Shane Croucher

James Murdoch, head of News Corp’s European side, attacked the BBC for undermining other news sources with its free content and expansion, declaring it as “dominant”. He also claimed that the Beeb threatens independent journalism in the UK. Obviously, Murdoch’s corporation have their huge flaws when it comes to ‘journalism’ (Fox News, The Sun). But he does have a point – the BBC and its free content undermines the ability for other news sources to charge for content, thus creating an obstacle for the print media in their attempt at saving the industry. Rick Waghorn at Out With A Bang believes they are ‘land grabbing’ in the territory of ‘written journalism’. He cites the example of the BBC’s newly won rights over the Football League:

They are churning out ‘live’ reports during the course of the game; come Sunday, what was once four pars and an audio clip are now full-blown, post-match quotes pieces – all timed, of course, to roll out on a Sunday long before any provincial newspaper hits the streets on a Monday.

Or, indeed, before The Sun’s ‘Goals’ supplement ever hits the news-stands.

And football sells. It’s the very foundation of Sky’s prosperity. And here is the BBC running amok on the traditional, written word fiefdoms of the newspaper barons.

Of course, it’s not all churned out by the transcribe teams that gather in the MailBox overnight on a Saturday. The live feed comes via the Press Association. It says so at the bottom.

So, that’s where my ‘TV’ licence fee is now going… paying PA for minute-by-minute,written Football League match coverage when – for example – a TrinityMirror reporter might be churning out exactly the same content at the same game via a CoverItLive ‘package’… Or, indeed, an Archant one.

Who knows more about Birmingham City, Norwich City, Bolton Wanderers, Ipswich Town… etc, etc… me or the bloke from PA? Who is churning out the homogenised stuff; and who, actually, knows both players and club inside-out cos this it is their expert field? Their passionate niche…

What if this type of ‘land grabbing’ continued into other areas? Like opinion pieces? One of the biggest pull-factors for newspapers when they come to charge for online content will be their columnists and debate sections, like CiF at the Guardian. If the BBC were to start welcoming guest columns on current affairs, giving it out free, this could really undermine the efforts of independent news sources to charge for content. Of course, this is just hypothetical, though.

I like BBC news. I think the BBC is a great broadcaster. But they should rein themselves in and avoid treading on independent news sources’ toes. The last thing we want to see is newspapers going bankrupt – how damaging to our already less-than-perfect democracy would that be?

Darrell Goodliffe over at Moments of Clarity seems to take issue with the charging of news content:

It is a bit rich of Murdoch to complain that;

“And it threatens significant damage to the provision of independent news, to investment in professional journalism, and to the growth of the creative industries.”

when his company intends to pioneer charging for access to online news in a further attempt to wring every last red cent out of hapless customers.  Furthermore, notice the defence of *professional* journalism in a clear attempt to say that the flourishing citizen news/blogging sectors are basically worthless as far as Murdoch is concerned. So, much for his support for ‘flowering creativity’.

Why is wanting to charge for news a problem? Journalism and news are commodities. Journalists need paying and having operational costs like everyone else. You pay for a newspaper, so why not pay online? Circulation is down, advertising revenue is down – newspapers need to make money to survive. And, whilst I wouldn’t expect investment in quality journalism from Murdoch, I would expect it from the Telegraph, the Guardian etc. How do they do this? By increasing their revenue. How do they do this? By charging for their product – journalism.

Secondly, of course citizen news/blogging is nowhere near as valuable as professional journalism. Sure, they can be valuable. Citizen journalism can break some great stories, some bloggers offer insightful commentary – but they can also be poorly researched, unreliable and unaccountable. I’d much rather have a team of trained journalists working on stories and feeding me news than some guy with a camera who happened to film something and then put it on the internet. Citizen journalism and blogging are new, interesting and sometimes of value – but they definitely should not be the future of national news.

With regards again to the BBC, we’re seeing more and more negative coverage in the mainstream media. Could this turn enough of the public against the BBC, forcing the Tories to streamline all Beeb services? It would certainly be in the interests of the independent news media if they decide to cut BBC News back. Perhaps trimming the license fee and charging separately for online BBC content – from news to Iplayer to sport – could be an answer? If the government did this then it could help save the print journalism industry, even if it is at the expense of the BBC’s current advantage.

Well, I said Murdoch was keen. Today he has declared that he will be charging for access to all of his news websites by next summer.

The story reports:

The charging model will be extended to red-top tabloids such as the Sun and the News of the World. Murdoch said he was keen to capitalise on the popularity of celebrity stories: “When we have a celebrity scoop, the number of hits we get now are astronomical.”

So, as suspected, celebrity gossip and ‘news’ will be the biggest pulling factor for The Sun. Murdoch believes that people will pay The Sun for exclusive access to pictures, videos and stories about celebrities. But how long will each story stay “exclusive”? Murdoch says that he will clamp down on breaches of copyright, but will that be enough? All it takes is one anonymous blogger with a subscription to rip all the media from the site. Actually, I’m sure there would be quite a few people doing it. Not only that but they’d probably rip the story straight off too. So why would people pay The Sun when a google search could bring up a few blogs that are dishing it all out for free?

Another thing is The Sun will be relying on the contacts of its celebrity ‘journalists’ to bring home the bacon. But what if these canny people buggered off somewhere else? Maybe started up their own website – for free? The profit from dwindling advertising revenue may not be enough for Murdoch, but it could certainly be enough for a couple of journalists and paps running a website. Perhaps even if they jumped ship to a rival who was still offering free content, removing The Sun’s top-dog status as celebrity know-it-alls.

Then again, Murdoch said he was “willing to take the risk” on charging for online content. So, maybe it will pay off? I’m dubious.