CBAA conference keynote speaker Margaret Simons took delegates on a time trip back to the invention of the printing press to make the point that technological change disrupts power relationships. The same is happening now in this era of new media. Anyone can publish to the world instantly, disrupting the established power and business models of existing media.
In the days before the printing press, people found it hard to check things that were beyond their immediate circle of experience. Once the printing press was invented, and newspapers began to be published, journalists started to develop the principle of checking facts which has continued in the journalistic tradition until today. But Simons thinks that fact checking and verification is a process that is now under threat.
Before newspapers, people were more ready to believe untruths and myths. Once newspaper was born, journalists “pushed back the boundaries of myths.”
Simons thinks that today myth is creeping back into society through new media. “Verifiable facts seem to be doubted and some people are choosing their own facts and spreading them on the internet.” She thinks the tradition of verifying facts has been diluted by the option for anyone to publish anything, even untruths.
When used well, new media can be a great boon to journalism, such as the verification via Twitter of things happening during the revolutions of the ‘Arab Spring,’ said Simons. But it can also be used badly in her opinion.
‘Citizen Journalists’ are often motivated by their own passions and opinions, but that if very different from ‘Professional Journalists,’ according to Simons. Professional journalists are motivated by salary and arms length ‘professional disinterest’ rather than their own views, which makes them different from bloggers and self-interested citizen journalists.
Simons also talked about the role of editors becoming more important in the world of new media because checking and editing is now more important than ever.
She said community radio broadcasters have been gathering communities together for years in the same way as ‘social media’ is doing now online. She urged community broadcasters to engage with the new forms of media and to think carefully about the content they choose.
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