CLICK. CLICK. Click. Stop. You know the advertisements on television, radio and in newspapers that you’ve learned to ignore or flick past? Well, it’s time to sit up and pay attention to them. (No, I have not embarked on a new career in advertising or public relations.)
The reason you should take note is that the number of advertisements are dwindling. When this happens, it has the potential to weaken our democracy and to further diminish our standing in the international business community. This is not as far-fetched as it might sound.
Media outlets traditionally obtain the bulk of their income from advertising. The retail price, subscription or licence fee only goes a small way to covering expenses. When a sharp decline in advertising occurs, as it has over the past couple of years, media companies need to cut costs and, ultimately, staffing levels.
Many Irish newspapers and radio stations have announced voluntary redundancies for journalists and, in the last week, a dozen or so staff members from TV3 were laid off. Big deal, right? Lots of people are losing their jobs.In a healthy democracy, journalists should act as a check and balance on the legislative, executive and judiciary branches of government. In addition to reporting the events of the day, they have a duty to investigate potential wrongdoing by those in power – in business, government and society.
Good investigative journalists are moral watchdogs with a sensitive nose for corruption, graft, cronyism, abuse of influence and power and much more.
Even so, investigations take time and lots of money. Traditionally, newspapers broke many of the big stories and radio and TV stations followed up on them. Recently – as newspapers’ advertising revenue dried up – the appetite for expensive investigative series (and potential legal actions) has diminished.
Over the past few years, television programmes like Prime Time and special RTÉ news reports by Charlie Bird and George Lee have filled some of the void. These TV investigations are no longer a certainty now that the editorial independence of the national broadcaster has been called in to question.
RTÉ’s strange apology for running a news item on the satirical painting of King Brian (sorry, the Taoiseach) in the National Gallery raises a very big issue. If RTÉ caved in on a simple thing like a painting then what other news items, or investigations, will they axe?
Print, broadcast and online media face several other problems when trying to meet their watchdog brief. Redundancies and layoffs mean many of their senior staff will leave – taking their long memories and years of experience with them.
Journalism is now a freelance world. Staff journalists are the exception rather than the rule at many newspapers and radio stations. This is the biggest threat of all to an independent, effective media. The rise in freelance journalism directly impacts on investigative reports. The Huffington Post, America’s famous blog turned internet newspaper, is so concerned about it that it launched an investigative report fund on Monday. The €1.75 million initiative, designed to fund freelance and staff journalists’ investigative reports, is asking for ideas and CVs.
Founder Arianna Huffington said layoffs at newspapers were hurting investigative journalism at a time the nation’s institutions need to be watched closely.
The same applies in Ireland. Print freelancers can only make a living if they crank out a high volume of well written articles. The rate for freelance work has not improved much in the last 10 years, so it’s really a numbers game. If you were a freelance journalist, would you take the risk of investigating and reporting a scandal?
Staff positions for talented freelance journalists are as rare as hen’s teeth so freelancers would be fools not to ask themselves a few questions: will I be paid for all the time I spend on this investigation? What happens if the scandal leads to a lawsuit in which I am named? Will this potential outcome impact on my ability to earn a living as a journalist?
Freelancers have less protection from legal action, or loss of income, than staffers if they publish a story that someone finds unfavourable.
Ireland’s international reputation is in tatters thanks to strange goings on in business, government and regulatory circles. Now, more than ever, we need a strong investigative media committed to shining a light in all those dark places. Who dares to fund it?
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Dear Margaret,
Thank you for your insightful piece on journalism and freelance journalism in particular in the article Democracy at Risk in Media Meltdown.
I am a freelance of longstanding, supplying news from Kerry to the national newspapers.
You are quite correct – rates for freelance in news especially are miserly and have not changed and in fact when the euro came I was paid in euros what I used be paid in pounds by some publications.
To make a living out of news I need to work six, and sometimes seven days, and supply a number of publications.
I am rarely paid mileage etc and in a county like Kerry which has long peninsulas this is a real hole in my pocket.
This has been the case throughout the Celtic Tiger era and it is here I depart from your views.
The boom led to bountiful publications – but most of it rubbishy supplements with no money put into investigative journalism and certainly no extra money or column inches for news. There was no increase in news pages and vast sums were paid to celebrity columnists – frequently of the political class, as if they haven’t enough fora already on the floors of houses, senates, lecture theatres etc.
Much of what happened during the Celtic Tiger era has contributed to the idea that is abroad now that news is meant to be amusing and not dangerous and above all must be profitable, ie “to sell papers”.
Enter the web also, and the tendency for journalists never to leave the computer, writing all their stories from the desktop.
I was stuck to the floor recently at the revealing remarks by columnist Noel Whelan, on RTE, which were left largely unchallenged, to the effect newspapers were only filling column inches to sell newspapers.
There are very few actual news reporters doing a beat and I can count on one hand the number supplying the councils courts etc. to the nationals.
In fact, I half suspect the bust will bring decent news reporting centre stage.
But the real problem in Irish journalism, it seems to me, and one you have omitted to mention is the lack of a powerful union or representative body for journalists .
We have a union that is headquartered in London and that takes its orders and ethos from outside this State, a devolved power, if you like almost 100 years after the declaration of Irish independence.
In the NUJ the virulent division of workers in the form we are now familiar with of private versus public worker has been allowed to thrive in the freelance v. staff form . Most people soon give up union involvement in despair and the NUJ is of little or no relevance to most working journalists I know.
The Irish branch of the NUJ refuses to represent freelances in the area of pay negotiations, hiding behind some daft legislation on sole traders etc, and has not engaged with journalists on bread and butter issues.
Therefore the journalist and especially the freelance feels completely without back-up, despite paying union fees at a higher rate than staff fees.
As well as a new representative body for working journalists , there is , I feel, a huge need for a daily newspaper to take up a weekly behind the scenes column garnered from journalists on the work behind the news stories of the week simply to show the public what is involved in news reporting and also to maybe re-kindle a bit of respect.
Anne Lucey
Posted by Anne Lucey | April 4, 2009, 10:01 amClear and thought-provoking piece as ever. It’s so funny (or maybe it’s not) how we have both been preoccupied with this same question over the past week. What now for the newspaper? I’ve mailed you my thoughts on the subject which will be in this Sunday’s paper.
Posted by Jennifer O'Connell | April 6, 2009, 5:17 pmJust wanted to say a few comments on your interesting and thought blog article (which i picked up through your nice little article link about the need for more respect amongst older people in the business section of the Irish Times.
This link and allowing people to follow you to your own content shows the value of personal blog content and the value of links. Google finds in its search algorithms relevant content through links.
I see more a movement towards a compromise towards reporters and the ordinary blogger in a shared partnership model. Its is a case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater. It doesn’t have to be as black and white as the folding of all traditional media and radio-but they should recognize the change happening and the shift towards the Google idea of collaboration and not so much mass media. If there is a movement away from full time journalism against freelancers to a working together-this may work. if there was an indepedent training authority or private investment it may take away media vs government battle seen in the last century her in Ireland. there could b for exmaple indepedent blogger training schools/social media advisory for traditional journos or firms could look into specialist consultancy into the value of social media blogging for journos.
Posted by shane o'donovan | May 1, 2009, 9:29 am