

• Annual revenue of more than $31bn (£19bn)
• News Corp owns 44% of the Sky Network in Australia 
• News Corp also owns some 150 national and local newspapers in Australia  including The Australian, Herald Sun and The Telegraph. 
• News Corp owns 50% stake in Premier Media Group that operates 9 Fox TV channels in Australia
• Under the STAR name, News Corp owns 9 cable channels in Asia 
• 20% stake in India's Tata Sky Channel
• Owns a 39% share of British Sky Broadcasting (BSKyB) 
• 45% share in Sky Deutschland

ITN - Inderpendant Television News

1. Established in 1954 for the regional ITV companies, ITN is a British based news and content provider
2. It is made up of three divisions ITN News, ITN Source and ITN Productions
3. ITN is owned by ITV PLC (40%), DMGT (20%), Thomson Reuters (20%) and UBM PLC (20%).

Despite being owned 40% by the biggest commercial TV channel,it is ITN that holds the influence over the news industry as they produce content for many other channels that also have news segments. I would say that ITN has quite a large influence behind Murdoch and his companies. I think that it is ITN that has the influence as they are governing how the content is coming to us which I think essentially determines if we are interested it what we are being shown. 

ITN - Produces content for...

• ITV
• Channel 4
• Channel 5
• UK mobile operators 
• Online outlets (YouTube, MSN, Telegraph Media Group, Yahoo!)
• Film producers and researchers worldwide

ITN has worldwide coverage, and therefore influences a lot of people in a variety of differnet ways. 

BBC - The British Broadcasting Corporation

The BBC, is the worlds oldest national broadcasting organisation and has a big influence on the news industry as it changes. The BBC has been there right of the start and changed with the times. They have a large influence but must remember to remain impartial at all times with whatever the choose to broadcast. Choosing what to broadcast is the responsibility of the gatekeepers at the BBC, who decide if they should broadcast stories that they are sent from a variety of sources.  

BBC Subsidiaries

BBC audience statistics

The BBC has a very large reach and is therefore very influential nationally and globally. Personally, I think that the reach of the BBC has often shaped our trust in the news that we receive. The BBC is always our first port of call and due to the developments in new and digital media we can access it whenever and wherever we like as the BBC almost always will have the story. The BBC has been there from the start and we trust them to be more accurate which likely explains why they have extremely high audience figures. The most recent figures I could find span April - June 2015 across a variety of their different channels showing the reach that they had to their different target audiences. 

Other statistical information about the BBC audience figures

http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/latestnews/2016/bbc-weekly-global-audience

-- The BBC weekly global audience 2016 reaches 348m

http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/iplayer/iplayer-performance-jan16.pdf

-- BBC monthly performance pack for Jan 2016, shows everything from TV channels to Iplayer preferences and Iplayer use by time of day.

The impact of Google 

1) Why has Google led to the decline of the newspaper industry?
Google has led to the decline in the newspaper industry  by siphoning off billions of dollars in classified advertising revenue in the past few years.  Google  

2) Find a statistic from the article that illustrates the decline of traditional news media.
More than $40 billion or about 60% of ad revenue generated at its peak in 2000 disappeared. 

3) Looking at the graph featured in the article, what period has seen the steepest decline in newspaper advertising revenue? 
The steepest decline is from the 2000 mark through to 2010, as it began declining from just of the $50bn and kept declining to below $20bn for both print and online. 
    

4) Do you personally think Google is to blame for newspapers closing and journalists losing their jobs? Why?

I think that Google isn't to blame. This is because you cannot just single out Google just because they are a large tech company. There are many other companies such as Apple Inc, who are also responsible for sucking out the lifeblood of traditional media because they to have their own version of news apps and have invested thousands in the journalism industry. In fact, Google and other companies are probably more of a help than a hindrance as many elements of the journalism industry such as peoples blogs are discovered by its audience on Google. 

5) Read the comments below the article. Pick one comment you agree with and one you disagree with and justify your opinions in detail.

I agree with this comment as many journalistic elements out there even those of the large newspaper conglomerates were discovered on Google. For example, some of the major newspaper companies have established their online audiences with Google as they pay them to advertise at the top of a search menu. Also, many talented YouTubers have found there fame with the help of Google and gone on to win several awards for it such as Lilly Singh and Cameron Dallas. In my opinion, just like this individual says Google has helped companies to innovate with the changing times and technologies.

W/C: 19th September: New and Digital Media Homework (4)

Are mobiles changing how we shop?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/shopping-and-consumer-news/12172230/Are-mobiles-changing-how-we-shop.html

Just when we thought that the internet couldn't transform anything else in our lifes it has conquered our purses and wallets. As the years have gone on the internet has only improved in what it can offer us, first social media now the ability to complete our weekly shop without leaving our homes. We are doing our shopping on a variety of devices nowadays and the surge in shopping on the go just keeps increasing. Majority of the shopping orders that stores receive are said to have come from mobile phones and tablets. Which makes you think 'Are Mobile phones changing how we shop?'

Statistical Information

• 51% of online sales between November and January in the UK involved handheld devices rather than the traditional desktop computer or a laptop
• According to IMRG Capagemini e- retail sales index which tracks trends 66% of visits to retail websites between November and January were via mobile devices
• 49% of sales came through traditional computers
• 33% of sales were through tablets
• 18% on smartphones 
•  Mintel (Market research company) found that only 37% surveyed bought all or most presents online at Christmas

My Opinion

My view on this is simple, the digital world is not just changing they way we shop and communicate it is changing our entire life. We rely on the online world for everything from news to getting our weekly milk and bread but we also rely on it for other things like the answers to medical question for studying and more. So the fact that this article has been published saying that we are increasingly shopping using a handheld device or online in general comes as no surprise to me. It was bound to happen sooner or later. I think that we are not to far from all the big well known retailers completely being based online including food supermarkets. You may think I'm crazy saying food supermarkets could go completley digital but they basically already have... CLICK AND COLLECT ANYONE??!!   

W/C: 19th September - New & Digital Media Homework (3)

The Sun cuts about 20 production jobs in shift to digital

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2016/sep/16/the-sun-cuts-production-jobs-digital

With the changes to the way in which we prefer to receive our news we have heavily reduced the amount of printed papers we buy. Instead we are going online and therefore newspaper companies are doing the same. The Sun is cutting print based jobs and trying to create a more digital based business model. After all, there website has grown rapidly since they dropped there paywall. But they have a long catch game to play as rivals Guardian, Daily Mail, Interdependent and Telegraph are all a lot further ahead in terms of turning/turned digital. 

Statistical Information

• Approx, 20 production jobs primarily in print to be cut
• Nine subeditors on news and a further 3 subeditors on sport have been told they are being laid off
• The Sun, is however the UK most popular daily selling an average of more than 1.7m copies a day in August
• The Sun website audience was up 14% to almost 3 million browsers a day after dropping the paywall 
• Before dropping the paywall audience browsers were less than half of what they received after dropping it

My Opinion

The Sun newspaper wanting to change to digital is a good move in this day and age. As the years go by more and more stuff can be accessed online and going online is always our first port of call. Therefore, to keep their readers they need to move with them and offer the same content but in the way that the audiences look for and want it. However, their rival newspapers went online a lot longer before them so they have a big game of cat and mouse to play to stay afloat. However, whatever they do The Sun should not under any circumstances reintroduce the paywall otherwise readers will go elsewhere, its not like they are short of choice. 

W/C: 12th September - New/Digital Media homework (2)

Twitter: 140 characters in search of a buyer

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/sep/10/twitter-140-characters-in-search-of-a-buyer-takeover-facebook-google-microsoft

In Summary, Twitter is looking to sell but are at a lose end as there are not any bids for the company on the table as yet. Twitter, seems to be financially struggling and due to no bids on the table they are considering cost cutting in multiple areas of the business. The look into cost cuts comes as share prices were not as expected in recent passing months. It is assumed that it is unlikely to go out of business with a $3.6bn cash pile but doesn't appear to have much time left as a separate entity in the eyes of the law. Since, Twitter went public in November 2013 it has never made a profit instead it has been steadily declining.Michael Pachter of Wedbush Securities has said that Twitter need to figure out who they want to be and sell themselves based on that. However, at the moment there only appears to be one logically buyer and that is Facebook. Twitter is all about instant news which is the one element of the mix that Facebook does not have and are not very good at given there response on the posting of the Vietnam war photo.

Statistical Information 

•  Value of Twitter stock pushed down by 6%, given that no bids on table
• Shares changing hands on Friday 9th September at $18, 20% down this year. That is short of their float price of $26 three years ago
• Twitter does however boast 313 million monthly active users of which 66 million are US based
•  Twitter went public in November 2013
• Twitter signed up in 2015 to use Google Double Click service giving them the firehose of every tweet as it happens.

My opinion

In my opinion if Twitter is to sell then I do not think that they should sell to Facebook as there overall ethos could be lost in the realm of Facebook. Facebook is more about meeting people and reconnecting with friends. Whereas Twitter is all about reporting and spreading the news as well as sharing your opinion. But given Facebook's response to the Vietnam war photo I think that it would block a lot of opinionated posted and drive users away. 

W/C: 12th September - New/Digital Media homework (1)

Facebook and Twitter join coalition to improve social media newsgathering

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2016/sep/13/facebook-twitter-social-media-newsgathering

In summary, this story outlines how Facebook and Twitter have joined a partner network with First Draft -  A google backed organisation to better the reporting of news through social networking by working with the tech companies while combating the fake news that is spread through a better verification process. The partner network consists many large names in the news world such as New York Times and Washington Post. The creation of this network among the big news organisations also hopes to improve the experience of eyewitnesses who are contacted by the news organisations. The contribution of Facebook gathered huge interest due to their involvement in spreading fake stories and their approach to dealing with what can and cannot be posted on their platform. The article then goes on to say that by Facebook joining this network they can showcase the tools they have put in place for journalists but also constantly improve them. 

Statistical Information

• 20 news organisations if not more have already signed up to the network

My opinion

In my opinion, I think that this network is a good idea because there is far to fake news going around in the media that we all easily believe and take in. We don't take the time to assess if it is true or accurate because we have invested show much trust in these social networking platforms and what they feed us. For example, a news story that quite frequently was/is reoccurring is that childhood 'Home Alone' star Macaulay Culkin is dead which we instantly believed and began re posting and sharing with our friends on social networking.