Abstract
Newsonomics, the discipline founded by Ken Doctor, expert news media analyst, examines the trends characterizing the transformation of journalism in the digital age. In this chapter, we focus our attention on some of these tendencies in our critical analysis of the sustainability of the firms in this industry that have opted to innovate and invest in new interactive formats. We understand that a book of this kind, dedicated as it is, to interactive communication, must not lose sight of the fact that the news media form part of an industry and that this industry must be sustainable, regardless of the ownership model employed by each firm. In this chapter, we provide a general overview of the main dimensions of sustainably in the news media. To do so, we draw primarily on sector reports published by bodies of high repute and illustrate our discussion with some of the best known cases. One of the key ideas underpinning our analysis is that new interactive platforms—in any of the formats examined elsewhere in this volume—offer a whole range of new incentives for readers. These, in turn, are exploited—or at least should be—by news media firms to increase their readership, and to build subscriber loyalty in the case of firms opting for a paywall business model. Over the following pages we review the various dimensions that Newsonomics can take—with The New York Times serving as an obvious success story—via the adoption of different digital communication formats. We also look at the new experiences and the new business models that are currently being considered by members of the news media industry for future adoption.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
According to Similar Web data, Bío-Bío Chile obtained an average traffic of 28 million monthly users between June and November 2017. Full details available at https://www.similarweb.com/website/biobiochile.cl.
- 2.
Ken Doctor continues to publish reports about the news media industry at his website http://newsonomics.com/ and to write opinion articles for Nieman Lab.
- 3.
The authors of this chapter have created an observatory of the uses of live video journalism on social platforms. It can be accessed at https://www.smls.info/.
- 4.
The English edition of BNamericas can be consulted at https://www.bnamericas.com/en/.
- 5.
Various Sustainable Journalism Prizes are awarded. Thompson Reuters Foundation and Barilla present the “Food Sustainability Media Award” for those who write about nutrition, the King of Spain Awards have a special section for “Environmental and Sustainable Development Journalism”, and various Latin American countries give Awards for Sustainable Journalism (PESU).
- 6.
On going to press, the percentage stake being put up for sale had not been confirmed.
References
Ali, C., and D. Radcliffe. 2017. Small-Market Newspapers in the Digital Age. New York: Tow Center for Digital Journalism. Retrieved from https://www.cjr.org/tow_center_reports/local-small-market-newspapers-study.php.
ANP Chile. 2017, December 20. 2018, el año de los medios digitales independientes. Retrieved from Asociación Nacional de la Prensa: http://anp.cl/noticias/nota-1/.
BBC News. 2017, November 2. What is 2017’s Word of the Year? Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-41838386.
Bilton, R. 2017, December 13. “The Media is in Crisis”: Jonah Peretti Lays Out His Vision for a More Diversified BuzzFeed. Retrieved from Nieman Lab: http://www.niemanlab.org/2017/12/the-media-is-in-crisis-jonah-peretti-lays-out-his-vision-for-a-more-diversified-buzzfeed/.
CfA. 2017. How Google Makes Millions Off of Fake News. Washington, DC: Campaign for Accountability.
Chartbeat. 2017. 2017 Top Stories. Retrieved December 31, 2017, from http://2017.chartbeat.com/stories.
Chinula, M. 2017, June 19. 7 Business Models That Could Save the Future of Journalism. Retrieved from IJNet: https://ijnet.org/en/blog/7-business-models-could-save-future-journalism.
Davis, M. 2017, December 19. Carlos Slim Plans to Slash New York Times Holdings. Retrieved from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-12-19/biggest-new-york-times-investor-slim-hatches-deal-to-slash-stake.
Doctor, K. 2010. Newsonomics: Twelve New Trends That Will Shape the News You Get. New York: St. Martin Press.
Dojcinovic, S. 2017, November 15. Hey, Mark Zuckerberg: My Democracy Isn’t Your Laboratory. Retrieved from The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/11/15/opinion/serbia-facebook-explore-feed.html.
Durán Ibatá, Ó. 2017, July 31. Dejemos de quejarnos, armemos nuestros propios medios. Retrieved from Puroperiodismo: http://www.puroperiodismo.cl/?p=28314.
Engel Bronosky, M., and J. Maurício de Carvalho (eds.). 2014. Jornalismo e convergência. São Paulo: Cultura Acadêmica.
Fletcher, R. 2017. Paying for News. Retrieved December 31, 2017, from Digital News Report: http://www.digitalnewsreport.org/survey/2017/paying-for-news-2017/.
FNPI. 2016. Ocho claves para entender las audiencias digitales en Colombia. Bogotá: Fundación Gabriel García Márquez para el Nuevo Periodismo Iberoamericano.
FNPI. n.d. Periodismo de salud, contenido clave en el NY Times en español. Retrieved December 30, 2017, from Fundación Gabriel García Márquez para el Nuevo Periodismo Iberoamericano: http://www.fnpi.org/es/blog/periodismosalud/periodismo-de-salud-contenido-clave-en-el-ny-times-en-espanol.
Folha. 2018, February 9. Facebook Says It Wants ‘High Quality’ News. Retrieved from http://www1.folha.uol.com.br/internacional/en/brazil/2018/02/1956092-facebook-says-it-wants-high-quality-news.shtml.
Freixa, P., J. Soler-Adillon, C. Sora, and J. Ribas. 2014. Snow Fall and A Short History of the Highrise: Two Approaches to Interactive Communication Design by The New York Times. Textual & Visual Media 7: 63–84.
Gottfried, J., and E. Shearer. 2017, September 7. Americans’ Online News Use is Closing in on TV News Use. Retrieved from Pew Research Center: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/09/07/americans-online-news-use-vs-tv-news-use/.
Hansen, E., and E. Goligoski. 2018. Guide to Audience Revenue and Engagement. New York: Tow Center for Digital Journalism.
Hardiman, A., and C. Brown. 2018, January 28. News Feed FYI: More Local News on Facebook. Retrieved from Facebook Newsroom: https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2018/01/news-feed-fyi-local-news/.
He, X., and R. Pedraza-Jiménez. 2015. Chinese Social Media Strategies: Communication Key Features from a Business Perspective. El Profesional de la Información 24 (2): 200–209.
Independent Journal Review. n.d. Audience Growth Director. Retrieved May 30, 2017, from Media Group of America: http://ijr.applytojob.com/apply/nQho2HRY6h/Audience-Growth-Director.
ISO. 2010. ISO 26000 project overview. Geneva: International Organization for Standardization.
Kafka, P., and R. Molla. 2017, December 4. 2017 Was the Year Digital Ad Spending Finally Beat TV. Retrieved from Recode: https://www.recode.net/2017/12/4/16733460/2017-digital-ad-spend-advertising-beat-tv.
Kamarck, E., and A. Gabriele. 2015. The News Today: 7 Trends in Old and New. Center of Effective Public Management of Brookings, 11.
Kleis Nielsen, R. 2016. The Business of News. In The SAGE Handbook of Digital Journalism, ed. T. Witschge, C.W. Anderson, D. Domingo, and A. Hemida, 51–67. London: Sage.
Knight Center. 2017. Innovative Journalism in Latin America. Texas: Open Society Foundations. Retrieved from https://knightcenter.utexas.edu/books/IJENGLISH1.pdf.
Leal, C. 2017, December 29. Medios digitales 2017 en Chile: ¿el año en que tocamos techo? Retrieved from Puroperiodismo: http://www.puroperiodismo.cl/?p=28718.
Lozano, V. 2017, November 7. 3,5 millones de lectores del ‘Times’. Retrieved from El Mundo: http://www.elmundo.es/opinion/2017/11/07/5a00aca822601dd0228b4596.html.
Mente Emprendedora. 2015, January 26. ME56: Greg Barton – BNAméricas: Líder en Información de Negocios en America Latina. Retrieved from http://menteemprendedora.com/greg-barton.
Mullin, B. 2017, November 29. Paywall Will Be Wired’s ‘Hedge Against the Future’. Retrieved from The Wall Street Journal: https://www.wsj.com/articles/paywall-will-be-wireds-hedge-against-the-future-1511956800.
Nafría, I. 2017a. La reinvención de The New York Times. Createspace Independent Publishing Platform.
Nafría, I. 2017b, November 6. Ismael Nafría: “Cada medio puede ser, en cierta medida, el New York Times”. Distintas Latitudes (F. Luján, Interviewer). Retrieved from Distintas Latitudes: https://distintaslatitudes.net/ismael-nafria-cada-medio-puede-ser-el-new-york-times.
Nalvarte, P. 2017a, April 27. Latin American and Spanish News Sites Experiment to Reach Audience and Finance Quality Journalism. Retrieved from Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas: https://knightcenter.utexas.edu/blog/00-18319-latin-american-and-spanish-news-sites-experiment-reach-audience-and-finance-quality-jo.
Nalvarte, P. 2017b, November 15. Paywalls in Latin America: A Special Report from the Knight Center on Digital Subscriptions in the Region’s Newspapers. Retrieved from Knight Center for Journalism in the Americas: https://knightcenter.utexas.edu/blog/00-19010-paywalls-latin-america-special-report-knight-center-digital-subscriptions-regions-news.
Newman, N. 2018. Digital News Project 2018. University of Oxford. London: Reuters Institute. Retrieved from https://reutersinstitute.politics.ox.ac.uk/sites/default/files/2018-01/Journalism%2C%20Media%20and%20Technology%20Trends%20and%20Predictions%202018%20Newman.pdf.
Nieman Journalism Lab. 2017, June 9. Newsonomics: CEO Mark Thompson Thinks The New York Times Can “Aspire to a Different Order of Magnitude”. Retrieved from http://www.niemanlab.org/2017/06/newsonomics-ceo-mark-thompson-thinks-the-new-york-times-can-aspire-to-a-different-order-of-magnitude/?relatedstory.
Pedersen, T. 2017, December 13. Fill It with Facts. Retrieved from WAN-IFRA: https://blog.wan-ifra.org/2017/12/13/fill-it-with-facts.
Pedraza-Jiménez, R., L. Codina, and J. Guallar (eds.). 2016. Calidad en sitios web. Método de análisis general, e-commerce, imágenes, hemerotecas y turismo. Barcelona: Colección EPI Scholar. Editorial UOC.
Pellicer, M. 2017, May 18. Modelos de pago en los medios europeos. Retrieved from https://miquelpellicer.com/2017/05/modelos-pago-los-medios-europeos/.
Ponsford, D. 2017, November 21. Financial Times Surpasses 700,000 Digital Subscribers and Boasts Highest Readership in 130-Year History. Retrieved from Press Gazette: http://www.pressgazette.co.uk/financial-times-surpasses-700000-digital-subscribers-and-boasts-highest-readership-in-130-year-history/.
Radcliffe, D. 2017, October 18. 8 Key Trends in Local Journalism. Retrieved from MediaShift: http://mediashift.org/2017/10/8-key-trends-local-journalism/.
Reuters. 2017, June 14. Tráfico datos móviles A.Latina se disparará al 2021 por mayor uso smartphones y video: Cisco. Retrieved from https://lta.reuters.com/article/internetNews/idLTAKBN1952QM-OUSLI.
Reuters Institute. 2017. Digital News Report 2017. London: University of Oxford.
Rutemberg, J. 2017, July 9. News Outlets to Seek Bargaining Rights Against Google and Facebook. Retrieved from The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/09/business/media/google-facebook-news-media-alliance.html?ref=nyt-es&mcid=nyt-es&subid=article.
Sanabre Vives, C. 2015. A Model for Website Analysis and Conception: The Website Canvas Model Applied to Eldiario.es. Hipertext.net 13: 1–19.
Sehl, A., A. Cornia, R. Kleis Nielsen, and F. Simon. 2017. Pay Models in European News. Oxford: Reuters Institute. Retrieved from http://www.digitalnewsreport.org/publications/2017/pay-models-european-news/?utm_source=API+Need+to+Know+newsletter&utm_campaign=77ea87d438-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2017_05_18&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_e3bf78af04-77ea87d438-45825977#the-sample.
SembraMedia. 2017. Inflection Point. California: Omidyar Network.
Shearer, E., and Gottfried, J. 2017. News Use Across Social Media Platforms. Washington, DC: Pew Research Center.
Silverstein, K. 2013, May 14. Enron, Ethics And Today’s Corporate Values. Retrieved from Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kensilverstein/2013/05/14/enron-ethics-and-todays-corporate-values.
Stulberg, A. 2017, September 22. In Paywall Age, Free Content Remains King for Newspaper Sites. Retrieved from Columbia Journalism Review: https://www.cjr.org/business_of_news/newspaper-paywalls.php.
Subtel Chile. 2017, July 31. Sector Telecomunicaciones Tercer Trimestre. Santiago de Chile: Ministerio de Transportes y Telecomunicaciones. Retrieved from http://www.subtel.gob.cl/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/PPT_Series_SEPTIEMBRE_2017_V1.pdf.
Tendencias Digitales. 2016. Usos de Internet en Latinoamérica. Caracas: Tendencias Digitales & Mercantil.
The New York Times. 2017, October 13. The Times Issues Social Media Guidelines for the Newsroom. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/13/reader-center/social-media-guidelines.html.
Thompson, M. 2017, June 9. Newsonomics: CEO Mark Thompson Thinks The New York Times Can “Aspire to a Different Order of Magnitude”. Nieman Lab (K. Doctor, Interviewer). Retrieved from http://www.niemanlab.org/2017/06/newsonomics-ceo-mark-thompson-thinks-the-new-york-times-can-aspire-to-a-different-order-of-magnitude/.
Warner, J., and M. Iastrebner. 2017, January 12. 5 Keys to Success for Entrepreneurial Journalists. Retrieved from IJNet: https://ijnet.org/en/blog/5-keys-success-entrepreneurial-journalists.
Zuckerberg, M. 2018, January 12. One of Our Big Focus Areas for 2018 is Making… Retrieved from Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10104413015393571.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2018 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Apablaza-Campos, A., Codina, L., Pedraza-Jiménez, R. (2018). Newsonomics in the Interactive Era: Dimensions of Sustainability in the News Media. In: Pérez-Montoro, M. (eds) Interaction in Digital News Media. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96253-5_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-96253-5_6
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-319-96252-8
Online ISBN: 978-3-319-96253-5
eBook Packages: Literature, Cultural and Media StudiesLiterature, Cultural and Media Studies (R0)