Journalism in the 21st Century

Technology and The Media: How the Technological Revolution has Changed Journalism and the way We Look at the News

Journalism has been at the source of global information for countless years. It comes in many different formats, types, and views. In early America, journalism took on the face of rules and laws of the British Empire, while in later America journalism evolved to talk about such things as the development of industry, political scandals, scientific explorations, and most importantly news and cultural information. The general topics covered by our news media haven’t changed much over the course of time but the format in which people can access the stories being presented has changed radically, especially in the last fifty years. With the technological revolution and resources in the world, journalism has become a source of general information with the tendency to lack professionalism and integrity due to the level of ease at which stories of rumors and fallacies can be created and distributed. Through the last ten years, journalism has been forced to adapt into the twenty-first century via the Internet and television. Keith Windschuttle talks about how media and journalism have become products of bias and propaganda through this evolution it has taken. In the article The Future of the Press Windschuttle talks about how the British press is being influenced and borderline controlled by government rule: “Nonetheless, there is a major threat looming for the British press in the form of the British government,” (Windschuttle 25). From this, the notion can be inferred that the government is only setting fourth the illusion that the press has freedom of speech when in reality the British government is censoring the press, which is a much different mentality that we have here in America. The information the press and journalists put out has to hold some level of truth, especially when it is attached to a ‘well known’ source. This usually counts news sources such as ABC, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, BBS, TIME, and others. Windschuttle again addresses this in his article when he talks about how when journalism sources are owned by privatized companies, or people. When Rupert Murdock bought the social network MySpace, and The Wall Street Journal, both sources turned out to show incredible bias. The Wall Street Journal is a newspaper that was created with the intention of reporting on the issues, solutions, and news to come from one of America’s economic hubs. When Murdock bought the Journal for five billion dollars, economists and other journalists reported a noticeable bias in the stories to come from Wall Street (Windscuttle). The Wall Street Journal as well as news broadcasters such as the BBC have been influenced by bias due to the technology that has been implemented in the reporting of news. With both online databases and newspapers, it is much easier to spread news stories before reporters can gather all the information (Kaul 134). While echnology has made reporting news and information easier and more universally accessible to most people people, Kaul talks about a generation of people who are having a harder time adjusting to the new age of journalism.
“There is also confusion about the fundamental differences in the experiences of the digital age of those born before and after 1980. Named the ‘digital immigrants’ and the ‘digital natives’ these two groups are portrayed as living on opposite sides of a chasm of skills and experience in the digital age…” (Kaul 136)
Here Kaul is talking about the generational gap that exists between the children and young adults of today with the people born before 1980. The people born before 1980 have been found to have a preference to the paper version of media (magazines, and newspaper) to the digital versions (websites and e-papers) (Kaul 137). The transformation to e-media and television has revolutionized the way people access media. The article Tom Regan published in Nieman Reports in the winter of 2000 is a testament to the technological integration into the media and everyday life. Regan opens the article with talking about a memory that he and his father shared. He talks about how his father quit his job in politics and media and went into “the new phenomena” of cable TV (Regan 6). He recounts the story as him asking his father why he quit his job. His father’s response was “’Someday, you’ll be able to read your newspaper on the television…’” (Regan 6). He goes on to say that his first reactions to his father’s statement caught him by surprise. This was in 1970 just twenty five years before the Internet started to become the primary source for information as well as the primary source for reporters and journalists to post their stories and articles. This article was written when journalistic technology was still young; Regan continues to wonder what his father would think of the way technology has evolved into in the year 2000 (Regan 8). Now in 2013 technology is still revolutionizing the way we look at media and the paparazzi. There will be a continued eye turned to the traditional ways we get our primary sources of information, however the technological advances will soon take over as the main source for media as this new generation grows up with iPads and other easily accessible forms of technology.

Works Cited
Kaul, V. "Journalism in the Age of Digital Technology." Online Journal of Communication and Media and Technology January 2013: 125-143. Vol 3 No. 1. Web.

Regan, T. “Technology is Changing Journalism: Just as it always has.” Neiman Reports. 2000. 6-9. Web.
Windschuttle K. “The Future of the Press.” The New Criterion. January 2013. 22-27. Web.

Cited: Kaul, V. "Journalism in the Age of Digital Technology." Online Journal of Communication and Media and Technology January 2013: 125-143. Vol 3 No. 1. Web. Regan, T. “Technology is Changing Journalism: Just as it always has.” Neiman Reports. 2000. 6-9. Web. Windschuttle K. “The Future of the Press.” The New Criterion. January 2013. 22-27. Web.