Strangers to this new media landscape have a lot to learn. If they hope to understand it, and take advantage of its interactive options, they can start by learning the new lingo. To advance the learning curve, here is a brief tour through some of the words that recur in new media; a discussion and some definitions of the terms in single quotation marks follow.
It may seem like a no brainer to say that the new media includes blogs and citizen journalism, but with the dizzying pace of change in today's media, even a 'netizen'(a citizen who feels comfortably at home on the internet) can end up feeling like a 'newbie' (a recent arrival to the party).
If the term new media seems self explanatory, 'legacy media' may be less so. Increasingly used in place of mainstream media, the legacies include the large metropolitan dailies, the three television networks, and the newsweeklies. Unlike the audience of new media, the receiver of news from the legacy companies remains passive, and not able to interact with the content, by commenting on it, adding feedback, or offering new knowledge.
Tension Exists Between New Media Voices and Legacy Media Professionals
New media professionals and those in the legacy media are in the same business. Both labor at fulfilling an identical mission - providing accurate and timely information to their fellow citizens; but there is a certain amount of tension, or a division, between the two. The technological shift brought about by the internet means the print products of journalism are no longer viable, according to the proponents of the new media.
And that is something they welcome, noting that:
- Digital options are so much cheaper to produce and distribute
- Are therefore better for the environment
- And offer a richer experience, giving access to information from many different sources
- Plus the chance to interact with the content provided
Some working in the legacy media world - and many thousands of professionals still do - counter that digital options remain a developing area, and worry that
- The potential of digital media is not yet fully realized
- A business model has not been found for supporting journalism on the internet
- Millions of citizens still rely on the print product for their connection to the world
Conflicting Visions of What News Aggregators Do
One well known example of legacy media's unease with the effects of new media is a running conflict with the 'news aggregators', in particular Google News. Websites that aggregate, collecting interesting links and offering them to anyone who visits their website, are doing what comes naturally on the web. News aggregators are 'web portals', (another term for websites) that assemble a collection of links to news items - they open a door to the news.
Because the majority of news stories that aggregators link to are items that have been written by reporters employed in the legacy media, some legacy publishers have been threatening legal or legislative action. But those who are doing the aggregating insist that by freely offering the reporter's work to the whole world, they are increasing the value of that work -- and the advertising that supports it -- by leading many new eyes back to the legacy media pages that originally displayed the work.
Add Theories of Disruptive Technology and Disruptive Innovation to the New Lingo
Another response to the 'disruptive technology' of the internet (disruptive technology is any technology that overturns a traditional business model) which is being considered by legacy media publishers is to adopt a'paid content' approach to their websites, or to erect 'pay walls' (a practice of blocking access to a website unless the user pays a fee to access it). Those who embrace new media say there are better ways for legacy publishers to respond to the challenges of the internet. The publishers must use other methods if the newspaper business is to survive the disruption, insist new media bloggers.
New media experts often talk about theories of disruptive technology and its companion, 'disruptive innovation'(venturing into unfamiliar territory; thinking outside the box) as a way for the publishers to find better alternatives to paid content or legal threats. These theories have been developed by Clayton Christensen of Harvard Business School. Newspapers have strong assets to bring to the challenge, he wrote in a column in Forbes magazine. "Newspaper companies have only begun to scratch their innovation potential," said Christensen.
Kathlin F. Sickel - Reading and writing in print and online. So much to uncover and report. Join me; let's see what we can discover.
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