1. The Impact of Technology on News Media
By Aaron Berhane

2. Agenda What’s new media New Media & its functionality
Distinct features of New Media
Fake News
Challenges of Traditional media
Advantage/disadvantage to society
Conclusion

3. What is New Media? New Media can be defined by
its technology (interactivity, digitalization, convergence);
Its services (delivery of information, entertainment, political participation, education, commerce) and
Its textual forms (genre hybridity, hypertextuality, multimedia)
Source:  Livingstone, S. Young People and New Media: Childhood and the Changing Media Environment. London: Sage Publications, 2002

4. . . .New Media
Which are the New Media?

5. . . .New Media Which are the New Media? Facebook Youtube Google +
Twitter
Textual blogs,
Photoblogs,
Videoblogs,
Wikis,
Podcasts
etc.

6. New Media & Its Functionality
How does the new media work?

7. New Media & Its Functionality
Contents produced by users
Possibility of on-demand access to content anytime
Interactive user feedback
Democracy in the creation, publishing, distribution & consumption of the media content
- (creative particiapation and community formation around the media content)

8. . . . . Media & Its Functionality
Example:

9. . . . . Media & Its Functionality
Example: Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently (RBSS), facebook page
It has 17 citizen reporters in the ISIS’s stronghold city – Raqqa
More than half a million people follow the group on facebook
More than 70,000 people follow them on Twitter
103 journalists were killed since 2011

10. . . . . Media & Its Functionality
Example: Current TV launched in 2005
Viewers created content
Viewers were encouraged to create ads
The business model depends on relatively inexpensive content
producers of televised pods were paid negotiated rate
However, despite the viewer create content business model, 2/3 of the content is produced by staff of Current TV.
"the beauty is the engagement opportunity that's offered to potential customers" director of T-mobile

11. . . . . Media & Its Functionality
Example: Current TV
Available in more than 50 million households
Subscription fee $40/m
Total revenue US$59 million
41 million in the United states households, 11 million in Britain and Ireland

12. What is the source of this news?
Task 1
Work with a partner
What is the source of this news?
How was this made? What tools/techniques were used?
Why was this made?
What is this missing? Is this the whole story?
Where do I go from here?

13. New Media & Its Functionality
Example: Huffington Post
It samples the highlights of others’ work
It writes a few original sentences to add context
It slaps on a come-hither headline and provide a link to the original article
HuffPost Canada has only two full-time employees
It describes itself as a platform and doesn’t offer payment to contributors
It’s an aggregator; HuffPost prefers the term curation, and it’s what 90 per cent of the Canadian site’s roughly 20 editorial employees spend their days doing.

14. Distinct features of New Media
What are the distinct features of the New Media?
Digital-technology based
It gives voice to anyone who is literate to the new media
An individual can use multiple platforms all in one go
Anyone can reach few or huge audience

15. What are the main concern of people about the news produced by New Media?

16. Differentiating real news from Fake News

17. Fake News
Fake news are stories that look like real news stories but are not
Fake news appears on websites that look professional
They relate to topics that are trending on Google and Facebook.
They have catchy or outrageous headlines designed to get people to click
They are hoax, propaganda or disinformation

18. Fake
Example:
Top US Admiral Fired For Questioning Obama Purchase of Mansion in Dubai
htm
Yoko Ono: “I had an affair with Hillary Clinton in the ‘70s”
ono-i-had-an-affair-with-hillary-clinton-in- the-70s/
Yoko Ono: “I Had an Affair with Hillary Clinton in the ’70s”

19. Fake . . . Why spread fake news?
To attract audience and advertising revenues that come with it.
Sometimes are published to harm someone’s reputation

20. Fake . . . What caused the growing problem of fake news?
News is no longer monopolized by traditional media.
Anyone can start a blog and claim to be a journalist.
Most fake news comes from websites.
Media literacy is no longer taught at many schools.
People are naïve and can’t distinguish real news from fake, studies show.

21. How can we spot fake news ?
Determine where the info comes from
Looks can be deceiving: Fake news sites often try to mimic real news sites.
Pay attention to the URL: Sites endings like .com.co (For example, abcnews.com is a legitimate news source, but abcnews.com.co is not, despite its similar appearance.)

22. How can we spot fake news ?
Read the “About Us” section
Find more information about the media outlet in other sites.
Examine the sources cited
Utilize fact- checking sites such as Snopes.com, FactCheck.org and FirstDraftNews.com

23. Is this real or fake news? Find out the authenticity of the news.
Task 3 Work in Group
Read the news article
Is this real or fake news?
Find out the authenticity of the news.

24. Challenges of traditional media
What are the impacts of the new media to a newsroom?
loss of job – shrinking the staff of the newsroom
Reduce the quality of news
Undermine the responsibility of journalists

25. Challenges of traditional . . .
What are the impacts to the profession of journalism?
Digital piracy -- copyright issues
Produced a phenomenon of citizen journalism
Undermining the traditional media & professional journalism
blurred the difference between factual and opinion based assumptions.
(Google, Yahoo, All Africa.com and other content aggregators

26. Challenges of traditional . . .
Resistance to change -- traditional media rivalries persist
Higher compensation for publishing on multiple platforms
How to maintain professionalism as we know it (ethics, values, etc)
the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) was the first entity to broadcast television programming within Canada, launching in September 1952 in both Montreal and Toronto.
- All television stations that signed on in Canada were required to be CBC affiliates with CBC

27. Challenges of traditional . . .
Taking the newspaper in particular to the next level
Newsrooms -- fewer or more journalists
Lack of resources to invest in new technology?
Lack of training, little or no access to the new technology

28. Task 2 Work with a partner
What are the advantages and disadvantages of new media to society?
small community media House has more audience than just its geographical reach

29. Advantage/Disadvantage to society
Advantages:
Enjoys more analysis, in-depth reporting, commentaries, investigative journalism, unique and specialist content
simplifies the research
More audience beyond geographic area
Journalism turns from lecture into conversation
News and info are available anywhere, anytime.
A lot to choose from AND IT’S ALL FREE

30. Advantage/Disadvantage to society
Plagiarism – it’s much easier to do.
Nationalist and hate speech is spreading
Commercialization & tabloidization dominate the media landscape
It’s easier to spread disinformation
It is a large competitive space and being first with the story may override publications standards of accuracy.

31. Conclusion The impact new media is huge:
Increases demand & pressures on journalists,
to retool and diversify their skill set
to produce more work in the same amount of time under ongoing deadline pressures for one or more media.
Technology takes time to sediment into the working culture
Increasing our awareness of news is crucial