Guest Columnist

Unleashing the news beast

In a multiplatform world where news waits for no man or network, traditional media would do well to heed the call of the Beowulf that would consume them.

01 August 2008

When long-time host of NBC's Meet the Press Tim Russert collapsed and died in the network's Washington Bureau in mid June, NBC tried to hold off the news - presumably to notify Russert's next-of-kin or prepare for the onslaught of a relentlessly hungry media. As the clock ticked and NBC mulled over its announcement, a "junior-level employee" updated Russert's profile page on Wikipedia. In seconds, the wired world knew the network's lauded political chat show host had passed. The "junior" was fired and NBC learned a swift, yet brutal, lesson. In the internet age, the news is a beast that will not be held back. More so with citizen journalism and multiplatform content channels becoming the Beowulf that would eat traditional media. Web 2.0 is changing the very nature of news, how it's delivered and how people want to consume it, with profound consequences for news organisations.

The NBC story broke shortly after the Associated Press (AP) revealed ground-breaking research showing the internet is revolutionising the way people want to consume news. AP unveiled key findings from a study of young adults in Britain, India and the United States. The research shows that 18- to 34-year-olds are driving a shift from traditional media to digital news, and that the news habits of these young consumers are dramatically different from those of previous generations. * News is multitasked - Subjects consumed news as part of another set of activities and are, therefore, unable to give their full attention to the news. This is very different from previous news consumption models where people sat down to watch the evening news or read the morning paper.

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