Technological Advancement; Threat to the Future Newspaper and Production
Chapter One
OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY
The Main Objective of the research is to proffer an appraisal of Technological advancement; and Threats to future newspapers and production. The specific objectives include:
- To determine the relevance of technological advancement.
- To determine the threats of technological advancement on the future of newspapers and production.
- To examine possible steps newspaper houses can adopt to keep up with technological advancement.
CHAPTER TWO
LITERATURE REVIEW
INTRODUCTION
Fitzgerald and Saba [4] express the change in the newspaper industry about an unprecedented crisis that combines cyclical turbulence with the diffusion of digital technology that steals away revenue and readers at an alarming and seemingly accelerating rate, publishers and editors everywhere have thrown away their rule books and, to find their way in this new and alien environment, are ready to implement previously unthinkable changes Of all the “old” media, newspapers have the most to lose from the internet. Circulation has fallen in America, Western Europe, Latin America, Australia, and New Zealand for decades. But in the past few years the web has hastened the decline. In his book “The Vanishing Newspaper”, Philip Meyer calculates that the first quarter of 2043 will be the moment when newsprint dies in America as the last exhausted reader tosses aside the last crumpled edition. Latency has become a massive issue in the delivery of all media, particularly news. We live in a time where on-demand is the norm and products that fall outside that are looking increasingly obscure and irrelevant [5]. As time goes on the period of latency that is acceptable and qualifies information as being “news” is decreasing. 24 hours used to be fine, it was an acceptable latency. Now only minutes and seconds will do. The latency involved with publishing a hardcopy newspaper makes it completely irrelevant to a contemporary audience, who demand accuracy and the very latest, most accurate information.
Newspapers failure to innovate
Cantrell [7] appreciated that the conventional wisdom is that the internet killed newspapers, but considers it too simple of an explanation. He stated that newspapers killed themselves, and the internet was simply the best and most convenient alternative. The Internet was the catalyst that started a process that had been queued up and ready to happen for a very long time. The newspaper industry went wrong by failing to innovate. Rather than constantly trying to outdo themselves, newspapers waited for something to come along and outdo them. Up until a few years ago, the only significant change that was ever made to newspapers was the transition from black and white photographs to colour. Over the course of decades, such a transition looks pathetic.
CHAPTER THREE
METHODOLOGY
This section covers the methods used to address the objectives of the study. The section discusses the research design, research population and sampling technique, the instrument for data collection, the method of data analysis and the analytical software used for the study.
Research Design
In this study, a survey research design is adopted. Survey is chosen based on the objectives of the study. Survey is defined according to Nworgu (2005) a survey studies the sampling of individual units from an already known population and its associated survey data collection techniques, such as questionnaire construction and methods for improving the number and accuracy of responses to survey.
Population of the Study
The population of this study comprises all lecturers of mass communication dept., University of Uyo.
CHAPTER FOUR
PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS OF RESULTS
This section presents the results of the field study; it shows the descriptive information of the respondents, the results of each of the research questions and the test of hypothesis.
CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Summary
This study focused on technological advancement; threat to the future of newspaper and production. The study was set to address three research objectives. The objectives which include:
- To determine the relevance of technological advancement.
- To determine the threats of technological advancement on the future of newspaper and production.
- To examine possible steps newspaper houses can adopt to keep up with technological advancement.
Based on the above stated objectives and the study carried out, the following findings were made:
- that the relevance of technological advancement include it aids the speedy flow of information, it breaks the barriers of distance in communication, it keeps us at the same pace with international community, technology fuels sustainable economic expansion and it drives productivity.
- that the threats of technological advancement on the future of newspaper and production include it reduces newspaper readership, it leads to low patronage of newspapers, it encourages spread of rumor, it can lead to the folding of newspaper houses and it deprives some of the workforce of their jobs and makes the printing machines dormant.
- that the possible steps newspaper houses can adopt to keep up with technological advancementinclude newspaper houses should have websites for online publication of their news, timely/ up-to-date reportage of news should be encouraged, they could adopt free pop-up of news on other organizations’ websites, objectivity in news reportage should be upheld and ultra-modern equipment should be used for news coverage.
Conclusion
The main purpose of this study is to assess technological advancement; threat to the future of newspaper and production. The study was set to address three research objectives. Three research questions guided the study.
In this study, a survey research design was adopted, the population comprises all lecturers of mass communication dept., University of Uyo, a simple random sampling technique was used to select 28 respondents for the study and a questionnaire was the instrument for data collection. Relevant literatures were reviewed which guided the objectives and methodology of this study. As result of the field study and analysis of results, the following findings were made:
- that the relevance of technological advancement include it aids the speedy flow of information, it breaks the barriers of distance in communication, it keeps us at the same pace with international community, technology fuels sustainable economic expansion and it drives productivity.
- that the threats of technological advancement on the future of newspaper and production include it reduces newspaper readership, it leads to low patronage of newspapers, it encourages spread of rumor, it can lead to the folding of newspaper houses and it deprives some of the workforce of their jobs and makes the printing machines dormant.
- that the possible steps newspaper houses can adopt to keep up with technological advancementinclude newspaper houses should have websites for online publication of their news, timely/ up-to-date reportage of news should be encouraged, they could adopt free pop-up of news on other organizations’ websites, objectivity in news reportage should be upheld and ultra-modern equipment should be used for news coverage.
Recommendations
Based on the findings of this study, the following recommendations are made:
- Firstly, newspaper houses should keep themselves up-to-date with current technological advancements. They can achieve this by having websites which report timely events as they unfold.
- Secondly, just as discovered from one of the findings, they could adopt free pop-up of news on other organizations’ websites, thereby reaching a larger audience.
- Lastly, for any media house to succeed, it must be objective in its reportage.
REFERENCES
- Kilman L (2013) World Press Trends: Newspaper Audience Rise, Digital Revenues Yet to Follow, WAN-IFRA.
- The Economist (2011) Back to the Coffee House, a 14-page special report on the future of news. Economist Group, UK.
- Levy S (2011) Can an Algorithm Write a Better News Story Than a Human Reporter?
- Fitzgerald M, Saba J (2008) Special Report-“Everything’s on table” quoted in Peggyholman Surfing the tidal wave”. Journalism that matters blog.
- Williams DP (2010) Latency has already killed newspapers, DP Williams blog. 6. Stevens T (2011) Blackbook Playbook Review.
- Cantrell C (2011) The Internet Didn’t Kill Newspapers; Newspapers Killed Newspaper, Living Digitally, Christian Cantrell’s personal blog.
- Buttry S (2009) Newspapers’ Original Sin: Not failing to charge but failing to innovate, The Buttry Diary, Digital first media.
- Kruse S (2009) What’s left in the Church Blogspot. The Collapse and decline of newspapers.
- Rusbridger (2009) The mutualisation of news, The Guardian Newspaper, July 27.
