As the debate continues about what to do as newspapers increasingly disappear - and there is discussion about charging users accessing newspaper content on line - Jeff Sparrow, writing on newmatilda.com [an excellent Australian online publication] discusses the Australian experience, especially the fact that the first-class ABC [not to be confused ABC in the USA] is free:
"It's true that the internet poses new challenges to the media, but they are not entirely without precedent. When radio came to Australia, that technology seemed as magical as the web does now, a wondrous and instantaneous format capable of transforming life in a big country with a small population. Yet it quickly became apparent that there was no obvious business model under which private operators would use radio to its full potential. Who would broadcast to the bush, for instance? Who would establish a serious newsroom, rather than simply producing light entertainment? From very early on, it was apparent that the provision of high-quality broadcasts reaching country and city alike required public funding."
And:
"We're now at a juncture with print journalism. Newspapers traditionally perform an important social function, and one for which there remains no obvious alternative. Even the most serious TV and radio broadcasts cannot cover complex stories with the same depth as the written word. And while the blogging revolution has immensely enriched the analysis of the news, the great majority of online sites specialise in commentary, implicitly relying on reports produced elsewhere. For the most part, that elsewhere is a newspaper, an institution that not only publishes information but that has the resources to uncover it. To take the most obvious example, investigative journalism — time consuming, expensive and sometimes dangerous — happens either in newspapers or not at all."
"It's true that the internet poses new challenges to the media, but they are not entirely without precedent. When radio came to Australia, that technology seemed as magical as the web does now, a wondrous and instantaneous format capable of transforming life in a big country with a small population. Yet it quickly became apparent that there was no obvious business model under which private operators would use radio to its full potential. Who would broadcast to the bush, for instance? Who would establish a serious newsroom, rather than simply producing light entertainment? From very early on, it was apparent that the provision of high-quality broadcasts reaching country and city alike required public funding."
And:
"We're now at a juncture with print journalism. Newspapers traditionally perform an important social function, and one for which there remains no obvious alternative. Even the most serious TV and radio broadcasts cannot cover complex stories with the same depth as the written word. And while the blogging revolution has immensely enriched the analysis of the news, the great majority of online sites specialise in commentary, implicitly relying on reports produced elsewhere. For the most part, that elsewhere is a newspaper, an institution that not only publishes information but that has the resources to uncover it. To take the most obvious example, investigative journalism — time consuming, expensive and sometimes dangerous — happens either in newspapers or not at all."
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