On Wednesday, RMIT University's European Union Centre hosted a free public lecture at the State Library as part of the ‘Media, Communication and Democracy: Global and National Enviroments conference’ (31 August- 02 September 2011) examining media fragmentation and its consequenses.
Paolo Mancini , who is a professor of the University of Perugia, talked about media fragmentation in a sense of how it creates a dramatic change in media by a so called ‘blurred identity’, and its effects on politics. Also a part of the lecture were Professor Stephanie H Donald (RMIT) and Professor Jan Zielonska from the University of Oxford.
When I first heard Mancini talking about ‘blurred identity’, I wasn’t exactly sure on what he was trying to convey. What does Mancini mean by a ‘blurred identity both in structure and in professional identity’? - With the strong evolving online presence of the media, suggestions about the future of traditional media, especially newspapers, are numbered. Nowadays, journalists and media outlets have different approaches of writing and they make a lot of use of social media (twitter, facebook, blogging) to gather information and make their stories public.
So it seems like the rise with the digital age is leading to a ‘blurred identity’ as more and more people are getting their news and information from the internet. Print and broadcast journalists are expected to post stories as quick as possible and the lines between the different layers of journalism become blurred. Resultingly, both the audience of print and broadcast media outlets will decline.
I believe that when Mancini talks about change in struture and professional identity, he points out to the changes within the media industry but also the journalist himself.
Manini referred to a 1992 paper written by Daniel Hallin in which he describes ‘the golden age of American journalism’ coming to an end through fragmentation, and indicates the end of prosperity of news organisations.
In this context, the ‘blurring’ between journalism and blogging came up. How does blogging contribute to media fragmentation and can we say that bloggers are journalists or just wannabe journalists?
This is a very interesting question and the aspect of ‘blurred journalism’ seems to describe this perfectly. Are there any boundaries between bloggers and journalists? Can I call myself a journalist because I have my own blog?
Last semester, I was part of La Trobe University’s online magazine for emerging journalists callled upstart. We were encouraged to make use of social media such as twitter and facebook, and write blogs to get our own stories out there. My former upstart lecturer Dr. Lawrie Zion and head of the upstart magazine has many years of experiences in the media and writes his own blog these days. So where can we drawn the lines between blogging and journalism?
The answer may lie in the illustration by Tom Foremski, who is a former journalist for the Financial Times, that we are all content creators when we upload something onto the web or post a blog entry. It is actually not about whether you are a journalist or a blogger, but about the quality of the content you deliver and share with the world. Of course it would be great if you’re also getting paid for what you write but the essential thing to remember is, we all can be a ‘journalist or a blogger or both’. But coming back to the lecture discussion, Zielonska raised an important question: “If people have a voice through social media such as writing a blog, does this mean anyone is listening?”
As in my case, I just started writing my own blog and I am not sure if I can call myself a journalist now but I do know that I like to share my thoughts and views within the digital age- being a blogger or a journalist.
