While the world of print media has dominated in the past, the rise of the internet has replaced many aspects, making it less prevalent than it was in the past. The boom of the World Wide Web significantly changed how most of us consume information, and this didn’t happen overnight. It was a gradual process that is still evolving, but it is fascinating to see its growth and speculate on where it may lead. Let’s look at the history of digital journalism, and it brought us to where we stand today.
Understanding Digital Journalism and Its Impact
Digital journalism might be challenging to understand on a surface level, but you don’t need a digital journalism degree to know what it involves. Its definition explains most of its function, as it is simply any form of journalism in digital form. This means the production, distribution and consumption of all news content using modern technologies. The medium has transformed not only how we consume the news but also how it is analyzed and developed.
Another critical thing to mention is that the rise and ease of publishing journalistic content has posed competition for traditional media outlets. With online independent websites, citizen journalists and even social media pages all transform the landscape in real-time. The ease, speed and accessibility mean digital journalism has already made its mark worldwide. Despite the challenges that traditional media might encounter, they must adapt to technological changes before being left behind.
The Origins of Digital Journalism
The start of the internet might seem like a lifetime away, but the boom of the 90s isn’t too far away when we look at the entire timeline of news and journalism. News and the transfer of information have been around, but it is the medium that has shifted. The recent development of digital journalism is nothing but a blip in the radar compared to the history of news and journalism.
The 90s were an exciting time of development where individuals and larger organizations were active in digital information distribution. Many popular news outlets such as Bloomberg, MTV, Yahoo! and many more started to open news websites and were the early innovators of these platforms. These brought about the pioneers of the digital world and meant that individuals also played more of an active role in the media landscape.
This accessibility meant that early users were more excited about sharing their ideas and thoughts rather than just being another consumer on the screen, eventually leading to blogging. While blogging can be open-ended, this eventually led to the birth of citizen reporters and news sources later on, meaning that these individuals could start competing with bigger media outlets as another source of media the public could rely upon.
The Golden Age of Technology and Social Media
We are now reaching a unique time in how news is consumed, and the development over the past few decades is tremendous. This is almost a golden age where the intersection of technology, abundance of information and interactivity of news consumers mean that distribution is possible in many ways. We have access to more information at our fingertips from almost anywhere in the world. A reality inconceivable decades ago.
Thanks to social media, we can now access news well before official sources publish, and global audiences can access this reporting. While there are some drawbacks, this distribution style means that conglomerates are held accountable by their competition as there is no longer one source gatekeeping the news to audiences. While some aspects of information on social media can be controlled, these various sources allow us to get a better picture of what is happening worldwide.
In addition to this, it’s essential to recognise how social media plays a role in the understanding of big tech and how platforms can observe user data in the information age. The ability to analyze data means that manipulation is also possible as we can understand how consumers respond in real-time to specific publishing of certain types of news. This feedback and live interaction have a massive impact as news outlets now understand how the masses respond and react accordingly.
Conclusion
The evolution of online and digital journalism has genuinely made strides since its inception in the early 1990s, from web-based beginnings to effecting the entire establishment of traditional reporting. Its influence on the global interpretation of events will continue as we move further into the digital age, and as things change, it holds promise for the times ahead.
Things like artificial intelligence and the development of virtual reality make the space of news and journalism exciting moving into the future. We all have a responsibility to support those who deliver good news and content with unbiased and precise information. If we focus on these principles, we get closer to a society that benefits everyone.
