Informal notes
The effects of the Internet on news coverage
by Doresa Banning

October 2, 2001

  • Journalists have access to information in virtual libraries, public records databases and numerous online encyclopedias, which is easily obtained. They can communicate via e-mail.
  • Journalists writing for online publications think about including sound, video and links that refer readers to background material, supplemental details, original documents and all the other forms of data that made the process of reporting the story instructive for the journalist.
  • Journalists want to include their e-mail address in everything they write.
  • Journalists want to participate in chats and forums.
  • Readers are demanding faster, more frequent news coverage, leading to some 24-hour online news sites. Journalists have to balance the desires of the online audience for up-to-the minute reports with the profession’s traditions of fairness, completeness, balance and accuracy.
  • Readers are demanding news customization or personalization.
  • Journalists writing for online news media have an unlimited news hole.
  • Because the Internet has a global reach, news providers have to be better at understanding and covering local news.
  • Print media are changing their approaches to providing news. Some are posting on their Web sites the stories that appear in their daily papers, perhaps with some supplementation of wire stories. Others are posting news on their Web sites as it happens then printing more analytical and companion pieces on the stories covered on the Web in their papers the next morning. Some are experimenting with a balance between wire stories and staff-generated stories on their Web sites and in their papers.
  • Print media are experiencing a growing role for providing analysis, in-depth coverage, and helping the public better comprehend all the information being thrown at them.
  • The Internet is raising new ethics issues for journalists, i.e. is it all right to participate in a discussion group or chat room without identifying yourself as a journalist. The Web has also re-opened old issues regarding drawing the line between advertising and editorial.
  • The Internet has provided a forum for activists (Indymedia) and amateur journalists. This new journalism is on the rise. Anybody can post on a site what they believe to be news.
  • Journalists and academics are experimenting with devices that could become an everyday reality for new media journalists, i.e., the mobile journalist workstation.

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